The truth is, the Bible alone has never done any thing to advance the cause of either morality or civilization in any country, because it is interdicted from improvement. It may be asked here, Why is it, then, that both religion and morality prosper in most countries where the Bible has been introduced? The answer to this question is found in the important fact, overlooked by the Christian world, that the arts and sciences generally accompany, or soon follow, the introduction of the Bible; but, where this has not been the case, and the Bible has been circulated alone, as in the case of Abyssinia, no progress whatever has been made towards the establishment of true morality or a rational religion, or any of the adjuncts of civilization, thus proving that the causes for the moral growth and improvement of society are outside of, and independent of, the Bible, and, we will add (in view of the many immoral lessons taught in the book), in spite of the Bible. A little rational reflection must convince any unbiased person that Bibles, in the very nature of things, must retard the moral and intellectual advancement and prosperity of society in every respect, notwithstanding they contain many good and beautiful precepts, for representing, as they do, the imperfect state of morals in the age and country in which they were written; while their teachings are assumed to be a finality in moral and religious progress, and hence are not allowed to be transcended in precept or practice. The consequence is, society would be pinned down immovably and perpetually to the same barbarous religion and morals of that age, if it were not pushed forward by the irresistible influences of the arts and sciences. Hence we owe our advancement and prosperity not to Bibles, but to causes adequate to counteract and overcome their adverse influences.
THE MORAL BENEFITS OF INFIDELITY.
An additional argument to prove the Bible is not a moral necessity to teach the practical duties of life is the fact that that class of persons known as "infidels," who entirely reject the book as a guide or as a moral instructor on account of its very defective and contradictory system of morals, are admitted by leading orthodox journals and representative men in the nation to possess better moral characters and habits, and to lead better moral lives, than Bible believers. As a proof of this statement, we will here present the most wonderful and humiliating concessions of that leading religious journal of the nation, "The New-York Evangelist." On this subject it speaks thus: "To the shame of the Church it must be confessed that the foremost men in all our philanthropic movements, in the interpretation of the spirit of the age, in the practical application of genuine Christianity, in the reformation of abuses in high and in low places, in the vindication of the rights of man and in practically redressing his wrongs, in the moral and intellectual regeneration of the race, are the so-called infidels in our land. The Church has pusillanimously left not only the working oar, but the very reins of salutary reform, in the hands of men she denounces as inimical to Christianity, and who are doing with all their might, for humanity's sake, that which the Church ought to be doing for Christ's sake; and if they succeed, as succeed they will, in abolishing slavery, banishing rum, restraining licentiousness, reforming abuses, and elevating the masses, then must the recoil upon Christianity be disastrous in the extreme. Woe! woe! woe to Christianity when infidels, by force of nature or the tendencies of the age, get ahead of the Church in morals, and in the practical work of Christianity. In some instances they are already far in advance. In the vindication of truth, righteousness, and liberty, they are the pioneers beckoning to a sluggish Church to follow in the rear." To this we will add the testimony of another orthodox writer (the eminent Catherine Beecher) as to the superior practical morality of infidels as compared with that of Christians. She says, in her "Appeal to the People" (p. 319), "It has come to pass that the world has been improving in practical virtue, while the Church has been deteriorating. The writer, in her very extensive travels and intercourse with the religious world, has had unusual opportunity to notice how surely and how extensively this fact has been observed and acknowledged by the best class of clergymen and laymen." She says one of the most laborious Episcopal bishops of the Western States declares, that "the world is growing better, and the Church is growing worse." She next cites the testimony of an eminent lawyer and church-member who is carrying on an extensive financial business throughout the country, and who makes the remarkable statement, that "the better class of worldly men are more honorable and reliable in business than the majority of church-members." (Let the reader mark this statement.) And this declaration was concurred in by another eminent lawyer, banker, and church-member, who is doing a more extensive business in the North-western States than any other man. And he states that the most extensive business-man in Central New York has arrived at the same conclusion as the result of his observation. And the greatest business-man in Boston is also referred to, whose experience led him to this conclusion. And other business-men in different parts of the country testify to the same effect. We may, then, set it down as the universal testimony of business-men that infidels and outsiders are more honest, more reliable, more truthful, and more honorable than church-members.
