"The entrance of thy word giveth light, it giveth understanding to the simple. Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law."—David.
An American citizen does not need to go to far-off India or Africa to learn how people live without the Bible. Every heathen nation, living in ignorance and degradation furnishes a practical illustration. This illustration may be found by visiting the countries on the other side of the southern boundary line of the United States, where for several centuries under dominant catholic influence the Bible has been a forbidden book in the few public educational institutions of the country. The result may now be seen in the general prevalence of ignorance, poverty and oppression; the ownership of land limited to a comparatively few persons, corruption and rapacity on the part of public officials, general improvement checked and the country impoverished by frequent insurrections and revolutions, that indicate incapacity for stable and prosperous self-government.
France, however, once made the actual experiment of suppressing the Bible and Bible readers for two centuries, during the period from 1572 to 1795, while the Reformation of the 16th century was progressing in Germany, Switzerland, Britain and other countries.
Thomas Carlyle, in his history of the French Revolution, that occurred 1788 to 1795, has very dramatically portrayed scenes and incidents, which become pregnant with new and thrilling interest, when briefly summarized to illustrate the folly and sad consequences of suppressing the Bible and Bible readers in that nation. The historic value of these incidents should make this story interesting and instructive to every student and teacher.
ATHEISM, DEISM, PHILOSOPHISM
Louis XV, king of France, at the end of a reign of fifty-nine years, dies unwept and unmourned in 1774. Affirming there is no God or heaven, at the beginning of his long reign, and not permitting any of his courtiers to mention the word "death" in his presence, he abandons himself to a life of forbidden pleasure, humiliates and scandalizes the people of France instead of enlightening and elevating them. He inherits and maintains the tyrannous and oppressive feudal system, that prevents the common people from acquiring ownership of land. His career has been described, "as an hideous abortion and mistake of nature, the use and meaning of which is not yet known." The persecution of Bible readers, or Protestants, is begun with a general massacre at Paris, on the anniversary of Saint Bartholomew in 1572. Those who escape the bloody horrors of that occasion, are commanded to emigrate from France, on pain of death. The following events occur, during the latter part of the last half century, preceding the French Revolution.
The leaders in thought are the shameless and selfish infidels and deists, Voltaire, Rosseau, Robespierre and others like them. Paris admires her deistical authors and makes them the objects of hero-worship. They are called "Philosophs," and Bible readers must not stand in their way. Philosophism sits joyful in glittering saloons, is the pride of nobles and promises a coming millennium. Crushing and scattering the last elements of the Protestant Reformation, they blindly and falsely talk of a Reformed France. The people applaud, instead of suppressing these false teachers. The highest dignitaries of the church waltz with quack-prophets, pick pockets and public women. The invisible world of Satan is displayed and the smoke of its torment goes up continually. No provision is made for the general education of the common people and yet the government is fast becoming bankrupt.
In 1774 Louis XVI succeeds his father, as the last King of France. He is youthful, uneducated, imbecile. He is wedded to a giddy superficial queen. Both are infidels and incapable of any intelligent acts of government. With imbecility and credulity on the throne, corruption continues to prevail among high and low. Instead of individual thrift and general prosperity, poverty and famine prevail throughout the land.
APPEAL FOR BREAD
In 1775, impelled by a scarcity of bread, a vast multitude from the surrounding country gather around the royal palace at Versailles, their great number, sallow faces and squalid appearance indicating widespread wretchedness and want. Their appeal for royal assistance is plainly written, in "legible hieroglyphics in their winged raggedness." The young king appears on the balcony and they are permitted to see his face. If he does not read their written appeal, he sees it in their pitiable condition. The response of the king is an order, that two of them be hanged. The rest are sent back to their miserable hovels with a warning not to give the king any more trouble.