Dr. MacArthur tells us also that Spain is not a representative of progressive religious teachers. I admit that. There are no progressive religious teachers in Spain, and right here let me make a remark. If religion rests on an inspired revelation, it is incapable of progress. It may be said that year after year we get to understand it better, but if it is not understood when given, why is it called a "revelation"? There is no progress in the multiplication table. Some men are better mathematicians than others, but the old multiplication table remains the same. So there can be no progress in a revelation from God.
Now, Spain—and that is the great mistake, the great misfortune—has remained orthodox. That is to say, the Spaniards have been true to their superstition. Of course the Rev. Dr. MacArthur will not admit that Catholicism is Christianity, and I suppose that the pope would hardly admit that a Baptist is a very successful Christian. The trouble with Spain is, and the trouble with the Baptist Church is, that neither of them has progressed to any great extent.
Now, in my judgment, what is called religion must grow better as man grows better, simply because it was produced by man and the better man is, the nearer civilized he is, the better, the nearer civilized, will be what he calls his religion; and if the Baptist religion has progressed, it is a demonstration that it was not originally founded on a revelation from God.
In my lecture I stated that we had no right to make any distinction between the actions of infinite wisdom and goodness, and that if God created and governs this world we ought to thank him, if we thanked him at all, for all that happens; that we should thank him just as heartily for famine and cyclone as for sunshine and harvest, and that if President McKinley thanked God for the victory at Santiago, he also should have thanked him for sending the yellow fever.
I stand by these words. A finite being has no right to make any distinction between the actions of the infinitely good and wise. If God governs this world, then everything that happens is the very best that could happen. When A murders B, the best thing that could happen to A is to be a murderer and the best thing that could have happened to B was to be murdered. There is no escape from this if the world is governed by infinite wisdom and goodness.
It will not do to try and dodge by saying that man is free. This God who made man and made him free knew exactly how he would use his freedom, and consequently this God cannot escape the responsibility for the actions of men. He made them. He knew exactly what they would do. He is responsible.
If I could turn a piece of wood into a human being, and I knew that he would murder a man, who is the real murderer? But if Dr. MacArthur would think as much as he preaches, he would come much nearer agreeing with me.
The Rev. Dr. J. Lewis Parks is very sorry that he cannot discuss Ingersoll's address, because to do so would be dignifying Ingersoll. Of course I deeply regret the refusal of Dr. J. Lewis Parks to discuss the address. I dislike to be compelled to go to the end of my life without being dignified. At the same time I will forgive the Rev. Dr. J. Lewis Parks for not answering me, because I know that he cannot.
The Rev. Dr. Moldehnke, whose name seems chiefly made of consonants, denounces me as a scoffer and as illogical, and says that Christianity is not founded upon the devil, but upon Christ. He further says that we do not believe in such a thing as a devil in human form, but we know that there is evil, and that evil we call the devil. He hides his head under the same leaf with Dr. MacArthur by calling the devil evil.
Now, is this gentleman willing to say that all the allusions to the devil in the Old and New Testaments can be harmonized with the idea that the devil is simply a personification of evil? Can he say this and say it honestly?