The Necessity of Atheism

The Necessity of Atheism
By DR. D. M. BROOKS
FREETHOUGHT PRESS ASSOCIATION NEW YORK
1933 BY FREETHOUGHT PRESS ASSOCIATION
(From Free Books)

Freethought has dethroned the gods from the pedestal, and has replaced, not an empty idol, but an _ideal_, the ideal of a man who is his own god.

It was Spinoza who remarked that, "The proper study of a wise man is not how to die but how to live." Religious creeds can but teach how man should live, so that when he dies, he may be assured of salvation; and the important thing is not what he does to help his fellow men while he is living, but how closely he lives in conformity to a reactionary code of dogmas.

Atheism as a Neccesity

It was Spinoza who remarked that, "The proper study of a wise man is not how to die but how to live." Religious creeds can but teach how man should live, so that when he dies, he may be assured of salvation; and the important thing is not what he does to help his fellow men while he is living, but how closely he lives in conformity to a reactionary code of dogmas.

To Be Understood

Emerson: "to be great is to be misunderstood."

Truth Is Made

William James of Pragmatism: "Truth is not a stagnant property. Truth is made, just as hearth, wealth and strength are make, in the course of experience."

What Is College For?

What the college was, or should be -what Meiklejohn hoped to make Amherst into - was a place to be thought of as "liberal," that is, "essentially intellectual": "The college is primarily not a place of the body, nor of the feelings, nor even of the will; it is, first of all, a place of the mind." Introducing "the boys" to the intellectual life led for its own sake, would save them from pettiness and dullness.

There are those among us who will find so much satisfaction in the countless trivial and vulgar amusements of a crude people that they have no time for the joys of the mind. There are those who are so closely shut up within a little round of petty pleasures they that have never dreamed of the fun of reading and conversing and investigating and reflecting.

A liberal education would rescue boys from stupidity, its purpose being to draw from that "reality-loving American boy" something like "an intellectual enthusiasm." But this result could not be achieved, Meiklejohn added, without a thorough reversal of the curriculum: "I should like to see every freshman at once plunged into the problems of philosophy," he said with enthusiasm.

沉思录：第一部

拥有温和持稳的品性。
要有自尊与胆识
虔诚大方，既无丑恶的行为也无丑恶的想法
注重良好的教育，在教育上不惜钱财
朴素，勤奋
做自己应该做的工作
避免过分的热情，不要对观看运动比赛过于兴奋
不要炫耀自己的知识，不要哗众取宠，书信形式要简单
读书要用心，不要为一知半解而满足，不要轻易地与人闲聊
在任何情况之下，都能自始至终地保持镇定，没有一刻缺乏理念的时候，不管失去自己的孩子也好，长年疾病在身也好

人生的基本规则之一

人生的规则在自然的规则之下。遵守人生的规则首先要遵守自然的规则。自然的力量大于人的力量。不要在自然面前忘乎所以。人生要学会顺乎自然，懂得自然，适应自然，使自己成为自然的一部分，成为自然的朋友，而不是成为自然的敌人。我们的任务是如何利用自然，使用自然，不被自然现象所吓倒，在自然的变幻之中找到规律，使自己在千变万化之中，沉稳地应付已经发生的和将要发生的变化，成为自己的主人，成为自己精神上的主人，一个有意识有目的生活的人。

自然是无限的，人生是有限的。什么是自然的规律，或者说规则哪

把自然作为我们的助手。

跟自然相比，一切人为的东西都是相对的，也都是有限的，