Joseph McCabe

“ Haeckel, Professor Ernst Heinrich, M.D., Ph.D., Sc.D., LL.D., (1834-1919) , the famous German zoologist.
As Haeckel outspokenly rejected all religion all his life and wrote the very anti-religious Riddle of the Universe, which sold several million copies in a score of languages, religious writers have been untruthful about his scientific distinction; and some scientific men, who envied his courage and candor, have encouraged them. His many large scientific works brought him 4 gold medals and 70 diplomas from scientific bodies all over the world. He was one of the most generous and upright men. ”

“ The first Curator, his intimate friend Professor Jaches, says (Political and Financial Opinions of Peter Cooper, 1877) he "was so broad, sincere, and catholic in his religious principles that I believe he would be recognized by any minister of the Christian religion as a truly religious man." It is the usual religious way of saying that a freethinker is a "true Christian" if he is a fine man. ”

“ The Hindu Moralist Gautama, who came to be known as Buddha (the enlightened one) .
[He] is chiefly interesting to us from the fact that, though the religion which now goes by the name Buddhism is a crass and to a great extent corrupt mass of superstitions, he was an atheist. It is admitted that he was educated in the Sankhya philosophy, which was atheistic. Brahmanism had become so andtract a religion while the mass of the people clung to the grossest myths, that there was a wide spread of atheism at that time. ”

“ Besides his caustic works on religion he wrote serious works on toleration, science and other subjects, and was one of the leading historians of his time and a tragedian of distinction. Few men were ever so widely read or had such influence yet, though a;; the world still talks about him, few really know him. He was a Deist, but his God, though infinite and eternal, did not create the universe, which is eternal. He ridiculed the idea of an immortal soul. He - contrary to Catholic libels - died peacefully and he courteously declined to see the priest who wanted to be present. ”

“ Moleschott did not refuse the label Materialist-and he was, of course, an atheist-though like Haeckel (and modern physics) he held that matter and energy are two aspects of the ultimate reality. In youth he had studied philosophy and had more inclination for poetry than science. He was a man of warm sentiments and high ideals. He was virtually driven out of Germany for his heresies and rose to high honors in Italy, where freethought was general in the academic world 50 years ago. ”

“ He is, like all communist leaders, an atheist but political expediency as well as personal inclination kept him off the subject of religion. When cooperation with the democracies became a necessity of Soviet policy he seems to have concluded that one of the chief obstacles was the supposed persecution of religion and the rampant atheism of the leaders, so the aggressive atheist movement was discouraged out of existence and all leaders refrained from expressions of opinion on religion. ”

“ His early work in mathematics and astronomy was so brilliant that the French Academy, against its own rules, admitted him at the age of 23. He was equally distinguished in physics, in manuals of which his name still occurs, and was honored by all the learned academies of Europe. But he was an outspoken atheist and republican even under Napoleon (who greatly esteemed him) and Louis Napoleon, and he fought at the barricades, at the age of 62, in the revolution of 1848. In his published correspondence with Baron von Humboldt, another scientific freethinker, he often attacks religion. ”

“ Yet his work on medicines were the standard works for ages, and he wrote also on theology, philosophy, philology, mathematics, astronomy, geology, physics, and music. Few have any idea of the cultural brilliance at that time of the Arab-Persian civilization. To baffle the fanatics Averroes professed a sort of Pantheism, but tradition ascribed to him the saying that "the world is divided into men who have wit and no religion and men who have religion and no wit." ”

“ Huxley was not only one of the most decorated men of science of his time, but all his life an outspoken agnostic (a term which he himself coined to avoid the harshness of atheist) and a splendid fighter for freethought. Pious folk spread a myth about conversion late in life but his son Leonard shows in his biography of his father that all this is nonsense. A few months before he died he said to his son: "The most remarkable achievement of the Jew was to impose on Europe for 18 centuries his own superstitions." Leonard (1860-1933) , a distinguished biographer, also was an agnostic. ”

