Ernest Renan
A tribute on the death of the historian of the life of Jesus.

by Robert G. Ingersoll
(1892)

From The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll (Dresden Edition, 1900–1902), Volume 11.
Source: https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/ernest-renan/
Public domain. CC0 / Public Domain Mark 1.0.

────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

"Blessed are those
    Whose blood and judgment are so well co-mingled
    That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger
    To sound what stop she please."

ERNEST RENAN is dead. Another source of light; another force of
civilization; another charming personality; another brave soul, graceful
in thought, generous in deed; a sculptor in speech, a colorist in
words—clothing all in the poetry born of a delightful union of heart
and brain—has passed to the realm of rest.

Reared under the influences of Catholicism, educated for the priesthood,
yet by reason of his natural genius, he began to think. Forces that
utterly subjugate and enslave the mind of mediocrity sometimes rouse to
thought and action the superior soul.

Renan began to think—a dangerous thing for a Catholic to do. Thought
leads to doubt, doubt to investigation, investigation to truth—the
enemy of all superstition.

He lifted the Catholic extinguisher from the light and flame of reason.
He found that his mental vision was improved. He read the Scriptures
for himself, examined them as he did other books not claiming to be
inspired. He found the same mistakes, the same prejudices, the same
miraculous impossibilities in the book attributed to God that he found
in those known to have been written by men.

Into the path of reason, or rather into the highway, Renan was led by
Henriette, his sister, to whom he pays a tribute that has the perfume of
a perfect flower.

"I was," writes Renan, "brought up by women and priests, and therein
lies the whole explanation of my good qualities and of my defects."
In most that he wrote is the tenderness of woman, only now and then a
little touch of the priest showing itself, mostly in a reluctance to
spoil the ivy by tearing down some prison built by superstition.

In spite of the heartless "scheme" of things he still found it in his
heart to say, "When God shall be complete, He will be just," at the same
time saying that "nothing proves to us that there exists in the world
a central consciousness—a soul of the universe—and nothing proves the
contrary." So, whatever was the verdict of his brain, his heart asked
for immortality. He wanted his dream, and he was willing that others
should have theirs. Such is the wish and will of all great souls.

He knew the church thoroughly and anticipated what would finally
be written about him by churchmen: "Having some experience of
ecclesiastical writers I can sketch out in advance the way my biography
will be written in Spanish in some Catholic review, of Santa Fe, in the
year 2,000. Heavens! how black I shall be! I shall be so all the more,
because the church when she feels that she is lost will end with malice.
She will bite like a mad dog."

He anticipated such a biography because he had thought for himself, and
because he had expressed his thoughts—because he had declared that "our
universe, within the reach of our experience, is not governed by any
intelligent reason. God, as the common herd understand him, the living
God, the acting God—the God-Providence, does not show himself in the
universe"—because he attacked the mythical and the miraculous in the
life of Christ and sought to rescue from the calumnies of ignorance and
faith a serene and lofty soul.

The time has arrived when Jesus must become a myth or a man. The idea
that he was the infinite God must be abandoned by all who are not
religiously insane. Those who have given up the claim that he was God,
insist that he was divinely appointed and illuminated; that he was
a perfect man—the highest possible type of the human race and,
consequently, a perfect example for all the world.

As time goes on, as men get wider or grander or more complex ideas of
life, as the intellectual horizon broadens, the idea that Christ was
perfect may be modified.

The New Testament seems to describe several individuals under the same
name, or at least one individual who passed through several stages or
phases of religious development. Christ is described as a devout Jew,
as one who endeavored to comply in all respects with the old law. Many
sayings are attributed to him consistent with this idea. He certainly
was a Hebrew in belief and feeling when he said, "Swear not by Heaven,
because it is God's throne, nor by earth, for it is his footstool; nor
by Jerusalem, for it is his holy city." These reasons were in exact
accordance with the mythology of the Jews. God was regarded simply as
an enormous man, as one who walked in the garden in the cool of the
evening, as one who had met man face to face, who had conversed with
Moses for forty days upon Mount Sinai, as a great king, with a throne
in the heavens, using the earth to rest his feet upon, and regarding
Jerusalem as his holy city.

Then we find plenty of evidence that he wished to reform the religion
of the Jews; to fulfill the law, not to abrogate it Then there is still
another change: he has ceased his efforts to reform that religion and
has become a destroyer. He holds the Temple in contempt and repudiates
the idea that Jerusalem is the holy city. He concludes that it is
unnecessary to go to some mountain or some building to worship or to
find God, and insists that the heart is the true temple, that ceremonies
are useless, that all pomp and pride and show are needless, and that it
is enough to worship God under heaven's dome, in spirit and in truth.

It is impossible to harmonize these views unless we admit that Christ
was the subject of growth and change; that in consequence of growth and
change he modified his views; that, from wanting to preserve Judaism as
it was, he became convinced that it ought to be reformed. That he then
abandoned the idea of reformation, and made up his mind that the only
reformation of which the Jewish religion was capable was destruction. If
he was in fact a man, then the course he pursued was natural; but if he
was God, it is perfectly absurd. If we give to him perfect knowledge,
then it is impossible to account for change or growth. If, on the other
hand, the ground is taken that he was a perfect man, then, it might be
asked, Was he perfect when he wished to preserve, or when he wished to
reform, or when he resolved to destroy, the religion of the Jews? If
he is to be regarded as perfect, although not divine, when did he reach
perfection?

It is perfectly evident that Christ, or the character that bears that
name, imagined that the world was about to be destroyed, or at least
purified by fire, and that, on account of this curious belief, he became
the enemy of marriage, of all earthly ambition and of all enterprise.
With that view in his mind, he said to himself, "Why should we waste our
energies in producing food for destruction? Why should we endeavor to
beautify a world that is so soon to perish?" Filled with the thought of
coming change, he insisted that there was but one important thing, and
that was for each man to save his soul. He should care nothing for the
ties of kindred, nothing for wife or child or property, in the shadow of
the coming disaster. He should take care of himself. He endeavored, as
it is said, to induce men to desert all they had, to let the dead, bury
the dead, and follow him. He told his disciples, or those he wished to
make his disciples, according to the Testament, that it was their duty
to desert wife and child and property, and if they would so desert
kindred and wealth, he would reward them here and hereafter.

