{
  "schema": "tga.work.v1",
  "identifier": "dresden:vol-4:what-is-religion",
  "slug": "what-is-religion",
  "title": "What Is Religion?",
  "subtitle": "Ingersoll's last public address.",
  "excerpt": "Ingersoll's last public address, delivered in Boston in June 1899, six weeks before his death — a summing up, in unsparing language, of what religion has actually been, and what a humane religion of this world might yet become.",
  "year": 1899,
  "volume": 4,
  "category": "Address",
  "author": {
    "name": "Robert G. Ingersoll",
    "wikidata": "Q360326",
    "viaf": "44331023"
  },
  "isPartOf": {
    "title": "The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll",
    "edition": "Dresden Edition",
    "publisher": "C. P. Farrell",
    "year": 1900
  },
  "license": "https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/",
  "url": "https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/what-is-religion/",
  "wordCount": 4735,
  "body": "• This was Col. Ingersoll's last public address, delivered\n    before the American Free Religious Association, in the\n    Hollis Street Theatre, Boston, June 2, 1899.\n\nIT is asserted that an infinite God created all things, governs all\nthings, and that the creature should be obedient and thankful to the\ncreator; that the creator demands certain things, and that the person\nwho complies with these demands is religious. This kind of religion has\nbeen substantially universal.\n\nFor many centuries and by many peoples it was believed that this God\ndemanded sacrifices; that he was pleased when parents shed the blood of\ntheir babes. Afterward it was supposed that he was satisfied with the\nblood of oxen, lambs and doves, and that in exchange for or on account\nof these sacrifices, this God gave rain, sunshine and harvest. It\nwas also believed that if the sacrifices were not made, this God sent\npestilence, famine, flood and earthquake.\n\nThe last phase of this belief in sacrifice was, according to the\nChristian doctrine, that God accepted the blood of his son, and that\nafter his son had been murdered, he, God, was satisfied, and wanted no\nmore blood.\n\nDuring all these years and by all these peoples it was believed that\nthis God heard and answered prayer, that he forgave sins and saved the\nsouls of true believers. This, in a general way, is the definition of\nreligion.\n\nNow, the questions are, Whether religion was founded on any known\nfact? Whether such a being as God exists? Whether he was the creator of\nyourself and myself? Whether any prayer was ever answered? Whether any\nsacrifice of babe or ox secured the favor of this unseen God?\n\nFirst.—Did an infinite God create the children of men?\n\nWhy did he create the intellectually inferior?\n\nWhy did he create the deformed and helpless?\n\nWhy did he create the criminal, the idiotic, the insane?\n\nCan infinite wisdom and power make any excuse for the creation of\nfailures?\n\nAre the failures under obligation to their creator?\n\nSecond.—Is an infinite God the governor of this world?\n\nIs he responsible for all the chiefs, kings, emperors, and queens?\n\nIs he responsible for all the wars that have been waged, for all the\ninnocent blood that has been shed?\n\nIs he responsible for the centuries of slavery, for the backs that have\nbeen scarred with the lash, for the babes that have been sold from\nthe breasts of mothers, for the families that have been separated and\ndestroyed?\n\nIs this God responsible for religious persecution, for the Inquisition,\nfor the thumb-screw and rack, and for all the instruments of torture?\n\nDid this God allow the cruel and vile to destroy the brave and virtuous?\nDid he allow tyrants to shed the blood of patriots?\n\nDid he allow his enemies to torture and burn his friends?\n\nWhat is such a God worth?\n\nWould a decent man, having the power to prevent it, allow his enemies to\ntorture and burn his friends?\n\nCan we conceive of a devil base enough to prefer his enemies to his\nfriends?\n\nIf a good and infinitely powerful God governs this world, how can we\naccount for cyclones, earthquakes, pestilence and famine?\n\nHow can we account for cancers, for microbes, for diphtheria and the\nthousand diseases that prey on infancy?\n\nHow can we account for the wild beasts that devour human beings, for the\nfanged serpents whose bite is death?\n\nHow can we account for a world where life feeds on life?\n\nWere beak and claw, tooth and fang, invented and produced by infinite\nmercy?\n\nDid infinite goodness fashion the wings of the eagles so that their\nfleeing prey could be overtaken?\n\nDid infinite goodness create the beasts of prey with the intention that\nthey should devour the weak and helpless?\n\nDid infinite goodness create the countless worthless living things that\nbreed within and feed upon the flesh of higher forms?