The beginning of intellectual development consists of observant experience. By frequent and repeated observation man acquired a familiarity with the subjects of that process—a clearer and better understanding of them.

Thus, the Chaldean shepherds, while minding their flocks of sheep and cattle, lazily and continuously watched the sky and starry hosts, and by degrees recognized, and acquired a knowledge of, many of the stars, laying the foundation for astronomy. Authorities state that they composed seventy-two volumes on that science, these books dating as far back as 2,540 B.C., treating of the polar star, Venus, Mars, and so on. It is possible that many errors attended their observations; many mistakes may have entered their explanations. That was natural, considering the remoteness of the times and the lack of facilities.

Knowledge and truth never come easily. The former is very hard to acquire, the latter very difficult to discover.

Every truth, every new idea, has to battle against old established notions. If the new idea is persisted in, which is ordinarily the case, a struggle must ensue. The old idea resists, refuses to yield, no matter how false, ridiculous, or pernicious it may be. Yield, however, it must, and does in the course of time. Truth must win in the long run, though it has to fight its way through depths of ignorance, prejudice, and superstition, sustained by hate, bigotry, terrorism, and persecution.

As century after century passed in the Dark Ages, apostles of science and truth appeared, here and there, now and then, calm, dignified, patient, persistent and persevering, untiring, self-denying, men of superior intellect, unswayed and undismayed by existing authorities. These men gave us, though not a complete, a very ample revelation of nature, unfolding its mysteries, explaining its phenomena, making known the truth as far as men had been able to discover up to their time.

Nature with its laws man had to observe carefully in order to learn to unravel its secrets, its workings, its forces. There is no way to reveal them except through the mind of man. There are no means of knowing or discovering the intricacies and subtleties of nature’s hidden and inexhaustible resources but by careful thought, reason, constant study and application. Not a single problem has ever been solved—in fact, one cannot be solved—except by acquired intellectual powers, developed by the refining process of education of the great nervous centers of man.

Many scholars have devoted and still devote their time, their energy, their life, in search of new facts, new truths, concerning the stars, planetary system, and this terrestrial globe we live on especially.

Centuries before Christ’s time, and after, men were engaged in developing the science of Astronomy—Anaximander, Hipparchus, Ptolemy, Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Herschel, and many others. These men were the apostles of truth, the teachers of facts, and some of them were martyrs to science.

The great civilizer, the press of modern times, was recently filled with accounts about the planet Mars, comet, etc., giving all the detailed information obtainable.

Everyone who reads the newspapers learns something about Mars, and ventures to give his opinion, whether it is like the earth—inhabited, has seas or atmosphere, etc. So that, whatever new facts are revealed, new truths announced, the minds of men are made so much richer.

Knowledge, the progress of science, the discoveries of important facts, the improvements of political, social, or civil laws, do not come to us spontaneously, nor do they come to us suddenly in overpowering quantities; it is a process of gradual acquirement, a slow accumulation, to which every generation contributes its quota of observation and experience that makes up the total wealth of aggregate thought, and is handed down from generation to generation, our common inheritance.

This common inheritance is neither all true nor all good. A large proportion that has been handed down to us by the ancients is not true or good, though it is believed to be true and good.

The revelations of absolute truths, of actual facts, are of more recent date—discoveries made within the last few centuries. The spurious, so-called revelations are the works of antiquity, which are not based on truth or fact or knowledge or experience. The mental faculties of pristine men were primitive, and their ideas were as primitive. They lived in an age of infancy; it was all surprise, wonder, astonishment, and miracle.

When Kepler discovered the law that “Planets revolve in ellipses with the sun at one focus,” he worked hard for many days, and after many trials succeeded. He also discovered a second law, which he defines, “A line connecting the center of the earth with the center of the sun passes over equal spaces in equal times;” and his third law, “The squares of the times of revolutions of the planets about the sun are proportioned to the center of their mean distance from the sun.”

No one ever claimed for Kepler, nor has he laid claim himself, that he was inspired by God, or received the idea through any supernatural agency.