We know now—if we know anything—that Jesus was mistaken about the
coming of the end, and we know now that he was greatly controlled in
his ideas of life, by that mistake. Believing that the end was near,
he said, "Take no thought for the morrow, what ye shall eat or what ye
shall drink or wherewithal ye shall be clothed." It was in view of the
destruction of the world that he called the attention of his disciples
to the lily that toiled not and yet excelled Solomon in the glory of its
raiment. Having made this mistake, having acted upon it, certainly we
cannot now say that he was perfect in knowledge.

He is regarded by many millions as the impersonation of patience, of
forbearance, of meekness and mercy, and yet, according to the account,
he said many extremely bitter words, and threatened eternal pain.

We also know, if the account be true, that he claimed to have
supernatural power, to work miracles, to cure the blind and to raise the
dead, and we know that he did nothing of the kind. So if the writers of
the New Testament tell the truth as to what Christ claimed, it is absurd
to say that he was a perfect man. If honest, he was deceived, and those
who are deceived are not perfect.

There is nothing in the New Testament, so far as we know, that touches
on the duties of nation to nation, or of nation to its citizens; nothing
of human liberty; not one word about education; not the faintest hint
that there is such a thing as science; nothing calculated to stimulate
industry, commerce, or invention; not one word in favor of art, of music
or anything calculated to feed or clothe the body, nothing to develop
the brain of man.

When it is assumed that the life of Christ, as described in the New
Testament, is perfect, we at least take upon ourselves the burden of
deciding what perfection is. People who asserted that Christ was divine,
that he was actually God, reached the conclusion, without any laborious
course of reasoning, that all he said and did was absolute perfection.
They said this because they had first been convinced that he was divine.
The moment his divinity is given up and the assertion is made that he
was perfect, we are not permitted to reason in that way. They said he
was God, therefore perfect. Now, if it is admitted that he was human,
the conclusion that he was perfect does not follow. We then take the
burden upon ourselves of deciding what perfection is. To decide what is
perfect is beyond the powers of the human mind.

Renan, in spite of his education, regarded Christ as a man, and did the
best he could to account for the miracles that had been attributed
to him, for the legends that had gathered about his name, and the
impossibilities connected with his career, and also tried to account for
the origin or birth of these miracles, of these legends, of these myths,
including the resurrection and ascension. I am not satisfied with all
the conclusions he reached or with all the paths he traveled. The
refraction of light caused by passing through a woman's tears is hardly
a sufficient foundation for a belief in so miraculous a miracle as the
bodily ascension of Jesus Christ.

There is another thing attributed to Christ that seems to me conclusive
evidence against the claim of perfection. Christ is reported to have
said that all sins could be forgiven except the sin against the Holy
Ghost. This sin, however, is not defined. Although Christ died for the
whole world, that through him all might be saved, there is this one
terrible exception: There is no salvation for those who have sinned, or
who may hereafter sin, against the Holy Ghost. Thousands of persons are
now in asylums, having lost their reason because of their fear that they
had committed this unknown, this undefined, this unpardonable sin.

It is said that a Roman Emperor went through a form of publishing his
laws or proclamations, posting them so high on pillars that they could
not be read, and then took the lives of those who ignorantly violated
these unknown laws. He was regarded as a tyrant, as a murderer. And
yet, what shall we say of one who declared that the sin against the
Holy Ghost was the only one that could not be forgiven, and then left an
ignorant world to guess what that sin is? Undoubtedly this horror is an
interpolation.

There is something like it in the Old Testament. It is asserted by
Christians that the Ten Commandments are the foundation of all law and
of all civilization, and you will find lawyers insisting that the Mosaic
Code was the first information that man received on the subject of law;
that before that time the world was without any knowledge of justice or
mercy. If this be true the Jews had no divine laws, no real
instruction on any legal subject until the Ten Commandments were given.
Consequently, before that time there had been proclaimed or published
no law against the worship of other gods or of idols. Moses had been on
Mount Sinai talking with Jehovah. At the end of the dialogue he received
the Tables of Stone and started down the mountain for the purpose of
imparting this information to his followers. When he reached the camp
he heard music. He saw people dancing, and he found that in his absence
Aaron and the rest of the people had cast a molten calf which they were
then worshiping. This so enraged Moses that he broke the Tables of Stone
and made preparations for the punishment of the Jews. Remember that
they knew nothing about this law, and, according to the modern Christian
claims, could not have known that it was wrong to melt gold and silver
and mould it in the form of a calf. And yet Moses killed about thirty
thousand of these people for having violated a law of which they had
never heard; a law known only to one man and one God. Nothing could be
more unjust, more ferocious, than this; and yet it can hardly be said to
exceed in cruelty the announcement that a certain sin was unpardonable
and then fail to define the sin. Possibly, to inquire what the sin is,
is the sin.

Renan regards Jesus as a man, and his work gets its value from the
fact that it is written from a human standpoint. At the same time he,
consciously or unconsciously, or may be for the purpose of sprinkling
a little holy water on the heat of religious indignation, now and then
seems to speak of him as more than human, or as having accomplished
something that man could not.

He asserts that "the Gospels are in part legendary; that they contain
many things not true; that they are full of miracles and of the
supernatural." At the same time he insists that these legends, these
miracles, these supernatural things do not affect the truth of the
probable things contained in these writings. He sees, and sees clearly,
that there is no evidence that Matthew or Mark or Luke or John wrote the
books attributed to them; that, as a matter of fact, the mere title
of "according to Matthew," "according to Mark," shows that they were
written by others who claimed them to be in accordance with the stories
that had been told by Matthew or by Mark. So Renan takes the ground that
the Gospel of Luke is founded on anterior documents and "is the work of
a man who selected, pruned and combined, and that the same man wrote the
Acts of the Apostles and in the same way."