\n\nDid infinite wisdom intentionally produce the microscopic beasts that\nfeed upon the optic nerve?\n\nThink of blinding a man to satisfy the appetite of a microbe!\n\nThink of life feeding on life! Think of the victims! Think of the\nNiagara of blood pouring over the precipice of cruelty!\n\nIn view of these facts, what, after all, is religion?\n\nIt is fear.\n\nFear builds the altar and offers the sacrifice.\n\nFear erects the cathedral and bows the head of man in worship.\n\nFear bends the knees and utters the prayer.\n\nFear pretends to love.\n\nReligion teaches the slave-virtues—obedience, humility, self-denial,\nforgiveness, non-resistance.\n\nLips, religious and fearful, tremblingly repeat this passage: \"Though he\nslay me, yet will I trust him.\" This is the abyss of degradation.\n\nReligion does not teach self-reliance, independence, manliness, courage,\nself-defence. Religion makes God a master and man his serf. The master\ncannot be great enough to make slavery sweet.\n\nII.\n\nIF this God exists, how do we know that he is-I good? How can we prove\nthat he is merciful, that he cares for the children of men? If this\nGod exists, he has on many occasions seen millions of his poor children\nplowing the fields, sowing and planting the grain, and when he saw them\nhe knew that they depended on the expected crop for life, and yet this\ngood God, this merciful being, withheld the rain. He caused the sun to\nrise, to steal all moisture from the land, but gave no rain. He saw the\nseeds that man had planted wither and perish, but he sent no rain. He\nsaw the people look with sad eyes upon the barren earth, and he sent no\nrain. He saw them slowly devour the little that they had, and saw them\nwhen the days of hunger came—saw them slowly waste away, saw their\nhungry, sunken eyes, heard their prayers, saw them devour the miserable\nanimals that they had, saw fathers and mothers, insane with hunger,\nkill and eat their shriveled babes, and yet the heaven above them was\nas brass and the earth beneath as iron, and he sent no rain. Can we say\nthat in the heart of this God there blossomed the flower of pity? Can\nwe say that he cared for the children of men? Can we say that his mercy\nendureth forever?\n\nDo we prove that this God is good because he sends the cyclone that\nwrecks villages and covers the fields with the mangled bodies of\nfathers, mothers and babes? Do we prove his goodness by showing that he\nhas opened the earth and swallowed thousands of his helpless children,\nor that with the volcanoes he has overwhelmed them with rivers of fire?\nCan we infer the goodness of God from the facts we know?\n\nIf these calamities did not happen, would we suspect that God cared\nnothing for human beings? If there were no famine, no pestilence, no\ncyclone, no earthquake, would we think that God is not good?\n\nAccording to the theologians, God did not make all men alike. He made\nraces differing in intelligence, stature and color. Was there goodness,\nwas there wisdom in this?\n\nOught the superior races to thank God that they are not the inferior? If\nwe say yes, then I ask another question: Should the inferior races thank\nGod that they are not superior, or should they thank God that they are\nnot beasts?\n\nWhen God made these different races he knew that the superior would\nenslave the inferior, knew that the inferior would be conquered, and\nfinally destroyed.\n\nIf God did this, and knew the blood that would be shed, the agonies that\nwould be endured, saw the countless fields covered with the corpses of\nthe slain, saw all the bleeding backs of slaves, all the broken hearts\nof mothers bereft of babes, if he saw and knew all this, can we conceive\nof a more malicious fiend?\n\nWhy, then, should we say that God is good?\n\nThe dungeons against whose dripping walls the brave and generous have\nsighed their souls away, the scaffolds stained and glorified with noble\nblood, the hopeless slaves with scarred and bleeding backs, the writhing\nmartyrs clothed in flame, the virtuous stretched on racks, their joints\nand muscles torn apart, the flayed and bleeding bodies of the just, the\nextinguished eyes of those who sought for truth, the countless patriots\nwho fought and died in vain, the burdened, beaten, weeping wives,\nthe shriveled faces of neglected babes, the murdered millions of the\nvanished years, the victims of the winds and waves, of flood and flame,\nof imprisoned forces in the earth, of lightning's stroke, of lava's\nmolten stream, of famine, plague and lingering pain, the mouths that\ndrip with blood, the fangs that poison, the beaks that wound and tear,\nthe triumphs of the base, the rule and sway of wrong, the crowns that\ncruelty has worn and the robed hypocrites, with clasped and bloody\nhands, who thanked their God—a phantom fiend—that liberty had been\nbanished from the world, these souvenirs of the dreadful past, these\nhorrors that still exist, these frightful facts deny that any God exists\nwho has the will and power to guard and bless the human race.