Seeing the logical force of this, he quibbles thus: "We do not say that God has intelligence, but that God is wisdom in form and love in essence, and therefore the infinite source of all intelligence." This will not do, Mr. "Rationalist!" It is entirely too vague. You must either contend for a personal or an impersonal God. Give us either Deism or Pantheism, and not an incongruous mixture, and then we will know on what ground to meet you. If you mean that God is simply the aggregate, or even the essence, of all intelligence, all love, all good, why this is a mere abstraction, and even an Atheist might accept it; but if you are contending for anything like the Christian's God, as set forth in the Bible, you will have to alter your definitions very materially.
As a specimen illustration of "Rationalist's" spiritual method of resolving Scriptural difficulties I give below his version of the story of Elisha, the children, and the bears, under the "rubbing off" process. We, Freethinkers, he says, will not "object to the bears" when we understand what the story means, and here is his elucidation, verbatim et literatim:—
"Elisha represents the external or literal words of Holy Writ on which the mantle of spiritual truth still rests. Children represent affections—don't fond mothers even yet call them 'little loves?'—They also correspond to the opposite, and so evil loves which destroy obedience to the external life of goodness, taught in, at least, some of the literal words of Scripture, naturally mock at the baldness of Elisha. Baldness, since it refers to the head, and the head corresponds to that union of will and intellect in man which rules, and is, the life, and ultimates in the very extreme of its very minute external, corresponds to the most external of the will and thought of Elisha, who represents the literal meaning of Scripture. So this incident means that evil loves could see no ultimate good to themselves in the doing of any good in a practical every-day way even where that was clearly enjoined, and rendered as beautiful externally as hair is, and therefore mocked at it, or rather at what seemed to them the lack of it. Then the bears, which correspond to the animal passions of the animal man, came out of the woods—woods correspond to the natural perceptions of natural truth in man—and utterly destroyed these evil loves out of the life. Again you see we find the same truth; that the Lord implants remains of goodness and truth in every degree of man's life, even in the natural man, fitted to cope with and conquer his evils, if man himself will but permit it."
There's a sample of "spiritual interpretation" for you! And what clearness is there, dear reader! Just return to the fourth sentence of the above extract, commencing with "Baldness," and re-read it, and see if you can make anything out of it. What the sentence does really mean is to me as profound a mystery as the incantations of a Gypsy thaumaturgist. It would be interesting to get "Rationalist" to try his hand at spiritualizing some of the following passages of Holy Writ:—
"In the same day shall the Lord shave with a razor that is hired," &c. "And it came to pass by the way in the inn, that the Lord met him" (Moses) "and sought to kill him." "I have seen God face to face." Per Contra: "No man hath seen God at any time." "I am the Lord, I change not, I will not go back, neither will I repent." Per Contra: "And God repented of the evil that he said he would do unto them, and he did it not." "There is no respect of persons with God." Per Contra: "Jacob have I loved, and Esau have I hated." "I am a jealous God, visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon the children." Per Contra: "The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father." "It is impossible for God to lie." Per Contra: "If the Prophet be deceived when he hath spoken a thing, I the Lord have deceived that Prophet." "Be not afraid of them that kill the body." Per Contra: "And after these things Jesus would not walk in Jewry, because the Jews sought to kill him." "And the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he moved David against them to say, 'Go number Israel.'" Per Contra: "And Satan provoked David to number Israel." "I bear witness of myself, yet my record is true." Per Contra: "If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true." "A man is not justified by the works of the law." Per Contra: "Ye see, then, how that by works a man is justified." "There shall no evil happen to the just." Per Contra: "All that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution." "Wisdom's ways are ways of pleasantness and all her paths are peace." Per Contra: "In much wisdom is much grief and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow." "It shall not be well with the wicked, neither shall he prolong his days." Per Contra: "Wherefore do the wicked live, become old, yea, are mighty in power." "Thou shalt not: commit adultery." Per Contra: "Then said the Lord unto me, 'Go get, love a woman, an adulteress.'"
Here, certainly, is ample scope for exegetical ingenuity. The passages quoted, besides scores of others, many of them too indecent for these pages, would seem to require the touch of "Rationalist's" spiritual interpretation wand. When the literal meaning is "rubbed off," the occult, spiritual meaning will appear.
As a sample of "Rationalist's" metaphysical philosophy I give the following:—
"Will and love are identical... Will or love is life. A man cannot think unless he wills to think; and he can only think that which he wills—only that and nothing more. He can only do what he wills and thinks. There is no action which is not the effect of will and its thought. A man wills in order to think," etc. He also tells us that God gave man a will "as free as His own." Matter is spoken of as "mere dead inert matter."
Is more evidence than this needed that "Rationalist" is living in the past, and has utterly failed to grasp modern thought? His philosophy is bad, but his metaphysics is worse. Any man who at this day attempts to "refute" Materialists should at least be somewhat acquainted with the results of modern thought and scientific research; but "Rationalist" has apparently advanced no further than the occult Swedenborgian mysticism of the last century. Further, to talk to-day of "dead inert matter," is to talk the language of an obsolete philosophy of the past; for modern science and philosophy alike agree that matter is not "that mere empty capacity which philosophers have pictured her to be, but the universal mother who brings forth all things as the fruit of her own womb." As Pope says:—
"See thro' this air, this ocean, and this earth, All matter quick and bursting into birth."