The gospels were certainly written long after the events described, and
Renan finds the reason for this in the fact that the Christians believed
that the world was about to end; that, consequently, there was no need
of composing books; it was only necessary for them to preserve in their
hearts during the little margin of time that remained a lively image of
Him whom they soon expected to meet in the clouds. For this reason
the gospels themselves had but little authority for 150 years, the
Christians relying on oral traditions. Renan shows that there was
not the slightest scruple about inserting additions in the gospels,
variously combining them, and in completing some by taking parts from
others; that the books passed from hand to hand, and that each one
transcribed in the margin of his copy the words and parables he had
found elsewhere which touched him; that it was not until human tradition
became weakened that the text bearing the names of the apostles became
authoritative.

Renan has criticised the gospels somewhat in the same spirit that he
would criticise a modern work. He saw clearly that the metaphysics
filling the discourses of John were deformities and distortions, full of
mysticism, having nothing to do really with the character of Jesus. He
shows too "that the simple idea of the Kingdom of God, at the time the
Gospel according to St. John was written, had faded away; that the
hope of the advent of Christ was growing dim, and that from belief the
disciples passed into discussion, from discussion to dogma, from dogma
to ceremony," and, finding that the new Heaven and the new Earth were
not coming as expected, they turned their attention to governing the old
Heaven and the old Earth. The disciples were willing to be humble for
a few days, with the expectation of wearing crowns forever. They were
satisfied with poverty, believing that the wealth of the world was to
be theirs. The coming of Christ, however, being for some unaccountable
reason delayed, poverty and humility grew irksome, and human nature
began to assert itself.

In the Gospel of John you will find the metaphysics of the church. There
you find the Second Birth. There you find the doctrine of the atonement
clearly set forth. There you find that God died for the whole world, and
that whosoever believeth not in him is to be damned. There is nothing of
the kind in Matthew. Matthew makes Christ say that, if you will forgive
others, God will forgive you. The Gospel "according to Mark" is the
same. So is the Gospel "according to Luke." There is nothing about
salvation through belief, nothing about the atonement. In Mark, in the
last chapter, the apostles are told to go into all the world and preach
the gospel, with the statement that whoever believed and was baptised
should be saved, and whoever failed to believe should be damned. But we
now know that that is an interpolation. Consequently, Matthew, Mark and
Luke never had the faintest conception of the "Christian religion." They
knew nothing of the atonement, nothing of salvation by faith—nothing.
So that if a man had read only Matthew, Mark and Luke, and had strictly
followed what he found, he would have found himself, after death, in
perdition.

Renan finds that certain portions of the Gospel "according to John" were
added later; that the entire twenty-first chapter is an interpolation;
also, that many places bear the traces of erasures and corrections. So
he says that it would be "impossible for any one to compose a life of
Jesus, with any meaning in it, from the discourses which John attributes
to him, and he holds that this Gospel of John is full of preaching,
Christ demonstrating himself; full of argumentation, full of stage
effect, devoid of simplicity, with long arguments after each miracle,
stiff and awkward discourses, the tone of which is often false and
unequal." He also insists that there are evidently "artificial portions,
variations like that of a musician improvising on a given theme."

In spite of all this, Renan, willing to soothe the prejudice of his
time, takes the ground that the four canonical gospels are authentic,
that they date from the first century, that the authors were, generally
speaking, those to whom they are attributed; but he insists that their
historic value is very diverse. This is a back-handed stroke. Admitting,
first, that they are authentic; second, that they were written about
the end of the first century; third, that they are not of equal value,
disposes, so far as he is concerned, of the dogma of inspiration.

One is at a loss to understand why four gospels should have been
written. As a matter of fact there can be only one true account of any
occurrence, or of any number of occurrences. Now, it must be taken for
granted, that an inspired account is true. Why then should there be four
inspired accounts? It may be answered that all were not to write
the entire story. To this the reply is that all attempted to cover
substantially the same ground.

Many years ago the early fathers thought it necessary to say why there
were four inspired books, and some of them said, because there were four
cardinal directions and the gospels fitted the north, south, east and
west. Others said that there were four principal winds—a gospel for
each wind. They might have added that some animals have four legs.

Renan admits that the narrative portions have not the same authority;
"that many legends proceeded from the zeal of the second Christian
generation; that the narrative of Luke is historically weak; that
sentences attributed to Jesus have been distorted and exaggerated;
that the book was written outside of Palestine and after the siege of
Jerusalem; that Luke endeavors to make the different narratives agree,
changing them for that purpose; that he softens the passages which had
become embarrassing; that he exaggerated the marvelous, omitted errors
in chronology; that he was a compiler, a man who had not been an
eye-witness himself, and who had not seen eye-witnesses, but who labors
at texts and wrests their sense to make them agree." This certainly is
very far from inspiration. So "Luke interprets the documents according
to his own idea; being a kind of anarchist, opposed to property, and
persuaded that the triumph of the poor was approaching; that he was
especially fond of the anecdotes showing the conversion of sinners, the
exaltation of the humble, and that he modified ancient traditions to
give them this meaning."

Renan reached the conclusion that the gospels are neither biographies
after the manner of Suetonius nor fictitious legends in the style of
Philostratus, but that they are legendary biographies like the legends
of the saints, the lives of Plotinus and Isidore, in which historical
truth and the desire to present models of virtue are combined in various
degrees; that they are "inexact" that they "contain numerous errors and
discordances." So he takes the ground that twenty or thirty years after
Christ, his reputation had greatly increased, that "legends had begun
to gather about Him like clouds," that "death added to His perfection,
freeing Him from all defects in the eyes of those who had loved Him,
that His followers wrested the prophecies so that they might fit Him.
They said, 'He is the Messiah.' The Messiah was to do certain things;
therefore Jesus did certain things. Then an account would be given of
the doing." All of which of course shows that there can be maintained no
theory of inspiration.