\n\nIII. The Power That Works for Righteousness.\n\nMOST people cling to the supernatural. If they give up one God, they\nimagine another. Having outgrown Jehovah, they talk about the power that\nworks for righteousness.\n\nWhat is this power?\n\nMan advances, and necessarily advances through experience. A man wishing\nto go to a certain place comes to where the road divides. He takes the\nleft hand, believing it to be the right road, and travels until he finds\nthat it is the wrong one. He retraces his steps and takes the right hand\nroad and reaches the place desired. The next time he goes to the same\nplace, he does not take the left hand road. He has tried that road, and\nknows that it is the wrong road. He takes the right road, and thereupon\nthese theologians say, \"There is a power that works for righteousness.\"\n\nA child, charmed by the beauty of the flame, grasps it with its dimpled\nhand. The hand is burned, and after that the child keeps its hand out of\nthe fire. The power that works for righteousness has taught the child a\nlesson.\n\nThe accumulated experience of the world is a power and force that works\nfor righteousness. This force is not conscious, not intelligent. It has\nno will, no purpose. It is a result.\n\nSo thousands have endeavored to establish the existence of God by the\nfact that we have what is called the moral sense; that is to say, a\nconscience.\n\nIt is insisted by these theologians, and by many of the so-called\nphilosophers, that this moral sense, this sense of duty, of obligation,\nwas imported, and that conscience is an exotic. Taking the ground that\nit was not produced here, was not produced by man, they then imagine a\nGod from whom it came.\n\nMan is a social being. We live together in families, tribes and nations.\n\nThe members of a family, of a tribe, of a nation, who increase the\nhappiness of the family, of the tribe or of the nation, are considered\ngood members. They are praised, admired and respected. They are regarded\nas good; that is to say, as moral.\n\nThe members who add to the misery of the family, the tribe or the\nnation, are considered bad members.\n\nThey are blamed, despised, punished. They are regarded as immoral.\n\nThe family, the tribe, the nation, creates a standard of conduct, of\nmorality. There is nothing supernatural in this.\n\nThe greatest of human beings has said, \"Conscience is born of love.\"\n\nThe sense of obligation, of duty, was naturally produced.\n\nAmong savages, the immediate consequences of actions are taken into\nconsideration. As people advance, the remote consequences are perceived.\nThe standard of conduct becomes higher. The imagination is cultivated.\nA man puts himself in the place of another. The sense of duty becomes\nstronger, more imperative. Man judges himself.\n\nHe loves, and love is the commencement, the foundation of the highest\nvirtues. He injures one that he loves. Then comes regret, repentance,\nsorrow, conscience. In all this there is nothing supernatural.\n\nMan has deceived himself. Nature is a mirror in which man sees his own\nimage, and all supernatural religions rest on the pretence that the\nimage, which appears to be behind this mirror, has been caught.\n\nAll the metaphysicians of the spiritual type, from Plato to Swedenborg,\nhave manufactured their facts, and all founders of religion have done\nthe same.\n\nSuppose that an infinite God exists, what can we do for him? Being\ninfinite, he is conditionless; being conditionless, he cannot be\nbenefited or injured. He cannot want. He has.\n\nThink of the egotism of a man who believes that an infinite being wants\nhis praise!\n\nIV.\n\nWHAT has our religion done? Of course, it is admitted by Christians that\nall other religions are false, and consequently we need examine only our\nown.\n\nHas Christianity done good? Has it made men nobler, more merciful,\nnearer honest? When the church had control, were men made better and\nhappier?\n\nWhat has been the effect of Christianity in Italy, in Spain, in\nPortugal, in Ireland?\n\nWhat has religion done for Hungary or Austria? What was the effect of\nChristianity in Switzerland, in Holland, in Scotland, in England, in\nAmerica? Let us be honest. Could these countries have been worse without\nreligion? Could they have been worse had they had any other religion\nthan Christianity?\n\nWould Torquemada have been worse had he been a follower of Zoroaster?