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fool hath said in his heart there is no God.” In the first place I do not 
know, nor can I imagine, any fool as a likely person to study this question ; 
the chances are that no fool ever thought the question out. We know there 
are thousands who believe, but there are few who really study and think out 
this great question. I think the time has arrived — especially when we know 
the class of men of high intellect and culture who are arising in this country, 
and who think differently to most people — when we should say that that 
phrase, and even the thought which it embodies, is totally inapplicable to 
them. It is bad in taste, and ought to be laid on one side, because, if you 
came here to read this paper, and did not intend to reason with those who 
disbelieve, or could not accept your conclusion, why did you read it at all ? 
Certainly it could not be to convince those of your own opinion. There are 
many clever men in this country, quite as clever as the opener, who totally 
disbelieve in his conclusions. I take a similar position ; but allow me to say 
that I am an Atheist in this sense — and I do not know any modem thinkers 
upon this subject who take different ground to what I do — namely, I am an 
Atheist as to the various representations of the Deity of which I have read and 
heard ; this is very different from being a denier of a God. No man knows 
any more of the existence of Deity than he knows of the existence of a 
Devil ; it is a pure matter of imagination, according to a person’s intelligence 
and education. 
The Chairman. — Do you not deny altogether the existence of Deity ? 
Mr. Holyoake.— I do not deny the possible existence of a God. I do not 
know any Atheist who does ; we deny the various representations which are 
made of a Deity. I will give you one or two reasons why I cannot believe 
some of the representations which have been made to-night. In the third 
clause of Dr. M‘Cann’s paper, he says : “ By Deity, or God, is meant a conscious 
person, eternal and unproduced, capable of causing all changes that have 
happened, knowing all that is knowable, perfect in every attribute of His 
nature, and voluntarily conditioned by His own act in creating/’ That is simple 
anthropomorphism, and nothing more. I would ask, if the alleged Deity be 
a person, how can he possibly be a Deity ? If a being is a person, how can 
he be other than persons such as we know ? “ Person ” implies organization, 
contrivance, and, if you will, intelligence. A Deity is simply, then, an 
organized person. Now, persons of whom we have any knowledge, or ever 
had any knowledge, are persons of finite capacities, limited in their know- 
ledge and powers. We never knew a person apart from organization. 
The Chairman.— I think I may make the acknowledgment that the paper 
is so far defective that it has not gone sufficiently into that definition ; but 
still it is obvious that Dr. M‘Cann has no idea of a “ person ” in the sense 
you apply it. 
Mr. Holyoake.— I would rather that you left him to defend his own 
arguments. 
The Chairman. It was not with the view of interfering with the dis- 
cussion that I spoke, but you are reasoning against a position which no one 
has maintained. I do not, for instance, believe in Deity as being an organ- 