It is admitted that where individuals are witnesses of the same
transaction, and where they agree upon the vital points and disagree
upon details, the disagreement may be consistent with their honesty,
as tending to show that they have not agreed upon a story; but if
the witnesses are inspired of God then there is no reason for their
disagreeing on anything, and if they do disagree it is a demonstration
that they were not inspired, but it is not a demonstration that they
are not honest. While perfect agreement may be evidence of rehearsal,
a failure to perfectly agree is not a demonstration of the truth or
falsity of a story; but if the witnesses claim to be inspired, the
slightest disagreement is a demonstration that they were not inspired.

Renan reaches the conclusion, proving every step that he takes, that
the four principal documents—that is to say, the four gospels—are in
"flagrant contradiction one with another." He attacks, and with perfect
success, the miracles of the Scriptures, and upon this subject says:
"Observation, which has never once been falsified, teaches us that
miracles never happen, but in times and countries in which they are
believed and before persons disposed to believe them. No miracle ever
occurred in the presence of men capable of testing its miraculous
character." He further takes the ground that no contemporary miracle
will bear inquiry, and that consequently it is probable that the
miracles of antiquity which have been performed in popular gatherings
would be shown to be simple illusion, were it possible to criticise them
in detail. In the name of universal experience he banishes miracles
from history. These were brave things to do, things that will bear good
fruit. As long as men believe in miracles, past or present they remain
the prey of superstition. The Catholic is taught that miracles were
performed anciently not only, but that they are still being performed.
This is consistent inconsistency. Protestants teach a double doctrine:
That miracles used to be performed, that the laws of nature used to be
violated, but that no miracle is performed now. No Protestant will
admit that any miracle was performed by the Catholic Church. Otherwise,
Protestants could not be justified in leaving a church with whom the
God of miracles dwelt. So every Protestant has to adopt two kinds of
reasoning: that the laws of Nature used to be violated and that miracles
used to be performed, but that since the apostolic age Nature has had
her way and the Lord has allowed facts to exist and to hold the field.
A supernatural account, according to Renan, "always implies credulity or
imposture,"—probably both.

It does not seem possible to me that Christ claimed for himself what
the Testament claims for him. These claims were made by admirers, by
followers, by missionaries.

When the early Christians went to Rome they found plenty of demigods. It
was hard to set aside the religion of a demigod by telling the story of
a man from Nazareth. These missionaries, not to be outdone in ancestry,
insisted—and this was after the Gospel "according to St. John" had been
written—that Christ was the Son of God. Matthew believed that he was
the son of David, and the Messiah, and gave the genealogy of Joseph, his
father, to support that claim.

In the time of Christ no one imagined that he was of divine origin. This
was an after-growth. In order to place themselves on an equality with
Pagans they started the claim of divinity, and also took the second step
requisite in that country: First, a god for his father, and second, a
virgin for his mother. This was the Pagan combination of greatness, and
the Christians added to this that Christ was God.

It is hard to agree with the conclusion reached by Renan, that Christ
formed and intended to form a church. Such evidence, it seems to me,
is hard to find in the Testament. Christ seemed to satisfy himself,
according to the Testament, with a few statements, some of them
exceedingly wise and tender, some utterly impracticable and some
intolerant.

If we accept the conclusions reached by Renan we will throw away, the
legends without foundation; the miraculous legends; and everything
inconsistent with what we know of Nature. Very little will be left—a
few sayings to be found among those attributed to Confucius, to Buddha,
to Krishna, to Epictetus, to Zeno, and to many others. Some of these
sayings are full of wisdom, full of kindness, and others rush to such
extremes that they touch the borders of insanity. When struck on one
cheek to turn the other, is really joining a conspiracy to secure
the triumph of brutality. To agree not to resist evil is to become
an accomplice of all injustice. We must not take from industry, from
patriotism, from virtue, the right of self-defence.

Undoubtedly Renan gave an honest transcript of his mind, the road his
thought had followed, the reasons in their order that had occurred to
him, the criticisms born of thought, and the qualifications, softening
phrases, children of old sentiments and emotions that had not entirely
passed away. He started, one might say, from the altar and, during a
considerable part of the journey, carried the incense with him. The
farther he got away, the greater was his clearness of vision and the
more thoroughly he was convinced that Christ was merely a man, an
idealist. But, remembering the altar, he excused exaggeration in the
"inspired" books, not because it was from heaven, not because it was
in harmony with our ideas of veracity, but because the writers of the
gospel were imbued with the Oriental spirit of exaggeration, a spirit
perfectly understood by the people who first read the gospels, because
the readers knew the habits of the writers.

It had been contended for many years that no one could pass judgment
on the veracity of the Scriptures who did not understand Hebrew. This
position was perfectly absurd. No man needs to be a student of Hebrew
to know that the shadow on the dial did not go back several degrees to
convince a petty king that a boil was not to be fatal. Renan, however,
filled the requirement. He was an excellent Hebrew scholar. This was a
fortunate circumstance, because it answered a very old objection.

The founder of Christianity was, for his own sake, taken from the divine
pedestal and allowed to stand like other men on the earth, to be judged
by what he said and did, by his theories, by his philosophy, by his
spirit.

No matter whether Renan came to a correct conclusion or not, his work
did a vast deal of good. He convinced many that implicit reliance could
not be placed upon the gospels, that the gospels themselves are of
unequal worth; that they were deformed by ignorance and falsehood, or,
at least, by mistake; that if they wished to save the reputation of
Christ they must not rely wholly on the gospels, or on what is found
in the New Testament, but they must go farther and examine all legends
touching him. Not only so, but they must throw away the miraculous, the
impossible and the absurd.

He also has shown that the early followers of Christ endeavored to add
to the reputation of their Master by attributing to him the miraculous
and the foolish; that while these stories added to his reputation at
that time, since the world has advanced they must be cast aside or the
reputation of the Master must suffer.

It will not do now to say that Christ himself pretended to do miracles.
This would establish the fact at least that he was mistaken. But we are
compelled to say that his disciples insisted that he was a worker of
miracles. This shows, either that they were mistaken or untruthful.

