To Infidelity and Back

by Henry F. Lutz

Mr. Orthodox—If you are through, Mr. Freethinker, I will now continue. But I must consider myself your opponent as well as Mr. Liberal's. In the first place, I must admit that you are thoroughly consistent with yourself as far as you go. But, my dear fellow, where does your consistency lead you to? You claim to be a freethinker, and yet you conclude that you are an entire slave and even think as you do because you cannot help it.

I stated at the beginning of my reply to Mr. Liberal that many religious facts must be accepted without thoroughly understanding them, and claimed that it is reasonable to so accept them. I will now endeavor to explain myself more fully. It seems to me that if anything has been proven, it is that our logical reason is not always a safe guide. For example, we cannot conceive of an end to divisibility of space; and therefore we cannot conceive how we can reach a given point. Now, practice gives the lie to this conclusion, and if some rationalist should follow his reason here, he would conclude that he can never get a piece of food into his mouth; or, in other words, the logical conclusion would lead to starvation. I know that some will deny this as a logical conclusion to get out of the difficulty. But I could never see it as otherwise than logical, and I have a goodly list of thinkers who have reached the same conclusion before me. Again, it is admitted by all thinkers of all ages that our reason tells us that there cannot be existence without beginning, or, on the other hand, there can be no beginning of existence without something existing before to cause its existence.

The conclusion is that inconceivability is not an infallible proof of the absence of a fact, and that we must follow our experience even if it conflicts with our reason. This is what we claim to do in religion. Whether experience is the sole source of knowledge is a question we need not discuss here. It is certainly the only safe method in most things. For example, I wish to know what will cure a certain disease. Suppose that I find a medicine that has cured every case in which it has been administered. Would it not be irrational for me to refuse to use that medicine because I cannot conceive how it effects the cure? Of course it might be possible that the medicine did not effect the cure; that it was the belief in its curative power that produced the effect. Cases have frequently occurred where a thing was for a long time believed to be the cause, while future investigation proved that it was some other attendant circumstance that was the real cause. But if our experience is that a given medicine cures a certain disease invariably, and that no other known medicine will cure it, we would be foolish not to use that medicine. The same is true in religion. If we wish to accomplish certain results and we have found a way in which those desirable results can be brought about, and know of no other way to bring them about; it would be irrational not to adopt that way, or follow out the requirements of that theory. I told you, Mr. Liberal, that your theory or doctrine was too simple. This is still more true of our friend, Mr. Freethinker. You claim to hold very broad, liberal and enlightened views. But although they are broad, they are not deep enough. They are stretched out over the surface merely, and thus hide from your view the great ocean of reality below. Yes, you have an abundance of light, but not enough heat. In the polar regions they have six months of light in one stretch, but no one would think of starting a garden there, as there is not enough heat. To the cold reason of some bachelor it is perfectly clear and indisputable that the young lover is a deluded fool and should follow his reason by never marrying. But I fondly believe that young lover sees the true worth of one human soul, and gives us an idea of the worth we shall see in all souls when we shall cease to see through a glass darkly. As the bachelor does not touch the reality in his case, so I believe that our friend, Mr. Freethinker, does not touch the great ocean of reality in religion. We are convinced by experience that man is free, and that nevertheless eternal causation does exist. We believe these to be two co-ordinate truths and we are willing to wait until we can solve the mystery; but in the meantime we wish to make use of the practical belief in both truths. People are convinced that there is a God who deals out exact justice; yet they are also convinced from experience that there is a God who is love who forgives the penitent sinner. That one God can possess both of these qualities seems as impossible as that three Gods can be in one God. And yet people are convinced that no other theory will explain their complex experiences, and that living according to no other theory will enable them to get the desirable results that they know from experience that they do get. They may be mistaken; but it will be time enough to consider that when some one has a theory that will account better for all their various experiences. Well, you see my point and I shall apply it no further. You see it is simply the principle that the empirical school of philosophy claims to employ, but which many of them employ only in the physical realm and fail to carry into the spiritual or religious realm. They must admit that religious convictions are and have been among the strongest, if not the strongest, motive powers in the world's history. And thus their philosophy of life leaves out the greatest pleasures and mightiest incentives to action found in life.

But Mr. Liberal and his friends would tell us that this all refers to theology. That doctrines are of no account. That what we want is works. Exactly, but don't you see that if after the afore-said experience you should not form the theory that the given medicine cures the given disease and act in accordance with the theory, the result would probably be death instead of health and life? The question is, is it true to experience? Does it accomplish what it purposes to accomplish better than any other theory, and can that result be accomplished only by following the said theory? According to many authorities, most if not all of our physical actions are performed according to a theory based on induction as to facts in the physical world. Thus we arrive at the conclusion that food nourishes our body because it has always been found to do so. In the same way many people have, through experience and facts, come to believe in God who guides them and nourishes them spiritually.

