 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Steve Brown. The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine. Part 1. Introduction. To my fellow citizens of the United States of America, I put the following work under your protection. It contains my opinions upon religion. You will do me the justice to remember that I have always strenuously supported the right of every man to his own opinion, however different that opinion might be to mine. He who denies to another this right makes a slave of himself to his present opinion because he precludes himself the right of changing it. The most formidable weapon against heirs of every kind is reason. I have never used any other and I trust I never shall. Your affectionate friend and fellow citizen, Thomas Paine, Luxembourg, Hath Pluvio's second year of the French Republic, one and indivisible. January 27th, OS 1794. End of introduction. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine. Part 1. Section 1. It has been my intention for several years past to publish my thoughts upon religion. I am well aware of the difficulties that attend the subject and from that consideration have reserved it to a more advanced period of life. I intended it to be the last offering I should make to my fellow citizens of all nations and that at a time when the purity of the motive that induced me to do it could not admit of a question even by those who might disapprove the work. The circumstance that has now taken place in France of the total abolition of the whole national order of priesthood and of everything abretaining to compulsive systems of religion and compulsive articles of faith has not only precipitated my intention, but rendered a work of this kind exceedingly necessary. Lest in the general wreck of superstition of false systems of government and false theology we lose sight of morality of humanity and of the theology that is true. As several of my colleagues and others of my fellow citizens of France have given me the example of making their voluntary and individual profession of faith, I also will make mine and I do this with all that sincerity and frankness with which the mind of man communicates with itself. I believe in one God and no more and I hope for happiness beyond this life. I believe in the equality of man and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy and endeavoring to make our fellow creatures happy. But, lest it should be supposed that I believe in many other things in addition to these, I shall in the progress of this work declare the things I do not believe and my reason for not believing them. I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church. All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind and monopolize power and profit. I do not mean by this declaration to condemn those who believe otherwise. They have the same right to their belief as I have to mine, but it is necessary to the haviness of man that he be mentally faithful to himself. Infidelity does not consist in believing or in disbelieving. It consists in professing to believe what he does not believe. It is impossible to calculate the moral mischief, if I may so express it, that mental lying has produced in society. When a man has so far corrupted and prostituted the chastity of his mind as to subscribe his professional belief to things he does not believe, he has prepared himself for the commission of every other crime. He takes up the trade of a priest for the sake of gain and in order to qualify himself for that trade, he begins with a perjury. Can we conceive anything more destructive to morality than this? Soon after I had published the pamphlet Common Sense in America, I saw the exceeding probability that a revolution in the system of government would be followed by a revolution in the system of religion. The adulterous connection of church and state, wherever it had taken place, whether Jewish, Christian or Turkish, had so effectually prohibited by pains and penalties every discussion upon established creeds and upon first principles of religion, that until the system of government should be changed, those subjects could not be brought fairly and openly before the world. But that whenever this should be done, a revolution in the system of religion would follow. Human inventions and priestcraft would be detected and man would return to the pure, unmixed and unadulterable belief of one God and no more. Every national church or religion has established itself by pretending some special mission from God communicated to certain individuals. The Jews have their Moses, the Christians their Jesus Christ, their Apostles and Saints, and the Turks their Muhammad, as if the way to God was not open to every man alike. Each of those churches show certain books which they call Revelation or the Word of God. The Jews say that their Word of God was given by God to Moses face to face. The Christians say that their Word of God came by divine inspiration. And the Turks say that their Word of God, the Koran, was brought by an angel from heaven. Each of these churches accuse the other of unbelief, and for my own part, I disbelieve them all. As it is necessary to affix right ideas to words, I will, before I proceed further into this subject, offer some other observations of the word Revelation. Revelation, when applied to religion, means something communicated immediately from God to man. No one will deny or dispute the power of the Almighty to make such a communication, if he pleases. But admitting, for the sake of a case, that something has been revealed to a certain person and not revealed to any other person, it is Revelation to that person only. When he tells it to a second person, a second to a third, a third to a fourth and so on, it ceases to be Revelation to all those persons. It is Revelation to the first person only, and here say to every other, and consequently they are not obliged to believe it. It is a contradiction in terms and ideas to call anything a Revelation that comes to us at second hand, either verbally or in writing. Revelation is necessarily limited to the first communication. After this, it is only an account of something which that person says was a Revelation made to him. And though he may find himself obliged to believe it, it cannot be incumbent on me to believe it in the same manner, for it was not a Revelation made to me, and I have only his word for it that it was made to him. When Moses told the children of Israel that he received the two tables of the commandments from the hands of God, they were not obliged to believe him, because they had no other authority for it than his telling them so. And I have no other authority for it than some historian telling me so. The commandments carry no internal evidence of divinity with them. They contain some good moral precepts, such as any man qualified to be a law giver or a legislator could produce himself without having recourse to supernatural intervention. It is, however, necessary to accept the declaration which says that God visits the sins of the fathers upon the children. It is contrary to every principle of moral justice. End of section 1. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Steve Brown. The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine. Part 1. Section 2. When I am told that the Qur'an was written in heaven and brought to Muhammad by an angel, the account comes to near the same kind of hearsay evidence and secondhand authority as the former. I did not see the angel myself, and therefore I have a right not to believe it. When also I am told that a woman, called the Virgin Mary, said or gave out that she was with child without any cohabitation with a man and that her betrothed husband, Joseph, said that an angel told him so, I have a right to believe them or not. Such a circumstance required a much stronger evidence than their bare word for it. But we have not even this, for neither Joseph nor Mary wrote any such matter themselves. It is only reported by others that they said so. It is hearsay upon hearsay, and I do not choose to rest my belief upon such evidence. It is, however, not difficult to account for the credit that was given to the story of Jesus Christ being the Son of God. He was born when the heathen mythology had still some fashion and repute in the world and that mythology had prepared the people for the belief of such a story. Almost all the extraordinary men that lived under the heathen mythology were reputed to be the sons of some of their gods. It was not a new thing at that time to believe a man to have been celestially begotten. The intercourse of gods with women was then a matter of familiar opinion. Their Jupiter, according to their accounts, had cohabited with hundreds. The story, therefore, had nothing in it either new, wonderful, or obscene. It was conformable to the opinions that then prevailed among the people called Gentiles or Mythologists. And it was those people only that believed it. The Jews, who had kept strictly to the belief of one God and no more, and who had always rejected the heathen mythology, never credited the story. It is curious to observe how the theory of what is called the Christian Church sprung out of the tale of the heathen mythology. A direct incorporation took place in the first instance by making the reputed founder to be celestially begotten. The trinity of gods that then followed was no other than a reduction of the former plurality, which was about twenty or thirty thousand. The statue of Mary succeeded the statue of Diana of Ephesus. The deification of heroes changed