We all know that a sleight-of-hand performer could gain a greater
reputation among savages than Darwin or Humboldt; and we know that the
world in the time of Christ was filled with barbarians, with people who
demanded the miraculous, who expected it; with people, in fact, who had
a stronger belief in the supernatural than in the natural; people who
never thought it worth while to record facts. The hero of such people,
the Christ of such people, with his miracles, cannot be the Christ of
the thoughtful and scientific.

Renan was a man of most excellent temper; candid; not striving for
victory, but for truth; conquering, as far as he could, the old
superstitions; not entirely free, it may be, but believing himself to be
so. He did great good. He has helped to destroy the fictions of faith.
He has helped to rescue man from the prison of superstition, and this is
the greatest benefit that man can bestow on man.

He did another great service, not only to Jews, but to Christendom,
by writing the history of "The People of Israel." Christians for many
centuries have persecuted the Jews. They have charged them with the
greatest conceivable crime—with having crucified an infinite God.
This absurdity has hardened the hearts of men and poisoned the minds of
children. The persecution of the Jews is the meanest, the most senseless
and cruel page in history. Every civilized Christian should feel on
his cheeks the red spots of shame as he reads the wretched and infamous
story.

The flame of this prejudice is fanned and fed in the Sunday schools
of our day, and the orthodox minister points proudly to the atrocities
perpetrated against the Jews by the barbarians of Russia as evidences of
the truth of the inspired Scriptures. In every wound God puts a tongue
to proclaim the truth of his book.

If the charge that the Jews killed God were true, it is hardly
reasonable to hold those who are now living responsible for what their
ancestors did nearly nineteen centuries ago.

But there is another point in connection with this matter: If Christ was
God, then the Jews could not have killed him without his consent; and,
according to the orthodox creed, if he had not been sacrificed, the
whole world would have suffered eternal pain. Nothing can exceed the
meanness of the prejudice of Christians against the Jewish people. They
should not be held responsible for their savage ancestors, or for their
belief that Jehovah was an intelligent and merciful God, superior to all
other gods. Even Christians do not wish to be held responsible for
the Inquisition, for the Torquemadas and the John Calvins, for the
witch-burners and the Quaker-whippers, for the slave-traders and
child-stealers, the most of whom were believers in our "glorious
gospel," and many of whom had been bom the second time.

Renan did much to civilize the Christians by telling the truth in a
charming and convincing way about the "People of Israel." Both sides are
greatly indebted to him: one he has ably defended, and the other greatly
enlightened.

Having done what good he could in giving what he believed was light to
his fellow-men, he had no fear of becoming a victim of God's wrath, and
so he laughingly said: "For my part I imagine that if the Eternal in his
severity were to send me to hell I should succeed in escaping from it.
I would send up to my Creator a supplication that would make him smile.
The course of reasoning by which I would prove to him that it was
through his fault that I was damned would be so subtle that he would
find some difficulty in replying. The fate which would suit me best is
Purgatory—a charming place, where many delightful romances begun on
earth must be continued."

Such cheerfulness, such good philosophy, with cap and bells, such banter
and blasphemy, such sound and solid sense drive to madness the priest
who thinks the curse of Rome can fright the world. How the snake of
superstition writhes when he finds that his fangs have lost their
poison.

He was one of the gentlest of men—one of the fairest in discussion,
dissenting from the views of others with modesty, presenting his own
with clearness and candor. His mental manners were excellent. He was
not positive as to the "unknowable." He said "Perhaps." He knew that
knowledge is good if it increases the happiness of man; and he felt that
superstition is the assassin of liberty and civilization. He lived a
life of cheerfulness, of industry, devoted to the welfare of mankind.

He was a seeker of happiness by the highway of the natural, a destroyer
of the dogmas of mental deformity, a worshiper of Liberty and the
Ideal. As he lived, he died—hopeful and serene—and now, standing in
imagination by his grave, we ask: Will the night be eternal? The brain
says, Perhaps; while the heart hopes for the Dawn.—North American
Review, November, 1892.

Tolstoi and "the Kreutzer Sonata."

COUNT TOLSTOI is a man of genius. He is acquainted with Russian life
from the highest to the lowest—that is to say, from the worst to the
best. He knows the vices of the rich and the virtues of the poor. He is
a Christian, a real believer in the Old and New Testaments, an honest
follower of the Peasant of Palestine. He denounces luxury and ease, art
and music; he regards a flower with suspicion, believing that beneath
every blossom lies a coiled serpent. He agrees with Lazarus and
denounces Dives and the tax-gatherers. He is opposed, not only to
doctors of divinity, but of medicine.

From the Mount of Olives he surveys the world.

He is not a Christian like the Pope in the Vatican, or a cardinal in a
palace, or a bishop with revenues and retainers, or a millionaire who
hires preachers to point out the wickedness of the poor, or the director
of a museum who closes the doors on Sunday. He is a Christian something
like Christ.

To him this life is but a breathing-spell between the verdict and the
execution; the sciences are simply sowers of the seeds of pride, of
arrogance and vice. Shocked by the cruelties and unspeakable horrors of
war, he became a non-resistant and averred that he would not defend his
own body or that of his daughter from insult and outrage. In this he
followed the command of his Master: "Resist not evil." He passed,
not simply from war to peace, but from one extreme to the other, and
advocated a doctrine that would leave the basest of mankind the rulers
of the world. This was and is the error of a great and tender soul.

He did not accept all the teachings of Christ at once. His progress has
been, judging from his writings, somewhat gradual; but by accepting one
proposition he prepared himself for the acceptance of another. He is
not only a Christian, but has the courage of his convictions, and goes
without hesitation to the logical conclusion. He has another exceedingly
rare quality; he acts in accordance with his belief. His creed is
translated into deed. He opposes the doctors of divinity, because they
darken and deform the teachings of the Master. He denounces the doctors
of medicine, because he depends on Providence and the promises of Jesus
Christ. To him that which is called progress is, in fact, a profanation,
and property is a something that the organized few have stolen from the
unorganized many. He believes in universal labor, which is good, each
working for himself. He also believes that each should have only the
necessaries of life—which is bad. According to his idea, the world
ought to be filled with peasants. There should be only arts enough to
plough and sow and gather the harvest, to build huts, to weave coarse
cloth, to fashion clumsy and useful garments, and to cook the simplest
food. Men and women should not adorn their bodies. They should not make
themselves desirable or beautiful.

