 section 16 of three essays on religion this is a LibriVox recording or LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org three essays on religion by John Stuart Mill theism section 8 it will be said however that if these be violations of law then law is violated every time that an outward effect is produced by voluntary act of human being human volition is constantly modifying natural phenomena not by violating their laws but by using their laws why may not divine volition do the same the power of volition over phenomena is itself a law and one of the earliest known and acknowledged laws of nature it is true that human will exercises power over objects in general indirectly through the direct power which it possesses only over the human muscles God however has direct power not merely over one thing but over all the objects which he has made there is therefore no more a supposition of violation of law and supposing that events are produced prevented or modified by God's action then in the supposition of their being produced prevented or modified by man's action both are equally in the course of nature both equally consistent with what we know of the government of all things by law those who thus argue are mostly believers in free will and maintain that every human volition originates a new chain of causation of which it is itself the commencing link not connected by invariable sequence with any interior fact even therefore if a design interposition did constitute a breaking in upon the connected chain of events by the introduction of a new originating cause without root in the past this would be no reason for discrediting it since every human act of volition does precisely the same if the one is a breach of law so are the others in fact the reign of law does not extend to the origination of volition those who dispute the free will theory and regard volition as no exception to the universal law of cause and effect may answer that volitions do not interrupt the chain of causation but carried on the connection of cause and effect being of just the same nature between motive and act as between a combination of physical intercedence and physical consequence but this whether true or not does not really affect the argument for the interference of human will with the course of nature is only not an exception to law when we include among laws the relation of motive to volition and by the same rule interference by the divine will would not be an exception either since we cannot but suppose the deity and every one of his acts to be determined by motives the alleged analogy therefore holds good but what it proves is only what I have from the first maintained that divine intervention was nature could be proved if we had the same sort of evidence for it which we have for human interference the question of antecedent and probability only arises because divine into position is not certified by the direct evidence of perception but is always matter of inference and more or less of speculative inference and a little consideration will show that in these circumstances the antecedent presumption against the truth of the inference is extremely strong when the human will interferes to produce any physical phenomenon except the movements of the human body it does so by the employment of means and is obliged to employ such means as by their own physical properties sufficient to bring about the effect to find interference by hypothesis proceeds in a different manner from this it produces its effect without means or with such as iron themselves and sufficient in the first case all the physical phenomena except the first bodily movement are produced in strict conformity to physical causation while the first movement is treated by positive observation to the cause the volition which produced it in the other case the event is supposed not to have been produced at all through physical causation while there is no direct evidence to connect it with any volition the ground on which it is ascribed to a volition is only negative because there is no other apparent way of accounting for its existence but in this merely speculative explanation there is always another hypothesis possible this that the event may have been produced by physical causes in a manner not apparent it may either be due to a law of physical nature not yet known or to the unknown presence of the conditions necessary for producing it according to some known law supposing even that the event supposed to be miraculous does not reach us through the uncertain medium of human testimony but rests on the direct evidence of our own senses even then so long as there is no direct evidence of its production by divine volition like that we have from the production of bodily movements by human volitions so long therefore as the miraculous character of the event is but an inference from the supposed inadequacy of the laws of physical nature to account for it so long the hypothesis of a natural origin from the phenomenon be entitled to preference over that of supernatural one the commonest principle of sound judgment forbid us to suppose from any effects the cause of which we have absolutely no experience unless all those of which we have experience are ascertained to be absent now there are a few things of which we have more frequent experience than a physical facts which our knowledge does not enable us to account for because they depend either on laws which observation aided by science has not yet brought to light or on facts the presence of which in the particular case is unsuspected by us accordingly when we hear of a prodigy we always in these modern times believe that if it really occurred it was neither the work of God nor of a demon but the consequence of some unknown natural law or of some hidden fact nor is either of these suppositions precluded when as in the case of a miracle properly so called the wonderful event seem to depend upon the will of a human being it is always possible that there may be at work some undetected law of nature which the wonder worker may