What a fatal argument these facts furnish against the religion and morality of the Christian Bible! They indicate that the religion and morality of nature and science are superior.
BURNING THE WORLD'S BENEFACTORS AS INFIDELS.
It will be perceived, from the preceding orthodox testimonies, that the class of people usually stigmatized as infidels are the true exemplars in practical morality, and the true benefactors of society. And Christian countries owe them a debt of gratitude for all the reforms and improvements which have proved such signal blessings to society within the last few hundred years, and for their own elevation out of the groveling ignorance of barbarism into the glorious sunlight of civilization. What withering self-reproach, what shameful mortification and self-condemnation, they ought therefore to feel in view of having committed so many of them to the flames, or otherwise maltreated and killed them! For, according to the above Christian testimonies, they were the world's real benefactors; and the following list will show that those victims perished at the hands of Christians as infidel martyrs: In 1511 Herman of Ryswick was burned for heresy; in 1546 Aonius Polearius was hung, and then burned for skepticism; in 1574 Geofroi Vallie was burned for publishing a heretical book; In 1546 Stephen Dolet, a printer and bookseller, was burned at Paris for atheism; in 1579 Matthew Hamont had his ears cut off, and was then burned alive, in England, for denying that Christ is God; in 1583 John Lewes was burned at Norwich, Eng., for "denying the Godhead of Christ;" in 1589 Francis Kett, a member of a college in Cambridge, Eng., was burned for holding "divers detestable opinions against Christ, our Savior;" In 1611 Bartholomew Legate was burned to ashes at Smithfield for denying that Christ was God; in 1644 Edward Wightman was burned at Litchfield for denying the divinity of Christ; in 1619 Lucilio Yanini, an Italian, was burned for atheistical opinions; in 1574 John Gonganelle was poisoned for his infidelity by the Holy Sacrament; in 1629 Alexander Leighton had his nose slit and his ears cut off, and was imprisoned for eleven years for publishing a work against miracles. To make the matter short, without extending the list, it has been estimated that forty thousand perished at the hands of Christians in forty y ears for infidelity, heresy, or other opinions deemed unsound by orthodox. And thus it will be perceived that infidelity has had its martyrs as well as Christianity; and that Christians, in putting these men to death, were robbing the world (according to "The New-York Evangelist")of its real benefactors. Oh, shame! Christianity, where is thy blush?
CHAPTER LI.—SEND NO MOKE BIBLES TO THE HEATHEN.
A recent work by a Christian writer states that there are now employed in the work of converting the heathen to Christianity fifteen thousand missionaries, and that they succeed in converting about ten thousand a year. From this statement, it appears that ten thousand missionaries make annually one convert apiece, while five thousand make none. And the cost the writer estimates to be about twenty thousand dollars for each convert. C. Wiseman estimated it, about thirty years ago, to be ten thousand dollars apiece. And, while these ten thousand converts were made, the heathen population increased in numbers five millions. Thus it appears they increase two hundred times faster than they are converted. How long will it take, at such rates, to effect the entire conversion of the world? and what will be the cost? All the gold ever dug from the mines of Golconda and California would be but a drop in the bucket compared with the requisite amount. The question naturally arises here, Do the results justify such an enormous expenditure of time and treasure, say nothing of the loss of health on the part of the missionaries? A learned Hindoo stated, in a speech made in London in 1876, that the conversions made in India are confined principally to the low, ignorant, superstitious class, who do not possess sufficient sense and intelligence to know the difference between the religion they are converted to and the religion they are converted from. Are such converts worth ten thousand or twenty thousand dollars apiece? The case suggests the story of the Hibernian who stated his horse had but two faults: "First, he is hard to catch; second, he is no account when caught." The heathen must be hard to convert if it requires an expense of ten thousand dollars apiece, and of but little account when converted if they know nothing about the nature of the religion they are converted to. There are various considerations which go to prove that the hundreds of millions of dollars expended annually in this enterprise are worse than wasted:—