Why I Am Not a Christian
                        An Examination of the God-Idea and Christianity
                                         Bertrand Russell

[The lecture that is here presented was delivered at the Battersea Town Hall under the auspices of 
the South London Branch of the National Secular Society, England. It should be added that the 
editor is willing to share full responsibility with the Hon. Bertrand Russell in that he is in 
accord with the political and other opinions expressed.] 
[The previous statement was included in the original, and is not made by Positive Atheism.]

As your chairman has told you, the subject about which I am going to speak to you tonight is "Why I 
Am Not a Christian." Perhaps it would be as well, first of all, to try to make out what one means 
by the word "Christian." It is used in these days in a very loose sense by a great many people. 
Some people mean no more by it than a person who attempts to live a good life. In that sense I 
suppose there would be Christians in all sects and creeds; but I do not think that that is the 
proper sense of the word, if only because it would imply that all the people who are not Christians 
-- all the Buddhists, Confucians, Mohammedans, and so on -- are not trying to live a good life. I 
do not mean by a Christian any person who tries to live decently according to his lights. I think 
that you must have a certain amount of definite belief before you have a right to call yourself a 
Christian. The word does not have quite such a full-blooded meaning now as it had in the times of 
St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas. In those days, if a man said that he was a Christian it was 
known what he meant. You accepted a whole collection of creeds which were set out with great 
precision, and every single syllable of those creeds you believed with the whole strength of your 
convictions.
 

What is a Christian?

Nowadays it is not quite that. We have to be a little more vague in our meaning of Christianity. I 
think, however, that there are two different items which are quite essential to anyone calling 
himself a Christian. The first is one of a dogmatic nature -- namely, that you must believe in God 
and immortality. If you do not believe in those two things, I do not think that you can properly 
call yourself a Christian. Then, further than that, as the name implies, you must have some kind of 
belief about Christ. The Mohammedans, for instance, also believe in God and immortality, and yet 
they would not call themselves Christians. I think you must have at the very lowest the belief that 
Christ was, if not divine, at least the best and wisest of men. If you are not going to believe 
that much about Christ, I do not think that you have any right to call yourself a Christian. Of 
course, there is another sense which you find in Whitaker's Almanack and in geography books, where 
the population of the world is said to be divided into Christians, Mohammedans, Buddhists, fetish 
worshipers, and so on; but in that sense we are all Christians. The geography books counts us all 
in, but that is a purely geographical sense, which I suppose we can ignore. Therefore I take it 
that when I tell you why I am not a Christian I have to tell you two different things: first, why I 
do not believe in God and in immortality; and, secondly, why I do not think that Christ was the 
best and wisest of men, although I grant him a very high degree of moral goodness.

But for the successful efforts of unbelievers in the past, I could not take so elastic a definition 
of Christianity as that. As I said before, in the olden days it had a much more full-blooded sense. 
For instance, it included the belief in hell. Belief in eternal hell fire was an essential item of 
Christian belief until pretty recent times. In this country, as you know, it ceased to be an 
essential item because of a decision of the Privy Council, and from that decision the Archbishop of 
Canterbury and the Archbishop of York dissented; but in this country our religion is settled by Act 
of Parliament, and therefore the Privy Council was able to override their Graces and hell was no 
longer necessary to a Christian. Consequently I shall not insist that a Christian must believe in 
hell.
 

The Existence Of God

To come to this question of the existence of God, it is a large and serious question, and if I were 
to attempt to deal with it in any adequate manner I should have to keep you here until Kingdom 
Come, so that you will have to excuse me if I deal with it in a somewhat summary fashion. You know, 
of course, that the Catholic Church has laid it down as a dogma that the existence of God can be 
proved by the unaided reason. This is a somewhat curious dogma, but it is one of their dogmas. They 
had to introduce it because at one time the Freethinkers adopted the habit of saying that there 
were such and such arguments which mere reason might urge against the existence of God, but of 
course they knew as a matter of faith that God did exist. The arguments and the reasons were set 
out at great length, and the Catholic Church felt that they must stop it. Therefore they laid it 
down that the existence of God can be proved by the unaided reason, and they had to set up what 
they considered were arguments to prove it. There are, of course, a number of them, but I shall 
take only a few.
 

The First Cause Argument

Perhaps the simplest and easiest to understand is the argument of the First Cause. It is maintained 
that everything we see in this world has a cause, and as you go back in the chain of causes further 
and further you must come to a First Cause, and to that First Cause you give the name of God. That 
argument, I suppose, does not carry very much weight nowadays, because, in the first place, cause 
is not quite what it used to be. The philosophers and the men of science have got going on cause, 
and it has not anything like the vitality that it used to have; but apart from that, you can see 
that the argument that there must be a First Cause is one that cannot have any validity. I may say 
that when I was a young man, and was debating these questions very seriously in my mind, I for a 
long time accepted the argument of the First Cause, until one day, at the age of eighteen, I read 
John Stuart Mill's Autobiography, and I there found this sentence: "My father taught me that the 
question, Who made me? cannot be answered, since it immediately suggests the further question, Who 
made God?" That very simple sentence showed me, as I still think, the fallacy in the argument of 
the First Cause. If everything must have a cause, then God must have a cause. If there can be 
anything without a cause, it may just as well be the world as God, so that there cannot be any 
validity in that argument. It is exactly of the same nature as the Hindu's view, that the world 
rested upon an elephant, and the elephant rested upon a tortoise; and when they said, "How about 
the tortoise?" the Indian said, "Suppose we change the subject." The argument is really no better 
than that. There is no reason why the world could not have come into being without a cause; nor, on 
the other hand, is there any reason why it should not have always existed. There is no reason to 
suppose that the world had a beginning at all. The idea that things must have a beginning is really 
due to the poverty of our imagination. Therefore, perhaps, I need not waste any more time upon the 
argument about the First Cause.
 