into the canonization of saints. The Mythologists had gods for everything. The Christian Mythologists had saints for everything. The Church became as crowded with the one, as the Pantheon had been with the other, and Rome was the place of both. The Christian theory is little else than the idolatry of the ancient Mythologists, accommodated to the purposes of power and revenue, and it yet remains to reason and philosophy to abolish the amphibious fraud. Nothing that is here said can apply, even with the most distant disrespect to the real character of Jesus Christ. He was a virtuous and amiable man. The morality that he preached impracticed was of the most benevolent kind, and those similar systems of morality had been preached by Confucius and by some of the Greek philosophers many years before, by the Quakers since, and by many good men in all ages. It has not been exceeded by any. Jesus Christ wrote no account of himself, of his birth, parentage, or anything else. Not a line of what is called the New Testament is of his own writing. The history of him is altogether the work of other people, and as to the account given of his resurrection and ascension, it was the necessary counterpart to the story of his birth. His historians, having brought him into the world in a supernatural manner, were obliged to take him out again in the same manner, where the first part of the story must have fallen to the ground. The wretched contrivance with which this latter part is told exceeds everything that went before it. The first part, that of the miraculous conception, was not a thing that admitted of publicity, and therefore the tellers of this part of the story had this advantage, that though they might not be credited, they could not be detected. They could not be expected to prove it, because it was not one of those things that admitted of proof, and it was impossible that the person of whom it was told could prove it himself. But the resurrection of a dead person from the grave, and his ascension through the air, is a thing very different as to the evidence it admits of, to the invisible conception of a child in the womb. The resurrection and ascension, supposing them to have taken place, admitted of public and ocular demonstration, like that of the ascension of a balloon, or the sun at noon day, to all Jerusalem at least. A thing which everybody is required to believe, requires that the proof and evidence of it should be equal to all, and universal. And as the public visibility of this last related act was the only evidence that could give sanction to the former part, the whole of it falls to the ground, because that evidence never was given. Instead of this, a small number of persons, not more than eight or nine, are introduced as proxies for the whole world, to say they saw it, and all the rest of the world are called upon to believe it. But it appears that Thomas did not believe the resurrection, and as they say, would not believe without having ocular and manual demonstration himself. So neither will I, and the reason is equally as good for me, and for every other person as for Thomas. It is in vain to attempt to palliate or disguise this matter. The story, so far as relates to the supernatural part, has every mark of fraud and imposition stamped upon the face of it. Who are the authors of it is as impossible for us to know, as it is for us to be assured that the books in which the account is related were written by the persons whose names they bear. The best surviving evidence we now have respecting that affair is the Jews. They were regularly descended from the people who lived in the times. This resurrection and ascension is said to have happened, and they say, it is not true. It has long appeared to me a strange inconsistency to cite the Jews as a proof of the truth of the story. It is just the same as if a man were to say, I will prove the truth of what I have told you by producing the people who say it is false. That such a person as Jesus Christ existed, and that he was crucified, which was the mode of execution of that day, are historical relations strictly within the limits of probability. He preached most excellent morality and the equality of man, but he preached also against the corruptions and avarice of the Jewish priests. And this brought upon him the hatred and vengeance of the whole order of priesthood. The accusation which those priests brought against him was that of sedition and conspiracy against the Roman government, to which the Jews were the subject and tributary. And it is not improbable that the Roman government might have some secret apprehensions to the effects of his doctrine as well as the Jewish priests. Neither is it improbable that Jesus Christ had in contemplation the delivery of the Jewish nation from the bondage of the Romans. Between the two, however, this virtuous reformer and revolutionist lost his life. It is upon this plain narrative of facts, together with another case I am going to mention, that the Christian mythologists calling themselves the Christian Church have erected their fable, which, for absurdity and extravagance, is not exceeded by anything that is to be found in the mythology of the ancients. End of section 2. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings on the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Steve Brown. The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine. Part 1, section 3. The ancient mythologists tell us that the race of giants made war against Jupiter, and that one of them threw a hundred rocks against him at one throw. That Jupiter defeated him with thunder and confined him afterward under Mount Etna, and that every time the giant turns himself, Mount Etna belches fire. It is here easy to see that the circumstance of the mountain, that of its being a volcano, suggested the idea of the fable, and that the fable is made to fit and wind itself up with that circumstance. The Christian mythologists tell us that their Satan made war against the Almighty, who defeated him, and confined him afterward, not under a mountain, but in a pit. It is here easy to see that the first fable suggested the idea of the second, for the fable of Jupiter and the giants was told many hundred years before that of Satan. Thus far the ancient and the Christian mythologists differ very little from each other, but the latter have contrived to carry the matter much farther. They have contrived to connect the fabulous part of the story of Jesus Christ with the fable originating from Mount Etna, and in order to make all the parts of the story tied together, they have taken to their aid the traditions of the Jews. For the Christian mythology is made up partly from the ancient mythology, and partly from the Jewish traditions. The Christian mythologists, after having confined Satan in a pit, were obliged to let him out again to bring on the sequel of the fable. He is then introduced into the Garden of Eden in the shape of a snake or a serpent, and in that shape he enters into familiar conversation with Eve, who is in no way surprised to hear a snake talk. And the issue of this ta-da-tet is that he persuades her to eat an apple, and the eating of that apple damns all mankind. After giving Satan his triumph over the whole creation, one would have supposed that the church mythologists would have been kind enough to send him back again to the pit, or if they had not done this, that they would have put a mountain upon him, for they say that their faith can remove a mountain, or have put him under a mountain, as the former mythologists had done, to prevent his getting again among the women and doing more mischief. But instead of this, they leave him at large, without even obliging him to give his parole, the secret of which is that they could not do without him, and after being at the trouble of making him, they bribed him to stay. They promised him all the Jews, all the Turks by anticipation, nine-tenths of the world beside, and Muhammad into the bargain. After this, who can doubt the bountifulness of the Christian mythology? Having thus made an insurrection and a battle in heaven, in which none of the combatants could be either killed or wounded, put Satan into the pit, let him out again, giving him a triumph over the whole creation, damned all mankind by the eating of an apple, these Christian mythologists bring the two ends of their fable together. They represent this virtuous and amiable man, Jesus Christ, to be at once both God and man, and also the Son of God, celestially begotten, on purpose to be sacrificed, because they say that Eve in her longing had eaten an apple. Putting aside everything that might excite laughter by its absurdity, or detestation by its profaneness and confining ourselves merely to an examination of the parts, it is impossible to conceive a story more derogatory to the Almighty, more inconsistent with his wisdom, more contradictory to his power than the story is. In order to make for it a foundation to rise upon, the inventors were under the necessity of giving to the being whom they call Satan a power equally as great, if not greater than they attribute to the Almighty. They have not only given him the power of liberating himself from the pit after what they call his fall, but they have made that power increase afterward to infinity. Before this fall, they represent him only as an angel of limited existence, as they represent the rest. After his fall, he becomes by their account omnipresent. He exists everywhere and at the same time, he occupies the whole immensity of space, not content with this