Morning journal and courier., 1885-03-16
The Concert at Davenport Church.
The following is the programme of the concert to be held at Davenport church this
SUPERSTHTEON.
Rev. Dr. kIeeberg Interests a Large Audience at the Court Street Church Last Evening.

Rev. Dr. Kleeberg lectured to large au-
 dience in the Court street synagogue last evening on Superstition" He pictured l superstition as a tyrant and traced it's origin, | growth and final decline. Ignorance is the i fruitful source of all kinds of superstitious l beliefs. Therefore knowledge and science, | natural and psychological, ,are the only means l Of contending against it. Faith and super stition deal principally with the supernatural. Superstition is not merely mistake, though
 mistake is involved in it. We all have one l phase of the supernatural which we call spirit and feel it in the cord which binds us to the supernatural power called God. Re
 ligion has taken hold of this thought insep- arabic from the idea of God of unlimited power. Miracles and prophecies thus be- come the two principal forms in which the belief in the supernat- ural becomes 8 reality Both these powers are means for moral purposes to sustain grand truths and to save the righte- ons They must, however, be entirely sep arated from selfshness and immoral pur- poses. There is great diversity of means supposed to exercise compelling influence upon Deity, either words, spoken or written, or symbolic scts Everything that happens comes to pass by law and order. Supersti- tion holds that an accident is brought about by higher cause and is token or "sign." Thus man is deluded by thinking that there is a secret connection between accidents and the fulfllment of hopes and duties.
 The idea of God is inseparable from the idea of unity. This idea of the oneness of God has it's basis in the harmony and order prevailing throughout nature. Yet there is dualsm which accepts two independent principles, an evil and good one. This system is mo or less marked in all positive religions. The reason is that man judges the great phenomena independently and not as the result of other phenomena. He therefore divides all phenomena into two classes according to the effect, and ascribes the two opposite kinds of effects to two op- pOsite superetitions causes. This system of dualism fixed dogma in the Persian religion and gained wide influence upon all subsequent religions. The second chap ter of Isaiah makes the one God, the author of light and darkness, of peace and evil, ris- ing against the doctrine of dua1ism.
 MT. Kleeberg then took up .witchcraft as it existed in medieval times and the belief in ghosts, spectres and separations, explaining their origin and tracing the line of their growth.
 How can superstition best be overcome? The best way for the destruction of all su- perstition is that science and religion enter into 8 noble alliance; that faith become more ard more scientific and science become more and more imbued with faith directed to higher ideals Then, too, there must be art, a third factor rec onciling and mediating between science and religion. One of it's functions is to use superstition as a symbol for higher ideas Though the ghosts in Shakespeare seem to be real, yet it cannot be doubted that they are only symbols of moral powers The witches in Macbeth are only persenifcations of the silent wishes and hopes of the heart, tempting thoughts arising from the depth of the soul Goethe goes further and represents l Faust as the problem of humanity. The great idea in Faust is the consciousness of the supernatural and the strong desire to | master it and make it serviceable. Let us | leave the dark picture of superstition with 1 the hope that there, where good men and | women believe in the realization of a happy | future brought about by noble endeavors and l by the sweat of our labors, all kinds of su- perstition must needs fade away like mist before the rising sun
 The lecture highly interested the congrega- tion present