Answer. Well, of course there are the same distinctions among clergymen as among other people. Some of them are quite respectable gentlemen, especially those with whom I am not acquainted. I think that since the loss of my brother nothing could exceed the heartlessness of the remarks made by the average clergyman. There have been some noble exceptions, to whom I feel not only thankful but grateful; but a very large majority have taken this occasion to say most unfeeling and brutal things. I do not ask the clergy to forgive me, but I do request that they will so act that I will not have to forgive them. I have always insisted that those who love their enemies should at least tell the truth about their friends, but I suppose, after all, that religion must be supported by the same means as those by which it was founded. Of course, there are thousands of good ministers, men who are endeavoring to make the world better, and whose failure is no particular fault of their own. I have always been in doubt as to whether the clergy were a necessary or an unnecessary evil.
Question. I would like to have a positive expression of your views as to a future state?
Answer. Somebody asked Confucius about another world, and his reply was: "How should I know anything about another world when I know so little of this?" For my part, I know nothing of any other state of existence, either before or after this, and I have never become personally acquainted with anybody that did. There may be another life, and if there is, the best way to prepare for it is by making somebody happy in this. God certainly cannot afford to put a man in hell who has made a little heaven in this world. I propose simply to take my chances with the rest of the folks, and prepare to go where the people I am best acquainted with will probably settle. I cannot afford to leave the great ship and sneak off to shore in some orthodox canoe. I hope there is another life, for I would like to see how things come out in the world when I am dead. There are some people I would like to see again, and hope there are some who would not object to seeing me; but if there is no other life I shall never know it. I do not remember a time when I did not exist; and if, when I die, that is the end, I shall not know it, because the last thing I shall know is that I am alive, and if nothing is left, nothing will be left to know that I am dead; so that so far as I am concerned I am immortal; that is to say, I cannot recollect when I did not exist, and there never will be a time when I shall remember that I do not exist. I would like to have several millions of dollars, and I may say that I have a lively hope that some day I may be rich, but to tell you the truth I have very little evidence of it. Our hope of immortality does not come from any religion, but nearly all religions come from that hope. The Old Testament, instead of telling us that we are immortal, tells us how we lost immortality. You will recollect that if Adam and Eve could have gotten to the Tree of Life, they would have eaten of its fruit and would have lived forever; but for the purpose of preventing immortality God turned them out of the Garden of Eden, and put certain angels with swords or sabres at the gate to keep them from getting back. The Old Testament proves, if it proves anything—which I do not think it does—that there is no life after this; and the New Testament is not very specific on the subject. There were a great many opportunities for the Saviour and his apostles to tell us about another world, but they did not improve them to any great extent; and the only evidence, so far as I know, about another life is, first, that we have no evidence; and, secondly, that we are rather sorry that we have not, and wish we had. That is about my position.
Question. According to your observation of men, and your reading in relation to the men and women of the world and of the church, if there is another world divided according to orthodox principles between the orthodox and heterodox, which of the two that are known as heaven and hell would contain, in your judgment, the most good society?
Answer. Since hanging has got to be a means of grace, I would prefer hell. I had a thousand times rather associate with the Pagan philosophers than with the inquisitors of the Middle Ages. I certainly should prefer the worst man in Greek or Roman history to John Calvin; and I can imagine no man in the world that I would not rather sit on the same bench with than the Puritan fathers and the founders of orthodox churches. I would trade off my harp any minute for a seat in the other country. All the poets will be in perdition, and the greatest thinkers, and, I should think, most of the women whose society would tend to increase the happiness of man; nearly all the painters, nearly all the sculptors, nearly all the writers of plays, nearly all the great actors, most of the best musicians, and nearly all the good fellows—the persons who know stories, who can sing songs, or who will loan a friend a dollar. They will mostly all be in that country, and if I did not live there permanently, I certainly would want it so I could spend my winter months there. But, after all, what I really want to do is to destroy the idea of eternal punishment. That doctrine subverts all ideas of justice. That doctrine fills hell with honest men, and heaven with intellectual and moral paupers. That doctrine allows people to sin on credit. That doctrine allows the basest to be eternally happy and the most honorable to suffer eternal pain. I think of all doctrines it is the most infinitely infamous, and would disgrace the lowest savage; and any man who believes it, and has imagination enough to understand it, has the heart of a serpent and the conscience of a hyena.
Question. Your objective point is to destroy the doctrine of hell, is it?
Answer. Yes, because the destruction of that doctrine will do away with all cant and all pretence. It will do away with all religious bigotry and persecution. It will allow every man to think and to express his thought. It will do away with bigotry in all its slimy and offensive forms.
—Chicago Tribune, November 14, 1879.
POLITICS AND GEN. GRANT
Question. Some people have made comparisons between the late Senators O. P. Morton and Zach. Chandler. What did you think of them, Colonel?