deification of Satan. They represent him as defeating by stratagem in the shape of an animal of the creation, all the power and wisdom of the Almighty. They represent him as having compelled the Almighty to the direct necessity either of surrendering the whole of the creation to the government and sovereignty of this Satan or of capitulating for its redemption by coming down upon earth and exhibiting himself upon a cross in the shape of a man. Had the inventors of this story told it the contrary way, that is, had they represented the Almighty as compelling Satan to exhibit himself on a cross in the shape of a snake, as a punishment for his new transgression, the story would have been less absurd, less contradictory. But instead of this, they make the transgressor triumph and the Almighty fall. That many good men have believed this strange fable and lived very good lives under that belief, for credulity is not a crime, is what I have no doubt of. In the first place, they were educated to believe it and they would have believed anything else in the same manner. There are also many who have been so enthusiastically and raptured by what they conceived to be the infinite love of God to man in making a sacrifice of himself that the vehemence of the idea has forbidden and deterred them from examining into the absurdity and profaneness of the story. The more unnatural anything is, the more it is capable of becoming the object of dismal admiration. But if objects for gratitude and admiration are our desire, do they not present themselves every hour to our eyes? Do we not see a fair creation prepared to receive us in the instant we are born? A world furnished to our hands that cost us nothing? Is it we that light up the sun that pour down the rain and fill the earth with abundance? Whether we sleep or wake, the vast machinery of the universe still goes on. Are these things and the blessings they indicate in future nothing to us? Can our gross feelings be excited by no other subjects than tragedy and suicide? Or is the gloomy pride of man become so intolerable that nothing can flatter it but a sacrifice of the Creator? I know that this bold investigation will alarm many, but it would be paying too great a compliment to their credulity to forbear it on their account. The times and the subject demand it to be done. The suspicion that the theory of what is called the Christian church is fabulous is becoming very extensive in all countries. And it will be a consolation to men staggering under that suspicion and doubting what to believe and what to disbelieve to see the object freely investigated. I therefore pass on to an examination of the books called the Old and New Testament. End of section three. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Steve Brown. The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine. Part first, section four. These books beginning with Genesis and ending with Revelation, which by the by is a book of riddles that require the Revelation to explain it. Or we are told the Word of God. It is therefore proper for us to know who told us so that we may know what credit to give to the report. The answer to this question is that nobody can tell, except that we tell one another so. The case, however, historically appears to be as follows. When the church mythologists established their system, they collected all the writings they could find and managed them as they pleased. It is a matter altogether of uncertainty to us whether such of the writings as now appear under the name of the Old and New Testament are in the same state in which those collectors say they found them or whether they added, altered, abridged, or dressed them up. Be this as it may, they decided by vote which of the books out of the collection they had made should be the Word of God and which should not. They rejected several. They voted others to be doubtful, such as the books called the Apocrypha. And those books which had a majority of votes were voted to be the Word of God. Had they voted otherwise, all the people since calling themselves Christians had believed otherwise. For the belief of the one comes from the vote of the other. Who the people were that did all this, we know nothing of. They called themselves by the general name of the church and this is all we know of the matter. As we have no other external evidence or authority for believing these books to be the Word of God than what I have mentioned, which is no evidence or authority at all, I come in the next place to examine the internal evidence contained in the books themselves. In the former part of this essay I have spoken of Revelation. I now proceed further with that subject for the purpose of applying it to the books in question. Revelation is a communication of something which the person to whom that thing is revealed did not know before. For if I have done a thing or seen it done, it needs to Revelation to tell me I have done it or seen it nor to enable me to tell it or to write it. Revelation therefore cannot be applied to anything done upon earth, of which man himself is the actor or the witness. And consequently all the historical and anecdotal parts of the Bible, which is almost the whole of it, is not within the meaning and compass of the word Revelation and therefore is not the Word of God. When Samson ran off with the gateposts of Gaza, if he ever did so, and whether he did or not is nothing to us, or when he visited his Delilah or caught his foxes or did anything else, what has Revelation to do with these things? If they were facts he could tell them himself or his secretary if he kept one could write them. If they were worth either telling or writing, and if they were fictions, Revelation could not make them true. And whether true or not, we are neither the better nor the wiser for knowing them. When we contemplate the immensity of that being, who directs and governs the incomprehensible whole, of which the utmost ken of human sight can discover but a part, we ought to feel shame at calling such paltry stories of the Word of God. As to the account of the creation with which the Book of Genesis opens, it has all the appearance of being a tradition which the Israelites had among them before they came into Egypt. And after their departure from that country, they put it at the head of their history without telling, as it is most probable, that they did not know how they came by it. The manner in which the account opens shows it to be traditionary. It begins abruptly. It is nobody that speaks. It is nobody that hears. It is addressed to nobody. It has neither first, second, nor third person. It has every criterion of being a tradition. It has no voucher. It has no voucher. Moses does not take it upon himself by introducing it with the formality that he uses on other occasions, such as that of saying, the Lord spoke unto Moses, saying, Why it has been called the mosaic account of the creation. I am at a loss to conceive. Moses, I believe, was too good a judge of such subjects to put his name to that account. He had been educated among the Egyptians who were a people as well skilled in science and particularly in astronomy as any people of their day. And the silence and caution that Moses observes in not authenticating the account is a good negative evidence that he neither told it nor believed it. The case is that every nation of people has been world makers. And the Israelites had as much right to set up the trade of world making as any of the rest. And as Moses was not an Israelite, he might not choose to contradict the tradition. The account, however, is harmless. And this is more than can be said of many other parts of the Bible. Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness with which more than half of the Bible was filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than the word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind. And for my part, I sincerely detest it as I detest everything that is cruel. We scarcely meet with anything. A few phrases accepted. But what deserves either the abhorrence or our content till we come to the miscellaneous parts of the Bible? In the anonymous publications, the Psalms, the Book of Job, more particularly in the latter, we find a great deal of elevated sentiment, reverentially expressed in the power and benignity of the Almighty. But they stand on no higher rank than many other compositions of similar subjects, as well before that time as since. The Proverbs, which are said to be Solomon's, though most probably a collection, because they discover a knowledge of life which his situation excluded him from knowing, are an instructive table of ethics. They are inferior in keenness to the Proverbs of the Spaniards and not more wise and economical than those of the American Franklin. All the remaining parts of the Bible, generally known by the name of the prophets, are the works of the Jewish poets and itinerant preachers who mix poetry. Footnote, as there are many readers who do not see that a composition is poetry unless it be in rhyme, it is for their information that I add this note. End of footnote. Anecdote and devotion together and those works still retain the air and style of poetry, though in translation. Poetry consists principally in two things, imagery and composition. The composition of poetry differs from that of prose in the manner of mixing long and short syllables together. Take a long syllable out of a line of poetry and put a short one in the room of it or put a long syllable where a short one should be and that line will lose its political harmony. It