have acquired consciously unconsciously the power of calling into action or that the wonder may have been wrought as in the truly extraordinary feats of jugglers by the employment unperceived by us of ordinary laws which also need not be a case of voluntary deception or lastly the event may have had no connection with the volition at all but the coincidence between them may be the effect of craft or accident the miracle worker having seemed or affected to produce by his will that which was already about to take place as if one were to command an eclipse of the sun at the moment they one knew by astronomy that an eclipse was on the point of taking place in a case of this description the miracle might be tested by a challenge to repeat it but it is worthy of remark that recorded miracles were seldom or never put to this test no miracle worker seemed ever to have made a practice of raising the dead that and the other most signal of the miraculous operations are reported to have been performed only in one or a few isolated cases which may have been either cunningly selected cases or accidental coincidences there is in short nothing to exclude the supposition that every alleged miracle was due to natural causes and as long as that supposition remains possible no scientific observer and no man of ordinary practical judgment would assume by conjecture a cause which no reason existed for supposing to be real save the necessity of accounting for something which is sufficiently accounted for without it were we to stop here the case against miracles might seem to be complete but on further inspection it will be seen that we cannot from the above considerations conclude absolutely that the miraculous theory of the production of a phenomenon ought to be at once rejected we can conclude only that no extraordinary powers which have ever been alleged to be exercised by any human being over nature can be evidence of miraculous gifts to anyone to whom the existence of a supernatural being and his interference in human affairs is not already a vericulza the existence of God cannot possibly be proved by miracles for unless a God is already recognized the apparent miracle can always be accounted for on a more probable hypothesis than that of the interference of a being of whose very existence it is supposed to be the sole evidence thus far huge argument is conclusive but it is far from being equally so when the existence of a being who created the present order of nature and therefore may well be thought to have power to modify it is accepted as a fact or even as a probability resting on independent evidence once admit a God and the production by his direct volition of an effect which in any case owed its origin to his creative will is no longer a purely arbitrary hypothesis to account for the fact but must be reckoned with as a serious possibility the question then changes its character and the decision of it must now rest upon what is known or reasonably surmised as to the manner of God's government of the universe whether this knowledge or surmise makes it the more probable supposition that the event was brought about by the agencies by which his government is ordinarily carried on or that it is the result of a special and extraordinary interposition of his will and supposition of those ordinary agencies in the first place then assuming as a fact the existence and providence of God the whole of our observation of nature proves to us by incontrovertible evidence that the rule of his government is by means of that all facts or at least all physical facts follow uniformly upon given physical principles and never occur but when the appropriate collection of physical conditions is realised I limit the assertion to physical facts in order to leave the case of human volition and open question though indeed I need not do so for if the human will is free it has been left free by the creator and is not controlled by him either through second causes or directly so that not being governed it is not a specimen of his mode of government whatever he does govern he governs by second causes this was not obvious in the infancy of science it was more and more recognised as the processes of nature were more carefully and accurately examined until there now remains no class of phenomena of which it is not positively known save some cases from their obscurity and complication our scientific processes have not yet been able completely to clear up and disentangle and in which therefore the proofs that they are governed by natural laws could not in the present state of science be more complete the evidence though merely negative which these circumstances afford that government by second causes is universal is admitted for all except directly religious purposes to be conclusive when either a man of science for scientific or a man of the world for practical purposes inquires into an event he asks himself what is a cause and not has it any natural cause a man would be laughed at who set down as one of the alternative supposition that there is no other cause for it than the will of god against this weight of negative evidence we have to set such positive evidence as is produced in attestation of exceptions in other words the positive evidences of miracles and I have already admitted that this evidence might conceivably have been such as to make the exception equally certain with the rule if we had the direct testimony of our senses to a supernatural fact it might be as completely authenticated and made certain as any natural one but we never have the supernatural character of the fact is always as I have said a matter of inference and speculation and the mystery always admits the possibility of a solution not supernatural to those who already believe in supernatural power the supernatural hypothesis may appear more probable than the natural one but only if it accords with what we know or reasonably submised respecting the way of the supernatural agent now all that we know from the evidence of nature concerning his ways is in harmony with the