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Page 23
"Still, doctor," I said, "the road to universal knowledge cannot be all
smooth. Ground must be broken by somebody. If there is anything in
Christianity that bars the way to final freedom of mind for the whole
human race, then I myself say, clear away the obstructions--the work
cannot begin too soon or continue too vigorously."
"I see nothing in true Christianity but good for the human race--surely
you speak only to call out my own views. If there is anything in any
church policy or polity which requires reforming, let it be reformed."
"Excuse me, doctor," I said; "but I had thought you yourself an
agnostic. Do you not think that if a religion will not bear the test of
cold reason, it should be discarded from the lives of men?"
"No, I do not. The human mind is not comprised in intellect alone--it
has its moral or emotional side, wholly apart from reason. Religion is
not to be reasoned about--it is to be felt. No founder of a religion
ever claimed for it a place in man's reason. Now just think for a
minute. Let us leave the ignorant, and consider what the best of men
are--men who have attained a mental cultivation certainly as great as
will ever be possible to the masses. Take the very highest society in
England and America--to what extent are its members controlled by
_reason_, and to what extent by _feeling_ and by the fixed sentiments
growing out of feeling? Ratiocination does not influence one of their
actions in a million. There is not within my knowledge a single instance
where a purely rational conception has been the basis of practice, in
opposition to feeling."
"Surely," I said, "you do not mean to say that educated men are not
governed in the main by reason?"
"I mean just what I say--that I do not know, in practice, a single
instance in which they are so governed in opposition to feeling. Pshaw,
pshaw! young man; if we are to compel the acts of practical daily life
to conform with a dialectic demonstration of what is best for us--to do
only what is in reason best for us--we must simply cease to live, though
we do continue to breathe. Even in physics, of what use are logical
demonstrations, when the premises are only a foundation more unstable
than quicksand--purely provisional?
"Now if these agnostics were truthful--which they try to be; and were
consistent--which they are not, they would be in a trying situation.
Reason shows no advantage to a man in kissing his wife; he has no
syllogistic endorsement for supporting her and the children; in fact, he
has no business to have children--all the result of feeling or
sentiment, all rubbish, and beneath the intellect of a man who worships
Pure Reason! And if the demands of man's moral or affectional nature are
a reason for such indulgences, then his aspirations to the great primal
cause of the known, the unknown, and (to us here and now) unknowable
wonders and mysteries of the universe without, and of ourselves within,
is also justifiable in reason, and ought not by wit and eloquence to be
juggled out of the ingenuous mind. The masses are governed by religion,
directly and indirectly, to an extent much greater than at first thought
appears. The daily life of the agnostic himself is shaped by his
Christian heredity and environment. Now our Author furnishes no
substitute for this intuitive demand of being. If reason can supply
nothing in place of religion, why not allow those who possess religious
conviction to retain so agreeable, and to others beneficial, a
belief?--Now right here I can detect the voice of the agnostic
agitator--this is his strongest situation, and he simply smiles when you
make this opening for him. The voice says, 'Agreeable? Agreeable to burn
forever in hell? Well, well, my friend--our ideas of pleasure differ.'
This is sophistical twaddle. It is not the Christian that suffers from a
fear of hell--it is the sinner, through his guilty conscience.
Conscience, conscience; the only barrier between us and hell on earth!
Christians are comforted by the thought of a loving Christ--Christians,
in my experience, do not suffer."
"Why, sir," I said, "I cannot but wonder that you are not yourself a
professed Christian."
"Never mind me, young man.--But here we are on the edge of town. I
could, if I wanted to, preach a sermon capable of converting every
heathen within sound of my voice. Once, at a camp-meeting, I did preach
a sermon; and I tell you, the old people looked mighty sober, and the
younger and more susceptible of my auditors covered their faces with
their hands and seemed to shake with grief and contrition. But, pshaw,
pshaw; people don't go to hear either witty agnostics lecture, or
preachers preach, to get something for their brain-boxes to reason
about. Believe me "--tapping the volume, still in his hand--"this sort
of thing won't make anybody reason. After all, the question is one of
swapping off Christ for an Illinois lawyer."
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