The hostile and bitter opposition that Galileo met on the part of the Christian Church is too well known; but the importance of his discoveries, and the truth, remains.

All intelligent persons ought to understand Newton’s law of gravitation. If they understood the full import and significance of that law, they would never believe in the absurd miracles of Moses, Joshua, Elijah, Christ and Company. The law: “Every particle of matter in the universe attracts every other particle of matter with a force directly proportional to its quantity of matter, and decreasing as the square of the distance increases.”

It is most remarkable—that man discovering great truths, concerning which there has never been any dispute, or controversy, or fight; that stand, unaltered and unchanged, forever. Such men have not been inspired by God, Jehovah, Christ, or the Holy Ghost, or anything supernatural. They have accomplished their works by their powers of observation, great mental efforts, skillful explanation and elucidation, accomplished by hard and untiring work.

It is astonishing that, in the presence of so many revealed natural truths, so many ascertained scientific facts, and numerous discoveries in this century, which is claimed to be much advanced in civilization, intelligent persons—teachers, preachers, priests, and those laying claim to scholarship—still believe that the visionary figures, the product of distorted imagination or hallucination, of men like Isaiah, Ezekiel, etc., were of supernatural origin.

The incredible stories found in the Bible, the fabulous inventions concocted in the imagination of some person or persons away in Chaldea many thousand years ago, are still taught to be true, and the children in the Sunday-schools are instructed to believe these absurdities.

The undue haste exhibited in the first chapter of Genesis, in creating the earth, etc., is one of those wonderful puzzles to a child’s mind. It is a something that is not easily explained at length to young people without awaking the suspicion of its impossibility, and requires considerable ingenuity to satisfy inquiring minds concerning it. The supernaturalists get over it by a final and complete answer, that admits of no argument—that “With God everything is possible.” That being absolutely untrue, the answer explains nothing, but has a tendency to stupefy the child and hinder its educational advancement, for the reason that such an answer puts a stop to all farther inquiry. This really has been the effect of this pernicious teaching for many centuries.

All the stories, fables, myths, handed down to us from antiquity may be classed in the same category. There are many of them—yes, a perfect wilderness. All are true in part, but false as a whole. Upon close examination we find glimmerings of truth in all of them. The difference lies in the kind, not in the quality. In the biblical story of creation, the writers had evidently observed, and knew, there were an earth, water, stars, and something above the earth which they called heaven, the atmosphere. That was the limit of their knowledge. They knew they existed, and things and objects that surrounded them existed, and they made an attempt in their primitive method to account for the manner in which these things came into existence. They could know nothing about it, because the most important discoveries were made thousands of years later.

Hesiod, 900 B.C., in his “Theogonia,” invokes the Muses who inhabit the heavenly mansions, and whose knowledge of generation and birth he had formerly sung: “Tell, ye celestial powers, how first the gods and world were made; the rivers, and the boundless sea, with its strong surge. Also, the bright, shining stars, and wide-stretched heaven above, and all the gods that sprang from them, givers of good things.” The Muses answer: “First of all existed chaos; next in order the broad-bosomed Earth; then Love appeared, the most beautiful of immortals. From chaos sprang Erebus and dusky night, and from night and Erebus came Ether and smiling day.”

He gives a further description, which, like the foregoing, we know to be fiction, yet to contain elements of truth. We are not asked to believe all. He says:

It is no easy matter for a man of ordinary education to form a notion of the mental crudeness of the lower type of the human race of our own times; it is far more difficult for him to divest his mind of all its acquisitions through study and observation, and reduce his ideas to the level of those progenitors of his race, the men of antiquity.

When men had to struggle with savage beasts, it required superior intelligence to preserve themselves from destruction. That might have led to the worship of the strongest animals, such as the lion and the tiger. But no sooner did man learn the use of iron, which enabled him to kill these his gods, proving himself superior to the thing he worshiped, than these gods were thrown aside.