natural theory and repugnant to the supernatural there is therefore a vast preponderance of probability against a miracle to counter balance which would require a very extraordinary and indisputable congruity in the supposed miracle and its circumstances with something which we conceive ourselves to know or to have grounds for believing with regards to the divine attributes this extraordinary congruity is supposed to exist when the purpose of the miracle is extremely beneficial to mankind as when it serves to accredit some highly important belief the goodness of God it is supposed affords a high degree of antecedent probability that he would make an exception to his general rule of government for so excellent a purpose for reasons however which have already been entered into any inference drawn by us from the goodness of God to what he has or has not actually done is to the last degree precarious if we reason directly from God's goodness to positive facts no misery no vice nor crime ought to exist in the world we can see no reason in God's goodness why if he deviated once from the ordinary system of his government in order to do good to man he should not have done so on a hundred other occasions nor why if the benefit aimed at by some given deviation such as the revelation of Christianity is transcendent and unique that precious gift should only have been vouchsafed after the lapse of many ages or why when it was at last given the evidence of it should have been left open to so much doubt and difficulty let it be remembered also that the goodness of God affords no presumption in favour of a deviation from his general system of government unless the good purpose could not have been attained without deviation if God intended that mankind should receive Christianity or any other gift it would have agreed better with all that we know of his government to have made provisions in the scheme of creation for its arising at the appointed time by natural development which let it be added all the knowledge we now possess concerning the history of the human mind tends to the conclusion that it actually did to all these considerations ought to be added the extremely imperfect nature of the testimony itself which we possess for the miracles real is supposed which accompanied the foundation of Christianity and of every other revealed religion taken at the best it is the uncross examined testimony of extremely ignorant people credulous as such usually are honorably credulous when the excellence of the doctrine or just reverence for the teacher makes them eager to believe and accustomed to draw the line between the perception of sense and what is super induced upon them by the suggestions of a lively imagination unversed in the difficult out of deciding between appearances and reality and between the natural and the supernatural in times moreover when no one thought it worthwhile to contradict any alleged miracle because it was the belief of the age that miracles in themselves proved nothing since they could be worked by a lying spirit as well as by the spirit of God such were the witnesses and even of them we do not possess the direct testimony the documents of date on subsequent even on the orthodox theory which contains the only history of those events very often do not even name the supposed eyewitnesses they put down it is but just to admit the best and least absurd of the wonderful stories such multitudes of which were current among the early Christians but when they do exceptionally name any of the persons who were the subjects or spectators of the miracle they doubtless draw from tradition and mention those names with which the story was in the popular mind perhaps accidentally connected for whoever has observed the way in which even now a story grows up from some small foundation taking on additional details at every step knows well how from being at first anonymous it gets names attached to it the name of someone by whom perhaps the story has been told being brought into the story itself first as a witness and still later as a party concerned there's also notable and is a very important consideration that stories of miracles only grow up among the ignorant and are adopted if ever by the educated when they have already become the belief of multitudes those which are believed by Protestants all originate in ages and nations in which there was hardly any canon of probability and miracles were thought to be among the commonest of all phenomena the Catholic Church indeed holds as an article of faith that miracles have never ceased and new ones continue to be now and then brought forth and believed even in the present incredulous age yet if in an incredulous generation certainly not among the incredulous portion of it but always among people who in addition to the most childish ignorance have grown up as all do who are educated by the Catholic clergy trained in the persuasion that it is the duty to believe and a sin to doubt that it is dangerous to be skeptical about anything which has tended for belief in the name of the true religion and that nothing is so contrary to piety as incredulity for these miracles which no one but a Roman Catholic and by no means every Roman Catholic believes rest frequently upon an amount of testimony greatly surpassing that which we possess for any of the early miracles and superior especially in one of the most essential points that in many cases the alleged eyewitnesses are known and we have their story at first hand thus then stands the balance of evidence and respect government of God to be proved by other evidence on the one side the great negative presumption arising from the whole of what the course of nature discloses to us of the divine government as carried on through second causes and by imbearable sequences of physical effects upon constant antecedents on the other side a few exceptional instances are tested by evidence not of a character to warrant belief in any effects in the smallest degree unusual or improbable the eyewitnesses in most cases unknown and non-competent by