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
Yes--to partially adopt the phraseology of a writer in "Macmillan's
Magazine"--I do refuse to see in God a being omniscient as omnipotent,
who puts us into this world without our volition, leaves us to struggle
through it as we can, unequally pitted against an almost omnipotent and
supersubtile Devil, and then, if we fail, finally drops us out of this
world into Hell-fire, where a legion of inferior Devils find constant
and never-ending employment in inventing fresh tortures for us; our
crime being that we have not succeeded where success was rendered
impossible. No high, no manly, no humane thinkings are developed in the
doctrine of Devils and damnation. If a potent faith, it degrades alike
the teacher and the taught, by its abhorrent mercilessness; and if a
form, instead of a faith, then is the Devil doctrine a misleading sham,
which frightens weak minds and never developes strong men.
NEW LIFE OF DAVID.
In compiling a biographical account of any ancient personage,
impediments mostly arise from the uncertainty of the various traditions
out of which we gather our biography, and from the party bias and
coloring which often pervade and detract from their value. In the
present case no such obstacle is met with, no such bias can be imagined,
for, in giving the life of David, we extract it from an all-wise God's
perfect and infallible revelation to man, and thus are enabled
to present it to our readers free from any doubt, uncertainty,
or difficulty. The father of David was Jesse, an Ephrathite of
Bethlehem-judah. Jesse had either eight sons (1 Samuel xvi, 10, 11, and
xvii, 12) or only seven (1 Chron. ii, 13 to 15), and David was either
the eighth son or the seventh. Some may think this a difficulty to
commence with, but such persons will only be those who rely on their own
intellectual faculties, or who have been misled by Colenso's arithmetic.
If you, my dear reader, are in any doubt, at once consult some qualified
divine, and he will explain to you that there is really no difference
between eight and seven when rightly understood with prayer and faith,
by the help of the spirit. Arithmetic is an utterly infidel acquirement,
and one which all true believers should eschew. In proof of this, I may
observe that the proposition three times one are one is a fundamental
article of the Christian faith. David's great grandmother was the holy
harlot Rahab, and his grandmother was a lady who when unmarried went in
the night and lay at the feet of Boaz, and left in the morning before
it was light enough for any one to recognize her like her grandson she
was "prudent in matters." When young, David tended his father's sheep,
and apparently while so doing he obtained the reputation for being
cunning in playing, a mighty valiant man, and a man of war and
prudent in matters. He obtained his reputation as a soldier early and
wonderfully, for he was "but a youth," and God's most holy word asserts
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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