“ Half Greek and half Phonecian he settled in Athens about the same time as Epicurus and, because he taught in the open colonade or gallery (stoa) in the center of the city, he and his pupils were called Stoics. In general (and some superior) literature there is a good deal of nonsense about the "Stoic religion" he is supposed to have founded. At least in social respects the moral inspiration of the Greek Roman world from 250 B.C. to 350 A.D. was so far superior to that of the succeeding Christian centuries that apologists have to claim the credit of it for a "religion". ”

“ He is a great figure both in French history and the history of economics. He was training for the Church when he adopted Deistic views and decided that he "could not bear to wear a mask all his life." He became a close friend of Voltaire and contributed to the famous Encyclopedia. But he rose to the highest positions in French politics and had to be discreet as the priests watched him closely. All historian describe the wonderful work he did for France in its decay, and he had as much influence as Adam Smith in founding a science of economics. ”

“ In the Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics Professor Macdonell (professor of Sanskrit at Oxford University) says in his article "Indian Buddhism" that he denied the existence of a world soul and individual soul"; yet the same encyclopaedia, which always keeps an eye on the churches (as all encyclopedias do) , entrusts its article on Buddhism to one of the clerical writers who hold that Buddha must have believed in God. These sophists first argue that atheism is inconsistent with high ideals and then that any man whose ideals they cannot deny must have been a theist. ”

“ The reader may begin to wonder why so many of the greater musicians, in comparison with other artists, are found amongst our freethinkers. It is enough to point out that the great development of music belongs to modern times and coincides with the growth of skepticism. Artists, whether they produce religious art or not, are just as apt as others to become freethinkers. ”

“ The greatest of the Moslem Arab Caliphs, who raised Spain from a state of profound demoralization to one of unprecedented prosperity, culture and brilliance while Christian Europe lay in the darkest phase of the Dark Age. It was from the splendor of his empire that civilization was rekindled in France, then in Europe generally. ”

“ Religious writers when they know the truth about his ideals, protest that he was no atheist. He was, like nearly all the Greek thinkers, a dogmatic materialist, but he said there might be gods, or a small colony of what we should call (material) supermen, in some remote part of the universe, not interested in the earth. Cicero quotes a contemporary saying that this was "by way of a joke." If he meand that it was just a way of evading the deadly charge of atheism it is probably true. See my sketch of Epicurus in the Hundred Men Who Moved the World . ”

“ Of poor parents he got little education except by his own exertions and when he became a prosperous attorney he took up education as the work of his life. It is not generally realized that the man who is so much honored as a freethinker through the Dictionary of American Biography candidly describes him ad "a Puritan without a theology." He was not merely outside the churches. He believed only in an impersonal God and rejected the idea of immortality. ”

“ The most eminent philosopher of Italy in the present century with a considerable international reputation. He is almost equally distinguished in history and has a very sound influence on public affairs. His philosophy is Neo-Hegelian, but, as his chief English follower, Professor Wilson Carr says, "the religious activity has no place in it. To him religion is mythology." ”

“ Son of a working man, he made his way in poverty and great sobriety of life to the front rank of French scholarship. His early books were burned for impiety and he was put in jail but a group of brilliant writers, the so-called "philosophers," rallied to him and during 30 years he brought out the famous Encyclopedia (28 volumes) which, in spite of bitter clerical opposition, rendered magnificent service in France. No one has ever questioned the high character and disinterestedness of this great atheist. ”

“ He not only opened up a new era in the writing of history but published works on ethics and philosophy which had great influence on the subsequent development of agnosticism-Huxley adopted his philosophy-in Britain. He professed belief in God and cut the ground from under every argument for his existence. Sir Leslie Stephen in the Dictionary of National Biography pronounces him "the acutest thinker in Great Britain in the 18th Century" and exposes the clerical libels about his last hours. Adam Smith said that Hume was the nearest approach to "a perfectly wise and virtuous man." ”

