Butler, Samuel, 1835-1902 -- Notebooks, sketchbooks, etc.
The Greeks and Romans did not enquire into the evidences on which their
belief that Minerva sprang full-armed from the brain of Jupiter was
based. If they had written books of evidences to show how certainly it
all happened, &c.—well, I suppose if they had had an endowed Church with
some considerable prizes, they would have found means to hoodwink the
public.
The Peace that Passeth Understanding
Yes. But as there is a peace more comfortable than any understanding, so
also there is an understanding more covetable than any peace.
The New Testament
If it is a testamentary disposition at all, it is so drawn that it has
given rise to incessant litigation during the last nearly two thousand
years and seems likely to continue doing so for a good many years longer.
It ought never to have been admitted to probate. Either the testator
drew it himself, in which case we have another example of the folly of
trying to make one’s own will, or if he left it to the authors of the
several books—this is like employing many lawyers to do the work of one.
Christ and the L. & N.W. Railway
Admitting for the moment that Christ can be said to have died for me in
any sense, it is only pretended that he did so in the same sort of way as
the London and North Western Railway was made for me. Granted that I am
very glad the railway was made and use it when I find it convenient, I do
not suppose that those who projected and made the line allowed me to
enter into their thoughts; the debt of my gratitude is divided among so
many that the amount due from each one is practically nil.
The Jumping Cat
God is only a less jumping kind of jumping cat; and those who worship God
are still worshippers of the jumping cat all the time. There is no
getting away from the jumping cat—if I climb up into heaven, it is there;
if I go down to hell, it is there also; if I take the wings of the
morning and remain in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there, and so
on; it is about my path and about my bed and spieth out all my ways. It
is the eternal underlying verity or the eternal underlying lie, as people
may choose to call it.
Personified Science
Science is being daily more and more personified and anthropomorphised
into a god. By and by they will say that science took our nature upon
him, and sent down his only begotten son, Charles Darwin, or Huxley, into
the world so that those who believe in him, &c.; and they will burn
people for saying that science, after all, is only an expression for our
ignorance of our own ignorance.
Science and Theology
We should endow neither; we should treat them as we treat conservatism
and liberalism, encouraging both, so that they may keep watch upon one
another, and letting them go in and out of power with the popular vote
concerning them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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