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Paraphrased,
expanded and simplified by Richard
Gunther
This attempt to write more simply by Lewis' stunning essay will probably meet
with disapproval by those who prefer to preserve and keep his work in its
original form, but I have produced this paraphrase on behalf of the many people
I have met who tell me they cannot understand Lewis' writings. It is not that
these people are mentally deficient, but that Lewis demands a high degree of
literacy and concentration. He wrote as a professor would write, and he himself
admitted that he could not write more simply. His great intellect would not run
on a lower gear.
So, with your permission, I shall proceed to 'knock out' a rough version of his
original essay, in the hope that it may encourage readers to take with them
something which makes sense, and then perhaps they might decide to tackle the
real thing.
Chapter
one MEN WITHOUT CHESTS
"So
he sent the word to slay And slew the little childer" - Carol.
The above quote from Carol is relevant because it refers to the sending of a
word, or command, and the dreadful damage that word did is then given. A child
was killed. Herod gave the word to slay all the children in Bethlehem. God gave
the word to slay the wicked Canaanites, including women and children. From a few
sounds passing from the mouth of a ruler, comes such violence and death.
We ought to pay attention to what is printed in primary school textbooks. I have
just been sent one of them, by someone who will remain anonymous. This book I
was sent has the description "for boys and girls in the upper forms of
schools". When I noticed this I wondered what these young kids were being
taught, so I had a good read.
I must say I was surprised at some of the comments.
For example, there is the story of Coleridge at the waterfall. In the story, two
tourists talk about the waterfall. One of them says it is "sublime"
and the other says it is "pretty". When Coleridge heard these
comments, he thought the first comment was good, (he liked it), and the second
comment terrible (he was disgusted by it).
The textbook has a few words to say about all this. The writers tell us:
"When the man said 'This is sublime', he appeared to be making a remark
about the waterfall, he was not making a remark about the waterfall, but about
his own feelings. What he was really saying was 'I have sublime feelings".
The textbook goes on to say "This confusion is continually present in
language as we use it. We appear to be saying something very important about
something; when actually we are only saying something about our own
feelings".
Before we take this any further, let us deal with the first simple problem: the
difference between what we see and what we feel. For example, suppose we met
someone mean and nasty, we would not say "You are contemptible because I
feel contemptible", we would say "You are contemptible because of the
way you behave". Again, we would not say to a beautiful woman "You are
beautiful because I have beautiful feelings". And again, we would not say
"You are attractive because I feel attracted to you" . How we feel
about something is very different to what a thing really is. A man may be
attracted to an ugly woman, and a woman may consider a mean and nasty man to be
charming. Our feelings are one thing and what an object really is, is another
thing altogether.
Suppose some intelligent schoolchild reads the comments in the textbook? They
may decide, as they have been encouraged to, that (1.) All statements, which
describe something as having some sort of value, are really about how the viewer
is feeling, and not about the object they are looking at. And (2.) It doesn't
matter how we feel about things, because our feelings are just something
personal to us, and not relevant to anyone else.
I must say here that it may not have been the intention of the writers of the
textbook to mislead children into the above two paths. They may have only wanted
to show, by one example, how some things can be viewed, but the way they have
presented their point certainly pushes the reader in that direction. When they
say we "appear to be saying something very important" when in fact we
are "only saying something about our own feelings", they are
presenting two powerful words: "appear and "only". The child who
reads these two words may not have any idea, not the slightest inkling, of how
much philosophy, and politics, and theology and ethics are tied up in such a
simple sentence, but who knows what the idea may do later on in life. For
example, if you teach children that they are descendants of monkeys, who knows
what twisted ideas may follow later on? Once planted, an evil seed can bring
forth some terrible crops.
Assumptions drive many people's lives. Some people assume that life is
meaningless, and they live it accordingly. Others assume there is a God who
loves them, so they live under that. Some assume they are failures, and adjust
everything to suit, while others assume they are intelligent and successful, and
live in the heights.
Suppose the tourist who said the waterfall was "sublime" was wrong?
Does this change the waterfall in any way? Not a bit. The waterfall continues to
cascade its white water, foaming and rippling, catching the light and splashing
as usual. But if the waterfall is not "sublime" what is it? Are we to
say that from now on, if we ever see a magnificent sight such as a waterfall, we
must negate all our feelings and see as a machine might see? Are all
awe-inspiring sights to be relegated to 'natural forces', or 'physics'? If we
did this, we would be relegating ourselves to a position of having absolutely no
relevance to anything.
By abolishing our right to have feelings about anything, we actually abolish
ourselves. We make ourselves as meaningless as the object we are looking at.
Before we go any further with this I would like to quote another part of the
textbook - an excerpt from chapter four. In this chapter, the writers quote a
silly advertisement about a pleasure cruise. If you take this cruise, the ad
says, you will go "across the Western ocean where Drake of Devon
sailed", "adventuring after the treasures of the Indies" and
bring home a "treasure" of "golden hours" and "glowing
colours". The writers of the textbook make it clear that the advertisement
is a good example of a bad example. I think it is a pity they didn't quote from
some of the really great writers, such as Johnson, or Wordsworth, but the point
is, their advertisement used words that they have already said are not to be
taken as real values.
Let us look at this more carefully. They suggest that a cruise will be much
better if it follows the same ocean route as Drake of Devon sailed, but they
cannot say why the cruise will be any better simply because it follows Drake's
route.
Again, they use words like "treasures of the Indies" when most
intelligent people will realize that what they bring home will not be
"treasures" in the sense that the advert seems to mean. The only
"treasures" the tourists will bring home will be a few souvenirs and
trinkets, a few photos and some other objects, and some happy memories. These
are not "treasures" in the sense that the advert implies. So why
associate souvenirs with "treasures"?
Again the advert suggests that the travelers will bring home "golden hours
and glowing colours", yet in an earlier chapter the textbook told us that
such things are just the personal feelings of the viewer. There is no such
thing, says the textbook, as a "golden hour".
At this point we could quote from some great writers, who have used similar
terms. For example, Wordsworth in 'The prelude' who described the oldness of
London this way: "Weight and power, Power growing under weight". These
words are either true of the city, or false. They are either about a city, which
really exists as Wordsworth describes it, or they are just one man's personal
feelings about it, and therefore mean nothing. If they are true, then London
really has a great antiquity, an atmosphere of age, an illustrious past built
into its buildings, and the appearance of old wealth and history bound together
in one glorious scene - or it is something which exists, like a stone on the
road, or a passing, ordinary cloud.
