A Few Words About the Devil, and Other Biographical Sketches and EssaysBradlaugh, Charles
Religion
A Few Words About the Devil, and Other Biographical Sketches and Essays
Bradlaugh, Charles
Free thought
"In a world in which there is so much to interest, so much to enjoy, and
so much also to correct and improve, every one who has a moderate amount
of moral and intellectual requisites is capable of an existence which
may be called enviable; and unless such a person, through bad laws,
or subjection to the will of others, is denied the liberty to use the
sources of happiness within his reach, he will not fail to find tins
enviable existence, if he escape the positive evils of life, the great
sources of physical and mental suffering, such as indigence, disease,
and the unkindness, worthlessness, or premature loss of objects of
affection. Yet no one whose opinion deserves a moment's consideration,
can doubt that most of the great positive evils of the world are in
themselves removable, and will, if human affairs continue to improve, be
in the end reduced within narrow limits. Poverty, in any sense implying
suffering, may be completely extinguished by the wisdom of society,
combined with the good sense and providence of individuals. Even that
most intractable of enemies, disease, may be indefinitely reduced in
dimensions by good physical and moral education and proper control of
noxious influences, while the progress of science holds out a promise
for the future of still more direct conquests over this detestable foe."
In a former pamphlet, "Jesus, Shelly, and Malthus," the reader's
attention was entreated to this grave question. In a few pages it is
impossible to do more than erect a fingerpost to point out a possible
road to a given end. To attempt in a narrow compass to give complete
details, would be as unwise as it would be unavailing. My desire is
rather to provoke discussion among the masses than to obtain willing
auditors among the few, and I affirm it, therefore, as a proposition
which I am prepared to support, "That the political conditions of the
people can never be permanently reformed until the cause of poverty has
been discovered and the evil itself prevented and removed."
WHY DO MEN STARVE?
Why is it that human beings are starved to death, in a wealthy country
like England, with its palaces, its cathedrals, and its abbeys; with its
grand mansions, and luxurious dwellings, with its fine inclosed parks,
and strictly guarded preserves; with its mills, mines, and factories;
with its enormous profits to the capitalist; and with its broad acres
and great rent rolls to the landholder? The feet that men, old, young,
and in the prime of life; that women, and that children, do so die, is
indisputable. The paragraph in the daily journals, headed "Death from
Starvation," or "Another Death from Destitution," is no uncommon one to
the eyes of the careful reader.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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