The Collected Works of Theodore Parker/Volume 01/The Introduction
“To false Religion we are indebted for persecutors, zealots, and bigots; and perhaps human depravity has assumed no forms, at once more odious and despicable, than those in which it has appeared in such men. I will say nothing of persecution; it has passed away, I trust, for ever; and torture will be no more inflicted, and murder no more committed, under pretence of extending the spirit and influence of Christianity. But the temper which produced it still remains; its parent bigotry is still in existence; and what is there more adapted to excite thorough disgust, than the disposition, the feelings, the motives, the kind of intellect and degree of knowledge, discovered by some of those, who are pretending to be the sole defenders and patrons of religious truth in this unhappy world, and the true and exclusive heirs of all the mercy of God? It is a particular misfortune, that when gross errors in religion prevail, the vices of which I speak show themselves especially in the clergy; and that we find them ignorant, narrow-minded, presumptuous, and, as far as they have it in their power, oppressive and imperious. The disgust which this character in those who appear as ministers of religion naturally produces, is often transferred to Christianity itself. It ought to be associated only with that form of religion by which those vices are occasioned.”—Andrews Norton, Thoughts on true and false Religion, second edition, p. 15, 16.
THE INTRODUCTION.
The history of the world shows clearly that Religion is
the highest of all human concerns. Yet the greatest good
is often subject to the worst abuse. The doctrines and
ceremonies that represent the popular religion at this time,
offer a strange mingling of truth and error. Theology is
often confounded with Religion; men exhaust their strength
in believing, and so have little Reason to inquire with, or
solid Piety to live by. It requires no prophet to see that
what is popularly taught and accepted as Religion is no
very divine thing; not fitted to make the world purer,
and men more worthy to live in it. In the popular belief
of the present, as of all time, there is something mutable
and fleeting; something also which is eternally the same.
The former, lies on the surface, and all can see it; the latter
lies deep, and often escapes observation. Our popular
theology is mainly based on the superficial and transient
element. It stands by the forbearance of the sceptic.
They who rely on it, are always in danger and always in
dread. A doubt strongly put, shakes the pulpits of New
England, and wakens the thunder of the churches; the
more reasonable the doubt the greater the alarm. Do men
fear lest the mountains fall: Tradition is always uncertain.
“Perhaps yes, perhaps no,” is all we can say of it. Yet it
is made the basis of Religion. Authority is taken for
Truth, and not Truth for Authority. Belief is made the
Substance of Religion, as Authority its Sanction and
Tradition its Ground. The name of Infidel is applied to the
best of men; the wisest, the most spiritual and heavenly of our brothers. The bad and the foolish naturally ask, If
the name be deserved, what is the use of Religion, as good
men and wise men can be good and wise, heavenly and
spiritual, without it? The answer is plain—but not to the
blind.
Practical Religion implies both a Sentiment and a Life. We honour a phantom which is neither life nor sentiment. Yes, we have two Spectres that often take the place of Religion with us. The one is a Shadow of the Sentiment; that is our creed, belief, theology, by whatever name we call it. The other is the Ghost of Life; this is our ceremonies, forms, devout practices. The two Spectres by turns act the part of Religion, and we are called Christians because we assist at the show. Real Piety is expected of but few. He is called a Christian that bows to the Idol of his Tribe, and sets up also a lesser, but orthodox Idol in his own Den. One word of the Prophet is true of our religion-Its voice is not heard in the streets. Our theology is full of confusion. They who admit Reason to look upon it confound the matter still more, for a great revolution of thought can set affairs right.
Religion is separated from Life; divorced from bed and board. We think to be religious without love for men, and pious with none for God; or, which is the same thing, that we can love our neighbour without helping him, and God without having an idea of Him. The prevailing theology represents God as a being whom a good man must hate; Religion is something alien to our nature, which can only rise as Reason falls. A despair of Man pervades our Theology. Pious men mourn at the famine in our churches; we do not believe in the inspiration of goodness now; only in the tradition of goodness long ago. For all theological purposes, God might have been buried after the ascension of Jesus. We dare not approach the Infinite One face to face; we whine and whimper in our brother's name, as if we could only appear before the Omnipresent by Attorney.
Our reverence for the Past is just in proportion to our ignorance of it. We think God was once everywhere in the World and in the Soul; but has now crept into a corner, as good as dead; that the Bible was his last word. Instead of the Father of All for our God, we have two Idols; the Bible, a record of men's words and works; and Jesus of Nazareth, a man who lived divinely some centuries ago. These are the Idols of the religious; our standard of truth; the gods in whom we trust. Mammon, the great Idol of men not religious—who overtops them both, and has the sincerest worshippers—need not now be named. His votaries know they are idolaters; the other worship in ignorance, their faith fixed mainly on transient things.
I know there are exceptions to this rule. Saints never fail from the earth. Reason will claim some deserted niche in every church. But wise men grieve over our notions of Religion—so poor, so alien to Reason. Pious men weep over our practice of Religion—so far from Christianity. What passes for Christianity in our times is not reasonable; no man pretends it. It can only be defended by forbidding a reasonable man to open his mouth. We go from the street to the church. What a change! Reason and good sense and manly energy, which do their work in the world, have here little to do; their voice is not heard. The morality, however, is the same in both places; it has only laid off its working dress, smoothed its face, put on its Sunday clothes.
The popular theology is hostile to man; tells us he is an outcast; not a child of God, but a spurious issue of the devil. He must not even pray in his own name. His duty is an impossible thing. No man can do it. He deserves nothing but damnation. Theology tells him that is all he is sure of. It teaches the doctrine of immortality; but in such guise that, if true, it is a misfortune to mankind. Its Heaven is a place no man has a right to. Would a good man willingly accept what is not his? Pray for it? This theology rests on a lie. Men have made it out of assumptions. The conclusions came from the premises; but the premises were made for the sake of the conclusions. Each vouches for the other's truth. But what else will vouch for either? The historical basis of popular doctrines, such as Depravity, Redemption, Resurrection, the Incarnation—is it formed of Facts or of No-Facts? Who shall tell us? Do not the wise men look after these things? One must needs blush for the patience of mankind.
But has Religion only the bubble of Tradition to rest on; no other sanction than Authority; no substance but Belief? They know little of the matter who say it. Did Religion begin with what we call Christianity? Were there no saints before Peter? Religion is the first spiritual thing man learned; the last thing he will abandon. There is but one Religion, as one Ocean; though we call it Faith in our church, and Infidelity out of our church.
It is my design in these pages to recall men from the transient Form to the eternal Substance; from outward and false Belief to real and Inward Life; from this partial Theology and its Idols of human device, to that universal Religion and its ever-living Infinite God; from the temples of human Folly and Sin, which every day crumble and fall, to the inner Sanctuary of the Heart, where the still small voice will never cease to speak. I would show men Religion as she is—most fair of all God's fairest children. If I fail in this, it is the head that is weak, not the heart that is wanting.