Elihu Palmer

“ Are murder, carnage, and injustice, the objects in which you delight? Have you lost all attachment to moral virtue, all veneration for the dignity and faculties of your nature? Have you dismissed all respect for nature and for truth? Will you never learn wisdom from the book of Nature, will you never derive instruction from the permanency of her laws? Is it only among miracles, ghosts, and crucified Gods that you delight to walk? ”

“ How long will man importune the heavens with unjust complaints? How long with vain clamours will he accuse fate as the author of his calamities? Will he then never open his eyes to the light, and his heart to the insinuations of truth and reason? This truth every where presents itself in radiant brightness, and he does not see it! the voice of reason strikes his ear; and he does not hear it! Unjust man! If you can for a moment suspend the delusions which fascinates your senses; if your heart be capable of comprehending the language of argumentation, interrogate nature. ”

“ If it be the will of the Divinity to pour out his wrath upon a whole city, and to destroy its inhabitants by malignant fevers, who shall dare to oppose his determination? Who shall presume to exercise the healing art, when Heaven decrees sickness and death? Who shall be found hardy enough to enter the lists with the Creator, and attempt to avert his judgment? In short, if this doctrine were admitted and reduced to practice, it would destroy, in some of the most essential cases, all the friendly and social virtues of man, and brutalize the human race. ”

“ Ought we not to conclude, that the general felicity of intelligent beings on the surface of the globe, must have been the unavoidable consequence? Are we not bound to suppose that a plan of operation formed in the cabinet of eternal wisdom, must have answered all the purposes which that wisdom was calculated to produce? Instead of this, how wretchedly are we disappointed? Vice is not destroyed, and the fears of future damnation are increased. Three infinite Gods have laboured in vain, and their united efforts have not been able to rescue mankind from endless torments. ”

“ DEISM; REASON; SCIENCE; VIRTUE; HAPPINESS. The nineteenth century opens to the human race with prospects of a most extraordinary and astonishing nature. It is impossible, at this moment, for the human mind to contemplate the past, and anticipate the future, without yielding to the mingled emotions of regret and joy; without perceiving itself to be alternately agitated with sentiments of misery and happiness. ”

“ No, no; the caprice of which man complains, is not the caprice of destiny; the darkness that misleads his reason, is not the darkness of God; the source of his calamities is not in the distant heavens, but near to him upon the earth; it is not concealed in the bosom of the divinity; it resides in himself, man bears it in his heart."
"You murmur and say, Why have an unbelieving people enjoyed the blessings of Heaven and of earth? Why is a holy and chosen race less fortunate than impious generations? Deluded man! where is the contradiction at which you take offence? ”

“ When the human mind takes a retrospective view of past ages, through the mirror of history; when it calls up to its contemplation, the murderous devastations, the horrid wars and cruelties which have desolated the Christian world; when it beholds the fagot every where lighted up for the destruction of man; when gibbets, imprisonment, and persecutions are presented on every quarter; when it sees domestic peace and tranquillity tortured and almost annihilated, malevolence and sectarian spirit enkindling the most unbridled resentments to disturb the benevolent sentiments of the human heart ”

“ Are not all the human race equally the children of one common and benevolent parent? Are they not all fed by his bounty, and supported by his universal beneficence? Do they not all experience the benefits resulting from that luminous body, which in turn enlightens and fructifies the earth? Whence then this unjust discrimination, this partial arrangement in the moral concerns of man? But the advocates of the Christian religion will perhaps retort and say, "Do you believe that God is the author of the system of nature?" ”

“ It is extremely destructive to the moral happiness of mankind to teach them the want of powers, or the inadequacy of those they possess; because the fact is otherwise, because it is a solemn truth that the powers of man are competent to provide for his happiness; they are equal to the exigencies of his existence. It is superstition that has made him a fool, it is religious tyranny that has enslaved his mind, perverted his faculties, and tarnished the glory of his intellectual energies. ”

“ And when, after this devastation, famine has started up, is it the vengeance of God that has sent it, or the mad fury of mortals? When, during the famine, the people are fed with unwholesome provisions, and pestilence ensues, is it inflicted by the anger of heaven, or brought about by human imprudence? When war, famine, and pestilence united, have swept away the inhabitants, and the land has become a desert, is it God who has depopulated it? ”

“ To teach mankind virtue, they are to be presented with the example of murder; to render them happy, it is necessary to exhibit innocence in distress; to provide for them the joys of Heaven, wretchedness is to be made their portion on earth. To make them love one another, they must be taught that the Deity, regardless of this principle, voluntarily sacrificed his only begotten Son. In fine, to procure for intelligent beings the happiness suited to their nature, cruelty and vindictive malice must be exhibited for their contemplation. ”