will have an effect upon the line like that of misplacing a note in a song. The imagery in these books called the prophets appertains altogether to poetry. It is fictitious and often extravagant and not admissible in any kind of writing than poetry. To show that these writings are composed in political numbers I will take ten syllables as they stand in the book and make a line of the same number of syllables, heroic measure, that shall rhyme with the last word. It will then be seen that the composition of these books is poetical in measure. The instance I shall produce is from Isaiah. Hear O ye heavens and give ear O earth to his guide himself that calls attention forth. Another instance I shall quote is from the mournful Jeremiah to which I shall add two other lines for the purpose of carrying out the figure and showing the intention of the poet. O, that mine head were waters and mine eyes were fountains flowing like liquid skies then would I give the mighty flood release and weep at deluge for the human race. End of section four. This is the LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Steve Brown. The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine. Part first, section five. There is not throughout the whole book called the Bible any word that describes to us what we call a poet nor any word that describes what we call poetry. The case is that the word profit to which latter times have affixed a new idea was the Bible word for poet and the word prophesizing meant the art of making poetry. It also meant the art of playing poetry to a tune upon any instrument of music. We read of prophesizing with pipes to braves and horns of prophesizing with harps, with salteries, with cymbals and with every other instrument of music of fashion. Where we now to speak of prophesizing with a fiddle or with a pipe and taber, the expression would have no meaning or would appear ridiculous and to some people contemptuous because we have changed the meaning of the word. We are told of Saul being among the prophets and also that he prophesied but we are not told what they prophesied nor what he prophesied. The case is, there was nothing to tell for these prophets were a company of musicians and poets and Saul joined in the concert and this was called prophesizing. The account given of this affair in the book called Samuel is that Saul and a company of prophets a whole company of them coming down with a saltery a tabray, a pipe and a harp and that they prophesied and that he prophesied with them but it appears afterward that Saul prophesied badly that is he performed his part badly for it is said that an evil spirit from God footnote as those men who call themselves divines and commentators are very fond of puzzling one another I leave them to the contest the meaning of the first part of the phrase that of an evil spirit from God I keep to my text I keep to the meaning of the word prophecy and footnote came upon Saul and he prophesied now were there no other passage in the book called the Bible than this to demonstrate to us that we have lost the original meaning of the word prophecy and substituted another meaning in its place this alone will be sufficient for it is impossible to use and apply the word prophecy in the place it is here used and applied if we give to it the sense which latter times have affixed to it the manner in which it is here used strips it of all religious meaning and shows that a man might then be a prophet or he might prophecy as he may now be a poet or a musician without any regard to the morality or immorality of his character the word was originally a term of science promiscuously applied to poetry and to music and not restricted to any subject upon which poetry and music might be exercised Deborah and Barack are called prophets not because they predicted anything but because they composed a song there is their name in celebration of an act already done David is ranked among the prophets for he was a musician and was also reputed to be though perhaps very erroneously the author of the Psalms but Abraham Isaac and Jacob are not called prophets it does not appear from any accounts we have that they could either sing play music or make poetry we are told of the greater and the lesser prophets they might as well tell us of the greater and the lesser God for there cannot be degrees in prophesizing consistently with its modern sense but there are degrees in poetry and therefore the phrase is reconcilable to the case when we understand by it the greater and the lesser poets it is altogether unnecessary after this to offer any observations upon what those men styled prophets have written the acts goes at once to the root by showing that the original meaning of the word has been mistaken and consequently all the inferences that have been drawn from these books the devotional respect that has been paid to them and the labored commentaries that have been written upon them are disputing about in many things however the writings of the Jewish poets deserve a better fate than that of being bound up as they now are with the trash that accompanies them under the abused name of the word of God if we permit ourselves to conceive right ideas of things we must necessarily affix the idea not only of unchangeableness but of the utter impossibility of any change taking place by any means or accident whatever in that which we would honor with the name of the word of God and therefore the word of God cannot exist in any written or human language the continually progressive change to which the meaning of words is subject the want of the universal language which renders translation necessary the errors to which translations are again subject the mistakes of opiates and printers together with the possibility of willful alteration are of themselves evidence that the human language whether in speech or in print cannot be the vehicle of the word of God the word of God exists in something else the book called the Bible Excel Impurity of ideas and expression all the books that are now in the world I would not take it for my rule of faith as being the word of God because the possibility would nevertheless exist of my being imposed upon but when I see throughout the greater part of this book scarcely anything but a history of the grossest vices and a collection of the most paltry and contemptible tales I cannot dishonor my creator by calling it by his name thus much for the Bible I now go on to the book called the New Testament the New Testament that is the new will as if there could be two wills of the creator had it been the object or the intention of Jesus Christ to establish a new religion he would undoubtedly have written the system himself or procured it to be written in his lifetime but there is no publication extent authenticated with his name all the books called the New Testament were written after his death he was a Jew by birth and by profession and he was the son of God in like manner that every other person is for the creator is the father of all the first four books called Matthew, Mark, Luke and John do not give a history but only detached anecdotes of him it appears from these books that the whole time of his being a preacher was not more than 18 months and it was only during this short time that these men became acquainted with him they make mention of him at the age of 12 years sitting they say among the Jewish doctors asking and answering them questions as this was several years when his acquaintance with him began it is most probable that they had this anecdote from his parents from this time there is no account of him about 16 years where he lived or how he employed himself during this interval is not known most probably he was working at his father's trade which was that of a carpenter it does not appear that he had any school education and the probability is that his parents were extremely poor as appears from there not being able to pay for a bed when he was born it is somewhat curious that the three persons whose names are the most universally recorded were a very obscure parentage Moses was a foundling Jesus Christ was born in a stable and Muhammad was a mule driver the first and last of these men were founders of different systems but Jesus Christ founded no new system he called men to the practice of moral virtues and the belief of one God the great trait in his character is philanthropy the manner in which he was apprehended shows that he was not much known at that time and it shows also that the meetings he then held with his followers were in secret and that he had given over or suspended preaching publicly and otherwise betray him then by giving information where he was and pointing him out to the officers that went to arrest him and the reason for employing and paying Judas to do this could arise only from the cause already mentioned that of his not being much known and living concealed the idea of his concealment not only agrees very ill with his reputed divinity but associates with it something of post-alanimity and his being betrayed or in other words his being apprehended on the information of one of his followers shows that he did not intend to be apprehended and consequently that he did not intend to be crucified the Christian mythologists tell us that Christ died for the sins of the world and that he came on purpose to die the same if he had died of a fever or of the smallpox of old age or of anything else end of section 5 this is the LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Steve Brown the age of reason by Thomas Payne part 1 section 6 the declaratory