Another much commended saying of Jesus is the following: "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these, ye have done it unto me." This has been interpreted as a command to help and succor even the poorest of the poor. I admire the thought. I applaud the generosity. But would it not have been grander, if Jesus, instead of saying, "ye have done it unto me," had said, "ye have done it unto Humanity." "For my sake" is not so large and noble as "for Humanity's sake." One of my neighbor preachers said the other day that he loved the poor and the lost "because Jesus loved them." Then, it was Jesus he loved, and not his fellows. Evidently he would not love them, if Jesus did not. What would become of this preacher's interest in his fellowmen, should he ever lose his faith in Christ? That explains why people often say that without religion there can be no morality. We desire a morality that can outlive all the gods. Christ or no Christ,—can we still be kind and just and compassionate toward the weak and the unfortunate?

"If you take Jesus Christ out of the world, the world's a carcass, and man's a disaster," cries the preacher at the top of his voice. Of course. If everything is to be done for Jesus' sake, what will become of morality, civilization or humanity with Jesus dropped out? We need no better excuse for summoning all our energies to combat a religion that commits the destinies of our world to the keeping of one man,—and he, in all probability,—a myth.[4]

[4] Read the author's The Truth About Jesus—Is He a Myth?

Let us recapitulate: Jesus taught a magical, not a scientific morality. It was by being born of "water and the Holy Ghost," whatever that might mean, and not by intellectual and moral effort, that people were to be saved. He placed the creed above the deed, and himself above humanity. "Believe in me, do good for my sake," gives to morality a sectarian stamp, or taint, which is bound to corrupt it. Morality is born of liberty. Christianity is the religion of absolutism, in which Jesus or God is everything, and man a mere puppet. Christianity denies to man the right to reason. He must only obey. There is no morality where there is no liberty. By his doctrine of an impending catastrophe, a future hell, and by his promises of fabulous wealth and glory beyond—Jesus helped to disturb and distort the judgment of the weak and the fearful, preventing thereby the cultivation of sane thoughts of life. The morality of Jesus was the morality of panic.

And what do we offer in place of supernaturalism, whether it be Christianity, Judaism, Mohammedanism, Brahmanism, or any other "ism"? In place of magic or miracle, we offer science; in place of "belief," we offer knowledge—the open light of day and the unhampered interchange of human love and thought. In place of Christ or God—both absent, and neither dependent upon anything we can do for him—we offer Humanity, forever at our side, and in daily need of our bravest service and most unstinted love.

THE STORY OF MY MIND
OR
HOW I BECAME A RATIONALIST

Price, Fifty Cents

¶ In this latest publication of the Independent Religious Society, M. M. Mangasarian describes his religious experience—how, starting as a Calvinist, a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary, and a pastor of the Spring Garden Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, he thought and fought his way up to

RATIONALISM