But even under such circumstances they might, like the Quakers, be proud
of humility and become arrogantly meek.

Tolstoi would change the entire order of human development. As a matter
of fact, the savage who adorns himself or herself with strings of
shells, or with feathers, has taken the first step towards civilization.
The tatooed is somewhat in advance of the unfrescoed. At the bottom of
all this is the love of approbation, of the admiration of their fellows,
and this feeling, this love, cannot be torn from the human heart.

In spite of ourselves we are attracted by what to us is beautiful,
because beauty is associated with pleasure, with enjoyment. The love of
the well-formed, of the beautiful, is prophetic of the perfection of the
human race. It is impossible to admire the deformed. They may be loved
for their goodness or genius, but never because of their deformity.
There is within us the love of proportion. There is a physical basis for
the appreciation of harmony, which is also a kind of proportion.

The love of the beautiful is shared with man by most animals. The wings
of the moth are painted by love, by desire. This is the foundation of
the bird's song. This love of approbation, this desire to please, to
be admired, to be loved, is in some way the cause of all heroic,
self-denying, and sublime actions.

Count Tolstoi, following parts of the New Testament, regards love
as essentially impure. He seems really to think that there is a love
superior to human love; that the love of man for woman, of woman for
man, is, after all, a kind of glittering degradation; that it is better
to love God than woman; better to love the invisible phantoms of the
skies than the children upon our knees—in other words, that it is far
better to love a heaven somewhere else than to make one here. He seems
to think that women adorn themselves simply for the purpose of getting
in their power the innocent and unsuspecting men. He forgets that
the best and purest of human beings are controlled, for the most part
unconsciously, by the hidden, subtle tendencies of nature. He seems to
forget the great fact of "natural selection," and that the choice of one
in preference to all others is the result of forces beyond the control
of the individual. To him there seems to be no purity in love, because
men are influenced by forms, by the beauty of women; and women, knowing
this fact, according to him, act, and consequently both are equally
guilty. He endeavors to show that love is a delusion; that at best it
can last but for a few days; that it must of necessity be succeeded by
indifference, then by disgust, lastly by hatred; that in every Garden of
Eden is a serpent of jealousy, and that the brightest days end with the
yawn of ennui.

Of course he is driven to the conclusion that life in this world is
without value, that the race can be perpetuated only by vice, and that
the practice of the highest virtue would leave the world without
the form of man. Strange as it may sound to some, this is the same
conclusion reached by his Divine Master: "They did eat, they drank, they
married, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered
the ark and the flood came and destroyed them all." "Every one that hath
forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife,
or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold,
and shall inherit everlasting life."

According to Christianity, as it really is and really was, the Christian
should have no home in this world—at least none until the earth has
been purified by fire. His affections should be given to God; not to
wife and children, not to friends or country. He is here but for a
time on a journey, waiting for the summons. This life is a kind of
dock running out into the sea of eternity, on which he waits for
transportation. Nothing here is of any importance; the joys of life are
frivolous and corrupting, and by losing these few gleams of happiness in
this world he will bask forever in the unclouded rays of infinite joy.
Why should a man risk an eternity of perfect happiness for the sake of
enjoying himself a few days with his wife and children? Why should he
become an eternal outcast for the sake of having a home and fireside
here?

The "Fathers" of the church had the same opinion of marriage. They
agreed with Saint Paul, and Tolstoi agrees with them. They had the same
contempt for wives and mothers, and uttered the same blasphemies against
that divine passion that has filled the world with art and song.

All this is to my mind a kind of insanity; nature soured or
withered—deformed so that celibacy is mistaken for virtue. The
imagination becomes polluted, and the poor wretch believes that he is
purer than his thoughts, holier than his desires, and that to outrage
nature is the highest form of religion. But nature imprisoned,
obstructed, tormented, always has sought for and has always found
revenge. Some of these victims, regarding the passions as low and
corrupting, feeling humiliated by hunger and thirst, sought through
maimings and mutilations the purification of the soul.

Count Tolstoi in "The Kreutzer Sonata," has drawn, with a free hand, one
of the vilest and basest of men for his hero. He is suspicious, jealous,
cruel, infamous. The wife is infinitely too good for such a wild
unreasoning beast, and yet the writer of this insane story seems to
justify the assassin. If this is a true picture of wedded life in
Russia, no wonder that Count Tolstoi looks forward with pleasure to the
extinction of the human race.

Of all passions that can take possession of the heart or brain jealousy
is the worst. For many generations the chemists sought for the secret by
which all metals could be changed to gold, and through which the basest
could become the best. Jealousy seeks exactly the opposite. It endeavors
to transmute the very gold of love into the dross of shame and crime.

The story of "The Kreutzer Sonata" seems to have been written for the
purpose of showing that woman is at fault; that she has no right to
be attractive, no right to be beautiful; and that she is morally
responsible for the contour of her throat, for the pose of her body, for
the symmetry of her limbs, for the red of her lips, and for the dimples
in her cheeks.

The opposite of this doctrine is nearer true. It would be far better to
hold people responsible for their ugliness than for their beauty. It may
be true that the soul, the mind, in some wondrous way fashions the body,
and that to that extent every individual is responsible for his looks.
It may be that the man or woman thinking high thoughts will give,
necessarily, a nobility to expression and a beauty to outline.

It is not true that the sins of man can be laid justly at the feet of
woman. Women are better than men; they have greater responsibilities;
they bear even the burdens of joy. This is the real reason why their
faults are considered greater.