The Natural-Law Argument

Then there is a very common argument from Natural Law. That was a favorite argument all through the 
eighteenth century, especially under the influence of Sir Isaac Newton and his cosmogony. People 
observed the planets going around the sun according to the law of gravitation, and they thought 
that God had given a behest to these planets to move in that particular fashion, and that was why 
they did so. That was, of course, a convenient and simple explanation that saved them the trouble 
of looking any further for any explanation of the law of gravitation. Nowadays we explain the law 
of gravitation in a somewhat complicated fashion that Einstein has introduced. I do not propose to 
give you a lecture on the law of gravitation, as interpreted by Einstein, because that again would 
take some time; at any rate, you no longer have the sort of Natural Law that you had in the 
Newtonian system, where, for some reason that nobody could understand, nature behaved in a uniform 
fashion. We now find that a great many things we thought were Natural Laws are really human 
conventions. You know that even in the remotest depth of stellar space there are still three feet 
to a yard. That is, no doubt, a very remarkable fact, but you would hardly call it a law of nature. 
And a great many things that have been regarded as laws of nature are of that kind. On the other 
hand, where you can get down to any knowledge of what atoms actually do, you will find that they 
are much less subject to law than people thought, and that the laws at which you arrive are 
statistical averages of just the sort that would emerge from chance. There is, as we all know, a 
law that if you throw dice you will get double sixes only about once in thirty-six times, and we do 
not regard that as evidence that the fall of the dice is regulated by design; on the contrary, if 
the double sixes came every time we should think that there was design. The laws of nature are of 
that sort as regards to a great many of them. They are statistical averages such as would emerge 
from the laws of chance; and that makes the whole business of natural law much less impressive than 
it formerly was. Quite apart from that, which represents the momentary state of science that may 
change tomorrow, the whole idea that natural laws imply a law-giver is due to a confusion between 
natural and human laws. Human laws are behests commanding you to behave a certain way, in which way 
you may choose to behave, or you may choose not to behave; but natural laws are a description of 
how things do in fact behave, and, being a mere description of what they in fact do, you cannot 
argue that there must be somebody who told them to do that, because even supposing that there were 
you are then faced with the question, Why did God issue just those natural laws and no others? If 
you say that he did it simply from his own good pleasure, and without any reason, you then find 
that there is something which is not subject to law, and so your train of natural law is 
interrupted. If you say, as more orthodox theologians do, that in all the laws which God issues he 
had a reason for giving those laws rather than others -- the reason, of course, being to create the 
best universe, although you would never think it to look at it -- if there was a reason for the 
laws which God gave, then God himself was subject to law, and therefore you do not get any 
advantage by introducing God as an intermediary. You really have a law outside and anterior to the 
divine edicts, and God does not serve your purpose, because he is not the ultimate law-giver. In 
short, this whole argument from natural law no longer has anything like the strength that it used 
to have. I am traveling on in time in my review of these arguments. The arguments that are used for 
the existence of God change their character as time goes on. They were at first hard intellectual 
arguments embodying certain quite definite fallacies. As we come to modern times they become less 
respectable intellectually and more and more affected by a kind of moralizing vagueness.
 

The Argument From Design

The next step in the process brings us to the argument from design. You all know the argument from 
design: everything in the world is made just so that we can manage to live in the world, and if the 
world was ever so little different we could not manage to live in it. That is the argument from 
design. It sometimes takes a rather curious form; for instance, it is argued that rabbits have 
white tails in order to be easy to shoot. I do not know how rabbits would view that application. It 
is an easy argument to parody. You all know Voltaire's remark, that obviously the nose was designed 
to be such as to fit spectacles. That sort of parody has turned out to be not nearly so wide of the 
mark as it might have seemed in the eighteenth century, because since the time of Darwin we 
understand much better why living creatures are adapted to their environment. It is not that their 
environment was made to be suitable to them, but that they grew to be suitable to it, and that is 
the basis of adaptation. There is no evidence of design about it.

When you come to look into this argument from design, it is a most astonishing thing that people 
can believe that this world, with all the things that are in it, with all its defects, should be 
the best that omnipotence and omniscience have been able to produce in millions of years. I really 
cannot believe it. Do you think that, if you were granted omnipotence and omniscience and millions 
of years in which to perfect your world, you could produce nothing better than the Ku Klux Klan, 
the Fascisti, and Mr. Winston Churchill? Really I am not much impressed with the people who say: 
"Look at me: I am such a splendid product that there must have been design in the universe." I am 
not very much impressed by the splendor of those people. Moreover, if you accept the ordinary laws 
of science, you have to suppose that human life and life in general on this planet will die out in 
due course: it is merely a flash in the pan; it is a stage in the decay of the solar system; at a 
certain stage of decay you get the sort of conditions and temperature and so forth which are 
suitable to protoplasm, and there is life for a short time in the life of the whole solar system. 
You see in the moon the sort of thing to which the earth is tending -- something dead, cold, and 
lifeless.

I am told that that sort of view is depressing, and people will sometimes tell you that if they 
believed that they would not be able to go on living. Do not believe it; it is all nonsense. Nobody 
really worries much about what is going to happen millions of years hence. Even if they think they 
are worrying much about that, they are really deceiving themselves. They are worried about 
something much more mundane, or it may merely be a bad digestion; but nobody is really seriously 
rendered unhappy by the thought of something that is going to happen in this world millions and 
millions of years hence. Therefore, although it is of course a gloomy view to suppose that life 
will die out -- at least I suppose we may say so, although sometimes when I contemplate the things 
that people do with their lives I think it is almost a consolation -- it is not such as to render 
life miserable. It merely makes you turn your attention to other things.
 

The Moral Arguments For Deity

Now we reach one stage further in what I shall call the intellectual descent that the Theists have 
made in their argumentations, and we come to what are called the moral arguments for the existence 
of God. You all know, of course, that there used to be in the old days three intellectual arguments 
for the existence of God, all of which were disposed of by Immanuel Kant in the Critique of Pure 
Reason; but no sooner had he disposed of those arguments than he invented a new one, a moral 
argument, and that quite convinced him. He was like many people: in intellectual matters he was 
skeptical, but in moral matters he believed implicitly in the maxims that he had imbibed at his 
mother's knee. That illustrates what the psycho-analysts so much emphasize -- the immensely 
stronger hold upon us that our very early associations have than those of later times.

Kant, as I say, invented a new moral argument for the existence of God, and that in varying forms 
was extremely popular during the nineteenth century. It has all sorts of forms. One form is to say 
that there would be no right and wrong unless God existed. I am not for the moment concerned with 
whether there is a difference between right and wrong, or whether there is not: that is another 
question. The point I am concerned with is that, if you are quite sure there is a difference 
between right and wrong, then you are then in this situation: is that difference due to God's fiat 
or is it not? If it is due to God's fiat, then for God himself there is no difference between right 
and wrong, and it is no longer a significant statement to say that God is good. If you are going to 
say, as theologians do, that God is good, you must then say that right and wrong have some meaning 
which is independent of God's fiat, because God's fiats are good and not bad independently of the 
mere fact that he made them. If you are going to say that, you will then have to say that it is not 
only through God that right and wrong came into being, but that they are in their essence logically 
anterior to God. You could, of course, if you liked, say that there was a superior deity who gave 
orders to the God who made this world, or could take up the line that some of the agnostics 
["Gnostics" -- CW] took up -- a line which I often thought was a very plausible one -- that as a 
matter of fact this world that we know was made by the Devil at a moment when God was not looking. 
There is a good deal to be said for that, and I am not concerned to refute it.
 