character or education discrimination the real nature of the appearances which they may have seen and moved moreover by a union of the strongest motives which can inspire human beings to persuade first themselves and then others that what they had seen was a miracle note simple the only known exception to the ignorance and want of education of the first generation of Christians attests no miracle but that of his own conversion which of all the miracles of the new testament is the one which admits are the easiest explanation for natural causes the facts too even if faithfully reported are never incompatible with the supposition that they were either more coincidences or were produced by natural means even when no specific conjecture can be made as to those means which in general it can the conclusion i draw is that miracles have no claim whatever toward the character of historical facts and are wholly invalid as evidences of any revelation what can be said with truth and on the side of miracles amounts only to this considering that the order of nature affords some evidence of the reality of a creator and of his bearing good will to his creatures though not of it being his sole prompter of his conduct towards them considering again that all the evidence of his existence is evidence also that he is not all powerful and considering that in our ignorance of the limits of his power we cannot positively decide that he was able to provide for us by the original plan of creation all the good which had entered into his intentions to bestow upon us or even to bestow any part of it at any earlier period than that at which we actually received it considering these things when we consider further that a gift extremely precious came to us which though facilitated was not apparently necessitated by what had gone before but was due as far as appearances go to the peculiar mental and moral endowments of one man and that man openly proclaimed that it did not come from himself but from God through him then we are entitled to say that there is nothing so inherently impossible or absolutely incredible in this supposition is to preclude anyone from hoping that it may perhaps be true i say from hoping i go no further or i cannot attach any evidentiary value to the testimony even of christ on such a subject since he has never said to have declared any evidence of his mission unless his own interpretations of the prophecies be so considered except internal conviction and everybody knows that in pre-scientific times men always suppose that any unusual faculty which came to them they knew not how were an inspiration from God the best men always being the radius to ascribe any honorable peculiarity in themselves to that higher source rather than their own merits end of theism section eight recording by sunny shields doha state of kata june 2011 section 17 of three essays on religion this is a libravox recording all libravox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libravox dot org this recording by hearhis.com three essays on religion by john steward mill theism section nine part five general result from the result of the preceding examination of the evidences of theism and theism being presupposed of the evidences of any revelation it follows that the rational attitude of a thinking mind towards the supernatural whether in natural or in revealed religion is that of skepticism as distinguished from belief on the one hand and from atheism on the other including in the present case under atheism the negative as well as the positive form of disbelief in a god that is not only the dogmatic denial of his existence but the denial that there is any evidence on either side which for most practical purposes amounts to the same thing as if the existence of a god had been disproved if we are right in the conclusions to which we have been led by the preceding inquiry there is evidence but insufficient for proof and amounting only to one of the lower degrees of probability the indication given by such evidence as there is points to the creation not indeed of the universe but of the present order of it by an intelligent mind whose power over the materials was not absolute whose love for his creatures was not his soul actuating inducement but who nevertheless desired their good the notion of a providential government by an omnipotent being for the good of his creatures must be entirely dismissed even of the continued existence of the creator we have no other guarantee than that he cannot be subject to the law of death which affects terrestrial beings since the conditions that produce this liability wherever it is known to exist are of his creating that this being not being omnipotent may have produced a machinery fallen short of his intentions and which may require the occasional interposition of the maker's hand is a supposition not in itself absurd nor impossible though in none of the cases in which such interposition is believed to have occurred is the evidence such as could possibly prove it it remains a simple possibility which those may dwell on to whom it yields comfort to suppose that blessings which ordinary human power is inadequate to attain may come not from extraordinary human power but from the bounty of an intelligence beyond the human and which continuously cares for man the possibility of a life after death rest on the same footing of a boon which this powerful being who wishes well to man may have the power to grant and which if the message alleged to have been sent by him was really sent he has actually promised the whole domain of the supernatural is thus removed from the region of belief and in that for anything we can see it is likely always to remain for we can hardly anticipate either that any positive evidence will be acquired of the direct agency of divine benevolence in human destiny or that any reason will be discovered for considering the realization of human hopes on that subject as beyond the pale of possibility it is now to be considered whether the indulgence of hope in a region of imagination merely