sentence which they say was passed upon Adam in case he eat of the apple was not that thou shall surely be crucified but thou shall surely die the sentence of death and not the manner of dying crucifixion therefore or any other particular manner of dying made no part of the sentence that Adam was to suffer and consequently even upon their own tactics it could make no part of the sentence that Christ was to suffer in the room of Adam a fever would have done as well as a cross if there was any occasion for either the sentence of death which they tell us was thus passed must either have meant dying naturally that is ceasing to live or have meant what these mythologists called damnation and consequently the act of dying on the part of Jesus Christ must according to their system apply as a prevention to one or other of these two things happening to Adam and to us that it does not prevent our dying as evident because we all die and if their accounts of longevity be true men die faster since the crucifixion then before and with respect to the second explanation including with it the natural death of Jesus Christ has a substitute for the eternal death or damnation of all mankind it is impertently representing the creator as coming off or evoking the sentence of the word death that manufacturer of quibbles Saint Paul if he wrote the books that bear his name has helped this quibble on by making another quibble upon the word Adam he makes there be two Adams the one who sins in fact and suffers by proxy the other who sins by proxy and suffers in fact a religion thus interrelated with quibble one has a tendency to instruct its professors in the practice of these arts they acquire the habit without being aware of the cause if Jesus Christ was the being which those mythologists tell us he was and that he came into this world to suffer which is a word they sometimes use instead of to die the only real suffering he could have endured his existence here was a state of exilement or transportation from heaven and the way back to his original country was to die in fine everything in this strange system is the reverse of what it pretends to be it is the reverse of truth and I become so tired of examining into its consistencies and absurdities that I hasten to the conclusion in order to proceed to something better how much or what parts of the books called the New Testament were written by the persons whose names they bear is what we can know nothing of neither are we certain in what language they were originally written the matters they now contain may be classed under two beads anecdote and epistolary correspondence the four books already mentioned Matthew Mark Luke and John are all together anecdotal they relate events after they had taken place they tell what Jesus Christ did and said and what others did and said to him and in several instances they relate the same event differently revelation is necessarily the result of the question with respect to those books not only because of the disagreement of the writers but because revelation cannot be applied to the relating of facts by the person who saw them done nor to the relating or recording of any discourse or conversation by those who heard it the book called the acts of the apostles and anonymous work belongs also to the anecdotal part all the other parts except the book of enigmas called the revelations are a collection of letters under the name of epistles and the forgery of letters has been such a common practice in the world that the probability is at least equal whether they are genuine or forged one thing however is much less equivocal which is that out of the matters contained in those books together with the assistance the church has set up a system of religion very contradictory to the character of the person whose name it bears it has set up a religion of pomp and revenue in pretended imitation of a person whose life was humility and poverty the invention of purgatory and of the releasing of souls therefrom by prayers bought of the church with money the selling of pardons and new laws without bearing that name or carrying that appearance but the case nevertheless is that those things derive their origin from the paroxysm of the crucifixion and the theory deduced therefrom which was that one person could stand in the place of another and could perform meritorious service for him the probability therefore is that the whole theory or doctrine of what is called the redemption which is said to have been accomplished by the act of one person in the room of another was originally fabricated on purpose to bring forward and build all those secondary and pecuniary redemptions upon and that the passages in the books upon which the idea or theory of redemption is built have been manufactured on purpose why are we to give this church credit when she tells us that those books are genuine in every part any more than we give her credit for everything else she has told us or for the miracles she says she had performed that she could fabricate writings is certain because she could write and the composition of the writings in question is of that kind and not more inconsistent with the probability than that she could tell us as she has done that she could and did work miracles since then no external evidence can at this long distance of time be produced to prove whether the church fabricated the doctrines called redemption or not for such evidence whether for or against the condition of being fabricated the case can only be referred to the internal evidence which the thing carries within itself and this affords a very strong presumption of its being a fabrication for the internal evidence is that the theory or doctrine of redemption has for its base an idea of pecuniary justice and not that of moral justice if I owe a person money and pay him and he threatens to put me in prison another person can take the debt upon himself and pay it for me but if I have committed a crime every circumstance of the case is changed moral justice cannot take the innocent for the guilty even if the innocent would offer itself to suppose justice to do this is to destroy the principle of its existence is then no longer justice it is indiscriminate revenge this single reflection will show that the doctrine of redemption is founded on a mere pecuniary idea corresponding to that of a debt which another person might pay and as this pecuniary idea corresponds again with the system of second redemption obtained through the means of money given to the church the probability is that the same persons fabricated both the one and the other of those theories and that in truth there is no such thing as redemption that it is fabulous and that man stands in the same relative condition with his maker as he ever did stand since man existed and that it is his greatest consolation to think so end of part six this is the LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Steve Brown the age of reason by Thomas Payne part first section seven let him believe this and he will live more consistently and morally than by any other system it is by his being taught to contemplate himself as an outlaw as an outcast as a beggar as a mumper as one thrown as it were on a dung hill at an immense distance from his creator and who must make his approaches by creeping and cringing to intermediate beings everything under the name of religion or becomes indifferent or turns what he calls devout in the latter case he consumes his life in grief or the affectation of it his prayers are reproaches his humility is in gratitude he calls himself a worm in the fertile earth a dung hill and all the blessings of life by the thankless name of vanities he despises the choicest gift of God to man the gift of reason and having endeavored to force upon himself the belief of a system against which reason revolts he ungrateful calls it human reason as if man could give reason to himself yet with all this strange appearance of humility and this contempt for human reason he ventures into the boldest presumptions he finds fault with everything his selfishness his ingratitude is never at an end he takes on himself to direct to the Almighty what to do even in the government of the universe he prays dictatorially when it is sunshine he prays for rain and when it is rain he prays for sunshine he follows the same idea in everything that he prays for for what is the amount of all his prayers in his mind and act otherwise than he does it is as if he were to say thou knowest not so well as I but some perhaps will say are we to have no word of God no revelation I answer yes there is a word of God there is a revelation the word of God is the creation we behold and it is in this word which no human invention can counterfeit or alter that God speaketh universally to man human language is local and changeable and is therefore incapable of being used as the means of unchangeable and universal information the idea that God sent Jesus Christ to publish as they say the glad tidings to all nations from one end of the earth to the other is consistent only with the ignorance of the extent of the world and who believed as those world saviors believed and continued to believe for several centuries and that in contradiction to the discoveries of philosophers and the experience of navigators that the earth was flat like a trencher and that man might walk to the end of it but how was Jesus Christ to make anything known to all nations he could speak but one language and there are in the world several hundred languages scarcely any two nations speak the same