the noblest and fairest child of science; but Catholicism scouts philosophy, as impious, profane, and only fit for the Devil and his angels. In short, the principle of Socialism was the great principle of progression; its fundamental axiom, that truth alone can regenerate the world, and that full and free inquiry is the only means by which that truth is to be obtained. It was to be a free, not a mock, inquiry; not a partial, but entire pursuit, of truth; which when obtained was to be preached and taught by all its advocates, even with their lives in their hands-without a shadow of mystery, a single particle of error, or fear of mortal man. Catholics hope to keep the human mind pure by keeping knowledge out; Socialists hope to purify by pouring it in. The morality of the latter was intellectual, and the early advocates expected all that is really noble and grand in human action to flow from the spread of intelligence, and the general cultivation of our higher faculties, far more in harmony, than heretofore, with the analogies of things; while the triumph of the Catholic priest is to reign in the heart by the stultification of the head, and make man obedient by destroying the desire for freedom. No genuine priest ever dreamt of other means by which the human race could be kept in order, than by perpetuating brute ignorance. Reform with them always meant innovation. The Catholic priest saw, in contented ignorance, the triumph of his system. The Social teacher, and not priest, saw his triumph in the active intelligence of his hearers. There is just the difference of darkness and light, truth and falsehood-between what Socialism was and Catholicism ever must be. Supernaturalism is the science of all the follies--anti-supernaturalism is its devil or accuser: the science of all the philosophies. These two principles never can amalgamate. They are not so much like oil and water, as fire and water; for, like these, when they kiss they mutually consume. The science of Socialism meant the knowledge and the right application of the powers of nature-now, it would puzzle a wizard to know what it means, or whether it mean anything. As a philosophic system, it never had, never could have, anything to do with supernaturalism. Things (if there be any) above nature, are of course above human capacity; but there is no science excepting that which can be grasped by the intellect of mah. Socialism, when it meant philosophy, was clear of all religions, for all religions are based on faith, or they have no basis; but who does not know that where faith begins knowledge ends? Religion is a blight upon the fair harvest of reason-man's deadliest curse and, if anything can be, his disgrace. The German Jew" has said "that religion is religion because it is not science," in which sentiment I heartily concur, and time was when all Socialists knew this-it was stamped on every letter of their philosophic alphabet; but of course that was before you were called Rational Religionists, or made to believe that there could be any rationality in that which must be either above, or in opposition to, all reason. There was not a single syllable about rational religions, when Socialists called themselves by the very long, but far more rational, name of " The Association of all classes of all nations." Then religion was scouted as insanity; and great pains were taken to turn men's thoughts from the wild fictions and senseless rants of religion, to the sober and delightful realities of cultivated reason. The Socialists were philosophers or nothing; and herein may be seen the great and striking difference between the principle of Catholicism and the then principle of Socialism; for Catholicism forms no alliance with philosophy, it has always contemned and abused it. Churchmen, whether Catholic or Protestant, all agree in this particular, that philosophy should be the handmaid, i.e., servile-slave, of religion. Whereas you, or at all events the Socialists of former times, made the fiction wait upon the fact-calling philosophy the first and the last, the beginning, the middle, and the end-the all necessary for the happiness of man. short they acknowledged no other guide than pure reason, which the Catholic consistently rejects with horror, as worse than vanity. Am I not right, then, in saying that the principle of Socialism, as I have stated it, and that received and acted upon by the Catholics, are wide as the poles asunder? Surely your parties should be equally wide in their practice! In Nor is this hatred of philosophy confined to Catholics; I mean, philosophy that will not stop when churchmen bid it. No, the priests of all religions are the same-essentially, radically the same; they seem instinctively to understand that they must put down philosophy, or philosophy will put them down. They are right, and I admire them; for they are much more knowing in this particular, at all events, than those who condemn it as a shallow opinion. When the Rev. Francis Close addressed, a few weeks since, the Church of England Tradesmen and Working Men's Association of Cheltenham, he had the honesty to say, "That the more a man is advanced in human knowledge, the more is he opposed to religion, and the more deadly enemy he is to the truth of God." This I call an honest declaration; and, on my conscience, I believe every syllable of it-believe! nay, I know it to be true, and that's better than believing. It is certain that the more a man is advanced in human knowledge, the more is he opposed to religion; and it is equally certain that the truth of science is indeed a deadly enemy "to the truth (?) of God." The Rev. Francis Close deserves at least a statue of brass for so wise a saying. If he had said fiction, instead