If we follow the line of the textbook, we ought to follow it, logically, to all
descriptions of things by all the great writers. If we do this, then we will
have to omit such words as "wonderful, exciting, gorgeous, magnificent,
timeless, attractive, splendid, and so on" because any word which tries to
press into an object or scene a quality, is not valid. Objects must not become
more valuable the older they are, history must have nothing to do with our
feelings, scenes and places must not be respected simply because certain
important events happened there, or because significant people lived there. The
natural instinct of humans to express respect, admiration, reverence, worship,
and adoration must be deleted, because these are just value judgements, and have
no relevance to the real world - so says the textbook.
So what are children who read the textbook to think? First of all they will
conclude that all the great literature, with its rich variety of metaphor and
description, is meaningless. All those expressed feelings, the child will say,
are just the feelings of the writer. They cannot be true. If the child
understands the textbook, he will say there is no romance in an ocean cruise,
and he will not be attracted to anything which is advertised as an
"adventure". If he thinks the way the textbook wants him to think, he
will see the ocean as just a huge pile of water, tourism as just a money-losing
exercise, and romance as just a figment of someone's imagination. In this way
the child will be robbed, crushed, and deadened.
"So
he sent the word to slay And slew the little childer" - Carol.
At this point I would like to mention another little book, written for children,
which contains a comment about the horses used by the colonists of Australia. In
the quote the horses are described as "willing servants of the early
colonists". The writer of this book makes a comment along the same lines as
the writers of the first book, in that he suggests that the horses were not in
the slightest bit interested in what the colonists were doing. He says,
correctly, that the horses were just doing work. They were not even aware of
what they were doing, or where they lived, or why they were harnessed.
True enough, but having destroyed the meaning of the line, he fails to suggest
what the writer might have meant by the expression "willing servants".
By way of illustration, here are some similar expressions, written by Mr.
Farmer: The dog enthusiastically helped me catch the rabbits, The cow faithfully
supplied her milk, The hens thoughtfully laid eggs every day, The birds
dutifully cleared the cabbages of grubs, The weather politely dropped a good
rain.
In each of these sentences, the same kind of thought is carried. It was not the
animals or weather which did what they did for any good reason, but the Farmer
who interpreted things that way, and by so doing he added a dimension to what he
was saying which lifted the meaning above the basic physics. In the same sort of
way we are told about the weeping horses of Achilles, and the snorting warhorse
in the book of Job, and the excited antics of Brer Rabbit and Peter Rabbit.
Over the centuries Men and Animals have developed quite a relationship. Dogs are
loved for their faithfulness, cats for their luxuriating elegance, goats for
their stubbornness and so on, and the ox has long been a symbol of plodding
strength. We speak of the 'industrious ant' and the 'slimy old toad ', the 'wilely
fox' and the 'busy bee'. So when we speak of the horses as being the
"willing servants of the colonists" we are moving into the
relationship area. Men who love their horses will always speak in such terms.
The horses are not only 'willing', but also 'faithful', 'selfless', 'dutiful'
and so on. Horses are spoken of with great admiration and respect, despite what
the writer of the textbook says.
So what is the child to conclude? That horses are just animals - just objects in
a material world without any value except that which is based on our feelings
towards them? If this is so, then respect or admiration for a horse is no longer
relevant. Horses may be used to do work, they may even be neglected, but they
must not be regarded with any ordinate love. The same could be said for
all other animals too, and people. That 'faithful' dog is just (or merely) a
dog, that purring, 'friendly' cat is just (and only) a cat. There must not be
any value judgements made over these creatures.
As I said before, I doubt whether the writers of the first or second textbook
really intended to change children's attitudes to the external world as
dramatically as I have suggested. On the other hand the writers may indeed think
that the feelings we have about the world around us are not to be trusted. They
may want the human race to throw away such feelings and go forward into the
bright, Scientific future relying only on objective truth - just the facts - and
maybe even work out a brand new system of morals while we're at it. If this is
what the writers want, then they have moved from teaching English Grammar, to
teaching Philosophy.
On the other hand, the writers of the textbooks may simply find good, honest
literary criticism too difficult. They may not want to tackle the subject from a
literary point of view, compare the words of the books or poems with other books
or poems, or deconstruct the quotes using the tools of Grammar. This is, after
all, rather difficult. It means having to read widely, and to think clearly and
thoroughly. It means having to put things into context, understanding the
meaning of the words, and so on. Faced with this difficult task, it is easier to
tell children that feeling are just personal reactions, and that reality is an
objective thing, separate from how we think it is.
Of course this reduces us to seeing things from the animal level. A cow, gazing
over a fence, may look at nothing but the sun rising and a few hills of grass.
Humans, it seems, must not see a beautiful sunrise, or soft, tender grass, or
feel a gentle caressing breeze.
And then again, perhaps the writers of the textbooks are afraid that if children
get too emotional about things they will fall prey to people who manipulate
others through emotion. Far better, they may think, to have children viewing the
world through stony pragmatism, hard-boiled analysis, emotionless scientific
enquiry, than that they should be overcome by, horror of horrors - their
feelings!
But there is more to this than what I have said so far. I would like to digress
for a moment, and look at the way objects around us were viewed in the past and
right up to 'modern' times. Let us join Coleridge as he stands with those two
tourists again. One tourist describes the waterfall as "sublime"
(awesome), and the other as "pretty".
In Coleridge's day it was believed that certain descriptions of things matched
what they described, such as a "majestic sunrise", an "awesome
mountain", a "mighty river". In Coleridge's day it would have
been quite wrong to call a huge river "sweet", or a mighty waterfall
"pretty". The night skies were "glorious", and the world of
Nature was described in appropriate terms, and everyone agreed on these terms as
being best suited to what they described.
Other things were also described with appropriate words. For example, when
Shelly described a lyre, he said that it could "accommodate its chords to
the motions of that which strikes them". When looked at objectively, an
instrument is but a material object which is either struck, stroked or blown, to
make a noise, and music is but sound waves, but most people know that when an
instrument is played well it can be used to express human feelings. The lyre
could be played well, or badly. People could describe how well or how badly the
lyre was played.
If we accept the words of the textbook writers, then we must describe all music,
good and bad, as sound waves. We must not make a value judgement. (It is
precisely because some people have taken this point of view that we now have
'modern' music, which is a random collection of sounds, without form or
structure. The textbook writers are correct - if music is just noises, then all
noises can be classed as music).