language or understand each other and as to translations every man who knows anything of languages knows that it is impossible to translate from one language to another not only without losing a great part of the original but frequently of mistaking the sense and besides all this the arts of printing it is always necessary that the means that are to accomplish any end be equal to the accomplishment of that end or the end cannot be accomplished it is in this that the difference between finite and infinite power and wisdom discovers itself man frequently fails in accomplishing his ends from a natural inability of the powers to the purpose and frequently from the want of wisdom to apply power properly but it is impossible for infinite power and wisdom to fail as man faileth the means it uses are always equal to the end but human language more especially as there is not a universal language is incapable of being used as a universal means of unchangeable and uniform information and therefore it is not able to exist in manifesting himself universally to man it is only in the creation that all our ideas and conceptions of a word of God can unite the creation speaketh and universal language independently of human speech or human language multiplied and various as they may be it is an ever existing original which every man it cannot be forged it cannot be counterfeited it cannot be lost it cannot be altered it cannot be suppressed it does not depend upon the will of man whether it shall be published or not it publishes itself from one end of the earth to the other it preaches to all nations and to all worlds and this word of God contemplate his power we see it in the immensity of the creation do we want to contemplate his wisdom we see it in the unchangeable order by which the incomprehensible whole is governed do we want to contemplate his munificence we see it in the abundance with which he fills the earth do we want to contemplate his mercy we see it thankful in fine do we want to know what God is search not the book called scripture which any human hand might make but the scripture called the creation the only idea a man can affix to the name of God is that of a first cause the cause of all things an incomprehensible and difficult as it is for a man to conceive what a first cause is but it is more difficult to conceive an end it is difficult beyond the power of man to conceive an internal duration of what we call time but it is more impossible to conceive a time when there shall be no time in like manner of reasoning everything we behold carries in its place it is more difficult to conceive an end in like manner of reasoning everything we behold carries in itself the eternal evidence that it did not make itself every man is an evidence to himself that he did not make himself neither could his father make himself nor his grandfather nor any of his race neither could any tree plant or animal make itself and it is the conviction arising from this evidence to the belief of a first cause eternally existing of a nature totally different to any material existence we know of and by the power of which all things exist and this first cause man calls God it is only by the exercise of reason that man can discover God take away that reason and he would be incapable of understanding anything and in this case he would be just as consistent to read even the book called the Bible to a horse as to a man how then is it that those people pretended to reject reason almost the only parts in the book called the Bible that convey to us any idea of God are some chapters in Job and the 19th Psalm I recollect no other those parts are true deistical compositions for they treat of the deity through his works they take the book of creation as the word of God they refer to no other book and all the inferences they make are drawn from that volume I insert in this place the 19th Psalm as paraphrased into English verse by Addison I recollect not the prose and where I write this I have not the opportunity of seeing it the spacious firmament on high with all the blue ethereal sky and spangled heavens a shining frame their great original proclaim the unwaried sun from day to day does his creator's power display and publishes to every land the work of an all mighty hand soon as the evening shades prevail the moon takes up the wondrous tale and nightly to the listening earth repeats the story of her birth while all the stars that round her burn and all the planets in their turn confirm the tidings as they roll and spread the truth from pole to pole what though in solemn silence all move around this dark terrestrial ball what though no real voice or sound amidst their radiant orbs be found in reason's ear they all rejoice and utter forth a glorious voice forever singing as they shine the hand that made us is divine end of part 7 this is the LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Steve Brown the age of reason by Thomas Payne part 1 section 8 what more does man want to know than that the hand or power that made these things is divine is omnipotent let him believe this with the force it is impossible to repel if he permits his reason to act and his rule of moral life will follow of course the illusions in Job have all of them the same tendencies with this psalm that of deducing or proving a truth that would be otherwise unknown from truths already known I recollect not enough of the passages in Job to insert them correctly but there is one occurs to me that is applicable to the subject I am speaking upon canst thou by searching find out God canst thou find out the almighty to perfection I know not how the printers have pointed this passage for I keep no Bible but it contains two distinct questions that admit of distinct answers first canst thou by searching find out God because in the first place I know I did not make myself and yet I have existence and by searching into the nature of other things I find that no other thing could make itself and yet millions of other things exist therefore it is that I know by positive conclusion resulting from this search that there is a power superior to all those things and that power is God almighty to perfection no not only because the power and wisdom he has manifested in the structure of the creation that I behold is to me incomprehensible but because even this manifestation great as it is is probably but a small display of that immensity of power and wisdom by which millions of other worlds to me invisible by their distance were created and continue to exist that both these questions were put to the reason of the person to whom they are supposed to have been addressed and it is only by admitting the first question to be answered affirmatively that the second could follow it would have been unnecessary and even absurd to have put a second question more difficult than the first if the first question have been answered negatively the two questions the existence of God the seconds to his attributes reason can discover the one but it falls infinitely short in discovering the whole of the other I recollect not a single passage in all the writings ascribed to the men called apostles that conveys any idea of what God is those writings are chiefly controversial and the subjects they dwell upon by a man dying in agony on a cross is better suited to the gloomy genius of a monk in a cell by whom it is not impossible they were written than to any man breathing the open air of the creation the only passage that occurs to me that has any reference to the works of God by which only his power and wisdom can be known is related to have been spoken by Jesus Christ distrustful care behold the lilies of the field they toil not neither do they spin this however is far inferior to the illusions in Job and in the 19th Psalm but it is similar in idea and the modesty of the imagery is correspondent to the modesty of the man as to the Christian system of faith it appears to me as a species of atheism a sort of religious denial of God it professes to believe in a man rather than in God it is a compound made up chiefly of manism with but little deism and is as near to atheism as twilight is to darkness it introduces between man and his maker an opaque body which it calls a redeemer as the moon introduces her an opaque self between the earth and the sun and it produces by this means a religious or an irreligious eclipse of light it has put the whole orbit of reason into shade the effect of this obscurity has been that of turning everything upside down and representing it in reverse and among the revolutions it has thus magically produced it has made a revolution in theology that which is now called natural philosophy embracing the whole circle of science of which astronomy occupies the chief place is the study of the works of God and of the power and wisdom of God in his works and is the true theology as to the theology that is now studied in its place it is the study of human opinions and of human fancies is not the study of God himself in the works that he has made but in the works or writings that man has made and it is not among the least of the mischiefs that the Christian system has done to the world that it has abandoned the original and beautiful system of theology like a beautiful innocent to distress and reproach to make room for the hag of superstition the book of Job admits it is to be more ancient than the chronological order in which they stand in the book called the Bible are theological orations conformable to the original system of theology the internal evidence of those orations proves to