of " the truth of God," it would have been perfect. Religion seems to me the madness of morals, the very delirium of metaphysics; its teachers I should be ashamed to be presumptuous, but display every kind of mental phenomena, in all that relates to thought I call no man from that of the sharp March-hare to the re-master, and should as little expect to see as to spectably stupid owl. Mr. Close is evidently think by proxy. I would not willingly belong an honest man, and therefore I admire him, for to an inquiring body of which there is one head I always admire honest men of any party, of which does the business of thinking for all the any or of no religion. One of the March-hares members. Intellect, unlike heat and light, of the church, he speaks out boldly what his loses in intensity by concentration, gaining in more owlish or foxy clerical friends think it an equal ratio by diffusion. What Bacon said imprudent to make known. He is just such a of money, applies with equal force to mind: sort of fiery zealot in the true Christian church," Like manure, to be fruitful it should be well as I was in the false Social church. No wonder, spread." It is in the intellectual vitality of all, therefore, that I sympathise with and admire not the wisdom of any one, that parties and him, though I much fear that he will not re- nations will find their surest pledge of safety. turn the compliment-either sympathise with There are Socialists who, untaught by experior admire me. ence, would set up a mental despotism as a cure for moral evils; but there are blockheads in all parties, so of course you have them in yours. There are some such who take high rank among you; who do what they are told are practical, but not thinking, men; who never venture an opinion without first inquiring "what does the master say." Your well wisher, He declares that pure religion is that alone which gives moral health, and should be the be-all and end-all of popular education, and denounces philosophy as the curse of states; whereas I, like a true Socialist, as conscientiously declare that pure philosophy is the only alm, the only cure for all moral wounds; and I would, had I the power to work miracles, cast out all religions from human society, as worse than a legion of devils. It is truly curious, and worth the pains, to note some further sayings of the same fiery gentleman, upon the occasion alluded to. "I know," said he, "I tread on tender ground; but I am sorry to see a sort of coquetting on the part of the church with human knowledge and philosophy. It is a leprosy infecting true religion, and pollutes the garb of the church;" which slap at the trimmers in the faith, thus amended, is just the sort of speech I have so often made: "I know I tread on tender ground, ut I am sorry to see a sort of coquetting on the part of Socialists with human creeds, regions, and absurdities. It is a leprosy inforting true philosophy, and pollutes the garb of the Socialists." It is most likely that myself and the Rev. Francis Close will be set down á a precious pair of fanatics, the Hotspurs of ir respective parties; he being a fanatic literally boiling over, who would Pluck bright RELIGION from the pale-fac'd moon; Where fathom-line could never touch the ground, I shall, in my next, back my opinion by thority, and show from the published writand speeches of Mr. Owen that the princie of Socialism was what I have stated it to It will, if I mistake not, astonish many of our party when shall have been set before them " bold truths touching religion that were *e years since publicly taught by Mr.Owen. Is my custom to show deference, but not obquiousness, to authority; give to authority That which it is worth, and not one tittle more. CHARLES SOUTHWELL. IS THERE A GOD? VI. "We are gravely and repeatedly told that there is no effect without a cause-that the world did not make itself. But the Universe is a cause; it is not an effect: no, I repeat it, the Universe is not an effect, but the cause of all effects. * * * Return from your useless excursions, enter again into a real world, keep to second causes, and leave to divines their first cause, of which nature has no need to produce all the effects you observe in the world."-COMMON SENSE. WELL-INTENTIONED ignorance will oft produce all the evils of the most malicious cunning; and the consequences of innocent errors are sometimes even more mischievous than those of the most guilty vices. It is the highest duty of those who watch over human opinions in the true spirit of philosophy, both to teach a warrantable and complete body of truth, as the best corrective of all human ills, and at the same time expose (if need be) the spurious teachings of others; who, whether from error or intention, corrupt and mislead the mind. With these views, I considered it to be my duty in the last number of the Oracle, to publish in my own defence some severe but just strictures on the tone, swaggering conceit, and, more than all, the gratuitous, unblushing falsehood, displayed by the conductors of a paper, called the Atheist and Republican. And I shall now proceed, according to promise, not to murder but dissect, to criticise not slander, what I conceive to be certain spurious notions that they have published as the genuine philosophy of Atheism. This will be called ingratitude by those who are not behind the curtain, seeing that since their first insidious onslaught, not yet a little month-when it was insinuated that I was of doubt. Men will bye and bye be quite as anxious to be known as members of the great Atheistical party, as the millions are now to be thought Christians. Materialism is the philosophy; and Atheism, or the denial of a god, its first grand fruit. I have, as