in which there is no prospect that any probable grounds of expectation will ever be obtained is irrational and ought to be discouraged as a departure from the rational principle of regulating our feelings as well as opinions strictly by evidence this is a point which different thinkers are likely for a long time at least to decide differently according to their individual temperament the principles which ought to govern the cultivation and the regulation of the imagination which a view on the one hand of preventing it from disturbing the rectitude of the intelligent and the right direction of the actions and will and on the other hand of employing it as a power for increasing the happiness of life and giving elevation to the character are a subject which has never yet engaged the serious consideration of philosophers though some opinion on it is implied in almost all modes of thinking on human character and education and I expect that this will hereafter be regarded as a very important branch of study for practical purposes and the more in proportion as the weakening of positive beliefs respecting states of existence superior to the human leaves the imagination of higher things less provided with material from the domain of supposed reality to me it seems that human life small and confined as it is and as considering merely in the present it is likely to remain even when the progress of material and moral improvement may have freed it from the greater part of its present calamities stands greatly in need of any wider range and greater height of aspiration for itself and its destination which the exercise of imagination can yield to it without running counter to the evidence of fact and that it is a part of wisdom to make the most of any even small probabilities on the subject which furnace imagination with any footing to support itself upon and I am satisfied that the cultivation of such a tendency in the imagination provided it goes on paripaso with the cultivation of severe reason has no necessary tendency to pervert the judgment but that it is possible to form a perfectly sober estimate of the evidences on both sides of a question and yet to let the imagination dwell by preference on those possibilities which are at once the most comforting and the most improving without in the least degree overrating the solidarity of the grounds for expecting that these rather than any others will be the possibilities actually realized though this is not in the number of the practical maxims handed down by tradition and recognized as rules for the conduct of life a great part of the happiness of life depends upon the tacit observance of it what for instance is the meaning of that which is always accounted one of the chief blessings of life a cheerful disposition what but the tendency either from constitution or habit to dwell chiefly on the brighter side of the present and of the future if every aspect whether agreeable or odious of everything ought to occupy exactly the same place in our imagination which it fills in fact and therefore ought to fill in our deliberate reason what we call a cheerful disposition would be but one of the forms of folly on par except in agreeableness with the opposite disposition in which the gloomy and painful view of all things is habitually predominant but it is not found in practice that those who take life cheerfully are less alive to rational prospects of evil or danger and more careless of making do provision against them than other people the tendency is rather the other way for a hopeful disposition gives a spur to the faculties and keeps all the active energies in good working order when imagination and reason receive each of its appropriate culture they do not succeed in usurping each other's prerogatives it is not necessary for keeping up our conviction that we must die that we should be always brooding over death it is far better that we should think no further about what we cannot possibly avert than is required for observing the rules of prudence in regard to our own life and that of others and fulfilling whatever duties devolve upon us in contemplation of the inevitable event the way to secure this is not to think perpetually of death but to think perpetually of our duties and the rule of life the true rule of practical wisdom is not that of making all the aspects of things equally predominant in our habitual contemplations but of giving the greatest prominence to those of their aspects which depend on or can be modified by our own conduct in things which do not depend on us it is not solely for the sake of a more enjoyable life that the habit is desirable of looking at things and at mankind by preference on their pleasant side it is also in order that we may be able to love them better and work with more heart for their improvement to what purpose indeed should we feed our imagination with the unlovely aspect of persons and things all unnecessary dwelling upon the evils of life is at best a useless expenditure of nervous force and when I say unnecessary I mean all that is not necessary either in the sense of being unavoidable or in that of being needed for the permanence of our duties and for preventing our sense of the reality of those evils from becoming speculative and dim but if it is often waste of strength to dwell on the evils of life on its meannesses and basenesses it is necessary to be aware of them but to live in their contemplation makes it scarcely possible to keep up oneself a higher tone of mind the imagination and feelings become tuned to a lower pitch degrading instead of elevating associations become connected with the daily objects and incidences of life and give their color to the thoughts just as associations of sensuality due to those who indulge freely in that sort of contemplations men often have felt what it is to have had their imaginations corrupted by one class of ideas and I think they must have felt with the same kind of pain how the poetry is taken out of the things fullest of it by mean associations as when a beautiful air that had been