The Argument For The Remedying Of Injustice

Then there is another very curious form of moral argument, which is this: they say that the 
existence of God is required in order to bring justice into the world. In the part of the universe 
that we know there is a great injustice, and often the good suffer, and often the wicked prosper, 
and one hardly knows which of those is the more annoying; but if you are going to have justice in 
the universe as a whole you have to suppose a future life to redress the balance of life here on 
earth, and so they say that there must be a God, and that there must be Heaven and Hell in order 
that in the long run there may be justice. That is a very curious argument. If you looked at the 
matter from a scientific point of view, you would say, "After all, I only know this world. I do not 
know about the rest of the universe, but so far as one can argue at all on probabilities one would 
say that probably this world is a fair sample, and if there is injustice here then the odds are 
that there is injustice elsewhere also." Supposing you got a crate of oranges that you opened, and 
you found all the top layer of oranges bad, you would not argue: "The underneath ones must be good, 
so as to redress the balance." You would say: "Probably the whole lot is a bad consignment;" and 
that is really what a scientific person would argue about the universe. He would say: "Here we find 
in this world a great deal of injustice, and so far as that goes that is a reason for supposing 
that justice does not rule in the world; and therefore so far as it goes it affords a moral 
argument against deity and not in favor of one." Of course I know that the sort of intellectual 
arguments that I have been talking to you about is not really what moves people. What really moves 
people to believe in God is not any intellectual argument at all. Most people believe in God 
because they have been taught from early infancy to do it, and that is the main reason.

Then I think that the next most powerful reason is the wish for safety, a sort of feeling that 
there is a big brother who will look after you. That plays a very profound part in influencing 
people's desire for a belief in God.
 

The Character Of Christ

I now want to say a few words upon a topic which I often think is not quite sufficiently dealt with 
by Rationalists, and that is the question whether Christ was the best and the wisest of men. It is 
generally taken for granted that we should all agree that that was so. I do not myself. I think hat 
there are a good many points upon which I agree with Christ a great deal more than the professing 
Christians do. I do not know that I could go with Him all the way, but I could go with Him much 
further than most professing Christians can. You will remember that He said: "Resist not evil, but 
whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also." That is not a new 
precept or a new principle. It was used by Lao-Tse and Buddha some 500 or 600 years before Christ, 
but it is not a principle which as a matter of fact Christians accept. I have no doubt that the 
present Prime Minister, for instance, is a most sincere Christian, but I should not advise any of 
you to go and smite him on one cheek. I think you might find that he thought this text was intended 
in a figurative sense.

Then there is another point which I consider excellent. You will remember that Christ said, "Judge 
not lest ye be judged." That principle I do not think you would find was popular in the law courts 
of Christian countries. I have known in my time quite a number of judges who were very earnest 
Christians, and they none of them felt that they were acting contrary to Christian principles in 
what they did. Then Christ says, "Give to him that asketh of thee, and from him that would borrow 
of thee turn thou not away." This is a very good principle. Your chairman has reminded you that we 
are not here to talk politics, but I cannot help observing that the last general election was 
fought on the question of how desirable it was to turn away from him that would borrow of thee, so 
that one must assume that the liberals and conservatives of this country are composed of people who 
do not agree with the teaching of Christ, because they certainly did very emphatically turn away on 
that occasion.

Then there is one other maxim of Christ which I think has a great deal in it, but I do not find 
that it is very popular among some of our Christian friends. He says, "If thou wilt be perfect, go 
and sell that which thou hast, and give to the poor." That is a very excellent maxim, but, as I 
say, it is not much practiced. All these, I think, are good maxims, although they are a little 
difficult to live up to. I do not profess to live up to them myself; but then, after all, I am not 
by way of doing so, and it is not quite the same thing as for a Christian.
 

Defects In Christ's Teaching

Having granted the excellence of these maxims, I come to certain points in which I do not believe 
that one can grant either the superlative wisdom or the superlative goodness of Christ as depicted 
in the Gospels; and here I may say that one is not concerned with the historical question. 
Historically, it is quite doubtful whether Christ ever existed at all, and if He did we do not know 
anything about Him, so that I am not concerned with the historical question, which is a very 
difficult one. I am concerned with Christ as He appears in the Gospels, taking the Gospel narrative 
as it stands, and there one does find some things that do not seem to be very wise. For one thing, 
he certainly thought his second coming would occur in clouds of glory before the death of all the 
people who were living at that time. There are a great many texts that prove that. He says, for 
instance: "Ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel till the Son of Man be come." Then He 
says: "There are some standing here which shall not taste death till the Son of Man comes into His 
kingdom"; and there are a lot of places where it is quite clear that He believed His second coming 
would happen during the lifetime of many then living. That was the belief of his earlier followers, 
and it was the basis of a good deal of His moral teaching. When He said, "Take no thought for the 
morrow," and things of that sort, it was very largely because He thought the second coming was 
going to be very soon, and that all ordinary mundane affairs did not count. I have, as a matter of 
fact, known some Christians who did believe the second coming was imminent. I knew a parson who 
frightened his congregation terribly by telling them that the second coming was very imminent 
indeed, but they were much consoled when they found that he was planting trees in his garden. The 
early Christians really did believe it, and they did abstain from such things as planting trees in 
their gardens, because they did accept from Christ the belief that the second coming was imminent. 
In this respect clearly He was not so wise as some other people have been, and he certainly was not 
superlatively wise.
 

The Moral Problem

Then you come to moral questions. There is one very serious defect to my mind in Christ's moral 
character, and that is that He believed in hell. I do not myself feel that any person that is 
really profoundly humane can believe in everlasting punishment. Christ certainly as depicted in the 
Gospels did believe in everlasting punishment, and one does find repeatedly a vindictive fury 
against those people who would not listen to His preaching -- an attitude which is not uncommon 
with preachers, but which does somewhat detract from superlative excellence. You do not, for 
instance, find that attitude in Socrates. You find him quite bland and urbane toward the people who 
would not listen to him; and it is, to my mind, far more worthy of a sage to take that line than to 
take the line of indignation. You probably all remember the sorts of things that Socrates was 
saying when he was dying, and the sort of things that he generally did say to people who did not 
agree with him.

You will find that in the Gospels Christ said: "Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye 
escape the damnation of hell." That was said to people who did not like His preaching. It is not 
really to my mind quite the best tone, and there are a great many of these things about hell. There 
is, of course, the familiar text about the sin against the Holy Ghost: "Whosoever speaketh against 
the Holy Ghost it shall not be forgiven him neither in this world nor in the world to come." That 
text has caused an unspeakable amount of misery in the world, for all sorts of people have imagined 
that they have committed the sin against the Holy Ghost, and thought that it would not be forgiven 
them either in this world or in the world to come. I really do not think that a person with a 
proper degree of kindliness in his nature would have put fears and terrors of this sort into the 
world.

Then Christ says, "The Son of Man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His 
kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity, and shall cast them into a furnace of 
fire; there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth"; and He goes on about the wailing and gnashing 
of teeth. It comes in one verse after another, and it is quite manifest to the reader that there 
is a certain pleasure in contemplating wailing and gnashing of teeth, or else it would not occur so 
often. Then you all, of course, remember about the sheep and the goats; how at the second coming He 
is going to divide the sheep from the goats, and He is going to say to the goats: "Depart from me, 
ye cursed, into everlasting fire." He continues: "And these shall go away into everlasting fire." 
Then He says again, "If thy hand offend thee, cut it off; it is better for thee to enter into life 
maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched, where 
the worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched." He repeats that again and again also. I must say 
that I think all this doctrine, that hell-fire is a punishment for sin, is a doctrine of cruelty. 
It is a doctrine that put cruelty into the world, and gave the world generations of cruel torture; 
and the Christ of the Gospels, if you could take Him as his chroniclers represent Him, would 
certainly have to be considered partly responsible for that.