I stated in my last, the good fortune, the luck, to be one; for what can he more lucky than to cast off the old clothes of superstition and take on the new suit; what Mr. Owen calls, the wedding garment of genuine philosophy. I will not give currency to the false notion, that a large portion, if not the majority, of this and many other countries, are Atheists, for I know well they are no such thing. If we say so, to borrow parsonic phrase, "we deceive ourselves, and there is no truth in us." It is not by deception, or any kind of crooked practices, that men are to be made morally grand, and that the great truth of the Atheist can ever be demonstrated. Setting out with such wild assertions is the trick of shallow teachers; who, like certain animals, the fox for example, sometimes seem most cunning, when, in reality, they are the most short-sighted. The plain truth is-a truth which should be known-there are very few Atheists, though many would fain be thought so. Pure Atheism is, I repeat, the child or first-fruit of Materialism; a philosophy which rejects the chimeras of scholastics and metaphysicians about creation, causation, reproduction, or annihilation. It destroys at once both "Universal causemongering and Universal chance-mongering." little better than a mere abuser, a boasting coward, who shrunk from actual conflict-I have grown in favour, and now it is openly said that I am quite the gentleman, never resort to abuse or play naughty tricks, "except in fair retaliation." Now I rejoice in this change, but cannot love the changeling; am delighted with the gift, but cannot admire the giver. It is the spirit of persecution, not the spirit of friendship, that has thus exalted me. It is to the firm of Wood and Company I owe the plastering up of my bankrupt character. They persecuted me, and those who had abused were frightened into honesty. I repeat, the defence of myself and my cause, which appeared in the third number of the Atheist and Republican delighted me much, but did not deceive me; nevertheless, with honest Sancho, I say," God bless the giver," nor look the gift horse in the mouth. I should not have written six words upon the matter, but I might else have been classed among the ungratefuls, the most hateful of all who wear the human form. I agree with the Stoics, that the benefit extorted, is not properly a benefit; at all events, we owe nothing to those from whom it is received. A friend stabs at, wounds, and plunders, me; but presently, with a view to his own safety, changes tactics, fights for, and shields, me from the assaults of a common enemy. What gratitude do I owe to such a friend? If he deserve anything, it would surely be a whip or the gallows. Besides, I cannot, consistently with my principles, permit private friendships to interfere with public duties. Any one who may That there are so few real Atheists is a fact read No. 2 of the Oracle, will find, under the to be lamented, but a fact, nevertheless, a knowhead of" Free Inquiry," the following:-"A ledge of which should not daunt, but incite us free searcher after truth should be clear of par- to energetic action. In the rich field of human tisanship, nay, even the delights that spring society, there is indeed much to do; a glorious from love and friendship should be, if necessary, harvest to be reaped but let us not mar it. sacrificed upon the altar of principle and con- either by putting in the sickle ere 'tis ripe, or sistency." It is not my practice to act the po- by using any other than the sharp scythe of litical weather-cock, allow my conduct to rise unalloyed truth. The people have not yet and fall with every wave of public opinion; or, learned their philosophical alphabet; the sublike the floating straw,only be useful as showing lime truths of Materialism have not yet been in which way the wind blows. I say it is not taught to them. How then should "a large my practice to shuffle off principle and consis- portion, if not the majority," be of opinion tency, wearing, or deserting it like an old gar- that "Atheism is the only system founded upou ment, whatever may be the practices of others. truth; and, therefore, the only one calculated Upon public grounds, therefore, and not to to make men wise and happy." It has been too gratify personal spleen or private malice, I shall much the practice of public men to aim a proceed to show the philosophical, or rather making the people believe that they understand unphilosophical blunders contained in the pa- what they do not understand, which has proper alluded to, thereby protect the cause of duced incalculable mischief. The bubble mus genuine philosophy; and teach a severe but burst sometime or other, and the day of reckuseful lesson to the thirty-and-one great un-oning is not to be avoided. Frogs should not be knowns; who, if they have anything in them, it will be an excellent thing to bring it out; for really, judging from their first moral demonstration, it seems probable that, instead of the "society of all the talents," they will form a nucleus of all the absurdities. That Atheism is growing in public favour is abundantly evident; that it will be in time the fashionable philosophy, I have not a shadow taught to play the ox, lest they swell to bursting It is high time for men of sense to set to work and tell a few homely truths; not to flatter but enlighten, the people; not to perpetuate but destroy deception. A dozen such me would go far to destroy all old delusions, and establish human liberty upon an unshakabl basis. Such men, however, must be workers not mere talkers; prepared to pursue the cours they recommend to others, however dangerous | yes, gentle reader, all these specimens are ex→ the act, or remote the