\nWould Calvin have been more bloodthirsty if he had believed in the\nreligion of the South Sea Islanders? Would the Dutch have been more\nidiotic if they had denied the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, and worshiped\nthe blessed trinity of sausage, beer and cheese? Would John Knox\nhave been any worse had he deserted Christ and become a follower of\nConfucius?\n\nTake our own dear, merciful Puritan Fathers? What did Christianity do\nfor them? They hated pleasure. On the door of life they hung the crape\nof death. They muffled all the bells of gladness. They made cradles\nby putting rockers on coffins. In the Puritan year there were twelve\nDecembers. They tried to do away with infancy and youth, with prattle of\nbabes and the song of the morning.\n\nThe religion of the Puritan was an unadulterated curse. The Puritan\nbelieved the Bible to be the word of God, and this belief has always\nmade those who held it cruel and wretched. Would the Puritan have been\nworse if he had adopted the religion of the North American Indians?\n\nLet me refer to just one fact showing the influence of a belief in the\nBible on human beings.\n\n\"On the day of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth she was presented with\na Geneva Bible by an old man representing Time, with Truth standing\nby his side as a child. The Queen received the Bible, kissed it, and\npledged herself to diligently read therein. In the dedication of this\nblessed Bible the Queen was piously exhorted to put all Papists to the\nsword.\"\n\nIn this incident we see the real spirit of Protestant lovers of the\nBible. In other words, it was just as fiendish, just as infamous as the\nCatholic spirit.\n\nHas the Bible made the people of Georgia kind and merciful? Would the\nlynchers be more ferocious if they worshiped gods of wood and stone?\n\nVII. How Can Mankind Be Reformed Without Religion?\n\nRELIGION has been tried, and in all countries, in all times, has failed.\n\nReligion has never made man merciful.\n\nRemember the Inquisition.\n\nWhat effect did religion have on slavery?\n\nWhat effect upon Libby, Saulsbury and Andersonville?\n\nReligion has always been the enemy of science, of investigation and\nthought.\n\nReligion has never made man free.\n\nIt has never made man moral, temperate, industrious and honest.\n\nAre Christians more temperate, nearer virtuous, nearer honest than\nsavages?\n\nAmong savages do we not find that their vices and cruelties are the\nfruits of their superstitions?\n\nTo those who believe in the Uniformity of Nature, religion is\nimpossible.\n\nCan we affect the nature and qualities of substance by prayer? Can we\nhasten or delay the tides by worship? Can we change winds by sacrifice?\nWill kneelings give us wealth? Can we cure disease by supplication? Can\nwe add to our knowledge by ceremony? Can we receive virtue or honor as\nalms?\n\nAre not the facts in the mental world just as stubborn—just as\nnecessarily produced—as the facts in the material world? Is not what we\ncall mind just as natural as what we call body?\n\nReligion rests on the idea that Nature has a master and that this master\nwill listen to prayer; that this master punishes and rewards; that he\nloves praise and flattery and hates the brave and free.\n\nHas man obtained any help from heaven?\n\nVI.\n\nIF we have a theory, we must have facts for the foundation. We must\nhave corner-stones. We must not build on guesses, fancies, analogies\nor inferences. The structure must have a basement. If we build, we must\nbegin at the bottom.\n\nI have a theory and I have four corner-stones.\n\nThe first stone is that matter—substance—cannot be destroyed, cannot\nbe annihilated.\n\nThe second stone is that force cannot be destroyed, cannot be\nannihilated.\n\nThe third stone is that matter and force cannot exist apart—no matter\nwithout force—no force without matter.\n\nThe fourth stone is that that which cannot be destroyed could not have\nbeen created; that the indestructible is the uncreatable.\n\nIf these corner-stones are facts, it follows as a necessity that matter\nand force are from and to eternity; that they can neither be increased\nnor diminished.\n\nIt follows that nothing has been or can be created; that there never has\nbeen or can be a creator.\n\nIt follows that there could not have been any intelligence, any design\nback of matter and force.\n\nThere is no intelligence without force. There is no force without\nmatter. Consequently there could not by any possibility have been any\nintelligence, any force, back of matter.