There are other things of less importance. There is the instance of the Gadarene swine, where it 
certainly was not very kind to the pigs to put the devils into them and make them rush down the 
hill into the sea. You must remember that He was omnipotent, and He could have made the devils 
simply go away; but He chose to send them into the pigs. Then there is the curious story of the 
fig-tree, which always rather puzzled me. You remember what happened about the fig-tree. "He was 
hungry; and seeing a fig-tree afar off having leaves, He came if haply He might find anything 
thereon; and when he came to it He found nothing but leaves, for the time of figs was not yet. And 
Jesus answered and said unto it: 'No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever'.... and Peter.... 
saith unto Him: 'Master, behold the fig-tree which thou cursedst is withered away.'" This is a very 
curious story, because it was not the right time of year for figs, and you really could not blame 
the tree. I cannot myself feel that either in the matter of wisdom or in the matter of virtue 
Christ stands quite as high as some other people known to History. I think I should put Buddha and 
Socrates above Him in those respects.
 

The Emotional Factor

As I said before, I do not think that the real reason that people accept religion has anything to 
do with argumentation. They accept religion on emotional grounds. One is often told that it is a 
very wrong thing to attack religion, because religion makes men virtuous. So I am told; I have not 
noticed it. You know, of course, the parody of that argument in Samuel Butler's book, Erewhon 
Revisited. You will remember that in Erewhon there is a certain Higgs who arrives in a remote 
country, and after spending some time there he escapes from that country in a balloon. Twenty years 
later he comes back to that country and finds a new religion in which he is worshipped under the 
name of the "Sun Child"; and it is said that he ascended into heaven. He finds that the feast of 
the Ascension is about to be celebrated, and he hears Professors Hanky and Panky say to each other 
that they never set eyes on the man Higgs, and they hope they never will; but they are the High 
Priests of the religion of the Sun Child. He is very indignant, and he comes up to them, and he 
says: "I am going to expose all this humbug and tell the people of Erewhon that it was only I, the 
man Higgs, and I went up in a balloon." He was told, "You must not do that, because all the morals 
of this country are bound round this myth, and if they once know that you did not ascend into 
heaven they will all become wicked"; and so he is persuaded of that and he goes quietly away.

That is the idea -- that we should all be wicked if we did not hold to the Christian religion. It 
seems to me that the people who have held to it have been for the most part extremely wicked. You 
find this curious fact, that the more intense has been the religion of any period and the more 
profound has been the dogmatic belief, the greater has been the cruelty and the worse has been the 
state of affairs. In the so-called Ages of faith, when men really did believe the Christian 
religion in all its completeness, there was the Inquisition, with all its tortures; there were 
millions of unfortunate women burned as witches; and there was every kind of cruelty practiced upon 
all sorts of people in the name of religion.

You find as you look around the world that every single bit of progress of humane feeling, every 
improvement in the criminal law, every step toward the diminution of war, every step toward better 
treatment of the colored races, or ever mitigation of slavery, every moral progress that there has 
been in the world, has been consistently opposed by the organized churches of the world. I say 
quite deliberately that the Christian religion, as organized in its churches, has been and still is 
the principal enemy of moral progress in the world.
 

How The Churches Have Retarded Progress

You may think that I am going too far when I say that that is still so, I do not think that I am. 
Take one fact. You will bear with me if I mention it. It is not a pleasant fact, but the churches 
compel one to mention facts that are not pleasant. Supposing that in this world that we live in 
today an inexperienced girl is married to a syphilitic man, in that case the Catholic Church says, 
"This is an indissoluble sacrament. You must stay together for life," and no steps of any sort must 
be taken by that woman to prevent herself from giving birth to syphilitic children. This is what 
the Catholic church says. I say that that is fiendish cruelty, and nobody whose natural sympathies 
have not been warped by dogma, or whose moral nature was not absolutely dead to all sense of 
suffering, could maintain that it is right and proper that that state of things should continue.

That is only an example. There are a great many ways in which at the present moment the church, by 
its insistence upon what it chooses to call morality, inflicts upon all sorts of people undeserved 
and unnecessary suffering. And of course, as we know, it is in its major part an opponent still of 
progress and improvement in all the ways that diminish suffering in the world, because it has 
chosen to label as morality a certain narrow set of rules of conduct which have nothing to do with 
human happiness; and when you say that this or that ought to be done because it would make for 
human happiness, they think that has nothing to do with the matter at all. "What has human happiness to do with morals? The object of morals is not to make people happy."
 

Fear, The Foundation Of Religion

Religion is based, I think, primarily and mainly upon fear. It is partly the terror of the unknown 
and partly, as I have said, the wish to feel that you have a kind of elder brother who will stand 
by you in all your troubles and disputes. Fear is the basis of the whole thing -- fear of the 
mysterious, fear of defeat, fear of death. Fear is the parent of cruelty, and therefore it is no 
wonder if cruelty and religion have gone hand-in-hand. It is because fear is at the basis of those 
two things. In this world we can now begin a little to understand things, and a little to master 
them by the help of science, which has forced its way step by step against the Christian religion, 
against the churches, and against the opposition of all the old precepts. Science can help us to 
get over this craven fear in which mankind has lived for so many generations. Science can teach us, 
and I think our own hearts can teach us, no longer to look around for imaginary supports, no longer 
to invent allies in the sky, but rather to look to our own efforts here below to make this world a 
fit place to live in, instead of the sort of place that the churches in all these centuries have 
made it.
 

What We Must Do

We want to stand upon our own feet and look fair and square at the world -- its good facts, its bad 
facts, its beauties, and its ugliness; see the world as it is and be not afraid of it. Conquer the 
world by intelligence and not merely by being slavishly subdued by the terror that comes from it. 
The whole conception of a God is a conception derived from the ancient oriental despotisms. It is a 
conception quite unworthy of free men. When you hear people in church debasing themselves and 
saying that they are miserable sinners, and all the rest of it, it seems contemptible and not 
worthy of self-respecting human beings. We ought to stand up and look the world frankly in the 
face. We ought to make the best we can of the world, and if it is not so good as we wish, after all 
it will still be better than what these others have made of it in all these ages. A good world 
needs knowledge, kindliness, and courage; it does not need a regretful hankering after the past or 
a fettering of the free intelligence by the words uttered long ago by ignorant men. It needs a 
fearless outlook and a free intelligence. It needs hope for the future, not looking back all the 
time toward a past that is dead, which we trust will be far surpassed by the future that our 
intelligence can create.