If now we judge by fruits rather than by doctrines, or rather judge our doctrines by their fruits, I claim that the orthodox doctrine is superior to yours, Mr. Liberal. In the first place, you admit that the lower ignorant classes you cannot reach, and you are greatly surprised that they do not eagerly accept your simple doctrines. It is not the whole, but the sick, that need a physician. A religion that cannot help those that need the greatest spiritual help cannot be the religion of Christ. But let us suppose that an intelligent foreigner who does not understand our language nor know our doctrines should attend our respective churches and see the result produced—the pleasure taken in coming and receiving our spiritual medicine. And making allowance for all other differences, should observe which helps most to make life worth living, and which makes the most and best changes in the character of its adherents. He would have no trouble to discover that orthodoxy ministers more to the needy soul than your simple faith.

You, Mr. Liberal, talk about making infidels of people and drawing them away from the church, but I believe it would have been fortunate for you if you had not mentioned this subject; because you, according to the confession of your own men, have driven more people from the churches than any religious body having a similar numerical strength. You tell people to use their reason, and after you have drawn them out of the orthodox churches by that bait, they see that they must go further than your position to satisfy what you call reason, and they find large numbers among you ready to lead them to that logical conclusion. It seems that the advocates of your liberal faith have always believed that they were on the verge of accomplishing great victories by drawing the multitudes to them; but as with the victim of tuberculosis, who imagines he is getting better all the time, it is always expectancy and never realization. If it is prejudice that prevents the spread of your belief, then it ought to grow most in New England, where it has largely worn away prejudice. But the facts seem to be that there it is growing the least comparatively; while out West, where it is a novelty and meeting with opposition, it is making the most progress. A person is almost tempted to conclude that if it were not for the opposition of some mistaken people, who do not realize your real error, your progress would come to an end at once.

I believe, Mr. Liberal, that Mr. Freethinker has the best of you because he vanquished you according to your own method of inquiry. But you are more nearly right according to the true method of inquiry. You see it is the proper method of inquiry that I am contending for. A person with the wrong method of inquiry in his head will only be repulsed by poking dogmas at him and nothing can be done with him until he has discovered the fallacy by following his method to absurdity, its natural conclusion. After that he may be induced to follow the empirical method of inquiry with a demonstration that experience and well-authenticated testimony are to be followed rather than rationalism.

What follows is the last part of the sermon on "The Proper Method of Religious Inquiry." Text: "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good."

It is not only important that we should appeal to our own experience in trying to discover what is true in religion, but we should also take into consideration the experiences of others. If a man, who is partially color blind, should base a science of color on his own experience, it would necessarily be partial or incomplete. So if a class of men, with certain peculiar traits, should build up a system of theology on their religious experiences, it would necessarily be partial and not adequate for universal application. Suppose, for example, that a number of persons with large reasoning powers, cold temperaments, and very little religious feeling, should build up a religious system on their experiences. Is it not perfectly clear that it would be partial and narrow? It would make no allowance at all for people of strong religious experiences. While it might be of some use to these few people, it would never help the great bulk of humanity who need the help of religion the most. To say that a religion is not for the common people is to admit that it is narrow and not true to universal human nature. Certainly it is not Christian, for the common people heard Jesus gladly; and they ever will hear gladly any one who preaches a religion that is true to their own religious experiences.

In trying to discover what is true in religion, we should also carefully examine the religious experiences of all ages, as recorded in their religious writings. I shall here quote from an authority on this point, because I think it of much value, and because it is not probable that the writer was influenced by prejudice and preconceived ideas. I shall quote from John Stuart Mill's "System of Logic," page 477: "There is a perpetual oscillation in spiritual truths, and in spiritual doctrines of any significance, even when not truths. Their meaning is almost always in a process either of being lost or of being recovered. Whoever has attended to the history of the more serious convictions of mankind—of the opinion by which the general conduct of their lives is, or as they conceive ought to be, more especially regulated—is aware that even when recognizing verbally the same doctrines, they attach to them at different periods a greater or less quantity, and even a different kind of meaning. The words in their original acceptation connoted, and the propositions expressed, a complication of outward facts and inward feelings, to different portions of which the general mind is more particularly alive in different generations of mankind. To common minds, only that portion of the meaning is in each generation suggested, of which that generation possesses the counterpart in its habitual experience. But the words and propositions lie ready to suggest to any mind duly prepared to receive the remainder of the meaning. Such individual minds are almost always to be found; and the lost meaning, revived by them, again by degrees works its way into the general mind.