a demonstration that the study and contemplation of the works of creation and of the power and wisdom of God revealed and manifested in those works in which they were written and it was this devotional study and contemplation that led to the discovery of the principles upon which they are now called sciences are established and it is to the discovery of these principles that almost all the arts that contribute to the convenience of human life or their existence every principle art has some science for its parent though the person is a very seldom perceive the connection it is a fraud of the Christian system to call the sciences human invention it is only the application of them that is human every science has for its basis a system of principles as fixed and unalterable as those by which the universe is regulated and governed man cannot make principles he can only discover them for example every person who looks at an almanac sees an account when an eclipse will take place and he sees also that it never fails to take place according to the account they are given this shows that man is acquainted with the laws by which the heavenly bodies move but it would be something worse than ignorance where any church on earth to say that those laws are a human invention to say that the scientific principles by the aid of which man is unable to calculate and foreknow when an eclipse will take place are a human invention man cannot invent a thing that is eternal and immutable and the scientific principles he employs for this purpose must be and are of necessity has eternal and immutable as the laws by which the heavenly bodies move or they could not be used certain the time when and the manner how any eclipse will take place the scientific principles that man employs to obtain the foreknowledge of an eclipse or of anything else relating to the motion of the heavenly bodies are contained chiefly in that part of science which is called trigonometry or the properties of a triangle which when applied to the study of the heavenly bodies is called astronomy on the ocean it is called navigation when applied to the construction of figures drawn by rule and compass it is called geometry when applied to the construction of plans or edifices it is called architecture when applied to the measurement of any portion of the surface of the earth it is called land surveying in fine it is the soul of science it is an eternal truth it contains the mathematical which man speaks and the extent of its uses is unknown it may be said that man can make or draw a triangle and therefore a triangle is a human invention but the triangle when drawn is no other than the image of the principle it is a delineation to the eye and from the sense to the mind of a principle that would otherwise be imperceptible the triangle does not exist anymore than a candle taken into a room that was dark makes the chairs and tables that before were invisible all the properties of a triangle exist independently of the figure and existed before any triangle was drawn or thought of by man man had no more to do in the formation of these properties or principles then he had to do in making the laws by which one must have the same divine origin as the other in the same manner as it may be said that man can make a triangle so also may it be said he can make the mechanical instrument called a lever but the principle by which the lever acts is a thing distinct from the instrument and would exist if the instrument did not it attaches itself to the instrument after it is made the instrument therefore acts otherwise than it does act neither can all the efforts of human invention make it act otherwise that which in all such cases man calls the effect is no other than the principle itself rendered perceptible to the senses since then man cannot make principles from whence did he gain a knowledge of them so as to be able to apply them not only to things on earth but to a certain the motion of him as all the heavenly bodies are from whence I ask could he gain that knowledge but from the study of the true theology end of part 8 this is the LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Steve Brown The Age of Reason by Thomas Payne part 1 section 9 it is the structure of the universe that has taught this knowledge to man that structure is an ever existing exhibition of every principle upon which every part of mathematical science is founded the offspring of this science is mechanics for mechanics is no other than the principles of science applied practically the man who proportions the several parts of a mill uses the same scientific principles as if he had the power of constructing a universe but as he cannot give to matter that invisible agency by which all the component parts of the immense machine of the universe have influence upon each other and act in emotional unison together without any apparent contact and to which man has given the name of attraction gravitation and repulsion he supplies the place of that agency by the humble imitation of teeth and cogs all the parts of man's microcosm must visibly touch but could he gain a knowledge of that agency so as to be able to apply it in practice we might then say that another canonical book of the word of God had been discovered if man could alter the properties of the lever so also could he alter the properties of the triangle for a lever taking that sort of lever which is called a steel yard for the sake of explanation forms when in motion a triangle the line it descends from one point of that line being in the fulcrum the line it descends to and the court of the arc which the end of the lever describes in the air are the three sides of a triangle the other arm of the lever describes also a triangle and the corresponding sides of those two triangles calculated scientifically or measured geometrically and also the signs, tangents and secants generated from the angles and geometrically measured have the same proportions to each other as the different weights have that will balance each other on the lever leaving the weight of the lever out of the case it may also be said that man can make a wheel and axis that he can put wheels of different magnitudes together and produce a mill still the case comes back to the same point which is that he did not make the principle that gives the wheels those powers that principle is as unalterable as in the former case or rather it is the same principle under a different appearance to the eye the power that two wheels of different magnitudes have upon each other is in the same proportion as if the semi diameter wheels were joined together and made into that kind of lever I have described suspended at the part where the semi diameters join for the two wheels scientifically considered are no other than the two circles generated by the motion of the compound lever it is from this study of the true theology that all our knowledge of science is derived and it is from that knowledge the almighty lecturer by displaying the principles of science in the structure of the universe has invited man to study and to imitation it is as if he had said to the inhabitants of this globe that we call ours I have made an earth for man to dwell upon and I have rendered the starry heavens visible to teach him science he can now provide for his own comfort and learn from my munificence to all to be kind to each other of what use is it unless it be to teach man something that his eye is endowed with the power of beholding to an incomprehensible distance and immensity of worlds revolving in the ocean of space or of what use is it that this immensity of worlds is visible to man what has man to do with the Pleiades with Orion with Sirius with the star he calls the North Star with the moving orbs he has named Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Venus and Mercury if no uses are to follow from there being visible a less power of vision would have been sufficient for man if the immensity he now possesses were given only to waste itself as it were on an immense desert of space glittering with shows it is only by contemplating what he calls the starry heavens as the book and school of science that he discovers any use in there being visible to him or any advantage resulting from his immensity of vision but when he contemplates the subject in this light he sees an additional motive for saying that nothing was made in vain for in vain would be this power of vision if it taught man nothing as the Christian system of faith has made a revolution in theology so also has it made a revolution in the state of learning that which is now called learning was not learning originally learning does not consist as the schools now make it consist in the knowledge of languages but in the knowledge of things to which language gives names the Greeks were learned people but learning with them did not consist in speaking Greek any more than a Romans speaking Latin or a Frenchman speaking French or an Englishman speaking English from what we know of the Greeks it does not appear that they knew or studied any language and this was one cause of their becoming so learned it afforded them more time to apply themselves to better studies the schools of the Greeks were schools of science and philosophy and not of languages and it is in the knowledge of the things that science and philosophy teach that learning consists almost all the scientific learning that now exists came to us from the Greeks of the Greek language it therefore became necessary for the people of other nations who spoke a different language that some