“ Will you never give to man his due degree of merit, and reward him for his real virtue. Is there nothing tender, nothing sympathetic, nothing moral in the heart of an intelligent being? Is there no justice for the benefit of society, no benevolence to brighten the character of man, no humanity for the relief of distressed objects? ”

“ Take away from man these restraints, justly imposed by the civil law; take away the love of reputation, which is a strong and active sentiment of the human heart; take away that internal idea of discrimination in the character of human actions; the idea that one class is useful and amiable, and that another is injurious and detestable; take from the constitution of man these powerful motives in the cause of virtue, and you will strip him of the most influential considerations by which he is bound to the faithful performance of his duty ”

“ Every fact that strikes our eyes, or presents itself to the contemplation of the understanding; every movement in nature furnishes are argument against a doctrine so unphilosophic and erroneous. Every thing that we behold; all the elements are in continual flux; agitation or motion is a universal and eternal law of nature. The earth, the ocean, and the atmosphere, are constantly in a high degree of action; the evidence of these facts are presented to every living creature. The raging element of fire is never wholly at rest ”

“ In religion, therefore, or in any other of the concerns of life, if the mind discerns that quantum of evidence necessary to establish the truth of any proposition, it will yield to the force and effect of the proofs which are produced; if, on the other hand, the intelligence of man does not discern the necessary influence of such evidence, infidelity will be the natural and unavoidable result. Why then is the principle of faith considered a virtue? If a man beholds the sun in its meridian splendour, and declares the truth of this exhibition, is he meritorious in making this acknowledgment? ”

“ Man has lost himself in the wanderings of a fantastic imagination, in the fleeting dreams of fanaticism, and the malignant fury of a blind superstition; he has sought for truth where it is not to be found, his mind has diverged from the line of reality, and he has become the victim of innumerable prejudices. The most common phenomena have been ascribed to causes which had no existence, and effects have been attributed to those chimerical combinations which were to be found only in the distorted brain of an enthusiastic religious zealot. ”

“ Religion affirmed the earth to be as flat as a trencher, and he who denied this assertion, was charged with a damnable heresy. Religion denied the existence of the Antipodes, and Genius trembled beneath its threatening rod. Religion inverted the whole order of nature, and truth and science had no safe or beneficial appeal. Religion pronounced damnation to the philosophic inquirer, and he sought tranquillity in the dark abodes of ignorance, or the suppression of useful knowledge. ”

“ Does the suffering of the virtuous man destroy the evil habits or propensities of him who is vicious and abandoned, especially when he is told that these sufferings are to annihilate his own crimes? Can this induce the mind to exhibit any efforts wearing the appearance of reformation? Does it not rather contribute to the practice of vice, from the belief that the burden and effect must be sustained by another person? Yet this is the true ground on which this scheme of atonement is promulgated. It is exhibited as a substitute for moral perfection. ”

“ In short, to comply with the spirit of this morality, we must invert the order of nature, and bestow on crimes and continued abuse, the most endearing affections of our heart. Where is the believer who puts this morality into practice? It is not considered by every one as merely theoretical. Have you who are believers in this system, coats and other garments to bestow, in order to comply with its injunctions? Are you willing to surrender your natural dignity, to sink your nature to a level of a spaniel, in order to become a true Christian? ”

“ Reason, which every kind of supernatural theology abhors; reason, which is the glory of our nature, is destined eventually, in the progress of future ages, to overturn the empire of superstition, and erect upon its ruins a fabric, against which the storms of despotism may beat in vain, against which superstition may reek her vengeance without effect, from which she will be obliged to retire in agonizing tortures.
It has been the opinion of some honest and intelligent minds, that the power of intellect is inadequate to the moral and political emancipation of man. ”

“ It is, therefore, impossible to give equal proof to all those who are equally interested in the ultimate decision upon revealed religion.
Every supernatural system has pretended to miracles, to something mysterious and marvellous, to something out of the order of Nature, and which would be calculated to excite alarm amongst weak and ignorant people. The truth is, there can be no such thing as a miracle, and the religion that is built upon this foundation is false, and cannot be permanent. The laws of Nature are immutable, and God, their author, is free from every species of imperfection. ”

“ Moses, Mahomet, and Jesus, can lay as little claim to moral merit, or to the character of the benefactors of mankind, as any three men that ever lived upon the face of the earth. They were all of them impostors; two of them notorious murderers in practice, and the other a murderer in principle; and their existence united has, perhaps, cost the human race more blood, and produced more substantial misery, than all the other fanatics of the world. ”