But we are sure that all noises are not music, because we believe the Christian
worldview to be the correct one. And this is not an isolated claim. It has much
support from many great thinkers in the past. St. Augustine, for example, taught
that every object should be accorded that kind and degree of love which is
appropriate to it. In other words, a person should love their children more than
they love their budgie, and a good meal should be esteemed as far better than a
bowl of sand.
Further back we find that Aristotle thought the aim of education was to teach
pupils the difference between likeable and unlikable things, so they would be
able to respond correctly to the outside world. Once they were trained in these
things, they could move into Ethics and make correct moral judgements.
Before Aristotle, Plato was teaching much the same thing. Humans, he said, must
be taught what to feel love for, what to feel hate for, what to feel disgust at
and awe over. Human emotions, he said, must be attached to the appropriate
things. In other words, Plato thought there were such things as beautiful
objects, and that human feelings were totally in harmony with the outside world
when a person said, "That is beautiful". In the same way, a human
could also say "That is ugly" as a statement of objective truth. It
was not an opinion, or merely an emotional reaction. That 'thing' really was
ugly.
Some of the early Hindu writing follows much the same path. They taught that
behind the universe is a supernatural power which comes through everything we
see. From this power we see pattern, and design, and the wonderful rituals of
Nature. The Hindu word for this was 'Ria'. From 'Ria', they said, 'comes
righteousness, goodness, correctness and order, and even the Hindu gods were
supposed to obey it. Plato said that Good was "beyond existence",
meaning that he thought the quality of Good was an eternal one, which existed
behind everything he saw around him. Wordsworth also agreed with this idea. He
suggested that the stars were "strong" because they came from
"virtue" - in other words, he thought the beauty of the stars was
caused by a supernatural power.
The Chinese also have a word for the supernatural power behind all things - the
'Tao'. This power, they believe, is the great invisible reality, which hides
behind everything we can see. They call it the Way, and the Road. It is the
origin of all matter, all space, all time.
From here on, to save confusion, I will refer to this great cosmic Cause of all
things simply as the Tao. The main point I am making by mentioning this power
called the Tao is that all these different cultures had the same idea, though
they gave it different names. They all believed that something could be good,
bad, beautiful or ugly without humans being needed to define it. Some things
really ARE beautiful or ugly, good or bad.
Now the important step to take from here is to see that when we use our
reasoning to decide whether something is beautiful or ugly, we are not making a
personal judgement, which may or may not be correct. We are making a correct
judgement. Our reasoning power agrees with what is actually there. For example,
some children really are delightful, some sunrises really are glorious, some old
dogs really mean. We don't need to add "But of course, its all
relative" because it isn't relative at all.
All this agrees with the Christian worldview. Christians have been saying, for
the last 2000 years, that God is Good, that sin is bad, that Creation is fallen,
and that the universe contains a variety of things which can correctly be
described as good, bad, beautiful or ugly. Instinctively the great thinkers of
the past have come to the same conclusion, only they have used many different
words for 'God the Creator', such as 'Ria' and 'Tao '.
But what happens if someone tells me the sunrise is beautiful, while I think it
is ugly? The answer is simple: the sunrise is still beautiful, regardless of how
I feel about it. My problem is that I am colour blind, or perhaps in a bad mood.
I may take the time to look at the sunrise and consider its qualities for a few
minutes. This would soon lead me to accept that, despite my feelings, the
sunrise is beautiful, because by reasoning I can agree with what is true, even
though my feelings may be going the other way.
In the same way, I can say, by reasoning, that something is bad, or ugly, or
mean, or delightful, and these judgements would be correct despite how I felt.
Jumping back to Coleridge again, we can say that a waterfall is sublime, even
though we may not particularly like waterfalls.
But the textbooks, with which we started this essay, suggest that there is no
objective truth 'out there'. The universe, say the textbooks, has only the
qualities which we impose on it. There is no supernatural origin, no 'Ria', no
'Tao', no Creator God, behind the universe. When we look at the universe
we must not feel awe, or love, or admiration, because the universe is empty of
these things. It is just a random conglomeration of matter. All life in fact has
no value, so we humans must not feel that it has, or if we do, we are only
expressing personal opinions.
So the textbooks have built a massive wall between our feelings and our
reasoning. On the one hand we may use our reasoning to decide that something is
beautiful or ugly, but we must not allow our feelings to share in this
conclusion. Why? Because our feelings and our reasoning cannot work together. By
reasoning we can only say that something is there. We may not use words like
'beautiful' or 'ugly', and our feelings must be excluded because they are not
reliable enough to trust. What we feel is beautiful, someone else may feel is
ugly. The textbooks have divided Man into two, and left him stranded with
nothing on which to base his response to the world around him.
The Christian worldview is the remedy for this. Christians believe that God
created the universe, their power to reason, and also their feelings. Starting
with the Creator God, Christians can now make correct valuations with their
reason, and their feelings may follow in agreement.
Let us take a common situation from the times of Rome. A father tells his son
"It is a sweet and good thing to die for your country". The father
believes what he says. He reasons that sacrifice for one's country is a good
thing. His feelings agree. In this way the father is passing a value judgement
to his son.
The writers of the textbooks would have a different approach. They would say
that death is not sweet, or good. They would say that dying for one's country
was really another way of giving someone else the chance to survive. The bare
facts of the case would have nothing sweet or good about them. Dying is simply
dying, and goodness is a value judgement relative only to the person making it.
From the textbook writer's point of view, death may be bitter and bad to someone
else.
But from the Christian point of view, self-sacrifice is a value built into the
universe, and so is goodness. To die for one's country is a virtue, which is
echoed in other ways of giving, such as paying the correct tax, keeping the
street tidy, working hard all day in proper employment, doing volunteer time for
others, giving to charities and so on. Jesus Himself died for the whole world -
the supreme example of Goodness in action. So from the Roman's point of view it
was indeed a "sweet" and "good" thing to die for Rome,
because the Roman already believed in an external value which was already built
into the universe. His own personal value judgement was based not just on his
feelings about patriotism, and self-sacrifice, but on something greater than
these things, which he believed gave meaning to his understanding of the meaning
of "sweet" and "good".
I would like to say at this point that the writers of the textbook actually
thought the Roman father was right to tell his son that it was a good thing to
die for his country, but they did this in spite of their earlier comments. They
probably had some vague notion that dieing for one's country could be justified
on biological grounds, or suchlike.