among them should learn the Greek language in order that the learning the Greeks had might be made known in those nations by translating the Greek books of science and philosophy into the mother tongue of each nation to study therefore the Latin was no other than the drudgery business of a linguist and the language thus obtained was no other than the means as it were the tools employed to obtain the learning the Greeks had it made no part of the learning itself and was so distinct from it as to make it exceedingly probable that the persons who had studied Greek sufficiently to translate those works such for instance as Euclid's elements did not understand any of the learning of the works contained end of part nine this is the LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Steve Brown the age of reason by Thomas Paine part first section 10 as there is now nothing new to be learned from the dead languages all the useful books being already translated the languages are become useless and the time expended in teaching and learning them is wasted so far as the study of languages may contribute to the progress and communication of knowledge it has nothing to do with the creation of knowledge it is only in the living languages that new knowledge is to be found and certain it is that in general a youth will learn more of a living language in one year than of a dead language in seven and it is but seldom that the teacher knows much of it himself the difficulty of learning the dead languages will rise from any superior obstruceness in the languages themselves but in their being dead and the pronunciation entirely lost it would be the same thing with any other language when it becomes dead the best greek linguist that now exists does not understand greek so well as a grecian plowman did or a grecian milkmaid and the same for the latin compared with a plowman or milkmaid of the romans it would therefore be advantageous to the state of learning to abolish the study of the dead languages and to make learning consist as it originally did in scientific knowledge the apology that is sometimes made for continuing to teach the dead languages is that they are taught when a child is not capable of exerting any other mental faculty than that of memory but that is altogether erroneous the human mind has a natural disposition to scientific knowledge and to the things connected with it the first and favorite amusement of a child even before it begins to play is that of imitating the works of man it builds houses with cards or sticks it navigates the little ocean of a bowl of water with a paper boat or dams the stream of a gutter and contrides something which it calls a mill and it interests itself in the fate of its works with a care that resembles affection it afterwards goes to school where its genius is killed by the barren study of a dead language and the philosopher is lost in the linguist but the apology that is now made for continuing to teach the dead languages could not be the cause at first of cutting down learning to the narrow and humble sphere of linguistry the cause therefore must be sought for elsewhere in all researches of this kind the best evidence that can be produced is the eternal evidence the thing carries with itself and the evidence of circumstances that unite with it both of which in this case are not difficult to be discovered putting that aside as a matter of distinct consideration the outrage offered to the moral justice of God by supposing him to make the innocent suffer for the guilty and also the loose morality and low contrivance of supposing him to change himself into the shape of a man in order to make an excuse to himself for not executing his supposed sentence upon Adam putting I say those things aside as a matter of distinct consideration it is certain that what is called the Christian system of faith including in it the whimsical account of the creation the strange story of Eve the snake and the apple the ambiguous idea of a man god the corporeal idea of the death of a god the mythological idea of a family of gods and the Christian system of arithmetic that three are one and one is three all are irreconcilable not only to the divine gift of reason that God hath given to man but to the knowledge that man gains of the power and wisdom of God by the aid of the sciences and by studying the structure of the universe that God has made the setters up therefore and the advocates of the Christian system of faith could not but foresee that the continually progressive knowledge that man would gain by the aid of science of the power and wisdom of God manifested in the structure of the universe and in all the works of creation would militate against and call into question the truth of their system of faith and therefore it became necessary to their purpose to cut learning down to a size less dangerous to their project and this they affected by restricting the idea of learning to the dead study of dead languages they not only rejected the study of science out of the Christian schools but they persecuted it and it is only within about the last two centuries that the study has been revived so late as 1610 Galileo of Florentine discovered and introduced the use of telescopes and by applying them to observe the motions and appearances of the heavenly bodies afforded additional means for ascertaining the true structure of the universe instead of being esteemed for those discoveries he was sentenced or the opinions resulting from them as a damnable heresy and prior to that time the Gileus was condemned to be burned for asserting the antipodes or in other words that the earth was a globe inhabitable in every part where there was land yet the truth of this is now too well known even to be told if the belief of errors not morally bad did no mischief it would make no part of the moral duty of man to oppose and remove them there was no moral ill in believing the earth was flat like a trencher anymore than there was moral virtue in believing that it was round like a globe neither was there any moral ill in believing that their creator was no other world than this anymore than there was moral virtue in believing that he made millions and that the infinity of space is filled with worlds but when a system of religion is made to grow out of a supposed system of creation that is not true and to unite itself therewith in a manner almost inseparable therefrom the case assumes an entirely different ground it is that the errors not morally bad become fraught with the same mischiefs as if they were it is then that the truth though otherwise indifferent itself becomes an essential by becoming the criterion that either confirms by corresponding evidence or denies by contradictory evidence the reality of the religion itself in this view of the case it is the moral duty of man to obtain every possible evidence that the structure of the heavens or any other part of creation affords with respect to systems of religion but this the supporters or partisans of the Christian system as if dreading the result incessantly opposed and not only rejected the sciences but persecuted the professors had Newton or Descartes lived three or four hundred years ago and pursued their studies as they did it is most probable they would not have lived to finish them and had Franklin drawn lightning from the clouds at the same time it would have been at the hazard of expiring for it in the flames later times have laid all the blame upon the Goths and the Vandals but however unwilling the Christian system may be to believe or to acknowledge it it is nevertheless true that the age of ignorance commenced with the Christian system there was more knowledge in the world before that period than for many centuries afterwards and as to religious knowledge the Christian system as already said was only another species of mythology and the mythology to which it succeeded was a corruption of an ancient system of theism footnote it is impossible for us now to know at what time the heathen mythology began but it is certain from the internal evidence that it carries that it did not begin in the same state or condition in which it ended all the gods of that mythology except Saturn were of modern invention the supposed reign of Saturn was prior to that which is called the heathen mythology and was so far a species of theism that it admitted the belief of only one god Saturn is supposed to have abdicated the government in favor of his three sons and one daughter Jupiter, Pluto, Neptune and Juno after this thousands of other gods and demigods were imaginarily created and the calendar of gods increased as fast as the calendar of saints and the calendars of courts have increased since and a footnote all the corruptions that have taken place in theology and in religion have been produced by admitting of what man calls revealed religion and the priests pretended to more revealed religion than the Christians do they had their oracles and their priests who were supposed to receive and deliver the word of god verbally on almost all occasions since then all corruptions down from malloc to modern predestinarianism and the human sacrifices of the heathens to the Christian sacrifice by admitting of what is called revealed religion the most effectual means to prevent all such evils and impositions is not to admit of any other revelation than that which is manifested in the book of creation and to contemplate the creation as the only true and real word of god that ever did or ever will exist and that everything else called the word of god is fable and imposition