So long as man was unable to explain the mysterious appearances of the sun, moon, and stars, he endowed them with his own intelligence. He worshiped what was to him incomprehensible, mighty, wonderful; made images representing their phenomena or forces for his adoration. In his mind he pictured the sun as a warrior clad in golden panoply, the pale moon he regarded as the queen, and the stars as an immense host of spirits and heroes. Some interpreted the sun to be the child of darkness, the morning the bride of heaven, the clouds a fairy network, and the heat a friend of man; when the heat was very intense, then the sun was slaying his children. They would liken the dark clouds which rested on the earth to a terrible being whom they named the Snake or Dragon, that shut up the waters in his prisonhouse. When the thunder rolled they said that this hateful monster was uttering his hard riddles; and when, at last, the rain burst forth, they said that the bright sun had slain his enemy, and brought the stream of life for the thirsting earth.

Professor Max MÜller says: “He begins to lift up his eyes; he stares at the tent of heaven, and asks, Who supports it? He opens his ears to the winds, and asks them, Whence and whither? He is awakened from darkness and slumber by the light of the sun, and him whom his eyes cannot behold, and who seems to grant him the daily pittance of his existence, he calls his life, his health, his brilliant Lord and Protector. He gives names to all the powers of nature.”

All sorts of names were invented to designate any particular force, phenomenon, or characteristic. In the Vedas the sun has twenty different names, each one descriptive of the sun or its aspect. In Persia the blazing sun was adored, and altars smoked perpetually of fire. In Gaul and Britain pillars were raised to the sun, altars to the moon, and fires were heaped under sacrificial caldrons to Cardwen, the earth-goddess.

Man’s ideas of course underwent modifications as civilization advanced. The religious idea had taken root and elaborated ramifications, and laws were evolved to govern them. The sun of prosperity shone; communities grew stronger and more numerous; from the worship of the physical laws of nature, the laws governing morality became involved. Thus morals invaded nations, over which they enthroned their gods. Every nation elaborated its own details, and slowly took its relative position. As these gods grew in importance men assumed the responsibility to guard them, and the function to attend them. Thus a class called priests were chosen, elected, or self-appointed to minister to them. These functionaries at the same time assumed the moral and political guidance of nations or communities, and individuals. In this manner arose hundreds upon hundreds of Gods: Io, Isis, Jupiter, Juno, etc., etc.

The qualities of the gods, like the qualities of men, were good and bad. They were good and evil, light and dark, life and death, and were arranged to suit the time and occasion. When laws were established to govern society, obedience to these laws was declared to be right, disobedience wrong. Men learned this; they became conscious of what was right and what was wrong. The ministration to these gods was acknowledged to be a righteous act. Rules were established to prevent any violation or infringement of the duty due to these gods. A trespass in violation of anything considered sacred was regarded as an evil—a sin. Slowly the consciousness of sin, of doing wrong, of violating the law, was recognized and established, and the attitude men assumed towards the gods, or their conduct towards them, was regarded as moral holiness, sanctity, or piety. The evolution of images, idols, gods and goddesses, was not the work of a day, but of very many centuries. The same may be said of sacrifices, worship, ceremonies, the laws concerning the same, holiness, sin, good and evil, sanctity, sacrilege, divinity, blasphemy, etc., etc.

Theologians, as well as theological philosophers and theorists, finding their pet notion of a god strangely interfered with and disturbed by the advancing progress in the knowledge of the natural sciences, bring to their aid additional proof to demonstrate the existence of a god, viz., that all races of men, wherever found, savage, barbarian, Indian, African, etc., on the different parts of the earth’s surface, believe in a something higher and greater or more powerful than themselves, a spirit, a soul, a supernatural being. Unfortunately for their argument, this mental condition that is ascribed to the barbarians, etc., as being instinctive or innate—that is, this supernatural element—this having an idea of something they do not understand—proves the contrary, that there is no truth in their assumption. The very fact that they have gone through that process, or are going through it, shows it a kind of educational distemper of a lower order that all primitive races have to pass. As children who learn to read must first know their A B C, it is the road that leads to a higher grade of thought. They begin in surprise and wonder at the natural, concerning which they know nothing. They fear, they adore the forces they cannot overcome. They make images of them in their likeness and worship them. When, however, they have learned through experience to overpower them, they cease to respect them. New forms are adopted, modifications made, and lastly so changed that but a mere shadow of the original remains.

