"Facts prove the contrary," maintained Hans Shund. "Millions of persons are moral who have no religious belief."
"That's an egregious mistake, sir," opposed the landholder. "The repudiation of a Supreme Being and the violent extinction of the idea of the Divinity in the breast are of themselves grave offences against moral conscience. I grant you that, in the eyes of the public, thousands of men pass for moral who have no faith in religion. But public opinion is anything but a criterion of certainty when the moral worth of a man is to be determined. A man's interior is a region which cannot be viewed by the eye of the public. You know yourselves that there are men who pass for honorable, moral, pure men, whose private habits are exceedingly filthy and corrupt."
Hans Shund's color turned a palish yellow; the eyes of the chieftains sank.
"Besides, gentleman, it would be labor lost to try to educate youth independently of religion. Man is by his very nature a religious being. It is useless to attempt to educate the young without a knowledge of God and of revealed religion; to be able to do so you would previously have to pluck out of their own breasts the sense of right and wrong, and out of their souls the idea of God, which are innate in both. Were the attempt made, however, believe me, gentlemen, the yearning after God, alive in the human breast, would soon impel the generation brought up independently of religion to seek after false gods. For this very reason we know of no people in history that did not recognize and worship some divinity, were it but a tree or a stone, that served them for an object of adoration. In my opinion, it would be far more indicative of genuine progress to adhere to the God of Christians, who is incontestably holy, just, omnipotent, and kind, whilst to return to the sacred oaks of ancient Germany or to adopt the fetichism of uncivilized tribes would be a most monstrous reaction, the most degrading barbarism."
The chieftains looked nonplussed. Earnest thinking and investigation upon subjects pertaining to religion were not customary among the disciples of progress. They looked upon religion as something so common and trivial that anybody was free to argue upon and condemn it with a few flippant or smart sayings; But the millionaire was now disclosing views so new and vast, that their weak vision was completely dazzled, and their steps upon the unknown domain became unsteady.
Mr. Seicht, observing the embarrassment of the leaders, felt it his duty to hasten to their relief. His polemical weapons were drawn from the armory of bureaucracy.
"The progressive development of humanity," said Mr. Seicht, "has revealed an admirable substitute for all religious ideas. A state well organized can exist splendidly without any religion. Nay, I do not hesitate to maintain that religion is a drawback to the development of the modern state, and that, therefore, the state should have nothing whatever to do with religion. An invisible world should not exert an influence upon a state--the wants of the times are the only rule to be consulted."
"What do you understand by a state, sir?" asked the millionaire.
"A state," replied the official, "is a union of men whose public life is regulated by laws which every individual is bound to observe."
"You speak of laws; upon what basis are these laws founded?"