OUR INDEBTEDNESS TO REVELATION—No. IV.

BY P.T. RUSSELL.

LANGUAGE AND RELIGION, FROM WHENCE?

There are conditions under which circumstantial evidence is the best possible testimony. These conditions are found inseparably connected with our present subject. That men now possess the same powers of body and mind that they always manifested is disputed by no intelligent individual. Those powers have been, through all the ages, precisely the same both in number and kind. Has the history of humanity furnished a single case in which a person, perfectly deaf during all his life, had the ability to speak words? Such is unknown in the history of the past, and also in the records of the present. History is as blank at this point, as a barren oasis. All the other faculties are as perfect with the deaf as they are with those whose hearing is perfect. Their inventive genius is equally vigorous; this being true, why should the defect of the ear deprive them of the power of speech? Will the Deist answer this question? Mr. Skeptic, as you are in the same difficulty with the Deist, you may help him if you choose. If you are, as you pretend, free and fearless thinkers, give us your thoughts upon this question. If you are cowardly, then stand off and sneer at the question which you dare not try to answer. The facts developed at this point ought to be remembered, and the question, why can the deaf, described, never talk? ought to be pressed home to every heart.

MATHEMATICS WILL AID US HERE.

When we see a constant increase in the number of persons or things in an undeviating ratio, with the aid of mathematics we can pass back to the first of the series, to the first man living at the base of the human series. Ever remember that there can not be a series without a unit lying at its base.

Why do the life-long deaf never talk? You answer: All Adam's children learn to talk by hearing others talk, and as those deaf ones never heard, so they never learned to talk. Very well. The first man, at the beginning of the series of humanity, had no powers or faculties which his descendants do not possess, and as they all have been under the necessity of learning to talk by hearing others talk, will you unbelievers and skeptics tell us, if you can, how that first man became a talker? Can the life-long deaf talk as well as those whose ears are perfect? No. Well, then, the difficulty rests upon you. That you may remember it, I will repeat it once more, it is this: who did the first man hear in order to learn the talker's trade?

WHERE DID LANGUAGE COME FROM?

Do you tell us that society made language? Then society must be older than language, for the maker is always, of necessity, older than the thing made. But without language there could be no interchange of ideas, and without this society could not exist. Where there is no intelligent communication of ideas we never think of society. Society does not exist where there is no intelligent communication of ideas between persons. The trees in the grove are never spoken of as a society. They are not and can not be in the social state. Neither are the brutes around us. Man is the only being upon earth capable of becoming a constituent element or part of society. Mr. Blair says, in his lectures on Belleslettres, "It would be extremely difficult to conceive how society could exist without language." Now, as society can not exist without language, it is certain that society could not be the author of language, for the author must be older than his production. But Mr. Blair springs another difficulty. It is in these words: "It would be equally difficult to conceive how language could exist without society." A moment's reflection will satisfy all reasonable persons that language can not exist without society, and that which can not exist without the other can not be the maker—author—of the other, for the maker must be older than the thing made. Then, as neither of these could exist without the other, neither could be the author of the other. So language and society are both effects, and their cause is outside of or antecedent to both, for every effect has an antecedent cause.

WHO, OR WHAT, IS THAT CAUSE?

First, it must have existed before man. Second, it must have possessed the powers of speech; and, therefore, must have been an intelligence. We have already seen this in our reflections upon the fact that the life-long deaf, who are deprived of hearing words spoken, are always dumb; so man, if he had never heard words spoken, would have remained dumb. He that created the ear, could He not hear? Did He not know what He was doing? He that arranged the vocal powers of man, could He not speak? Is there no evidence of an intelligent authorship here? He who not only created but also endowed man with all His noble and God-like attributes, would He not delight in visiting man and talking with him and learning him the art of speech? Did man not have the privilege of learning to talk? Did he not hear and learn from the "ancient of days"—from his great author? Is it not unreasonable to suppose that the author of man's being took no delight in him? Without this the first man could never have commanded the use of words. Here we have the "Arriere pensee" clue, that is, the clue in mental reservation; and here we meet the axiom. The clear is the true, and the "Ariadne," the clue that leads us out of the labyrinth. Language at the first must have been specific. This, in the nature of the case, must have been true; that is, each and every word must have been used in such a manner as to convey a certain definite idea. As we have already seen how mathematics aid us in passing back to the first man, so we can easily see how to reach an approximate idea of his mental condition. Physiologically, he might have been a full developed athlete, but in mentality, like the helpless infant. He is at the first uneducated. True, he possesses powers of mind, but they are inactive. No thought has passed through his mind to wake him up. He opens his eyes and immediately he thinks, he hears, and thought is increased. He is connected with the objective world of things by means of the five senses, and his mind goes to work upon these. His thoughts are all his own; he himself thought them; they were within his reach. He saw and heard, but his thoughts, like yours and mine, did not go beyond his perceivings. Yes, he wakes up and hears a rustling sound in the air just above his head; looking up he discovers a pair of the birds of Paradise flying over him; they light on the branch of a tree near by. These were the first things seen; he saw them in the morning of the first day of his life. He looks and looks, and thinks these birds are older than himself, for he remembers having seen them at the moment of the first consciousness. The question possible came up, Whence came they, and all the other things which I now see and hear? Were they always here? No answer is found. His curiosity is aroused; his reason is perplexed; he would be puzzled. He now reaches for thoughts too high for him; neither bird, beast, nor any other part of all creation can give the light he seeks. Whichever way he turns he receives no answer; he is bewildered; he is now anxious for light and ready to receive it. Man has found his extremity, and this is God's opportunity. He visits man and talks to him, and man, hearing the speech of his Creator, learns to talk. He is now able to ask for the solution of the perplexing problem of the ages, From whence came all these beautiful and useful things with which I am surrounded? Did they come of themselves, or did somebody make and arrange them? Here the Lord drives away all his troubles, simply saying: "I created all these things; the earth and the heavens, and all that is in them, the sun, moon and the stars also, and I now place you here in this beautiful Eden, earth, to dress and keep it." Thus man obtained the use of language and the foundation of religion at the same time. Of this I will speak more at length in my next. Tell them farewell.

N.B.—Let the determined skeptic answer these essays if he can, and if he can not, let him be an honest man and surrender.