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    The Limits Of Atheism Or, Why should Sceptics be Outlaws?
    The Limits Of Atheism Or, Why should Sceptics be Outlaws?
    The Limits Of Atheism Or, Why should Sceptics be Outlaws?
    Ebook51 pages35 minutes

    The Limits Of Atheism Or, Why should Sceptics be Outlaws?

    By George Jacob Holyoake

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    Read preview
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArchive Classics
    Release dateNov 26, 2013
    The Limits Of Atheism Or, Why should Sceptics be Outlaws?

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      Book preview

      The Limits Of Atheism Or, Why should Sceptics be Outlaws? - George Jacob Holyoake

      Project Gutenberg's The Limits Of Atheism, by George Jacob Holyoake

      This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with

      almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or

      re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included

      with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

      Title: The Limits Of Atheism

             Or, Why should Sceptics be Outlaws?

      Author: George Jacob Holyoake

      Release Date: July 20, 2011 [EBook #36798]

      Last Updated: January 25, 2013

      Language: English

      *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIMITS OF ATHEISM ***

      Produced by David Widger

      THE LIMITS OF ATHEISM

      Or, Why should Sceptics be Outlaws?

      BY G. J. HOLYOAKE.

                          "It is historically true that a large proportion of Infidels

                          in all ages have been persons of distinguished integrity and

                          honour."—John Stuart Mill 'On Liberty,' p. 80.

      LONDON: J. A. BROOK & CO., 282, STRAND, W.C

      1874.

      PRICE TWOPENCE.

      REVEREND RICHARD WILLIAM JELF, D.D.,

      PRINCIPAL OF KING'S COLLEGE, LONDON, WHO HAS LATELY ALARMED CONVOCATION

      BY CONNECTING

      THE 'ESSAYS AND REVIEWS' WITH ATHEISM

      THESE PAGES,

      WRITTEN IN ARREST OF THE PARLIAMENTARY JUDGMENT WHICH PLACES THE WORD OF THE ATHEIST BELOW THAT OF THE FELON,

      Are Respectfully Inscribed,

      BY

      GEORGE JACOB HOLYOAKE.

      PREFACE.

      The object of these pages* is not to defend the intellectual accuracy of Atheism (which could not be attempted in this brief space), the object is to explain its case, to vindicate its moral rectitude, and the right of those who hold these views, to legal equality. There are two Atheisms in literature—the ancient one of mere negation; and the affirmative form, whose relevant name is Cosmism, and of which Humboldt, in his 'Cosmos,' is a great illustrator, and Comte, in his 'Positive Philosophy,' an expounder. The term Cosmism ought to supersede the misleading term Atheism; just as Secularism has superseded the libellous term Infidelity. Cosmism, as well as Secularism, expresses a new form of Freethought, and I use the term Atheism, as the subject of a Lecture, for the first time here. It is a worn-out word, used by Theists in hateful senses. I employ it, as a title, to-day for political reasons, in order to show those who make it a ground of civil exclusion, that it is a thing of law and limits: that the reputed Atheism of English working men, so far as it prevails, is no longer the old Atheism of mere negation, but the Cosmism of modern science; neither dissolute, anarchical, nor impious—recognises that the universe is, without theorising why it is. Negative Atheism says there is nothing beyond the universe. Cosmism says it cannot explain anything beyond, and pauses where its knowledge ends.

           *A report of a Lecture delivered in Bendall's Assembly

           Rooms, City Road, London, March 8rd, 1861.

      Atheism questions—Cosmism affirms. The language of Cosmism is that of the poet in the 'Purgatory of Suicides':—

           'I do not say—there is no God,

           But this I say—I know not.'

      I prefer Secularism, which

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