BIRTON.—Be it so! There is a God, I grant it. But what is that to you and me? What connection is there between the superior Being and worms of the earth? What relation is there between his essence and ours? Epicurus, when he supposed a God in the planets, did well to conclude that he took no part in our horrors and follies; that we could neither please nor offend him; that he had no need of us; nor we of him. You admit a God, more worthy of the human mind than the God of Epicurus, or the gods of the east and west: but if you assert, with so many others, that God made the world and man for his own glory; that he formerly required sacrifices of oxen for his glory; that he appeared for his glory in our biped form, you would, I think, be asserting an absurdity. The love of glory is nothing but pride. A proud man is a conceited fellow, such as Shakespeare would introduce in his plays. This epithet cannot suit God—it does not agree with the divine nature—any more than injustice, cruelty or inconstancy. If God condescended to regulate the universe, it could only be to make others happy. Has he done so?
FREIND.—He has doubtless succeeded with all just spirits. They will be happy one day; if they are not so now.
BIRTON.—Happy! How? When? Who told you so?
FREIND.—His justice.
BIRTON.—Will you tell me that we shall live eternally—that we have immortal souls, after admitting that the Jews, whom you boast of having succeeded, did not entertain this notion of immortality up to the time of Herod? This idea of an immortal soul was invented by the Brahmins, adopted by the Persians, Chaldeans, and Greeks, and was for a long time unknown to the insignificant and superstitious Jewish tribes. Alas! sir, how do we know that we have souls? or how do we know but other animals, who have similar passions, wills, appetites, and memories, so incomprehensible to us, have not souls as well?
Hitherto I have thought that there is in nature a power by which we have the faculty of life in all our body,—walking with our feet,—taking with our hands,—seeing with our eyes, feeling with our nerves, thinking with our brain,—and that all this is called the soul, which is merely a vague word, signifying the unknown principle of our faculties. With you, I will call God the intelligent principle animating nature; but has he condescended to reveal himself to us?
FREIND. Yes, by his works.
BIRTON.—Has he revealed his laws, or spoken to us?
FREIND.—Yes, by the voice of conscience. Is it true, that, if you killed your Father and mother, your conscience would be a prey to a remorse as terrible as it would be involuntary? Is not this truth avowed and felt throughout the world? To come down to lesser crimes,—do they not all revolt us at the first glance,—make us turn pale when we commit them for the first time,—and leave in our hearts the stings of repentance?
BIRTON.—I must confess it.