reward; and remember what Plutarch said of those who were victors in the Olympic games, "they were not crowned when they entered the lists-but after they had run the course." When the principles of Atheism shall be more popular than they now are, they will not want advocates; and even now many are sitting up Es teachers of its principles whose ideas upon the subject are crude and ill digested. It will, therefore, I repeat, be the highest duty of those who do not think or write at random, and whose highest pleasure it is to watch over the interests of truth, not merely to teach its lessons, but, if need be, lay bare the sophistries, and expose the blunders of such ignorant pretenders. Jean Paul strongly recommends that men should never write upon a subject without havng first read themselves full of it; nor read without first having an appetite for it. It is much to be desired that modern writers upon Atheism would adopt the first part of the recommendation, when its principles would not he placed in jeopardy, or at least misrepresented, as they now are. But, alas! many of these writers feed little upon the Atheistical dainties that are to be found in books; but set about teaching Atheism without reading themselves, still less thinking themselves, full of it. We find, for example, in the first number of the Atheist and Republican, such teaching as the following: "These fellows (believers in god) know no more about the great cause which produced and maintains the universe than we do ourselves." Which sentence I shall presently show is neither Atheism, Deism, nor any thing else (to borrow a phrase from the writer) than Universal chance-mongery. I may here just observe, that the writer who found fault with my language and manner, as grossly abusive and vulgar, has coined some new words, and adopted a mode of expression peculiarly his own-such words as god-mongers,chance-mongers, and such sentences as, "they went up to heaven at least once a week, and sat hob-nobbing with god;" then we have, "fellows, imbeciles, meagrims (certainly a coinage), impostors, milk and water cowards, drunkards, debauchees, and fools, with others fit to keep them company," are thickly strewn over its pages. Paley is called "the greatest drunkard and debauchee of his time;" Lord Bridgwater, "an old Deist and fool," and all those who have endeavoured to prove the existence of a god by arguments. a posteriori, are set down as "miserable poltroons," "an exhibition of whom will produce a universal burst of laughter, a shout of derisive scorn." The Arabs are spoken of as the greatest "thieves" in the World except the Jews and Christians, who will probably think such language rather abusive. Such are a few flowers culled from but one patch of the new garden of rhetoric: tracted from the first number of the Atheist and Republican, in which I was lectured for descending to mere abuse. What a pity the thirty-and-one did not remember, that when living in glass houses it is dangerous to throw stones. But to return. The philosophy of Materialism, upon which the denial of a god is based, proves that no "great cause," or big somebody, either produced, or now maintains, the universal fabric. The idea of universal causation has been, and is, the fundamental fallacy of all those who have written against Atheism. It is the fallacy of fallacies, which I shall have no difficulty in proving to the full satisfaction of all who are guided by pure reason. In the fifth number of the Oracle, a heavy blow was dealt at this fallacy, the fundamental of Causationists, who never were, and never will be, pure or impure Atheists. Why, it is the fundamental principle of Atheism, that all is of necessity UNPRODUCED; I say of necessity uncreated or unproduced, or to those who like the term better, uncaused; and necessity, we know, is the strongest of all things. What can be more unphilosophical than to talk about the whole being produced, or the universe being maintained, when common sense teaches that a producing power must always be distinct from the thing produced; and that which maintains, an existence independent of the thing maintained? The very terms produced and maintains, always imply a producer and maintainer, as the word effect cannot be separated even in idea from cause-no man can understand the meaning of the word effect, and then suppose an effect without a cause; for to talk about effects without causes, if not a contradiction, is an absurdity in terms. Materialism teaches that the universe is not an effect, but an uncaused, and therefore eternal, existence. And if it be objected that the idea of the eternity of matter is not satisfactory, I have only to say, that it is not my fault nor the fault of philosophy; and just ask, at the same time, what is gained by flying to the notion of a god, existing somewhere, no one knows where; acting somehow, no one knows how-to explain the existence of matter, that, to our reason, exists everywhere, and every one knows where; and acts somehow, and how every one knows, more or less? The universe exists, that I know, if I know anything; but who will believe that the most divine of theologians knows as well that a god exists? Mine is absolute knowledge-the fact. His, at best, mere hypothesis. But, who would think of weighing knowledge against belief? Who, but mad people, would give up the great fact of materialism for the wild imagining of theologians? There is nothing in human knowledge quite satisfactory, and those who look about for perfect satisfaction, will look themselves blindand then not find it. But because we cannot get all knowledge, are we to receive all absur dities? Because a self-existent universe may be difficult to conceive, are we to be living lies