All races began in a similar fashion, varying in form and method. The sun, clouds, atmosphere, seasons, oceans, thunder, and all other phenomena in nature—the inability to account for the existence of these led to worship, sacrifice, etc.; and images, idols, gods, originated; and in connection with them, stories, fables, myths, and fictions were supplied by the officiating priests or persons in attendance. The fanciful creations of the imagination hold good and will hold good so long as we do not know anything of the realities of life, of nature, of the actualities, of facts, of truth. But when the masses shall have learned more of nature, then the visionary, the imaginary god, the heirloom and heritage of our antiquated forefathers, will be thrown aside as the images were by Abraham, the idols dismissed or discarded later. The relics, the remnants, of this barbarism still have a hold on the minds of men.

Our entire religious fabric rests upon the creation as related in the Bible, handed down to us as the universally acknowledged text-book of all knowledge. The time was when it was dangerous to doubt, and imperiled one’s safety or even life to openly state an opinion contrary to the supposed infallible assertions contained in the holy book.

The man or men who originally wrote that part of Genesis had not the remotest idea what he or they were talking about. He or they knew nothing of the subject-matter in consideration. The story told is like many other fables that had their origin in those early days of waking humanity.

The great masses are not very much better off to-day as regards these notions. They still believe in the Bible, and hang their hopes of salvation on its truth. The churches teach it, and it forms part and parcel of the church creed.

It will therefore do no harm to present a few facts—that the holiest priest cannot contradict, that the most pious preacher must admit—that admit of no argument or controversy, because absolutely true.

Every intelligent person knows that we live on this earth; that this earth is also called the world, and that this world is a planet; that this planet belongs to a family of planets. This planet of ours, this earth, belongs to a system of planets known as the solar system. And the solar system is mainly comprised within the limits of the Zodiacs. By the Zodiacs is meant a belt of the Celestial Sphere. 8° on each side of the Ecliptic is styled the Zodiac. This division is of very high antiquity, having been in use among the Hindoos and Egyptians. The Zodiac is divided into twelve equal parts, of 30° each, called signs, to each of which a fanciful name is given.

The sun is the center. Around him the planets revolve in ellipses.

The sun itself has a diameter of 866,000 miles. The major planets revolving around the sun as far as known are as follows:

It is not an easy matter to imagine that we are suspended in space; being held up, not by any visible object, but in accordance with the laws of universal gravitation, whereby each planet attracts every other planet and is in turn attracted by all.

There are a number of minor planets, satellites, a moon, and meteors or shooting-stars, and comets, etc., etc.

The sun, the great central globe, is so vast as to overcome the attraction of all the planets, and compel them to circle around him; next we come to the planets, each turning on its axis while it flies around the sun in an elliptical orbit; then accompanying them are the satellites or moons, each revolving about its own planet, while all whirl in a dizzy waltz about the central orb; next the comets, rushing across the planetary orbits at irregular intervals of time and space; and finally shooting-stars or meteors, darting hither and thither, interweaving all in apparently inextricable confusion. To make the picture more wonderful still, every member is flying with an inconceivable velocity, and yet with such accuracy that the solar system is the most perfect timepiece known.

The moon’s distance from the earth is 239,000 miles; and it has a diameter of 2,160 miles.

The above gives some idea of the immensity of the solar system. And it is but one of the myriads of systems, and our earth a speck amidst it. If on a clear night we cast our eyes upwards, we behold a belt of closely dotted stars extending across the sky—the Milky Way. This galaxy, a luminous, cloudlike band, stretches across the heavens in a great circle, and contains myriads of stars, densely crowded together. Herschel remarks that 288,000 stars once passed across the field of his great reflector in forty-one minutes, and says: “Thus we are to think of our own sun as a star of the second or third magnitude, and of our little solar system as plunged far into the midst of the vortex of worlds, a mere atom along that