Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1882-01-03
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/ How did man become religious: VIVA
form of religion did he first adopt? In try
| ing to answer these questions, We must no
be afraid to follow where facts and reason
lead. but must admit what appears not sim
| ply what we rtsh. We must respect fact
| when they agree with popular dogmas, ant
| respect them when they do not. Some
| people only see half a truth, and never know
which half. We must not believe a religion
| to be from God, unless it bears Gods sig
nature. No greater obstacle can be put If
the way of religion. than the authority of 2
supposed infallible church, or the dead letter
of an infallible book There is no subject toe
sacred for inquiry. Religion, unless it per
mits the fullest and freest criticism, becomes
superstition. Let US, free from the tyranny OF
creeds, seek the true cause of what is. and
the order of its growth Many grasp the first,
but often the most unreliable explana-
ton. Religion came direct from heaven. IS
some say. Others, that men in
vented it. Neither have the truth There
is not only no evidence of a primitive
revelation, but positive evidence against it.
The assumption Of an original revelation is
impious, because it implies that man was Gre
ated an atheist! There could have been only
two kinds Of revelation received,-written
and oral. II written. the earlier generations
must have been without it, for the art of
writing requires time for its requirement. If
oral, the language through W hich it was give
must have been created But science proves
that language is growth not a creation
Some of the ancient philosophers taught
that fear gave place to religion. The fright
full pictures seen in dreams, meteors and
tempests. created. they thought, the notion
of invisible beings, and the fear inspired by
thorx1 birth tn raltfr,nn 81; l.. =
came from the attempts to placate by sacri-
fee the unknown causes of the alterations
of nature. Spencer teaches that the first form
of religion was the worship of dead ances-
tors, who were supposed to be still in exist
ence, and TO be capable of working good or
ill to their progeny. This theory seems rea-
sonable and is supported BY facts. Primitive
man would look at the dead body of
his ancestor that lately moved with life.
and the question would naturally rise, where
has that life gone? In spring, he saw the
plants and trees that had no life a few days
previous, now sending up green shoots, and
rObing themselves in buds and blossoms.
All! here lies the solution of his puzzle The
those plants and trees. Even to-day children
imagine that nature acts by virtue of an i'm
minent life. Nature was living, and the life
in it was worshipped as divine. This '.ances-
tor worship through visible phenomena, de-
veloped into Polytheism, which eliminated
in Monotheism.
Standing in his primitive home, and watch
ing the clouds that poured upon the earth the
genial showers, and in the morning barred
the road Of the sun, asking for his passage a
toll of gold, and at night tripped up the feet
of the mOonbeams and detained the silver
hunters from the chase; watching the glory
Il. 49, al - IL.
ing the mountains until they smoked as with
incense, and the waters until they seemed
like liquid flame; seeing the moon rise calm
and holy, soothing man with her tender still
ness and bathing the world in her cleansing
light; gazing at the trembling beauty of the
stars. man called their bright abode God.
Heaven and God were one to his crude con-
ception. Heaven apparently being the source
OF all life, in time man personified heaven
and called it Father. Heaven-Father. We
now say "Our Father who art in Heaven"
What the next age will call him, it is difficult
to conjecture. God cannot be much higher
than the mind of the wOrshipper. The gods
of all the ancient religions were in the form
of men. As knowledge increased, the concep-
ton Of God became loftier and purer. Let
any one compare the angry, revengeful god
of the earlier Old Testament books and the
wide gulf separated one from the other.
God being an enlarged man, gifts were
supposed to please him even as they pleased
men. This worship through sacrifice made
man think, and just as soon as consciousness
was developed the feeling of obligation follow
ed. Obligation brought with it the conscious
ness of relation. Man found that some acts
gave pleasure, others pain. A certain line
of conduct being essential to happiness, there
existed m olive for such conduct, which we
call the ''moral sense" 1t told one man how
he should act towards another. it made him feel
pleasure when lie did right, and soon, he
perceived that some things were right, and
the more he did right, the more developed
became the sense of what was right. As
population increased. and he was brought in
contact with other men. the sense of right
and wrong was deepened. Each generation
inherited the tendencies of the previous one;
but. receiving more light. had to reject some
of the ideas bequeathed by the past, and be-
came through this more religious. Every
advance in knowledge was step towards
God Every age has contributed to the
growth of religion. This age has more
knowledge than any previous age, and
consequently less superstition, but more
religion, that moves mans spirit with
deeper and sublmer awe. In fact this age
10 not need more but a nobler quality.
Fineness and purity of quality and not
quantity. is the desideratum. Yes, we need
a b, tier kind of religion, that shall harmonize
with mans highest thoughts, meet his pro-
gressive wants, and touch his actions with a
purer morality. We might as well attempt
to kindle a fire with ice as to think we can
be Christ-like by living the conventional
religion, for it perverts mans moral nature
letters his intellect, and tends to lead him
back to the darkness from which he emerged.
religion which mainly consists in wearing
long faces droniug doleful confessions, and
telling God that we are worse than we honest
IL feel ourselves to be, while it is selfish and
mean, shrewd and Inscriptions in the store
and the caucus, is worthless. II is the worst
kind of atheism. Let US cultivate more the
religion of Jesus. for there is none so sweet,
pure so humane.