Men and women desire each other, and this desire is a condition of
civilization, progress, and happiness, and of everything of real value.
But there is this profound difference in the sexes: in man this desire
is the foundation of love, while in woman love is the foundation of this
desire.

Tolstoi seems to be a stranger to the heart of woman.

Is it not wonderful that one who holds self-denial in such high esteem
should say, "That life is embittered by the fear of one's children, and
not only on account of their real or imaginary illnesses, but even by
their very presence"?

Has the father no real love for the children? Is he not paid a thousand
times through their caresses, their sympathy, their love? Is there no
joy in seeing their minds unfold, their affections develop? Of course,
love and anxiety go together. That which we love we wish to protect. The
perpetual fear of death gives love intensity and sacredness. Yet
Count Tolstoi gives us the feelings of a father incapable of natural
affection; of one who hates to have his children sick because the
orderly course of his wretched life is disturbed. So, too, we are told
that modern mothers think too much of their children, care too much for
their health, and refuse to be comforted when they die. Lest these words
may be thought libellous, the following extract is given;

"In old times women consoled themselves with the belief, The Lord hath
given, and the Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
They consoled themselves with the thought that the soul of the departed
had returned to him who gave it; that it was better to die innocent
than to live in sin. If women nowadays had such a comfortable faith to
support them, they might take their misfortunes less hard."

The conclusion reached by the writer is that without faith in God,
woman's love grovels in the mire.

In this case the mire is made by the tears of mothers falling on the
clay that hides their babes.

The one thing constant, the one peak that rises above all clouds, the
one window in which the light forever burns, the one star that darkness
cannot quench, is woman's love.

This one fact justifies the existence and the perpetuation of the human
race. Again I say that women are better than men; their hearts are more
unreservedly given; in the web of their lives sorrow is inextricably
woven with the greatest joys; self-sacrifice is a part of their nature,
and at the behest of love and maternity they walk willingly and joyously
down to the very gates of death.

Is there nothing in this to excite the admiration, the adoration, of a
modern reformer? Are the monk and nun superior to the father and mother?

The author of "The Kreutzer Sonata" is unconsciously the enemy of
mankind. He is filled with what might be called a merciless pity, a
sympathy almost malicious. Had he lived a few centuries ago, he might
have founded a religion; but the most he can now do is, perhaps, to
create the necessity for another asylum.

Count Tolstoi objects to music—not the ordinary kind, but to great
music, the music that arouses the emotions, that apparently carries us
beyond the limitations of life, that for the moment seems to break the
great chain of cause and effect, and leaves the soul soaring and free.
"Emotion and duty," he declares, "do not go hand in hand." All art
touches and arouses the emotional nature. The painter, the poet, the
sculptor, the composer, the orator, appeal to the emotions, to the
passions, to the hopes and fears. The commonplace is transfigured;
the cold and angular facts of existence take form and color; the
blood quickens; the fancies spread their wings; the intellect grows
sympathetic; the river of life flows full and free; and man becomes
capable of the noblest deeds. Take emotion from the heart of man and
the idea of obligation would be lost; right and wrong would lose their
meaning, and the word "ought" would never again be spoken. We are
subject to conditions, liable to disease, pain, and death. We are
capable of ecstasy. Of these conditions, of these possibilities, the
emotions are born.

Only the conditionless can be the emotionless.

We are conditioned beings; and if the conditions are changed, the result
may be pain or death or greater joy. We can only live within certain
degrees of heat. If the weather were a few degrees hotter or a few
degrees colder, we could not exist. We need food and roof and raiment.
Life and happiness depend on these conditions. We do not certainly know
what is to happen, and consequently our hopes and fears are constantly
active—that is to say, we are emotional beings. The generalization of
Tolstoi, that emotion never goes hand in hand with duty, is almost the
opposite of the truth. The idea of duty could not exist without emotion.
Think of men and women without love, without desires, without passions?
Think of a world without art or music—a world without beauty, without
emotion.

And yet there are many writers busy pointing out the loathsomeness of
love and their own virtues. Only a little while ago an article appeared
in one of the magazines in which all women who did not dress according
to the provincial prudery of the writer were denounced as impure.
Millions of refined and virtuous wives and mothers were described as
dripping with pollution because they enjoyed dancing and were so well
formed that they were not obliged to cover their arms and throats to
avoid the pity of their associates. And yet the article itself is far
more indelicate than any dance or any dress, or even lack of dress. What
a curious opinion dried apples have of fruit upon the tree!

Count Tolstoi is also the enemy of wealth, of luxury. In this he follows
the New Testament. "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a
needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven." He gathers
his inspiration from the commandment, "Sell all that thou hast and give
to the poor."

Wealth is not a crime any more than health or bodily or intellectual
strength. The weak might denounce the strong, the sickly might envy the
healthy, just as the poor may denounce or envy the rich. A man is not
necessarily a criminal because he is wealthy. He is to be judged, not
by his wealth, but by the way he uses his wealth. The strong man can use
his strength, not only for the benefit of himself, but for the good of
others. So a man of intelligence can be a benefactor of the human race.
Intelligence is often used to entrap the simple and to prey upon the
unthinking, but we do not wish to do away with intelligence. So strength
is often used to tyrannize over the weak, and in the same way wealth may
be used to the injury of mankind. To sell all that you have and give to
the poor is not a panacea for poverty. The man of wealth should help
the poor man to help himself. Men cannot receive without giving some
consideration, and if they have not labor or property to give, they
give their manhood, their self-respect. Besides, if all should obey this
injunction, "Sell what thou hast and give to the poor," who would buy?
We know that thousands and millions of rich men lack generosity and have
but little feeling for their fellows. The fault is not in the money, not
in the wealth, but in the individuals. They would be just as bad were
they poor. The only difference is that they would have less power. The
good man should regard wealth as an instrumentality, as an opportunity,
and he should endeavor to benefit his fellow-men, not by making them the
recipients of his charity, but by assisting them to assist themselves.
The desire to clothe and feed, to educate and protect, wives and
children, is the principal reason for making money—one of the great
springs of industry, prudence, and economy.