Plato and others thought that Man must organize himself in a way similar to a
good government: the king at the top rules with Reason, while the body, or
Emotion (Feelings) represents the people under him. Between the king and the
body must be a Senate, with its seat in the Chest. The Chest is the part of Man
which must bring the Emotions and the Reason together. The King must rule the
body through the Chest, otherwise he cannot rule well or properly. Hence the
title of this chapter - Men Without Chests - I am suggesting that there must not
be a wall between Reason and Emotion. People who have abandoned belief in a
Creator God (or 'Ria' or Tao' or whatever they like to call the supernatural
power and origin of all things), these people have lost their ability to make
correct value judgements. These people cannot be sure if they are right or wrong
about the world around them through their Reason, or through their Feelings.
They have nothing solid or absolute on which to base their value judgements.
In closing I would like to make one more point. It is often said that people who
deny the existence of a Creator God are of a superior intellect to those who do
not. This is a gross insult to believers, and a shameful waste of praise on
unbelievers. Those who say there is no Creator God (no 'Tao' or 'Ria') cannot
avoid using value-loaded words themselves, thus condemning themselves as
hypocrites. If there is no external value, then words such as 'noble, wonderful,
creative, dynamic and so on should never pass from their lips. If these
so-called Intellectuals really believe all values are merely personal responses,
then they ought to be consistent with their own statements.
For example, if there is no such thing as love, except in the emotions of the
person feeling it, then we should never say "I love you". The same
must be said about "hate" too, and "injustice", and
"malice, envy, spite, and so on. In a universe empty of values, all values
are the same as each other, and meaningless. If all we do is project values from
ourselves, then we are at fault, and our existence is reduced to nearly zero.
But think of the repercussions of this sort of thinking. Imagine the schoolboy
who accepts the ideas in his textbook. He is urged to "work hard" to
"be virtuous" to "tackle an enterprise" and to "aim
high", yet none of these values have any meaning outside of himself.
"Success" and "failure" are just two values which he alone
can decide on, and so are "working hard" and "being lazy".
If the writers of the textbook were surgeons, they would have removed the heart
but still expected the blood to pump, or removed the lungs and still expected
the body to breath. If they were breeders of livestock they would have castrated
the stallion but still expected it to be fertile.
Chapter
two THE WAY.
In this chapter I would like to look at a problem which all humans have - that
of 'labouring under a preconception'. Another way of saying this is 'inbuilt
bias'.
For example, the person who believes in Evolution (monkeys to Man) has already
decided many things, so he has a bias towards one particular line of thinking.
On the other hand, the Christian who believes in Creation has another bias. Then
there is the person who claims to have no beliefs. This belief in no beliefs is
also a bias, because the non-believer would have to argue with the believer that
they were right and the other wrong.
Then again there are people who want a world free of religion, such as John
Lennon. "Imagine there's no heaven, above us only sky . . ." His bias
was clear. The writers of the textbook also have a very clear bias, and while
they are busy trying to remove one set of beliefs they are busy trying to
replace them with another - their own. Now the question is, which of the two
systems is correct? And who is to say that one is wrong and the other right? On
what do we base our judgement? The irony of all this is that, having removed a
basis for making a correct judgement, the writers of the textbook expect us to
accept their own values! How can we do that when the grounds for making a
correct judgement have been taken away?
But the matter is even worse than this.
Logically, if everyone accepted the point of view of the textbook writers, the
whole of society would fall to pieces. If all traditional values were thrown
out, nobody would work hard, or be faithful in marriage, or care about their
neighbour, or show kindness, or be upset over injustice, or uphold the law.
Every value we traditionally hold dear would have to be ignored, and in its
place would be a nation of autonomous individuals, all doing what they wanted to
do regardless of the consequences to other people. Even thoughts of revenge
would have to be banished, because after all, what would the revenge be against
- injustice? There would be no such thing. Value judgements no longer could
exist because they imply some universal set of morals, and that would not be
allowed to intrude into this new system.
Let us examine the earlier thought of a man dying for his country. What virtues
does this display? A short list would include:
·
Love of family · Love of country · Self-sacrifice for a greater good ·
Courage · Expectation of reward in an afterlife for martyrdom
In the case of Jesus, he himself said:
"Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his
friends" John 15:13
And
God commanded that:
"You shall love your neighbour as yourself" Mark 12:31
The writers of the textbook would like us to think that love cannot be graded
into greater and lesser, that patriotism and self-sacrifice are not expressions
of love, and that loving a neighbour is an arbitrary decision not based on love
at all. They might suggest that dieing for one's country is a useful thing
to do, but that implies the virtue of goodness, because we need to know WHY it
is useful. They might say that if some people die for their country, other
people will live, but that raises the question "But why should I die, and
not someone else?" Again, we head towards a virtue. We mustn't say that
dieing for our country is a "good" thing to do, or a "brave and
courageous" thing to do, because we are not allowed to have such feelings.
The Evolutionist, who has banished God from the universe, would have similar
problems in justifying patriotism. After all, if all men are but animals, there
is no point in defending a country. Migration might be a better remedy, or
perhaps simply wiping out the aggressors. Animals have no morals, death is
merely death, self-preservation is the most important rule for animals.
Furthermore, we must ask how can anyone define "good" in an empty
universe? The only way we can get any value out of the word is by drawing on our
own personal judgement, but that means every person in the world could have a
slightly different value for the word "good". There is no universally
agreed standard on which to base our values, in an empty universe. Everything is
relative.
The Christian worldview brings into this problem a most wonderful solution. The
Creator God who made the universe, and who made Man, has also built into Man the
basic rules by which Man can discern morals. This inherent ability to know
values is called the Law. As Paul says: "(People) show the work of the law
written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their
thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing (them)" Romans 2:15
But returning to the writers of the textbook, let us, out of interest, see if
their reasoning is correct. Let us suppose, for sake of argument, that they are
right when they say it is logical for a few people to die for their country so
that other people may live. The reason may be for preservation of the
population, or it may be because the community from which the martyr comes is
seen by him to be worth protecting. Now we have a problem, because on what basis
does the martyr decide that the country or the community deserves to be
protected? It cannot be on the basis that the "country is good" or
that the "community is good", because there is no standard by which we
can say that any country or community is "good". By cutting off one
end of the subject, we lose the other end. We cannot say "therefore"
in the middle because the first part has been destroyed.
Perhaps there is another word we can use: Instinct. In its limited sense, this
means the inbuilt desire of animals to do things without knowing why. Birds
migrate, cats lick themselves, dogs growl at intruders, ducks head for the water
as soon as they can float on it, budgies preen themselves, salmon return to the
same stream they were hatched in, and so on. Instinct is another word for a
mysterious, unknown behaviour, which nobody understands.
