The Essays of "George Eliot": CompleteEliot, George
History
The Essays of "George Eliot": Complete
Eliot, George
Literature -- History and criticism
“I believe that there is no God, but that matter is God, and God is
matter; and that it is no matter whether there is any God or not. I
believe also that the world was not made, but that the world made
itself, or that it had no beginning, and that it will last forever.
I believe that man is a beast; that the soul is the body, and that
the body is the soul; and that after death there is neither body nor
soul. I believe there is no religion, that _natural religion is the
only religion_, _and all religion unnatural_. I believe not in
Moses; I believe in the first philosophers. I believe not in the
evangelists; I believe in Chubb, Collins, Toland, Tindal, and Hobbes.
I believe in Lord Bolingbroke, and I believe not in St. Paul. I
believe not in revelation; _I believe in tradition_; _I believe in
the Talmud_; _I believe in the Koran_; I believe not in the Bible. I
believe in Socrates; I believe in Confucius; I believe in Mahomet; I
believe not in Christ. And lastly, _I believe_ in all unbelief.”
The intellectual and moral monster whose creed is this complex web of
contradictions, is, moreover, according to Dr. Cumming, a being who
unites much simplicity and imbecility with his Satanic hardihood—much
tenderness of conscience with his obdurate vice. Hear the “proof:”
“I once met with an acute and enlightened infidel, with whom I
reasoned day after day, and for hours together; I submitted to him
the internal, the external, and the experimental evidences, but made
no impression on his scorn and unbelief. At length I entertained a
suspicion that there was something morally, rather than
intellectually wrong, and that the bias was not in the intellect, but
in the heart; one day therefore I said to him, ‘I must now state my
conviction, and you may call me uncharitable, but duty compels me;
you are living in some known and gross sin.’ _The man’s countenance
became pale_; _he bowed and left me_.”—“Man. of Evidences,” p. 254.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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