                                       为什么我不是基督徒  
                                          伯特兰·罗素 
 

                                              前言 
 
    主席对大家说了，今晚我演讲的题目是：“为什么我不是基督教徒”。首先。也许应该搞清楚，人们所说的
“基督教徒”这个词是什么含义。现在．许多人用起它来是很不确切的。有人以为基督教徒只是指那些想过高尚
生活的人。照这样说来，我想各种宗教，各种教派中都有基督教徒了，但是我看这不是这个词的本意，最大的理
由是，这样说言外之意就是说凡不是基督教徒的人：一切佛教徒、儒教徒、伊斯兰教徒等等，都不想过高尚的生
活。我说的基督教徒并不就是想按自己的看法过清白生活的人。我想你有权利自称为基督教徒，一定有某种程度
的具体信仰，今天，基督教徒这个名词远不如圣奥古斯丁时代和圣托马斯·阿奎那时代那样含义单纯明确。当年，
如果有人宣称自己是基督教徒，谁都知道这意味着什么。你接受一整套严谨精确地制定的信条，而且全心全意，
刚毅坚定地信仰这些信条的一词一句。 
 
                                         什么是基督教徒 
 
    现在的情况并未完全那样。我们理解基督教这个词的含义就要稍稍含混一些。不过，我认为有两条是每个自
命为基督教徒的人都不可不具备的。第一是教义性的，就是你必须信仰上帝和永生。你如果并不信仰这两点，我
看你就不能很适当地自称为基督教徒。其次，再进一步，顾名思义。你必须对基督有某种的信仰。举例来说，回
教徒也信奉上帝和永生，然而他们决不自称为基督教徒。我认为你至少要相信基督即使不是神明，至少也是人类
中最有道德，最有智慧的。如果对于基督不能信仰到这个程度，你就根本没有权利自命为基督教徒。当然，你在
惠特克编的年鉴上，在地理书上还会看到另一种意义，这些书把世界人口划分为基督教徒、伊斯兰教徒、佛教徒、
拜物教徒等等；而根据这一意义，我们就成了基督教徒。地理书籍把我们算进去了，但这纯粹是地理学的含义，
我认为我们完全可以不去理会这些。综上所述，我认为要说清楚我为什么不是基督教徒这个问题，就必须从两个
不同方面加以阐述。首先，我必须说明我为什么不信仰上帝和永生！其次，说明我为什么认为基督并不是最有道
德，是有智慧的人，尽管我承认基督的道德还是十分高尚的。 
    如果不是由于非宗教信仰者过去所作的卓有成效的努力，我就不能象现在这样对基督教这个词采用这样灵活
的定义。正象我在前面已经指出的那样，在悠远的过去，这个词的定义要严谨确切得多。比如：其中也包括信仰
地狱的存在。直到不久以前，信仰地狱中有永远的烈火，还是基督教信仰中不可或缺的部分。大家知道，由于英
国枢密院的决策，这一条才被取消了，而坎特伯雷大主教和约克大主教还曾对此持有异议。但是在我们国家里，
国会法令可以左右我们的宗教，因此枢密院才能够无视两位大主教大人，使基督教徒不再需要信仰地狱了。既然
如此，我便不必硬说基督教徒必须相信地狱的存在了。 
 
                                           上帝的存在 
 
    谈到上帝存在的问题，这真是一个涉及面很广的严肃问题，我要是面面俱到地加以论述，我会把你们留在这
儿直到天国来临，因此，我只得讲得简短扼要些，尚请各位鉴凉。大家当然都知道，天主教会把上帝的存在可以
用不言而喻的理由来证明这一点作为教条而规定下来。这是多少有些荒唐的，然而却是他们规定的教条之一。他
们只好采用这一教条，因为自由思想家一度采用了这样的习惯，说是有这样或那样的许多论点，仅仅理智就可以
用这些论点来使人怀疑上帝的存在，但是当然，天主教徒从信仰出发，却知道上帝确实是存在的。这些论点和理
由长篇累牍地提了出来，因此，天主教会感到再也不能任其发展了，于是他们规定上帝的存在可以用不言而喻的
理由来证明，并且提出他们认为可资佐证的论点。当然，这样的论点是不会少的，我只选择几点谈谈。 
 
                                          最初起因的论点 
 
    也许很简单易懂的就是最初起因的论点（据认为，我们看到的世界万物都有起因，你一步一步地追本溯源，
最后就会发现一个最初起因，我们就给这个最初起因以上帝的名称）。我们看这个论点在今天完全无足轻重，因
为首先今天所讲的起因，同当年所指的完全不是同一回事。哲学家和科学界人士已经对于起因进行研究，它并没
有当年那样的活力了。除此以外，大家也一目了然，所谓必有最初起因的论点也是没有活力的论点．我年轻时头
脑中对这些问题进行过认真的思想交锋，在很长一段时间里也赞同最初起因的论点。直到十人岁那年，有一天读
到约翰·斯图亚特·穆勒自传时，忽然发现这么一句话：“父亲教导我说，‘谁创造了我？’，是无法解答的难
题，因为接着人们必然要问，‘谁又创造了上帝？’”今天我仍然认为，这句极端简单的话指出了最初起因这一
论点的荒谬。如果说万物都要有起因，那么，上帝也必有起因，如果存在着没有起因的事物，那也很可能就是世
界，正和可能是上帝一样，因此这一论点就毫无活力可言。这和印度教的观点是性质完全一样的，他们认为世界
置身在一只象背上，而这象又置身在一只龟背上。如果有人追问“乌龟又在谁的背上呢？”他们就只能支吾其词：
“还是谈谈别的吧！”最初起因的论点确实并不比这高明。没有任何理由说世界没有起因就不能产生。另一方面，
我们也没有理由说世界不应该本来就是一直存在着的。我们更没有理由认为世界一定要有个开始。认为万物必定
都有个开始的观念实际上是因为我们缺乏想象而造成的。因此，我大概不必在最初起因的论点上浪费时间了。 
 