“ Reader in Indian Law at the University of Cambridge and author of several important legal works. In his later years he concerned himself with religion and ended in agnosticism. In an article which appeared in the Hibbet Journal a few weeks before he died he said that for 30 years he had followed Francis Newman (theist brother of the Cardinal) but: "I have of late felt myself less and less able to affirm with any confidence the existence of any supreme mind behind the visible universe" (p. 28) . Even if there is such a thing, he ads, men must ignore it in practice and follow human ideals. ”

“ He was made a canon of the Church at the age of 17 but he became a Deist and turned to science. He rose to the supreme rank in zoology and did fine work in preparing the way for the acceptance of evolution, especially buy opposing the reactionary Christian zoologist Baron Cuvier. He remained a Deist with a "fanaticism of humanity as his religion" (his biographer says) and was advanced in politics, yet in the Revolution of 1830 he saved the life of the Archbishop of Paris. ”

“ For a young man he played a very active and important part in the Revolution, helping to draft the constitution of the State of New York and being sent as a delegate to the Continental Congress at the age of 25. In later years he held high political and diplomatic positions. His biographer Jared Sparks does not give away his opinion on religion and he is responsible for much of the libel of Thomas Paine, whit whom he had a bitter quarrel. But he was himself, like Paine. and so many of the leading revolutionaries, a deist. ”

“ It was mainly the philosophy of Epicurus that ruled the lives of thoughtful Greeks and Romand from 200 B.C. onward, and it led to the greatest development of social idealism until modern times.
Erasmus, Desiderius (1466-1536) , the leading scholar and greatest freethinker of his time.
Probably the bastard of a Dutch priest and his niece, he became a priest and monk and so richly developed his gift for satire . His wit and learning won him the highest recognition all over Europe, and for a time he taught Greek at Oxford University. ”

“ The biographer says that in his last days he turned to the Church but the only "evidence" he gives is that he liked to read the life of St. Vincent de Paul, and he admits that he did not receive the sacraments at death. Relatives put rosary beads in his hands, and the Catholic Encyclopedia claims him as a Catholic in virtue of the fact and of an anonymous and inconclusive statement about him. Wheeler says in his Dictionary of Freethinkers that in his prime Pasteur was Vice-President of the British Secular (Atheist) Union; and Wheeler was the chief Secularist writer of the time. ”

“ A professor of Pali and Buddhist literature at London University and President of various learned bodies, he was respected as one of the highest authorities on ancient Hindu religion and he rendered great service by insisting in his works that Buddha was an atheist. In a public lecture (Is Life Worth Living?) 1879 he rejects Christianity and the idea of immortality and was probably himself an atheist. ”

“ He deals frankly with religious questions in several of his works and was clearly an Agnostic with tenderness to religion. In his Ingersoll Lecture Science and Immortality he shows how science demolishes the myth and then professes a sentimental attachment to it. He also says (p. 52) : "It may be questioned whether more comfort or sorrow has come to the race since man peopled the unseen world with spirits to bless and demons to damn him." His moral and humanitarian works effectively reply to such criticisms of science as those of O'Neill. ”

“ A brilliant scholar, loaded with international honors and academic degrees. At various times he was professor of history at Michigan, President of Cornell University (to which he gave $300,000 and 40,000 volumes) , American Minister in half a dozen countries, Regent of the Smithsonian, Trustee of the Carnegie Institution, etc. Yet he did not hesitate to publish a deadly historical indictment of Christianity, his learned and valuable Warfare of Science and Theology (2 vols., 1876) , which is a classic of freethought literature. He was a theist but skeptical about a future life. ”

“ We are told by Jowett that he once said about the Reformation: "You cut off the head of one beast, the Church of Rome, and immediately the head of another beast, the Church of England makes its appearance." All admit that he was a freethinker, but no public declaration was possible to a man in his position, and it is not clear whether Lord Bethell was a non-Christian theist or an atheist. ”

“ Daughter of Judge Cady and married to the abolitionist Stanton. She was a very accomplished young woman-she knew Latin and Greek-and threw herself with great zeal into the feminist movement and became the leader. Like most of the leaders she was a skeptic, an agnostic. "The Bible and the Church have been the greatest stumbling blocks in the way of woman's emancipation." ”