associated with highly poetical words is heard sung with trivial and vulgar ones all these things are said to be mere illustration of the principle that in the regulation of the imagination literal truth of facts is not the only thing to be considered truth is the province of reason and it is by the cultivation of the rational faculty that provision is made for its being known always and thought of as often as is required by duty and the circumstances of human life but when the reason is strongly cultivated the imagination may safely follow its own end and do its best to make life pleasant and lovely inside the castle in reliance on the fortifications raised and maintained by reason around the outward bounds on these principles it appears to me that the indulgence of hope with regard to the government of the universe and the destiny of man after death while we recognize as a clear truth that we have no ground for more than a hope is legitimate and philosophically defensible the beneficial effect of such a hope is far from trifling it makes life and human nature a far greater thing to the feelings and gives greater strength as well as greater solemnity to all the sentiments which are awakened in us by our fellow creatures and by mankind at large it allays the sense that irony of nature which is so painfully felt when we see the exertions sacrifices of life culminating in the formation of a wise and noble mind only to disappear from the world when the time has just arrived at which the world seems about to begin reaping the benefit of it the truth that life is short and art is long is from of old one of the most discouraging parts of our condition this hope admits the possibility that the art employed in improving and beautifying the soul itself may avail for good in some other life even when seemingly useless for this but the benefit consists less in the presence of any specific hope than in the enlargement of the general scale of the feelings the loftier aspirations being no longer in the same degree checked and kept down by a sense of the insignificance of human life by the disastrous feeling of not worthwhile the gain obtained in the increased inducement to cultivate the improvement of character up to the end of life is obvious without being specified there is another and a most important exercise of imagination which in the past and present has been kept up principally by means of religious belief and which is infinitely precious to mankind so much so that human excellence greatly depends upon the sufficiency of the provision made for it this consists of the familiarity of the imagination with the conception of a morally perfect being and the habit of taking the probation of such a being as the norma or standard to which to refer and buy which to regulate our own characters and lives this idealization of our standard of excellence in a person is quite possible even when that person is conceived as merely imaginary but religion since the birth of christianity has inculcated the belief that our highest conceptions of combined wisdom and goodness exist in the concrete of a living being who has his eyes on us and cares for our good though the darkest and most corrupt periods of christianity has raised this torch on high has kept this object of veneration and imitation before the eyes of man true the image of perfection has been most imperfect and in many respects a perverting and corrupting one not only from the low moral ideas of the times but from the mass of moral contradictions which the deluded worshiper was compelled to swallow by the supposed necessity for contemplating the good principle with the possession of infinite power but it is one of the most universal as well as the most surprising characteristics of human nature and one of the most speaking proofs of the low stage to which the reason of mankind at large has ever yet advanced that they are capable of overlooking any amount of either moral or intellectual contradictions and receiving into their minds propositions utterly inconsistent with one another not only without being shocked by the contradiction but without preventing both the contradictory beliefs from producing a part at least of their natural consequences of the mind pious men and women have gone on ascribing to god particular acts and a general course of will and conduct incompatible with even the most ordinary and limited conception of moral goodness and have had their own ideas of morality in many important particulars totally warped and distorted and notwithstanding this have continued to conceive their god as clothed with all the attributes of the highest ideal goodness which their state of mind enabled them to conceive and have had their aspirations toward goodness stimulated and encouraged by that conception and it cannot be questioned that the undoubting belief of the real existence of a being who realizes our own best ideas of perfection and of our being in the hands of that being as the ruler of the universe gives an increase of force to these feelings beyond what they can receive from reference to a merely ideal conception this particular advantage it is not possible for those to enjoy who take a rational view of the nature and amount of the evidence for the existence and attributes of the creator on the other hand they are not encumbered with the moral contradictions which beset every form of religion which aims at justifying in a moral point of view the whole government of the world they are therefore enabled to form a far truer and more consistent conception of ideal goodness than is possible to anyone who thinks it necessary to find ideal goodness in an onipotent ruler of the world the power of the creator once recognized as limited there is nothing to disprove the supposition that his goodness is complete and that the ideally perfect character in whose likeness we should wish to form ourselves and to those supposed appropriation we refer our actions may have a real existence in a being to whom we owe all such good as we enjoy above all the most valuable part of