                                          自然法则的论点 
 
    其次是根据自然法则而提出们一个极为常见的论点。这在整个十八世纪，特别是在艾萨克·牛顿爵士及其宇
宙进化论的影响之下，确是受人重视的论点。人们观察到行星按万有引力定律围绕太阳运转，便认为上帝命令这
些行星按照这种独持的方式运行，这就是它们这样活动的原因。这当然是简单而便利的解释，使他们省却进一步
探求引力定律的说明的麻烦。今天，我们用爱因斯坦介绍的比较复杂的方法来解释引力定律。我不打算对你们演
讲，介绍爱因斯坦解释的万有引力定律，因为这又要花费很多时间。无论如何，你们现在已经不再有牛顿理论中
的自然法则了，按照他的理论，自然由于人们还不了解的某种原因而有规律地运行。我们现在才知道，许多我们
过去当作是自然法则的东西，原来只是人为的约定俗成的框框。谁都知道，在无限遥远的太空，一码还是等于三
英尺。毫无疑问，这是非常显著的事实，但你却不大会称之为自然法则。许多被认为是自然法则的事物就是属于
这类性质。另一方面，你要是能认真地研究一下原子活动的真实情况，就会发现它们远不如人们所想象地那样严
格服从规律，而人类所掌握的规律只是随机事件出现的统计平均数。大家都知道有个规律：掷骰子大约每掷三十
六次只会出现一次双六，这时我们总不会说这就证明骰子是受到某种意志的支配，要是每次都是双六，那才是受
到支配呢。自然法则中很多都是属于这种性质的。它们只是事件根据机率的规律出现的统计平均数，因此，所谓
自然法则这一整套说法就不象过去那样引人入胜了。且不说这些法则反映的只是不断变化着的科学的暂时现象，
认为有自然法则就有法则制订者的这一意见，就是由于把自然的法则和人为的规律混为一谈。人为的规律是有关
人类的行为方式的种种规定，你可以服从，也可以违犯。而自然法则则是对事物运动方式的如实反映。也仅仅是
客观地反映而已。你决不能说有谁命令自然服从某一法则，因为即使是这样假设，你也不能回避这个问题：为什
么上帝只提出这些自然法则，而没有提出别的法则？要是你说上帝高兴怎么做就怎么做，并没有什么理由，那你
又会发觉有些事物并不服从规律，于是，关于自然法则的一系列理论便说不下去了。如果按大多数正统神学家的
说法：上帝规定的一切法则，其所以是这些而不是那些，当然是为了创造最美好的宇宙，尽管你决不会认为应该
当真去查看一下这个“最美好的”宇宙；如果上帝创造的法则真有理由。那么上帝本人也应受法则的约束，因此，
把上帝搬出来作为法宝，对你并没有什么好处。你确实具有一条超越并且先于神旨的规律，上帝并不能帮你什么
忙，因为他不是规律的最初创造者、简而言之，有关自然法则的整个论点再也没有它昔日的魅力了。我正在依时
间顺序逐个检视那些论点。随着时间的推移，昔日用以证明上帝存在的论点已经改变了性质。当初，这些严格而
富有思想的论点就含有某些显见的谬误，而到了现代，在理智上便显得不那么可敬了，并且越来越显得有种空洞
的说教味道。 
 
                                         事先计划的论点 
 
    以下我们要讲到事先计划的论点。大家都知道，事先计划的论点就是说，世界万物正好造成现在的状态是使
人类得以在其中生存，稍加改变我们便无法生存下去。这就是事先计划的论点。这种论点有时采取了十分可笑的
形式。例如，说上帝让兔子长白尾巴，是要使人容易瞄准捕捉。我不知道兔子如何看待这一妙论。这是很容易仿
制的拙劣论点，你们都记得伏尔泰的话，他说事先计划把鼻子造成现在这个样子显然是为了能架眼镜。这类翻来
复去的妙论已经不再象在十八世纪时那样显得文不对题，因为从达尔文的时代起，我们逐渐更加了解生物为什么
能适应环境，不是环境被造得适宜于生物的生存，而是生物逐渐适应变化的基础，这就是适应性变化的基础。这
里丝毫也不能证明有什么事先的计划。 
    当你深入研究事先计划这一论点的时候，最今人惊叹不已的是，人们居然能相信这个世界以及世界万物，尽
管缺点很多，却是全智、全能的上帝在千百万年中能够创造的最完美世界。我可怎么也无法相信这一点。你如果
有全智和全能，并且有千百万年的时间来使你的世界臻于完善，你难道创造不出比三Ｋ党和法西斯更美好的东西
么？而且。你只要承认科学的一般规律，就必然认为，地球上人类生命和一切生命到了一定阶段都将灭亡，这是
太阳系逐渐衰亡的过程。太阳系在衰亡的某一阶段中产生了适宜原生质生存的诸如温度之类的条件，于是在整个
太阳系存在的过程中，生命可以存在一个短暂的时期。你在月球中就可以看到表示地球发展趋势的某些情况——
死寂、寒冷、没有生命。 
 
    有人说，这种观点使人沮丧。也有人说，要是相信这种观点，他们简直就无法生活下去。不用理睬这种胡言
乱语。决没有人会为几百万年后行将发生的事情担忧。即使他们自称确实非常忧虑，也只是自欺欺人而已。他们
忧心仲仲地关心的是更现实的东西，或者仅仅是消化不良；但是，不会有人因为想到亿万年后世界发生的事而悲
哀。因此，尽管一切生命都将灭绝的观点肯定是令人不快的——至少我想我们可以这样说；尽管我有时沉思默想
着人们活着所做的一切，这种观点倒反是一种安慰——它毕竟还不会使生活苦不堪言，它只是让人们去注意另外
一些事情。 
 
                                         神明道德的论点 
 
    我们现在再进一步看看有神论者提出的上帝存有的道德论点，我将称之为他们的理性传统。大家当然都知道，
历史上一向存在用以证明上帝存在的三种理性伦点，都巳经披伊曼努尔·康德在《纯粹理性批判》中驳倒了。然
而，康德自己又马上发明了一个新的论点，也就是道德的论点，这使他深信不疑，和许多人一样，他在知识方面
敢于大胆怀疑。但在道德方面却盲目地相信他在母亲的膝前学到的道德箴言。这就说明精神分析学家不断强调的
早期接触的事物比起晚期来，对人的思想具有更强大得多的影响。 
    如上所述，康德为上帝的存在创造了个新的道德论点。在十九世纪，不同形式的这种道德论点是非常流行的。
它有各种各样的形式。一种形式说，如果不存在上帝，便没有是非可言。我现在不想说究竟有无是非之分，这是
另一回事。我要讲的是：如果你坚信确有是非之分，那就得说明是非之分是否出自上帝的圣旨。如果是的，那么
对上帝本身来说便无是非之分，再说上帝至善便毫无意义了。如果你象神学家那样，认为上帝至善，那就得承认
是非具有某种不以上帝的圣旨为转移的含义，因为上帝的圣旨所以善而不恶不能仅仅因为它们是上帝提出的。如
果你要这么说，你就必须承认，是非的产生并不完全是由于上帝的圣旨而事实上是有逻辑上早于上帝的存在的。
当然，加果你愿意的话，你可以说还有个至高无上的神明命令上帝创造了世界，或者象诺斯替教徒那样，说世界
是魔鬼乘上帝疏忽之时创造出来的——我常认为这是非常动听的说法。这种说法花样百出，我就不打算一一驳斥
了。 
 
                                         伸张正义的论点 
 
    此外，关于道德的论点还有一种奇怪的形式，那就是他们说，为了给世界带来正义，我们就需要上帝的存在，
在整个宇宙的我们知道的这一部分中，确实存在着极大的不公平，好人总是受气遭殃，坏人往往青云直上，很难
说哪种情况更加可恶。如果你要在这整个宇宙中到处都是正义，就得假定还有个来世以弥补今生的不平。因此，
他们说必定有个上帝，也必定有天堂和地狱，使正义最终得到伸张。这真是非常奇怪的论点。如果用科学的眼光
看待这个问题，你就会说：“我到底还只知道这个世界，对于宇宙的其他部分我并不了解。如果能根据概然性来
研究。人们也许会说，“这个世界大概是最有代表性的样板，既然这里有不公平，其他地方多半也有。”假如你
打开一箱桔子，发现面上一层全坏了，你决不会说“为了保持好坏均衡，下面一定是好桔子。”你会说：“可能
整箱桔子全是坏的。”这是有科学头脑的人对宇宙当然具有的见解，他会悦：“我们在这个世界上发现很多不公
平，因此我们有理由认为世界上并无正义可言（而依照这样的说法，就为人们提供了一个反对神明之说而不是赞
同神明之说的道德论点。）”我当然知道，我给你们谈到的这种理智的论点并不能打动人的心弦。真正使人信仰
上帝的完全不是什么理智的论点。绝大多数人信仰上帝，是因为他们从儿童时代起就受到这种熏陶，这才是主要
的原因。  
    此外，我觉得另一个最强有力的原因是人们要求安全的心理。希望有个老大哥照应他们。这对人们产生信仰
上帝的要求起了异常微妙的影响。 
 
