“ ‘Do you not claim that the Bible teaches that God has provedhis power to make mind perfect by creating angels and Adam with perfect minds, and at the same time, as a penalty for the sin of the first parent, has made such a constitution of things, that every human mind comes into existence with a ruined and depraved nature, that never can, or never will, act right till God re-creates it, while as yet, for the great mass of mankind, he never remedies this wrong?
“ ‘Do you not claim that the Bible teaches that no human being has any right and acceptable feelings or actions till God thus re-creates the mind?
“ ‘If the Bible does teach thus, we can find a nobler Creator and more perfect system of religion by the light of nature without any [pg 310]revelation at all, while the God of the Bible, by its own showing, is proved unworthy of confidence as a teacher of the way to virtue and happiness.’
“Pressed by these questions, I have searched the Bible in vain to find any such doctrines in its pages. I find nothing of the kind, and so I acknowledge that I have been in the wrong, and relinquish the Augustinian dogma in which I have been educated, as unsupported either by reason or revelation; and first privately and then publicly ask for any evidence to sustain it.
“I come before the public, not as a teacher of metaphysics or theology, but as an inquirer for the truth. I state, as nearly as I am able, the difficulties I have met, and take every possible method to avoid mistake and misrepresentation in regard to the opinions of both those with whom I agree and those from whom I differ.
“I assume that theology is capable of improvement; that Protestant divines are no more infallible than Catholic; that a humble and teachable spirit is the distinctive mark of a Christian teacher; and that the courage and manliness that can acknowledge mistakes is not only more Christian, but even in the eye of the world, is more honorable and dignified than any assumption of infallibility, however well sustained.
“In publicly meeting such an amount of talent, learning, and influence as seems now to be arrayed against me, I deem that it in no way implies a presumptuous or self-confident spirit. I concede that many of those I thus meet are my equals or superiors in natural abilities, and certainly all are so in learning. I believe also they are men of conscientious integrity, and that, probably, most of them, would go to the stake rather than knowingly to sacrifice their allegiance to truth, duty, and God. And I believe that if I have any special mission in this matter, it is to illustrate the truth that common sense, without any unusual talents or learning, united to a sincere desire to learn and to obey the truth, are sufficient for all men and all women, in all important decisions for this life, and as much so for the life to come.
“Nor do I regard this as a resort to old and unpractical meta-physical abstrusities. It rather involves that great practical question of life, before which all others fade into nothingness—that question which meets every parent and every teacher for every [pg 311]child—which meets every human being, as in sorrow, or disappointment, or sickness, or death, the soul asks from its Creator help and guidance for the dread and eternal future. Instead of leading to metaphysical and theological abstrusities, my hope is to entice from their dark and sorrowful mazes to the plain and cheerful path of common sense.
“The great question involved is, have the people a reliable revelation from the Creator in the Bible, and are they qualified to decide what are its true teachings on that great question of life, ‘What must we do to be saved?’
“And at the same time, the great practical question for my sex is no less at issue, ‘How are we best to train the mind of childhood to virtue and eternal happiness?’ These questions surely are capable of being, and should be, discussed in the language of the common people, and not in those scholastic and metaphysical terms which they can not, and will not seek to comprehend.