But the wider meaning of the word is more important to us here. When we say
"instinct" we might mean that the desire to die for one's country is
"instinctive", that is, built into us. We also have an
"instinct" of self-preservation. We instinctively want to do many
other things too. We have an instinct for relief of hunger and thirst, relief of
pain, a desire for sex, a need for security, a need for love, approval and so
on. These are all good instincts, but if we followed the path of the textbook
writers we would see nothing wrong in satisfying all these "instincts"
whenever we could. (Some exceptions might occur when one instinct clashes with
another, such as an instinct for food might go counter to an instinct to not be
killed while taking it from someone else).
But the problem with basing everything on instincts is that we cannot be sure if
instincts are a good basis on which to base our lives. How can we judge this?
How can one person say that instincts are a reliable basis? Some other person
might say they are not. And just because a majority may say they are, does not
mean they are right. And just because we may have an impulse to do something,
why do so many people refuse to obey it - by another instinct? One instinct
guiding another, and then a third level of instincts to guide the first two. At
this rate we will never find the original instinct on which all the others are
built.
But looking at the man and his son again, is it really an instinct built into
people to die for each other or for their country? I doubt it. I think most
people will do anything to avoid dying, even if it means someone else having to
die instead. Most people do not want to die, for any reason. This is obvious by
the millions of dollars they spend collectively on life-preserving drugs and
operations. I am not belittling the tremendous courage shown by men and women
who join the Services, but I am questioning the assumption that people have an
instinct to die for other people. If that is an instinct, like all other
instincts, then why do most people show such tremendous restraint when it comes
to their other instincts? Do we have some instincts for self-destruction working
against other instincts for self-preservation? Do we have instincts for
fidelity, chastity and self-control at war with instincts for polygamy, hedonism
and bestiality? Which instincts are the strongest and which the weakest? Where
did this warfare come from? The questions raise too many unanswerable questions,
and we are left with yet another value judgement: "I think this instinct is
better than that one".
The solution to this dilemma is found in the Bible. This is how it is explained,
in simple terms: God created humans with attributes similar to His own, only on
a vastly limited scale. One of these attributes was the ability to choose one
course of action against another. When the first humans chose an action which
God had forbidden they sinned, or disobeyed God, and thus they brought in a
system of rebellion, which became inherent in them and was passed on to their
offspring. While God's image remains in all humans, though marred, the rebellion
also lingers within this image. This is where the war between what we know we
ought to do, and what we actually do, comes from. Our conscience responds to the
Law of God, but our rebellious nature rejects that Law.
What the writers of the textbook and others try to do is banish God and the Law,
and then replace both with something else. To do this they use many interesting
words, and delve into philosophy, and use intricate intellectual arguments, but
in the end they cannot deny their inner instinct to respond to the Law and their
conscience. This is why they are always so inconsistent. If they were truly
consistent, they would live and speak by what they say they believe. But they
never do.
The people who try to ban any external value system have no viable alternative
to replace it with, and no basis on which to ground it. Their arguments are as
pointless as the following humorous quotes:
·
"I hate violence and I will punch anyone who disagrees with me!" ·
"Love is an illusion except for the love I have for my wife". ·
"I cannot stand people who cannot stand things" · "From now on
there are no rules - that's the rule"
You cannot abolish something if you have no grounds from which to abolish it.
You cannot throw your sword away and then expect to fight better without it. The
approach some people have is just like this. They try to get rid of the
Christian worldview, but then they need to keep some of it in order to destroy
what they are attacking. Another illustration would be a child who leaves the
house and slams the door shut in an attempt to drive his parents from the house.
Those who attack the Christian worldview slam the door on God, the Law and their
conscience, and then try to say that God has gone - but it is they who have
gone.
Taking this point a little further, let us imagine a flat where six 'radical'
teenagers live. They all like heavy rock music, and they all leave their
personal hygiene way down the list of priorities. They are in full agreement
over matters of employment (they don't need it), and clothing (dirt is OK), and
relationships (do whatever you like), but there is a problem over the rent.
Three of the teenagers think it is wrong that they should have to pay all the
rent, while the other three say it doesn't matter. To whom can any of the
teenagers appeal? If the rent-payers appeal to something called 'justice' or
'fairness', they cannot prove they are right, and neither can the
non-rent-payers prove they are right. None of the young people has any grounds
on which to base their point of view, other than a 'sense of right and wrong'.
But it is inconsistent for any of these young people to make an appeal in one
area (honesty with money) while at the same time ignoring all the other areas
(responsibility to others, fidelity, faithfulness, etc) One cannot stand firm on
fragments of the universal rules given to us by God, while at the same time
refusing to acknowledge them in other areas of life.
Take another example, a grandmother tells a child that it is "bad to
steal." The child asks "Why?" and the grandmother might say: ·
"Because it is, that's all." · "My parents taught me, so now I'm
teaching you." · "Society breaks down if people steal." ·
"It's the best rule." · "People won't trust you if you
steal." · "Honesty is the best policy."
Do you see how, in every one of these examples the most important reason for not
stealing has been avoided? In every case given above, the child is presented
with relativism - that is, he can conclude that to steal or not to steal is
really an arbitrary decision. It comes, he concludes, from the culture, or the
society. It is a rule made up by people, for purely rational reasons. It has no
basis in any absolute standard. In 100 years time people may have decided that
stealing is good.
What the grandmother should have said is: "Because God's Word, which is the
absolute, unchanging standard for all eternity, commands people not to steal.
Stealing is sin, and the wages of sin is death."
In the case of the Roman who advised his son that it was a good thing to die for
his country, if there is no absolute standard on which to base this statement,
then it becomes a nonsense to say such a thing to one's offspring. In 1000 years
time it might not be a good thing to die for one's country - society might
change its mind. It might be considered a bad thing to care for one's wife and
children. It might be considered foolish to protect one's community. If people
alone are the arbiters of such things, then any rule may be ignored or
challenged, and no-one can say who is right or wrong.
Another problem may also arise - that of picking and choosing which rule to keep
as most important and which to keep as less important. For example, who deserves
the most commitment: the country, the community, the family, or self? And if
someone tells us that one or other of these things is the most important, on
what can they base this? Once we have left God's absolutes behind, we have
nothing on which to base our values, other than the shifting sands of
rationality and feelings.