\n\nIt therefore follows that the supernatural does not and cannot exist. If\nthese four corner-stones are facts, Nature has no master. If matter and\nforce are from and to eternity, it follows as a necessity that no God\nexists; that no God created or governs the universe; that no God exists\nwho answers prayer; no God who succors the oppressed; no God who pities\nthe sufferings of innocence; no God who cares for the slaves with\nscarred flesh, the mothers robbed of their babes; no God who rescues\nthe tortured, and no God that saves a martyr from the flames. In other\nwords, it proves that man has never received any help from heaven;\nthat all sacrifices have been in vain, and that all prayers have died\nunanswered in the heedless air. I do not pretend to know. I say what I\nthink.\n\nIf matter and force have existed from eternity, it then follows that all\nthat has been possible has happened, all that is possible is happening,\nand all that will be possible will happen.\n\nIn the universe there is no chance, no caprice. Every event has parents.\n\nThat which has not happened, could not. The present is the necessary\nproduct of all the past, the necessary cause of all the future.\n\nIn the infinite chain there is, and there can be, no broken, no missing\nlink. The form and motion of every star, the climate of every world,\nall forms of vegetable and animal life, all instinct, intelligence\nand conscience, all assertions and denials, all vices and virtues, all\nthoughts and dreams, all hopes and fears, are necessities. Not one\nof the countless things and relations in the universe could have been\ndifferent.\n\nVii\n\nIF matter and force are from eternity, then we can say that man had no\nintelligent creator—that man was not a special creation.\n\nWe now know, if we know anything, that Jehovah, the divine potter, did\nnot mix and mould clay into the forms of men and women, and then breathe\nthe breath of life into these forms.\n\nWe now know that our first parents were not foreigners. We know that\nthey were natives of this world, produced here, and that their life did\nnot come from the breath of any god. We now know, if we know anything,\nthat the universe is natural, and that men and women have been naturally\nproduced. We now know our ancestors, our pedigree. We have the family\ntree.\n\nWe have all the links of the chain, twenty-six links inclusive from\nmoner to man.\n\nWe did not get our information from inspired books. We have fossil facts\nand living forms.\n\nFrom the simplest creatures, from blind sensation, from organism from\none vague want, to a single cell with a nucleus, to a hollow ball filled\nwith fluid, to a cup with double walls, to a flat worm, to a something\nthat begins to breathe, to an organism that has a spinal chord, to\na link between the invertebrate to the vertebrate, to one that has a\ncranium—a house for a brain—to one with fins, still onward to one with\nfore and hinder fins, to the reptile mammalia, to the marsupials, to\nthe lemures, dwellers in trees, to the simiae, to the pithecanthropi, and\nlastly, to man.\n\nWe know the paths that life has traveled. We know the footsteps of\nadvance. They have been traced. The last link has been found. For this\nwe are indebted, more than to all others, to the greatest of biologists,\nErnst Haeckel.\n\nWe now believe that the universe is natural and we deny the existence of\nthe supernatural.\n\nVIII. Reform.\n\nFOR thousands of years men and women have been trying to reform the\nworld. They have created gods and devils, heavens and hells; they have\nwritten sacred books, performed miracles, built cathedrals and dungeons;\nthey have crowned and uncrowned kings and queens; they have tortured and\nimprisoned, flayed alive and burned; they have preached and prayed; they\nhave tried promises and threats; they have coaxed and persuaded; they\nhave preached and taught, and in countless ways have endeavored to make\npeople honest, temperate, industrious and virtuous; they have built\nhospitals and asylums, universities and schools, and seem to have done\ntheir very best to make mankind better and happier, and yet they have\nnot succeeded.\n\nWhy have the reformers failed? I will tell them why.\n\nIgnorance, poverty and vice are populating the world. The gutter is a\nnursery. People unable even to support themselves fill the tenements,\nthe huts and hovels with children. They depend on the Lord, on luck and\ncharity. They are not intelligent enough to think about consequences\nor to feel responsibility. At the same time they do not want children,\nbecause a child is a curse, a curse to them and to itself. The babe is\nnot welcome, because it is a burden. These unwelcome children fill\nthe jails and prisons, the asylums and hospitals, and they crowd\nthe scaffolds. A few are rescued by chance or charity, but the great\nmajority are failures, They become vicious, ferocious. They live by\nfraud and violence, and bequeath their vices to their children.\n\nAgainst this inundation of vice the forces of reform are helpless, and\ncharity itself becomes an unconscious promoter of crime.