the effect on the character which christianity has produced by holding up a divine person a standard of excellence and a model of for imitation is available even to the absolute unbeliever and can never more be lost to humanity for it is christ rather than god whom christianity has held up to believers as the pattern of perfection for humanity it is the god incarnate more than the god of the jews or of nature who being idealized has taken so great and salutory a hold on the modern mind and whatever else may be taken away from us by rational criticism christ is still left a unique figure not more unlike all his precursors than all his followers even those who had the direct benefit of his personal teaching it is of no use to say that christ as exhibited in the gospels is not historical and that we know not how much of what is admirable has been super added by the tradition of his followers the tradition of followers suffices to insert any number of marvels and may have inserted all the miracles which he is reputed to have wrought but who among his disciples or among their proselytes was capable of inventing the sayings ascribed to jesus or of imagining the life and character revealed in the gospels certainly not the fishermen of gallilee as certainly not st paul whose character and idiosyncrasies were of a totally different sort still lest the early christian writers in whom nothing is more evident than that the good which was in them was all derived as they always professed that it was derived from the higher source what could be added and interpolated by a disciple we may see in the mystical parts of the gospel of st john matter imported from philo and the alexandrian platinist and put into the mouth of the savior in long speeches about himself such as the other gospels contain not the slightest vestige of though pretended to have been delivered on occasions of the deepest interest and when his principal followers were all present most prominently at the last supper the east was full of men who could have stolen any quantity of this poor stuff as the multitudinous oriental sex of afterwards did but about the life and sayings of jesus there is a stamp of personal originality combined with profundity of insight which if we abandon the idle expectation of finding scientific precision where something very different was aimed at must place the prophet of nazareth even in the estimation of those who have no belief in his inspiration in the very first rank of the men of sublime genius of whom our species can boast when this preeminent genius is combined with the qualities of probably the greatest moral reformer and martyr to that mission whoever existed upon earth religion cannot be said to have made a bad choice in pitching on this man as the ideal representative and guide of humanity nor even now would it be easy even for an unbeliever to find a better translation of the rule of virtue from the abstract into the concrete than to endeavor so to live that christ would approve our life when to this we add that to the conception of the rational skeptic it remains a possibility that christ actually was what he supposed himself to be not god for he never made the smallest pretension to that character and would probably have thought such a pretension as blasphemous as it seemed to the men who condemned him but a man charged with a special express and unique commission from god to lead mankind to truth and virtue we may well conclude that the inferences of religion on the character which will remain after rational criticism has done its utmost against the evidences of religion are well worth preserving and that what they lack in direct strength as compared with those of a firmer belief is more than compensated by the greater truth and rectitude of the morality they sanction impressions such as these though not in themselves amounting to what can properly be called a religion seem to me excellently fitted to aid and fortify that real though purely human religion which sometimes calls itself the religion of humanity and sometimes that of duty to the other inducements for cultivating a religious devotion to our welfare and our fellow creatures as an obligatory limit to every selfish aim and an end for the direct promotion of which no sacrifice can be too great it super ads the feeling that in making this the rule of our life we may be cooperating with the unseen being to whom we owe all that is enjoyable in life one elevated feeling this form of religious idea admits of which is not open to those who believe in the omnipotence of the good principle in the universe the feeling of helping god of requiting the good he has given by a voluntary cooperation which he not being omnipotent really needs and by which a somewhat near approach may be made to the fulfillment of his purposes the conditions of human existence are highly favorable to the growth of such a feeling in as much as a battle is constantly going on in which the humblest human creature is not incapable of taking some part between the powers of good and those of evil and in which every even the smallest help to the right side has its value in promoting the very slow and often almost insensible progress by which good is gradually gaining ground from evil yet gaining it so visibly at considerable intervals as to promise the very distant but not uncertain final victory of good to do something during life on even the humblest scale if nothing more is within reach towards bringing this consummation ever so little near is the most animating and invigorating thought which can inspire a human creature and that it is destined with or without supernatural sanctions to be the religion of the future I cannot entertain a doubt but it appears to me that supernatural hopes and the degree and kind in which what I have called rational skepticism does not refuse to sanction them may still contribute not a little to give to this religion its due ascendancy over the human mind end of theism section nine recorded by hearhis.com end of three essays on religion by john steward mill