                                           基督的品性 
 
    我现在谈谈我总觉得理性主义者阐述得很不充分的一个问题，就是基督是否在人类中最有道德最有智慧的问
题。一般都是人云亦云地认为情形就是这样。我却不以为然，我自信在很多观点上要比那些自称为基督教徒的人
更同意基督的观点。我并不认为我能完全同意他的观点，但是我同意的程度却远远胜过那些自称为基督教徒的人。
你们都记得他曾说过：“不要与恶人作对。有人打你的右脸，连左脸也转过来由他打。”这并不是什么新的箴言
或原则。早在基督以前五、六百年，老子和释加牟尼就用过这样的训谕。事实上，基督教徒并没有接受这一原则。
比如，我毫不怀疑现任首相确是非常虔诚的基督教徒，我却并不主张你们去打他的耳光。我相信你们会发现他认
为这句话只有象征性的意义。 
    我认为另外还有一点也说得好极了。基督说：“你们不要论断人，免得你们被论断。”我相信你一定会发现，
在基督教国家的法庭上，这条原则是并不流行的。我这半辈子认识过好些虔诚的基督教徒的法官，根本就没有人
觉得他们自己的行为是违背基督教的原则的。基督还说：“有求你的，就给他。有向你借贷的，不可推辞。”这
也是极其高尚的原则。  
    主席提醒过大家，我们在这里不要谈政治，但我还是免不了要提一下，在上次的大选中。激烈争辩的就是对
借贷的人推辞是多么必要。显然我们可以肯定，我国自由党和保守党的成员都是些不同意基督教导的人，因为他
们在这种情况下都肯定无疑地要推辞的。 
    另外还有一条箴言也是很有意义的，但我看在我们基督教徒的朋友那里却并不时髦。基督说：“你若愿意作
完全人，可去变卖你所有的，分给穷人。”这是一条很好的箴言，但是，正如我讲过的那样，实行的并不多。上
述各项箴言都很不错，但是有些难以做到。我也并不标榜自己要去实践这些箴言，不过，这同基督教徒不去实践，
到底并不完全是一回事。 
 
                                         基督训导的缺点 
 
    讲了基督箴言的高尚之处之后，我要提出几点，说明我们不能象《福音》书中描述的那样承认基督睿智而又
至善的说法。我在这里还要声明一下：这并不牵涉历史问题。历史上究竟有无耶稣其人是大可怀疑的。即使真有
其人，对他的生平我们也一无所知。因此，我不打算探讨这个很难说清楚的历史问题，我只准备根据《福音》的
描述，研究基督在《福音》中的形象，我们从这些记载中确实可以发现一些似乎不很明智的地方。举例来说：基
督肯定地认为，在当时的人死亡之前，他的第二次降临就会在光采夺目的云霞中出现。《圣经》中有许多章节都
证明这一点。例如他说：“以色列的城邑，你们还没有走遍，人子就到了。”接着又说：“站在这里的，有人在
没尝死味以前，必看见人子降临在他的国里。”还有许多章节都明白无误地说明，他相信他的第二次降临将在当
时还活着的人有生之年实现。这是他早期信徒的信仰，也是基督许多道德箴言的基础。他说“不要为明天忧虑”
这类话时，他主要是认为第二次降临是很快就要实现的事，一切日常的俗事都算不了什么。事实上我就知道，有
些基督教徒确实相信基督复临巳经迫在眉睫了，我还认识一位牧师，他把他的教徒吓得惶惶不可终日，说什么基
督即将来临；后来他们看到牧师自己在庭园里栽树才放了心。早期的基督教徒对这一点确是深信不疑的，他们绝
不参加在花园里栽树这样的事务。在这一方面基督并不象某些人那样聪明，自然也就肯定算不上大智。 
 
                                            道德问题 
 
    接着讲道德问题。我认为在基督的道德品性中存在着一个非常严重的缺点，那就是他相信地狱。我自己认为，
真正非常慈悲的人决不会相信永远的惩罚。《福音》书中描绘的基督无疑是相信永远的惩罚的，我们也一再发现
把不听从他训导的那些人视为寇仇的报复心理，这种态度在传教士中并不少见，但它确实有损于他至善至美的形
象。举例来说，苏格拉底就没有这种态度，他对不听从训导的人总是和颜悦色，彬彬有礼；我自己认为，采取这
样的态进要比采取忿怒的态度，对于圣贤来说、是更值得称道的。也许大家还记得他临终的遗言，以及他平时对
持不同观点的人所说的活吧。 
    你们会发现基督在《福音》中曾说：“你们这些蛇类、毒蛇之种啊，怎能逃脱地狱的刑罚呢？”这是对那些
不听他教诲的人讲的。我认为这并不是很高明的口气，而诸如此类关于地狱的描写也比比皆是。当然，还有一段
经文，是关于亵渎圣灵的罪的，也是大家很熟悉的：“唯独说话干犯圣灵的。今世来世总不得赦免。”这句经文
给世界带来了无穷苦难，使各种各样的人都以为自己已犯下了亵渎圣灵的大罪，今生来世都不能得到饶恕。我坚
决相信，生性还有一点仁慈的人，就决不会把世界置于这种畏惧和恐怖的笼罩之下。 
    基督还说：“人子要差遣使者，把一切叫人跌倒的，和作恶的，从他的国里挑出来，丢在火炉里。在那里必
要哀哭切齿了。”他还不断谈到哀哭切齿，这种说法在一节又一节的经文中一再出现，使读者明显地觉得，说话
的人对于别人哀哭切齿感到某种乐趣，否则他就不会这样津津乐道。大家当然记得分别绵羊和山羊的故事，讲到
他第二次降临时将如何把人类分成绵羊和山羊两大类。他要对山羊说：“你们这披咀咒的人，离开我。进入那永
火里去。”他继续说：“这些人要往永刑里去。”他又说：“倘若你一只手叫你跌倒，就把他砍下来。你缺了肢
体进入永生。强如有两只手落到地狱，入那不灭的火里去。在那里，虫是不死的，火是不灭的。”他也一再重复
这一说法。我必须承认，我认为把地狱的永火当作是对罪恶的惩罚的这种种理论，是一种惨无人道的理论。它是
给世界带来残忍，使世界多少世代受到残酷折磨的理论。《福音》中的基督，如果你相信他的传记编写者所描绘
的那样，无疑是对于这一点必须负部分责任的。 
    另外还有些重要性较小的例子。例如格拉森猪群的事件，驱使恶魔进入猪群，使它们撞下山崖，投海而死，
这样做法显然是不很仁慈的。你要记得他是无所不能的，能叫魔鬼走开了事，但他却让它们进入猪群。还有无花
果树的那个奇怪的故事，我也一直百思不得其解。大家都知道无花果树的遭遇：“耶稣饿了，远远的看见一棵无
花果树，树上有叶子，就往那里去，或者在树上可以找着甚么。到了树下，竟找不着甚么，不过有叶子，因为不
是收无花果的时候。耶稣就对树说：“从今以后，永没有人吃你的果子。”……彼得……就对他说、“拉比，请
看，你所咒诅的无花果树，已经枯干了。”这个故事荒谬绝伦，因为当时并不是结果子的季节，你很难归咎无花
果树。无论从智慧上看或者从品德上看，我自己都觉得他不象历史上传颂的某些人那样高超。我看在这些方面，
释迎牟尼和苏格拉底的地位要比他高。 
 