\n\nFailure seems to be the trademark of Nature. Why? Nature has no design,\nno intelligence. Nature produces without purpose, sustains without\nintention and destroys without thought. Man has a little intelligence,\nand he should use it. Intelligence is the only lever capable of raising\nmankind.\n\nThe real question is, can we prevent the ignorant, the poor, the\nvicious, from filling the world with their children?\n\nCan we prevent this Missouri of ignorance and vice from emptying into\nthe Mississippi of civilization?\n\nMust the world forever remain the victim of ignorant passion? Can the\nworld be civilized to that degree that consequences will be taken into\nconsideration by all?\n\nWhy should men and women have children that they cannot take care\nof, children that are burdens and curses? Why? Because they have more\npassion than intelligence, more passion than conscience, more passion\nthan reason.\n\nYou cannot reform these people with tracts and talk. You cannot reform\nthese people with preach and creed. Passion is, and always has been,\ndeaf. These weapons of reform are substantially useless. Criminals,\ntramps, beggars and failures are increasing every day. The prisons,\njails, poorhouses and asylums are crowded. Religion is helpless. Law can\npunish, but it can neither reform criminals nor prevent crime. The tide\nof vice is rising. The war that is now being waged against the forces of\nevil is as hopeless as the battle of the fireflies against the darkness\nof night.\n\nThere is but one hope. Ignorance, poverty and vice must stop populating\nthe world. This cannot be done by moral suasion. This cannot be done by\ntalk or example. This cannot be done by religion or by law, by priest or\nby hangman. This cannot be done by force, physical or moral.\n\nTo accomplish this there is but one way. Science must make woman the\nowner, the mistress of herself. Science, the only possible savior of\nmankind, must put it in the power of woman to decide for herself whether\nshe will or will not become a mother.\n\nThis is the solution of the whole question. This frees woman. The babes\nthat are then born will be welcome. They will be clasped with glad hands\nto happy breasts. They will fill homes with light and joy.\n\nMen and women who believe that slaves are purer, truer, than the free,\nwho believe that fear is a safer guide than knowledge, that only those\nare really good who obey the commands of others, and that ignorance is\nthe soil in which the perfect, perfumed flower of virtue grows, will\nwith protesting hands hide their shocked faces.\n\nMen and women who think that light is the enemy of virtue, that purity\ndwells in darkness, that it is dangerous for human beings to know\nthemselves and the facts in Nature that affect their well being, will be\nhorrified at the thought of making intelligence the master of passion.\n\nBut I look forward to the time when men and women by reason of their\nknowledge of consequences, of the morality born of intelligence, will\nrefuse to perpetuate disease and pain, will refuse to fill the world\nwith failures.\n\nWhen that time comes the prison walls will fall, the dungeons will be\nflooded with light, and the shadow of the scaffold will cease to curse\nthe earth. Poverty and crime will be childless. The withered hands of\nwant will not be stretched for alms. They will be dust. The whole world\nwill be intelligent, virtuous and free.\n\nIX.\n\nRELIGION can never reform mankind because religion is slavery.\n\nIt is far better to be free, to leave the forts and barricades of fear,\nto stand erect and face the future with a smile.\n\nIt is far better to give yourself sometimes to negligence, to drift with\nwave and tide, with the blind force of the world, to think and dream,\nto forget the chains and limitations of the breathing life, to forget\npurpose and object, to lounge in the picture gallery of the brain,\nto feel once more the clasps and kisses of the past, to bring life's\nmorning back, to see again the forms and faces of the dead, to paint\nfair pictures for the coming years, to forget all Gods, their promises\nand threats, to feel within your veins life's joyous stream and hear the\nmartial music, the rhythmic beating of your fearless heart.\n\nAnd then to rouse yourself to do all useful things, to reach with\nthought and deed the ideal in your brain, to give your fancies wing,\nthat they, like chemist bees, may find art's nectar in the weeds of\ncommon things, to look with trained and steady eyes for facts, to find\nthe subtle threads that join the distant with the now, to increase\nknowledge, to take burdens from the weak, to develop the brain, to\ndefend the right, to make a palace for the soul.\n\nThis is real religion. This is real worship.\n"
}