Those who labor have a right to live. They have a right to what they
earn. He who works has a right to home and fireside and to the comforts
of life. Those who waste the spring, the summer, and the autumn of their
lives must bear the winter when it comes. Many of our institutions are
absurdly unjust. Giving the land to the few, making tenants of the many,
is the worst possible form of socialism—of paternal government. In
most of the nations of our day the idlers and non-producers are either
beggars or aristocrats, paupers or princes, and the great middle
laboring class support them both. Rags and robes have a liking for each
other. Beggars and kings are in accord; they are all parasites, living
on the same blood, stealing the same labor—one by beggary, the other by
force. And yet in all this there can be found no reason for denouncing
the man who has accumulated. One who wishes to tear down his bams and
build greater has laid aside something to keep the wolf of want from the
door of home when he is dead.

Even the beggars see the necessity of others working, and the nobility
see the same necessity with equal clearness. But it is hardly reasonable
to say that all should do the same kind of work, for the reason that all
have not the same aptitudes, the same talents. Some can plough,
others can paint; some can reap and mow, while others can invent the
instruments that save labor; some navigate the seas; some work in mines;
while others compose music that elevates and refines the heart of the
world.

But the worst thing in "The Kreutzer Sonata" is the declaration that a
husband can by force compel the wife to love and obey him. Love is not
the child of fear; it is not the result of force. No one can love on
compulsion. Even Jehovah found that it was impossible to compel the Jews
to love him. He issued his command to that effect, coupled with threats
of pain and death, but his chosen people failed to respond.

Love is the perfume of the heart; it is not subject to the will of
husbands or kings or God.

Count Tolstoi would establish slavery in every house; he would make
every husband a tyrant and every wife a trembling serf. No wonder that
he regards such marriage as a failure. He is in exact harmony with the
curse of Jehovah when he said unto the woman: "I will greatly multiply
thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth
children, and thy desire shall be unto thy husband, and he shall rule
over thee."

This is the destruction of the family, the pollution of home, the
crucifixion of love.

Those who are truly married are neither masters nor servants. The idea
of obedience is lost in the desire for the happiness of each. Love is
not a convict, to be detained with bolts and chains. Love is the highest
expression of liberty. Love neither commands nor obeys.

The curious thing is that the orthodox world insists that all men and
women should obey the injunctions of Christ; that they should take him
as the supreme example, and in all things follow his teachings. This is
preached from countless pulpits, and has been for many centuries. And
yet the man who does follow the Savior, who insists that he will not
resist evil, who sells what he has and gives to the poor, who deserts
his wife and children for the love of God, is regarded as insane.

Tolstoi, on most subjects, appears to be in accord with the founder of
Christianity, with the apostles, with the writers of the New Testament,
and with the Fathers of the church; and yet a Christian teacher of a
Sabbath school decides, in the capacity of Postmaster-General, that "The
Kreutzer Sonata" is unfit to be carried in the mails.

Although I disagree with nearly every sentence in this book, regard the
story as brutal and absurd, the view of life presented as cruel, vile,
and false, yet I recognize the right of Count Tolstoi to express his
opinions on all subjects, and the right of the men and women of America
to read for themselves.

As to the sincerity of the author, there is not the slightest doubt. He
is willing to give all that he has for the good of his fellow-men. He
is a soldier in what he believes to be a sacred cause, and he has the
courage of his convictions. He is endeavoring to organize society in
accordance with the most radical utterances that have been attributed
to Jesus Christ. The philosophy of Palestine is not adapted to an
industrial and commercial age. Christianity was born when the nation
that produced it was dying. It was a requiem—a declaration that life
was a failure, that the world was about to end, and that the hopes of
mankind should be lifted to another sphere. Tolstoi stands with his back
to the sunrise and looks mournfully upon the shadow. He has uttered many
tender, noble, and inspiring words. There are many passages in his works
that must have been written when his eyes were filled with tears. He has
fixed his gaze so intently on the miseries and agonies of life that he
has been driven to the conclusion that nothing could be better than the
effacement of the human race.

Some men, looking only at the faults and tyrannies of government, have
said: "Anarchy is better." Others, looking at the misfortunes, the
poverty, the crimes, of men, have, in a kind of pitying despair, reached
the conclusion that the best of all is death. These are the opinions of
those who have dwelt in gloom—of the self-imprisoned.

By comparing long periods of time, we see that, on the whole, the race
is advancing; that the world is growing steadily, and surely, better;
that each generation enjoys more and suffers less than its predecessor.
We find that our institutions have the faults of individuals. Nations
must be composed of men and women; and as they have their faults,
nations cannot be perfect. The institution of marriage is a failure to
the extent, and only to the extent, that the human race is a failure.
Undoubtedly it is the best and the most important institution that has
been established by the civilized world. If there is unhappiness in that
relation, if there is tyranny upon one side and misery upon the other,
it is not the fault of marriage. Take homes from the world and only wild
beasts are left.

We cannot cure the evils of our day and time by a return to savagery.
It is not necessary to become ignorant to increase our happiness. The
highway of civilization leads to the light. The time will come when the
human race will be truly enlightened, when labor will receive its due
reward, when the last institution begotten of ignorance and savagery
will disappear. The time will come when the whole world will say that
the love of man for woman, of woman for man, of mother for child, is the
highest, the noblest, the purest, of which the heart is capable.

Love, human love, love of men and women, love of mothers fathers, and
babes, is the perpetual and beneficent force. Not the love of phantoms,
the love that builds cathedrals and dungeons, that trembles and prays,
that kneels and curses; but the real love, the love that felled the
forests, navigated the seas, subdued the earth, explored continents,
built countless homes, and founded nations—the love that kindled the
creative flame and wrought the miracles of art, that gave us all there
is of music, from the cradle-song that gives to infancy its smiling
sleep to the great symphony that bears the soul away with wings of
fire—the real love, mother of every virtue and of every joy.—North
American Review, September, 1890.

THOMAS PAINE.