“ If plagues, malignant fevers, or national calamities of any kind be considered as the scourges of divine vengeance for the punishment of sin, why do they fall indiscriminately upon the virtuous and the vicious, upon the young and the old, upon the weak and the strong, in fact, upon every class of intelligent beings, whatever may be their character, their circumstances, and condition in life? Why does not divine justice apportion these punishments to the actual degree of criminality in each individual that is made the object of is displeasure? ”

“ Fanaticism, which attempts to exalt its God by making him work wonders, is as great an enemy to true Theism, as the open and professed Atheist. A wonder- working God, who violates his own laws, and acts inconsistently with the principles which he himself has established, is no God at all. It is an immoral phantom conjured up in the wild vagaries of superstitious imagination. It is easy to perceive that if there be in nature a perfect God, he cannot be the author of those marvellous and even ridiculous violations of the laws of nature detailed in the Old and New Testament. ”

“ Must the mind of man be for ever on the rack, in consequence of an anticipated evil, which no prudence or foresight can possibly prevent? Must the unpleasant sensations, which result from the capacity of our natures, be increased by the artificial ingenuities of a blind and fanatic zeal? Is there no source from whence to draw consolation and mental tranquillity; no fundamental principles of repose and happiness; no primary objects, of delight, calculated to dissipate the mist of ignorance and general wretchedness? ”

“ The physical force of nations would be drawn forth to suppress the independent power of thought, destroy damnable heresy, and arrest, in the name of heaven, those infidel philosophers, whose efforts had been directed to the emancipation and moral felicity of these malicious and tyrannical persecutors. The cry of vengeance and merciless punishment against the benevolent philosophers of all countries of the present day has not deterred them from the faithful discharge of their duty, and the most unremitting attention to the best interest of individual and national happiness. ”

“ Wherever motion is discoverable in matter, be the form of it what it may, we must acknowledge it to entertain the living principle; but it may be said, that though motion be an evidence of life in matter in certain forms, and where the motion is of certain kinds, yet motion of every kind will not prove the existence of life in matter of every form. This absurdity of supposing a 'caput mortuum', must appear to every one who considers the connection and dependence which exits in all bodies upon each other, the motion which this connection supposes, and life which motion evidences. ”

“ Its morality is declared to be pure, excellent, and celestial; that it rises above the earth, and partakes of the nature of heaven, that its maxims are sublime, its doctrines holy, its moral precepts universally unexceptionable, and that the mind that does not perceive in the Christian religion indubitable marks of its divinity, must be blind to that blaze of internal evidence which shines with refulgent splendour through this revealed system. Such in substance is the opinion, such the sentiments and feelings of the Christian believer. ”

“ It is certainly of the highest importance, that every system of religion should be immaculate in its moral principles; and in deficiency of this, its pretended claim to divinity sinks into nothing, and merits absolute contempt. All the miracles in the world can never prove that religion to be true, whose internal maxims are immoral and destructive. Purity of rules and principles, must be fundamental in every ethical treatise; that nature of our existence demands it, our powers bear a constant relation to the production of moral effects, and our happiness cannot be secured by any other means. ”

“ A world regularly existing from all eternity, and continuing so to exist through an endless futurity, would be, in the estimation of supernatural theology, an object of disgust. To nourish the superstitious pride and folly of man, it is necessary to derange, overturn, and destroy the splendid beauties and majestic grandeur of the vast empire of Nature. Not content with the scheme of prediction, whose fulfilment including the ultimate dissolution of the earth, Superstition conceived it was necessary to retrace and discover in the history of past ages, an event equally distressing and terrific. ”

“ With the civil law, the settlement must be instant, and the compensation adequate and complete; there is a corporal, moral, and pecuniary punishment, which has a powerful effect in restraining man from vice, and without these, all the hells of fanaticism would never be able to hold him to the point of substantial virtue: he would fly off in a moral tangent, from the great circle of human happiness, and sow the seeds of disorder in the very bosom of society. ”

“ Matthew we are commanded to love our enemies. By what strange perversion of moral sentiment is it, that we are commanded in one place to hate our nearest relations, and in another to exercise a tender and affectionate regard to our implacable enemies? Such a violation of consistency in a moral code, annihilates at once all human confidence, destroys the finest feelings of the heart, and renders it indubitably certain that such a book cannot be divine or true. ”

“ It is sufficient at this time to remark, that despotism gives no encouragement to any kind of improvement, and the hope of human amelioration from this quarter will ever prove to be fallacious. Reason, righteousness and immortal reason, with the argument of the printing types in one hand, and the keen argument of the sword in the other, must attack the thrones and the hierarchies of the world, and level them with the dust of the earth; then the emancipated slave must be raised by the power of science into the character of an enlightened citizen ”