8 THE LIGHT OF DAT 



of a universe the sport and tool of supernatural be- 

 ings, to a world inexorably bound by the sequence 

 of cause and effect, or like that from the Ptolemaic 

 astronomy to the Copernican system. That the early 

 religions were fantastic and unreal needs no proof. 

 That the Christian mythology is equally fantastic 

 and unreal is not so generally admitted. The 

 teachings of Jesus himself were simple and natural 

 in the extreme, but out of the notions which were 

 formed about Jesus there grew up a religious organ- 

 ization which was equally the extreme of complex- 

 ity and artificiality. For seventeen hundred years 

 mankind were under its sway as under a nightmare. 

 It perverted nearly every natural fact and paralyzed 

 every natural instinct of the heart. In the Catholic 

 church this nightmare still rides mankind ; in the 

 Protestant churches its spell has been partially bro- 

 ken. Protestantism is more or less a compromise 

 with reason, but Catholicism deliberately puts reason 

 under foot. The Catholic reasons very astutely 

 within certain limits, but he is tethered and cannot 

 go beyond a fixed point. His reason is the ser- 

 vant of his faith and obeys it implicitly. It is like 

 a muzzled ferret that hunts not for itself but for 

 its master ; the game belongs to faith. 



The priest with his magic and the doctor with 

 his nostrums have had their day. If natural good- 

 ness will not save a man he is lost, and if his innate 

 powers of recuperation will not cure him he must 

 die, just as has always been the case. 



