As to man, the case is equally strong: The philosophers taught that man was constitutionally an immaterial immortal being, underlying and distinct from the body, and capable of existence apart from it, a fallacy from which came their doctrine of post mortem rewards and punishments in the Elysian fields and Tartarus, and a consequent rejection of the doctrine of the resurrection. This notion, succinctly defined as "the immortality of the soul," was, like their polytheism, a plausible deduction from appearances -- universal among the ancients, beginning with the Egyptians. But Moses, by the admission of Gibbon, is untainted with the notion, notwithstanding his Egyptian associations. The prophets and apostles are likewise free of this philosophic speculation, and, on the contrary, teach human mortality as expounded by Tyndall and other scientists of the modern era. The doctrine of immortality which they teach is the hope of resurrection to a future existence on the earth. Science does not teach this, because science only deals with what is, and can throw no light on what is to be. With the doctrine of human mortality all Scripture agrees, consequently the Bible is in harmony with science on the subject of man as well as God; that is, as regards his present constitution. That the Bible should teach a doctrine in harmony with science in an age when all the world was dreaming about the natural immortality of speculative induction, is another proof of the Bible's divinity. This argument has been obscured by orthodox religion, which accepts the Pagan view, and, by consequence, teaches the eternal torment of the unrighteous -- a doctrine which gives the argument for unbelief an advantage that does not belong to it.

The Bible's depreciation of human nature is the strongest proof of the Bible having come from God. The sentiment is foreign to human nature. This depreciation of human nature is characteristic of the Bible alone. We have in Psalm 9 this inquiry made: "What is man that thou art mindful of him, and the son of man that thou visitest him?" In Psalm 144 a similar question is asked and answered in this way: "Man is like to vanity: his days are like a shadow which passeth away." In Isaiah 40 we read: "The voice said, Cry; and he said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field; the grass withereth; the flower fadeth, because the Spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it; surely the people is grass." Isaiah 2 last verse: "Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils, for wherein is he to be accounted of?" Ezek. 36:22: "Not for your sakes, O house of Israel," -- that is, not for their sakes would He bring them from all the nations among whom they were scattered. "I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for my holy name's sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen whither ye went." In Jeremiah 17:5 we read: "Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm . . . but blessed is the man that putteth his trust in the Lord." In Jeremiah 9:23: "Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might; Let not the rich man glory in his riches; but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me."

No book, pervaded by such sentiments, could have a merely human authorship. All writers, whether ancient or modern, Jew or Gentile, glorify human nature, and boast in human achievements. All human writers, without exception, speak of the dignity of manhood and the greatness of human nature.

CHAPTER 8: "The Lord Alone Exalted"