The Martyrdom of Man - Winwood Reade (golden son ebook txt) 📗
- Author: Winwood Reade
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retribution and no reward for the actions of the earthly life; that life is
merely continued in another region of the world. Death is in fact
regarded as a migration in which, as in all migrations, the emigrants
preserve their relative positions. When a man of importance dies his
family furnish him with an outfit of slaves and wives, and pack up in his
grave his arms and ornaments and clothes, that he may make his
appearance in the underworld in a manner befitting his rank and fortune.
It is believed that the souls of the clothes, as well as of the persons
sacrificed, accompany him there, and it is sometimes believed that all the
clothes which he has worn in his life will then have their resurrection day.
The underworld and the upper-world are governed by the same gods or
unseen kings. Man’s life in the upper-world is short: his life in the underworld is long. But as regards the existence of the worlds themselves,
both are eternal, without beginning and without end. This idea is not a
creation of the ripened intellect, as is usually supposed. It is a product of
limited experience, and expression of a seeming fact. The savage did not
see the world begin; therefore it had no beginning. He has not seen it
grow older; therefore it will have no end.
The two worlds adjoin each other, and the frontier between them is very
faintly marked. The gods often dress themselves in flesh and blood and
visit the earth to do evil or to do good—to make love to women, to
torment their enemies, to converse with their favourites and friends. On
the other hand there are men who possess the power of leaving their
bodies in their beds and of passing into the other world to obtain divine
poisons which they malignantly employ. The ghosts of the dead often
come and sit by their old firesides and eat what is set apart for them.
Sometimes a departed spirit will re-enter the family, assuming a body
which resembles in its features the one he previously wore.
Distinguished heroes and prophets are often supposed to be hybrids or
mulattoes, the result of a union between a woman and a god. Sometimes
it is believed that a god has come down on earth out of love for a certain
nation, to offer himself up as a sacrifice, and so to quench the blood-thirst
of some sullen and revengeful god who has that nation in his power.
Sometimes a savage people believe that their kings are gods who have
deigned to take upon them a perishable body for a time, and there are
countries in which a still more remarkable superstition prevails. The
royal body even is immortal. The king never eats, never sleeps, and
never dies. This kind of monarch is visible only to his priests. When the
people wish to present a petition he gives them audience seated behind a
curtain, from beneath which he thrusts out his foot in token of assent.
When he dies he is secretly buried by the priests, and a new puppet is
elected in his stead.
The savage lives in a strange world, a world of special providences and
divine interpositions, not happening at long intervals and for some great
end, but every day and almost at every hour. A pain, a dream, a sensation
of any kind, a stroke of good or bad luck—whatever, in short, does not
proceed from man, whatever we ascribe, for want of a better word, to
chance—is by him ascribed to the direct interference of the gods. He
knows nothing about the laws of nature. Death itself is not a natural
event. Sooner or later men make the gods angry and are killed.
It is difficult for those who have not lived among savages perfectly to
realise their faith. When told that his gods do not exist the savage merely
laughs in mild wonder at such an extraordinary observation being made.
It seems quite natural to him that his gods should be as his parents and
grandparents have described; he believes as he breathes, without an
effort; he feels that what he has been taught is true. His creed is in
harmony with his intellect, and cannot be changed until his intellect is
changed. If a god in a dream, or through the priests, has made him a
promise and the promise is broken, he does not on that account doubt the
existence of the god. He merely supposes that the god has told a lie. Nor
does it seem strange to him that a god should tell a lie. His god is only a
gigantic man, a sensual, despotic king who orders his subjects to give him
the first fruits of the fields, the firstlings of the flock, virgins for his
harem, human bodies for his cannibal repasts. As for himself, he is the
slave of that god or king; he prays, that is to say, he begs; he sings hymns,
that is to say, he flatters; he sacrifices, that is to say, he pays tribute,
chiefly out of fear, but partly in the hope of getting something better in
return—long life, riches, and fruitful wives. He is usually afraid to say of
the gods what he thinks, or even to utter their real name. But sometimes
he gives vent to the hatred which is burning in his heart. Writhing on a
bed of sickness, he heaps curses on the god who he declares is “eating his
inside”; and when he is converted prematurely to a higher creed his god is
still to him the invisible but human king. “O Allah!” a Somali woman
was heard to say, “O Allah! May thy teeth ache like mine! O Allah! May
thy gums be sore as mine!” That Christian monarch the late King Peppel
once exclaimed, when he thought of his approaching end, that if he could
see God he would kill him at once because he made men die.