and say we believe in a god that never can be conceived? Some one has said, that to expose the absurdity of those who flatter themselves that they believe in a god, you have only to ask them what a god is? and this is true, for they cannot reply to it, either to their own or anybody else's satisfaction, and are driven for refuge to cant and hypocrisy. Ask proof that a god exists, and who will furnish it? None, I promise you, and the wisest in this world always play the fool when they attempt to preach gods. I know we have had the science of gods as well as other sciences; but it has been from Infidelity out-at-elbows, or philosophy maddened by disappointment. But, to my thinking, all that has ever been written about gods, if to be called science, is the science of humbugthe oldest,newest, and unquestionably the most profitable, of all the sciences. No! no! these men of science can give no proof, not even proof's shadow, that anything exists save matter; and to set about proving the existence of matter, is to throw labour and pains away; we require no proof that matter exists-it is its own proof. It is unphilosophical to say it exists because it exists-a phrase, seemingly profound, but really shallow; the universe actually existing, and there is an end-not however because of any thing. To ask why the universe exists, is to suppose a reason for its existence, and then a because, if there were any, would be reasonable enough; but to ask why that exists which necessarily exists, is the folly of metaphysicians, and has no place in the philosophy of materialism. Here, then, I am at issue with those who write for the Atheist. I say that an Atheist admits not a producer, breeder, or maintainer of the universe; that an Atheist never admits, as an element of his philosophy, the existence of a great cause, which must be set down as blunder the first in the philosophy of these writers. In a former number was quoted the opinion of Bacon, "That the world could not generate as a whole, but only by way of its parts." So I maintain, that the universe does not cause by way of a whole, but only by way of its parts; and further, that the words cause and effect cannot have any other than a relative meaning. The world cannot generate by way of a whole, having nothing external to itself wherewith to generate. It does not cause by way of a whole, for the sufficient reason that there is nothing but itself to cause, act upon, or modify. As Ocellus Lucanus says, "The universe has never had a beginning, and it is impossible that it should ever have an end; it can neither increase nor diminish, can neither grow nor decay, but must be ever the same, and like only to itself." Who can conceive the beginning of a universe, or imagine its annihilation? Who can suppose that all or the whole could either move, grow, or diminish! If the universe moved, it would move out of itself; now the whole moving out of the whole would be a comical kind of mo tion. It cannot grow or increase, because it i impossible that any thing should be added to everything; and as to its destruction, the notion can only find place amid the ruins of the human intellect. The universe is without change or "shadow of turning ;" as it was, it is, and ever will be, world without beginning and without end. To this I take it no Atheist will hesitate to say amen; for the world, or universe, is a fixture-that is, motionless: a positive uncaused, unchanging, self-existent, only, and eternal thing. To admit, therefore, either directly or indirectly, a great first cause, or a principle of universal causation, is a big blunder, which I have already called blunder the first; while to speak of a power that maintains the universe, as though a universe required propping up, keeping in order, and (like a big baby) some mother's milk, may be put down as blunder the second, by the "gentleman of distinguished talents," who has been engaged to Edit the Atheist and Republican, in conjunction with thirty other able writers no less distinguished than himself. In the same article (What is Atheism?) I find the following: "We know that things do exist, and we know there is sufficient cause for their existence." Had the writer stopped with "We know that things do exist" he would have escaped the ditch of metaphysics, but he was not wise enough to know that there cannot be a cause, and therefore not a sufficient cause for the existence of things, unless we fall back upon Universal cause-mongery, by doing which we shall lay philosophy upon the flat of its back, opening its mouth, shutting its eyes, to see what cause will send it; but I must be careful and get off my hobby, lest I should be accused of "treating people with bombastic bravado, merely for the want of something better." Now, in sober seriousness, I deny that any man knows that there is a sufficient cause for the existence of things. We know that they exist, but we do not know that they were caused. To talk of a sufficient cause of things, is the madness of speech, for it includes the idea of a something distinct from things, or, as I said in the fifth Oracle, a shadow power that moves all substance weakness. This rash writer goes on to say that "there is no reason whatever for supposing that this cause is any thing extraneous to themselves." And here we have the genuine philosophy of Causationists, who tell us that the universal cause of things is not extraneous, that is, without, apart from, or beside of things; and though he says that every thing with which we are acquainted must have a cause for its existence," gravely informs us that "there is no reason whatever for supposing that this cause is any thing extraneous to themsolves." So here we have, for the first time in 66 |