But when we turn to the Law of God we find that it is the source of the 'Tao',
or the 'Ria' or what some people called 'Traditional Morality' or 'Natural Law',
or 'First Principles of Natural Reason, or 'First Platitudes' . Without
realizing it, the whole human race has chosen to practice the principles of
God's Law, but they have given it different names. It is this Law which has come
through every society for the last 6000 years, and been practiced in many
different forms and in many diverse cultures, but the principles have always
been the same.
At times a sharp-worded barb is flung at Christianity, which goes like this:
"You Christians think you have a monopoly on morals! No way. People don't
have to be Christian in order to be good, kind, helpful, unselfish, generous,
forgiving, honest, diligent and so on."
To which the answer is "Christian ethics are not different from 'ordinary '
ethics. All good behaviour, all good morals, all fine ethics are universal.
Jesus did not start a new morality, nor did the Church invent Christian ethics.
Good morals have been with Mankind since Man was created. And since then nobody
has been able to invent any new morals, or make the ones we have any better.
But there are people who try to turn their backs on the whole universal moral
law and live without it (like the flat-mates who threw out only some of the
Law), and make up a new system of ethics, just for themselves. This, as we have
already seen, is impossible, and we shall look at the problems they have with it
in the next chapter.
Chapter
three THE ABOLITION OF MAN
"It came burning hot into my mind, whatever he said and however he
flattered, when he got me home to his house, he would sell me for a slave"
- John Bunyan.
In this chapter I would like to look at the subject of 'Man's Progress'. Before
I go any further I would like to say that, in my opinion, much of what Man is
doing and has done in the way of 'progress' has been very good. Advances in
technology, medicine, agriculture and so on have given Man many advantages and
blessings. Man is gaining more and more power over the natural world. He has
harnessed its wind, water, sunlight and soil. He has built airplanes, ships,
submarines and rockets. He is steadily winning the war against disease, hunger
and drought. All this is good.
But there is a down side to Man's 'progress' which I think ought to be examined
carefully. I'll pick three examples out of many and explain what I mean through
them. 1. The airplane 2. The radio 3. The contraceptive
1.
The airplane. Do you own an airplane? Most people in the world do not, and only
a small percentage of all the people in the world actually fly in one. It
usually costs money to fly, so mainly the people who own airplanes actually
benefit from them. Now if you or I pay to fly, are we exercising power over
Nature - no. We are admitting that we are too weak to fly, and paying someone
else to fly us. The same can be said of ships, submarines, and rockets. In every
case, the big, expensive means of transport are inaccessible to most people
unless they pay large sums of money.
The next question we need to ask is "Who controls the airplane?"
Someone else. Someone who is probably very wealthy. We may think we are
exercising power over Nature when we pay to fly, but that power can be stopped
if the owner of the airplane decides to deny us a ticket. And is Nature really
being overpowered by an airplane? Hardly. All Man is able to do is harness some
of Nature's power to make his airplane fly.
And let us not forget some of the more horrible uses of airplanes. Bombs,
poisons, flames, bullets, propaganda. Through airplanes many people have been
destroyed or injured. Is this Man's power over Nature? It seems that, in these
cases, Nature has exercised even more power over Man. It is therefore a
tentative thing to claim that just because some men have airplanes, nature is
being conquered. It is all much like an illusion.
2.
The Radio. Millions of people own radios. With these wonderful machines they can
receive all sorts of services, but how many people own their own transmitters?
Not many. Most people with radios receive only what other people have produced.
In this way, while Nature's powers are being harnessed, only the very few who
produce programs, and only the manufacturers of the radios are the ones who
benefit. And let us not forget that radios can be used to transmit propaganda,
and programs with a bad influence on the listeners. So once again we see that
Man's supposed power over Nature is really a few men's power over a large number
of other people. And if someone claims that by listening to the radio they are
exercising power over Nature, they would be wrong. All the transmitting people
need to do is stop transmitting and the claimant has no power at all. All the
power company needs to do is switch off the power and the householder is
helpless. All the manufacturers of radios need to do is stop putting them
together. All the suppliers need to do is stop providing the raw materials.
The only way ordinary householders could gain control over Nature would be by
all of them producing and transmitting their own programs, but again, they would
need a large amount of money to build the transmitters, and they would also need
to pay for permission, and they would still need power, so Nature has not been
conquered at all. With regard to the radio, all that has happened is a few
people have gained control over a large number of people and used Nature as
their means, or tool.
3.
The Contraceptive. People who use contraceptives prevent babies from being
conceived. At first sight this might seem like a good example of control over
Nature. If a couple can stop a child from being born, they have exercised
awesome power, but what if the child they prevented was 'destined' to be a great
musician, or teacher, or scientist, or some such thing, and the parent of many
children? This would mean that contraception was a power wielded by one or two
people over large numbers of others not yet born. Today's users of contraception
are wielding huge control over generations never to be born. (Abortion is
similar in its effect - except in this case humans who are already in existence
are destroyed before they have any say on the matter. In a sense, the unborn are
treated like criminals, tried and condemned without a defense attorney, and
killed without a thought for their right to live). Once again, we have a
situation where a small number of people control a larger number, with Nature as
the medium.
For those who breed plants or animals, the situation is much the same. A breeder
can change the future of an industry, or alter the diet of millions yet to be
born, or modify the environment of whole countries. With Genetic Modification
and Genetic Engineering, Cloning and so on Man has the potential to devastate
the whole planet - and all through the power of a handful of people exercising
power over many others. But once again, we have the power of a few over a
helpless many - is this conquering Nature?
But there is another side to all this, which involves the 'conquerors -suppose,
after many hundreds of years, the human race began to die out. Because of
toxins, genetic work, environmental problems and so on, all caused by the
powerful few, the number of humans left to carry on dwindled down to a few
thousands. These few survivors might consider themselves to be the greatest
controllers of Nature, the supreme conquerors, but they would really be the most
enslaved. Their lives would be the result of all the controllers who had come
before them. Instead of greater freedom and power, they would have the most
obvious enslavement and imprisonment. Earlier generations would be their
masters. They, not Nature, would be the conquered.
Even today the work of controllers is easy to see. In Education the children are
being conditioned by a small number of specialists, in Politics the propaganda
is more brazen and oblique, in Psychology and other branches of that discipline
the thinking is often shaped by Evolution, as also in Philosophy and even
Theology. Advertising tries to mould people into 'customer-think'. Religions and
cults work on their members with half-truths and fictions. Everywhere we look we
see minorities trying to alter majorities. These shapers and molders are
affecting generations to come, making these future people more like victims than
conquerors.