The arithmetical arrangement of the gods depends entirely upon
the intellectual faculties of the people concerned. In the period of
thing-worship, as it may be termed, every brook, tree, hill, and star is
itself a living creature, benevolent or malignant, asleep or awake. In the
next stage every object and phenomenon is inhabited or presided over by
a genius or spirit, and with some nations the virtues and the vices are also
endowed with personality. As the reasoning powers of men expand their
gods diminish in number and rule over larger areas, till finally it is
perceived that there is unity in nature, that everything which exists is a
part of one harmonious whole. It is then asserted that one being
manufactured the world and rules over it supreme. But at first the Great
Being is distant and indifferent, “a god sitting outside the universe”; and
the old gods become viceroys to whom he has deputed the government of
the world. They are afterwards degraded to the rank of messengers or
angels, and it is believed that God is everywhere present; that he fills the
earth and sky; that from him directly proceeds both the evil and the good.
In some systems of belief, however, he is believed to be the author of
good alone, and the dominion of evil is assigned to a rebellious angel or a
rival god.
So far as we have gone at present, there has been no question of morality.
All doctrines relating to the creation of the world, the government of man
by superior being, and his destiny after death, are conjectures which have
been given out as facts, handed down with many adornments by tradition,
and accepted by posterity as “revealed religion.” They are theories more
or less rational which uncivilised men have devised in order to explain
the facts of life, and which civilised men believe that they believe. These
doctrines are not in themselves of any moral value. It is of no
consequence, morally speaking, whether a man believes that the world
has been made by one god or by twenty. A savage is not of necessity a
better man because he believes that he lives under the dominion of
invisible tyrants who will compel him some day or other to migrate to
another land.
There is a moral sentiment in the human breast which, like intelligence, is
born of obscure instincts, and which gradually becomes developed. Since
the gods of men are the reflected images of men, it is evident that as men
become developed in morality the character of their gods will also be
improved. The king of a savage land punishes only offences against
himself and his dependents. But when that people become more civilised
the king is regarded as the representative of public law. In the same
manner the gods of a savage people demand nothing from their subjects
but taxes and homage. They punish only heresy, which is equivalent to
treason; blasphemy, which is equivalent to insult; and the withholding of
tribute and adoration, which is equivalent to rebellion. And these are the
offences which even among civilised nations the gods are supposed to
punish most severely. But the civilised gods also require that men shall
act justly to one another. They are still despots, for they order men to
flatter them and to give them money. But they are not mere selfish
despots; they will reward those who do good, they will punish those who
do evil to their fellow-men.
That vice should be sometimes triumphant and virtue sometimes in
distress creates no difficulty to the savage mind. If a good man meets
with misfortune it is supposed that he is being punished for the sins of an
ancestor or a relation. In a certain stage of barbarism society is composed
not of individuals but of families. If a murder is committed the avengers
of blood kill the first man they meet belonging to the guilty clan. If the
life cannot be obtained in that generation the feud passes on, for the
family never dies. It is considered just and proper that children should be
punished for the sins of their fathers unto the third and fourth generation.
In a higher state of society this family system disappears; individualism
becomes established. And as soon as this point is reached the human
mind takes a vast stride. It is discovered that the moral government of
this world is defective, and it is supposed that poetical justice will be
administered in the next. The doctrine of rewards and punishments in a
future state comes into vogue. The world of ghosts is now divided into
two compartments. One is the abode of malignant spirits, the kingdom of
darkness and of pain to which are condemned the blasphemers and the
rebels, the murderers and the thieves. The other is the habitation of the
gods, the kingdom of joy and light, to which angels welcome the obedient
and the good. They are dressed in white robes and adorned with golden
crowns; they dwell eternally in the royal presence, gazing upon his
lustrous countenance and singing his praises in chorus round the throne.
To the active European mind such a prospect is not by any means
inviting; but heaven was invented in the East, and in the East to be a
courtier has always been regarded as the supreme felicity. The feelings
of men towards their god in the period at which we have now arrived are
precisely those of an Eastern subject towards his king. The Oriental king
is the lord of all the land; his subjects are his children and his slaves. The
man who is doomed to death kisses the fatal firman and submits with
reverence to his fate. The man who is robbed by the king of all that he
has earned will fold his hands and say “The king
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