The Faith of the Millions (2nd series) — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
The Faith of the Millions (2nd series)
John Stuart Mill · en
Doubtless, the semi-scientific millions will be much impressed by the
wideness of Mr. Laing's reading and his profound grasp of all that he
has read, when they are told casually that "space and time are, ... to
use the phraseology of Kant, 'imperative categories;'" [39] but perhaps
to other readers it may convey nothing more than that he has heard a dim
something somewhere about Kant, about the categories, about space and
time being schemata of sense, and about the _categorical imperative._
It is only one instance of the unscrupulous recklessness which shows
itself everywhere. Akin to this is his absolute misapprehension of the
Christian religion which he labours to refute. He never for a moment
questions his perfect understanding of it, and of all it has got to say
for itself. Brought up apparently among Protestants, who hold to a
verbal inspiration [40] and literal interpretation of the Scriptures,
who have no traditional or authoritative interpretation of it, he
concludes at once that his own crude, boyish conception of Christianity
is the genuine one, and that every deviation therefrom is a "climbing
down," or a minimizing. He has no suspicion that the wider views of
interpretation are as old as Christianity itself, and have always
co-existed with the narrower.
He regards the Christian idea of God as essentially anthropomorphic.
Indeed, whether in good faith or for the sake of effect, he brings
forward the old difficulties which have been answered _ad nauseam_ with
an air of freshness, as though unearthed for the first time, and
therefore as setting religion in new and unheard-of straits. So, at all
events, it will seem to the millions of his young readers and to the
working classes.