And what happens when Man finally conquers Man? Today the work is going full
steam by a handful of highly-trained specialists to alter Man and make Man what
some people think Man ought to be: perhaps more intelligent, or better-looking,
athletic, slim, brown-skinned, fair-skinned, with or without large muscles,
having special abilities, free of genetic defects, longer-lived, slower ageing,
large or small, and so on. 'Designer babies' have been planned already, or
alterations, made in the womb, or specially designed environments for growing
babies. And then, when the next generations of 'modified' people discover how
altered they are, who is the conquered, and who the conqueror? And what if
the Greeks had done all the modifications over 2000 years ago? How would today's
generation feel if we were all mutants?
There are moves in this country to add fluoride to the city water supply - is
this mass medication, or Man exercising power over Nature? Should a government
be able to force its citizens to take certain chemicals, or medications 'for its
own good'? Should a parent have the power to modify his or her child according
to the shape and quality they think is best for the child - think of the Nazi
Youth Movement, or the Communist's enthusiasm in conditioning its members, or
the common religious habit of training children on spiritual doctrine. Should
Educators be allowed to shape and mould children's minds with 'conditioning'
beliefs - as a teacher may do, if he or she thinks a certain philosophy, or
political party, or moral stance is more desirable than others? Power over
Nature comes with a very high cost. It can affect our freedom, our integrity,
and the majority's right to free choice.
A second point must be made. Up until modern times, most moral teaching, or
ethic teaching, was based on the idea that morals are universal. The older
people taught the younger people the same morals which they themselves had been
taught. Children grew up with the principles of God's Law, and they passed these
same principles on to their children.
But what is happening today is a dramatic shift away from this pattern of the
old teaching the young. Today the 'new morality' is being brought in as a
'relative' idea. Children are being told that there is no solid basis for the
morals that govern their lives. Right may equally be wrong, and wrong right.
Ethics are a said to be the result of social customs, or something else thought
up by Man - not the result of a Creator God writing His Law on our hearts.
A lot of the blame for this 'new morality' can be laid at the feet of Darwinian
evolution. This destructive teaching has as one of its core beliefs the idea
that Man is related directly to animals, and not related in any way to God. In
fact, for the evolutionist, there can be no God. The universe for the
evolutionist is an empty expanse, dotted with random stars, whose existence is
the result of an accidental explosion. Man the animal has therefore made up all
his own morals, and can alter or abandon them if he wants to. Man is not
accountable to God. Sin is a natural, not a spiritual response to cultural
rules. There is no absolute Law on which all of Man's laws can be based. Death
is final. Life is a brief moment of consciousness. Science is a study of matter
and forces.
From this standpoint, it is logical for Man to want to control and 'conquer'
Nature and Man too. But where do those who want to control Nature and Man get
their set of rules from? And if they decide that Nature should be controlled
this or that way, and Man should be controlled this or that way; who can say if
their choice of control is correct? Are they right? Are they wrong? They
certainly don't know for sure. They've thrown God's Law out - now they have to
make up their own Law, but who can say if they have made up a better Law than
the one they have rejected?
The Bible says that there are people who suppress the truth. "For the wrath
of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of
men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness" Romans 1:18 This word
"hold" means 'to hold down, or suppress'. One commentator says it is
like someone pushing an eager dog away, as the dog jumps up to lick the face.
People are confronted with God's Law but they push it away deliberately. They
suppress it, and stop it from exercising their consciences.
And how can any Christian "Prove all things; (or) hold fast that which is
good." (1 Thessalonians 5:21) if it is now impossible to "prove"
anything? If "that which is good" is merely some relative value based
on society's personal values, then it is impossible to really know what is
"good".
These people who want to 'conquer' Nature and Man are like a crowd of people who
have separated themselves from the rest of the human race. They then set about
trying to shape and mould the human race according to their own ideas. But
these people are outcasts, refugees, and homeless wanderers. Should they be
permitted to turn on the rest of the world and try to alter it? They have
nothing better to offer the world. The Traditional Morality has served Mankind
very well for thousands of years, and it is by far the best system of values
ever discovered, so why should we, the human race try to switch to another
system of morals - a system which has no solid base, and has never been shown to
be better? It is like someone leaving his or her clean, efficient, dependable
car on the side of the road and hopping into a stranger's car to finish the
journey. It is like a conductor abandoning a symphony by Beethoven halfway
through and trying to finish with some unheard, untried sheet-music posted to
him from someone he has never heard of.
And of course it is just like Satan to inspire a thing like this. In the Garden
of Eden he asked "Has God said . . .?" and now within the New Morality
he is still whispering the same question.
A question we need to ask the people who want to start a New Morality is this:
"When you have abolished God's basis for being kind, on what basis can we
expect you to be kind?" "And on what basis will you love, or care, or
be generous?" "What will you call virtues, now that you have decided
to invent new ones?" We wonder these things, because in some cases we
already know what the New Morality will do. For example we know what the people
who promote euthanasia, and doctor-assisted suicide think. They consider the
'rights' of the sick person so much more important than those of family,
doctors, friends and the community. They think it is more 'compassionate' to let
someone take their life, than it is to allow them a pain-free span of time as
they die, for the sake of those who love them to spend those last few days or
weeks with them by the bedside. And further down the line we see doctors being
the right to 'kill' dying people as they see fit.
Even further down the line we may see some more 'compassionate' killings - the
lame, the handicapped, the mentally retarded perhaps? If, as evolutionists say,
humans are but animals, they killing a human is not much more different than
killing a worm or snail. Voluntary euthanasia may be replaced by compulsory
euthanasia. The State may decide who lives and who dies, which babies born or
not born are kept, and which discarded, what the age limit for old people will
be, which children with certain low IQs should be kept, and so on. Man
controlling Man is a frightening idea, but there are people in the New Morality
who want to put it into practice, and they think it is a good idea.
"Good"? For whom?
By abolishing the universal Law of God, the would-be controllers of Man and
Nature have actually abolished themselves. If we follow the logic of their ideas
through, by abolishing the Law of God from Man, they also abolish the God who
gave it. That leaves them with Man the animal, and no morality except his own to
guide him. Man is therefore meaningless in a material desert, with no future,
and no past. A nothing, in an empty universe, without hope, or reason for hope.