                                            感情因素 
 
    正象前面面说过的那样，我认为人们信仰宗教的真实原因同论证根本没有什么关系。他们信仰宗教是由于感
情的原因。人们常说，攻击宗教是错误的。因为宗教使人更有道德。有人这样对我说过，我没有理睬。大家当然
都知道岔缨尔·巴特勒写的《重游埃瑞璜》对这种论调的嘲讽。你们都还记得他在书中提到，有个叫希格斯的人
来到一个遥远的地方。他在那里度过一段时间以后乘气球逃离了那个地方。二十年以后，他又旧地重游，发现那
儿出现一种新宗教，说他希格斯已经升天，并崇拜他为“太阳王子”。他发现纪念他升天的节日即将到来，他听
到汉基和潘基两位教授在交谈，说他们未尝目睹希格斯的尊容，也永远不愿碰到他；但他们是“太阳王子”教的
大祭司。希格斯勃然大怒，就走到他们面前去对他们说“我要揭露这一切骗人的鬼话，我要告诉埃瑞璜的人民，
我不过是凡人希格斯，我是乘气球腾空而去的。”别人却对他说：“你可不能这样做，因为这个国家一切的道德
准则都是同这一神话联系在一起的、他们一旦知道你并没有升天，便会一下子全变得邪恶了。”他终于被说服，
只好俏俏地走了。 
 
    这意思就是说，如果不坚信基督教，我们都会变邪恶了。我倒似乎觉得，信仰基督教的人大多都是极其邪恶
的。大家可以看到这种咄咄怪事，就是历史上无论什么时期，只要宗教信仰越狂热，对教条越迷信，残忍的行为
就越猖狂，事态就变得越糟糕，在所谓宗教信念的时代里，当人们不折不扣地信仰基督教义的时候，就出现了宗
教裁判所和与之俱来的严刑，于是也便有数以百万计的不幸妇女被当作女巫烧死，在宗教的名义下，对各阶层人
民实施了各种各样的残酷迫害。环顾今日的世界，你会发现世界上人类的情感稍微有一点进展，刑法有任何改进，
缓和战争的每一步骤，改善有色人种待遇的每一步骤，奴隶的解放和道德的进步，都曾受到世界上有组织的教会
一贯的反对。我可以很慎重地说：“基督教作为有组织的教会，过去是，现在也依然是世界道德进步的主要敌人。” 
 
                                      教会是怎样阻碍进步的 
 
    我说今日的教会依然阻碍着人类的进步，你也许觉得有些过火。我并不认为这样。现在只说一件事实。请你
们原谅我提到这样的事。这不是令人愉快的事，但是教会强迫我们谈论令人不愉快的事。假定在我们今天居住的
世界上，有一个天真无知的少女嫁给了一个梅毒病患者，天主教会就说：“这是不可变更的神圣誓约。你们必须
共同生活一辈子。”女方还不能采取任何措施以预防生养患梅毒病的婴儿，这就是天主教的主张。我认为这是穷
凶极恶的残忍，只要人类天然的同情心还没有被教条完全泯灭，只要人类的道德天性对苦难的感觉还没有达到麻
木不仁的地步，谁也不能说这种事情是合乎情理的，这种事态应该继续下去。 
    这还只是一个例子。目前，教会仍然拥有各种手段坚持它所称为的道德，使各种人民蒙受不应有和不必要的
痛苦，当然，正如我们知道的那样，它仍然反对减轻世界上痛苦的各种各样的发展和进步。因为它把某些同人类
幸福毫无关系的狭隘的行为准则，美其名为道德；如果你认为应该做这做那，因为它有利于人类幸福，他们却说
这同问题毫无关系。“人类的幸福与道德有什么关系呢？道德的目的并不在于让人类幸福“ 
 
                                        恐惧是宗教的基础 
 
    我认为宗教基本上或主要是以恐惧为基础的。这一部分是对于未知世界的恐怖、一部分是象我巳说过的。希
望在一切困难和纷争中有个老大哥以助一臂之力的愿望。恐惧是整个问题的基础——对神秘的事物，对失败，对
死亡的恐惧。恐惧是残忍的根源，因此，残忍和宗教携手并进也便不足为奇了。在这个世界上，我们依靠科学的
力量已经开始能了解一点事物、掌握一点事物。科学终于在同基督教的斗争中，在同一切教会势力们斗争中，在
一切陈腐箴言的逆流中，一步一步艰难而顽强地发展起来了。科学能够帮助我们战胜多少世代以来人类一直生活
在其中的怯懦的恐惧。科学能使我们懂得，我们扪心自问也该知道：我们再也不要到处寻找子虚乌有的帮助，再
也不要幻想天上的救星，而宁可脚踏实地，依靠我们自己在地上的努力，把多少世纪以来教会造成的这个世界改
造成为适于生活的地方。
 
                                          我们要做什么 
 
    我们要独立思考、光明正大他看待世界的一切——善的、恶的、美的、丑的；正视客观而不是害怕现实。用
智慧征服自然而不是仅仅慑于自然的淫威，甘愿俯首听命。有关上帝的整个观念来源于古代东方专制主义。这种
观念是同自由人格格不入的。当你听见人们在教堂中自我贬斥，说他们是可怜的罪人这类话时，会感到是可耻的，
是同有自尊心的人不相称的。我们应当昂然奋起、坦率地正视世界。我们应当把世界建设得尽可能美好些，纵然
不能十全十美尽如人意，也总要比别人在过去干的强得多。建设一个美好的世界需要的是知识、善良、勇气，而
不是对以往嗟悔不已，也不是用许久以前无知的人们用过的话语来禁锢我们自由的思想。这需要的是大无畏的观
点和自由的思想。这需要的是对末来的憧憬，而不是对于业已死亡的过去永无止息的怀恋。我们深信：用人类智
慧创造的末来世界将远远地超过死亡的过去。