One is reminded of the words: "In those days there was no king in Israel,
but every man did that which was right in his own eyes." Judges 17:6
It is human nature to want to reject God. Inherent in all humans is a desire for
autonomy, to 'do our own thing', to live like a gypsy, wild and free, always
heading out on the road, without having to obey anyone but yourself, free as a
bird. There are many movies, and books with this sort of theme, all feeding the
same general fantasy of a world where any desire may be indulged in without any
adverse consequences. ( i.e. Bond and his women). It starts at birth - even a
baby a few weeks old will test the rules. Children resist their parents'
authority for years, constantly wanting their own way, and teenagers often
'break out' as soon as they can, trying out bizarre clothes, fashions and styles
of living. Younger and older adults often become hardened rebels, drinking,
smoking, swearing, gambling, jumping in and out of relationships, avoiding
responsibilities, abandoning children and spouses, quitting jobs, continually
moving on. The New Morality appeals to most people because it offers them the
sort of irresponsible freedom they want. It gives them some "leaves"
to hide behind, just as Adam and Eve tried to hide from God.
If Man can 'conquer' Nature, then Man is in control, and not God - is this not
so? The more Man can take control of his planet and himself, the less room there
is for thoughts of God. This also appeals to most people. The thought of having
to one day face a God and give an account is irksome and repellant to sinners.
Nature and the New Morality. We have to be careful when we use
this word Nature. It has several different shades of meaning. In a general way,
when we say "Nature" we mean the things around us - the mountains and
skies, the land, trees, plants and animals, the sun and planets, and the starry
heavens. All the things in our environment which can be weighed, measured and
timed.
Thanks to the labours of many scientists over the years a huge amount has been
discovered about Nature. Forces and laws and processes have been discovered.
Chemical bonds have been worked out, and molecules, atoms, and sub-atomic
particles have been identified, and named. What Science has done is reduce what
people traditionally called "beautiful" to a page of formulae. The
further Science takes us, the less we can justify our feelings of awe, and our
wonder at the beauties and glories of Nature. Thanks to Science we can look at
some beautiful aspect of Nature and say "Oh that, it is just refraction, or
waves, or chemical reactions . . ." Science has reduced everything to
statements of fact. It's a bit like someone pulling a brand new Ferrari to
pieces and laying all the nuts and bolts on the floor of the garage. "See?
It isn't really a top-design car, its oil and metal and rubber!"
Those who support the New Morality are enthusiastic about Science when it goes
in this direction. They say: "See, we told you there was no spiritual
dimension. Its all just molecules and atoms! There's no God in there, or out
there, and no Law of God - just plain old Matter!" The whole universe is
now known to be much the same in every direction - atoms and more atoms,
physical laws and forces, mathematical, so Science seems to have reduced all
things to formulae and equations.
But there's a catch. Man may use Science to reduce everything to atoms and
molecules, but isn't Man also made of the very same atoms and molecules? In
scientific terms there is no difference between Man and the universe. So how can
Man claim to have 'conquered' Nature, when he himself is also Nature? Man has
'conquered' nothing. Man has reduced himself to the same equations and formulae
he uses to reduce Nature. Nature, through Science, has now conquered Man.
Now let us follow this line of thought to its logical conclusion. Science has
declared Man to be nothing more than Matter (atoms and molecules), therefore: ·
Mankind is nothing but Matter arranged into human shape, · Mankind is as
insignificant as Matter, · Mankind may do to Matter whatever he likes, ·
Mankind may also do to Mankind whatever he likes, · It is neither moral nor
immoral to manipulate Matter, · It is totally permissible to manipulate humans
in any way those in control may think fit.
And so we have the New Morality, with its agenda to change things to suit the
plans that hide in the heads of the controllers. These people (a comparatively
small number of rich and powerful people) have detached themselves from God and
from God's law, and now, like willful children, they want to turn on their
parents and do experiments on them. And there is no limit to what they would
like to do. They want to change the genetic makeup of life, get rid of all
humans they deem useless, alter the Earth's climate, breed people and animals
and plants in strange ways, and so on.
At this point someone may suggest that it is only in Communist countries where
this sort of thing goes on. Those regimes have rejected God, and given all power
and authority to the State, and the State has, in many cases, treated its
citizens in callous and brutal ways. The State, of course, does not see these
acts as 'callous' or 'brutal' because it has adopted the new Morality. It sees
them as 'improvements'. The minority in power, at the point of a gun, does with
the people whatever it wants, treating them like soft clay, kneading, cutting
and dicing the population as raw material. Many people protest, because they
have God's Law in their hearts - they know such behaviour is a violation of
universal principles, they suffer because injustice is a real thing. East
Germans escape to West Germany to get away from the Communists, prisoners escape
from Germany to England and then fly back in bombers, oppressed minorities fight
for freedom, and so on. The desire to be free, with democratic rights is
inherent in the human heart, despite what those of the New Morality may say, and
no amount of brainwashing will ever extinguish it altogether.
But what about other countries? Yes, it is much the same in Democratic
countries, only not so obvious. Traditional values are constantly being
challenged or debunked - one has only to watch TV for a while to see it. Some
programs deliberately revolve around immoral subjects in order to be
provocative. One comedy many years ago had a character called Archie Bunker.
Archie and his wife represented wholesome values - right was right and wrong was
wrong, men were men and girls were girls. A huge number of viewers agreed with
this morality. But in the storyline there was a daughter and her boyfriend.
These two younger people represented the New Morality. From the younger
generation came talk of drugs and other immoral subjects, and they often wore
unusual fashions - the young man had long hair and beads. All these violations
brought a swift response from Archie, and the audience laughed every time. But
in an interview, the scriptwriter admitted that he was manipulating the audience
to laugh, not at Archie, but at his 'old fashioned' and 'outdated' morality.
Since the Bunkers the war against Traditional Morals has gone on with incredible
persistence. Today we hear profanity, and blasphemy, and we see explicit sex,
violence and immoral behaviour, regularly on the screen. We hear Bart Simpson
disrespectfully calling his father by his first name, and we have programs
devoted to promoting homosexuality. Satan's war against God's Law is unremitting
and ferocious.
The meaning of words is changing too. When I was young "wicked" meant "sinful" but today it means "exciting." "Family" used to mean "a man and woman married with a child or children" but now it means "any two adults of any sex living together with children from any number of marriages or partnerships". There was a time when "bad men" were "killed", but now we "liquidate unsocial elements". "The dead" are called a "body count" and the number of fallen is counted in "body bags". Some who is "thrifty" and self-controlled with their money is referred to as showing "sales-resistance", and to be "pragmatic" used to be a harsh criticism, but now it a highly praised virtue. "Love" has come to mean "physical love" or sex, "truth" is seen as whatever we may interpret something to be, "charity" is used