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Charles Bradlaugh Roberts Bradlaugh Night6 6brad Cx


Do you admit my definition of life as applied to man?–I don’t recollect what your definition was.

Do you mean seriously to tell me that you have forgotten my definition of life last night?–Yes, but if you will repeat it, I will tell you whether I agree with it.

Kindly tell me your ideas of life as applied to a man and as applied to an elephant.–I believe it is the same in both cases.

You have read Eccles. 3:18?–Yes.

Mr. B., (reading): "I have said in mine heart concerning the estate of the sons of men, that God might manifest them, and that they might see that they themselves are beasts. For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth the beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no pre-eminence over a beast; for all is vanity."–Yes, those words are there.

Do you think those words are God’s authentic revelation to man?–Yes.

Do you consider that a sheep which has been killed by your butcher, of which you have eaten part, will continue to live despite that eating?–No.

Do you consider that a man who has been dined on by the Patagonians will continue to live despite that dining?–No: not unless he is raised.

Have you sufficient memory to serve you as to the plagues of Egypt?–Perhaps.

Is it a fact that God afflicted the land with a plague of murrain, which killed the whole of the cattle in the land, excepting the cattle of the children of Israel? I refer you to the 9th chapter of Exodus and the 6th verse. Is it the fact that after the whole of the cattle of the land had been killed, God, in the 19th verse, sent a warning so that those that were left might be taken out of the field and not die?–I prefer you to read it as it is.

Does it say, in the 19th verse: "Send, therefore, now, and gather thy cattle, and all that thou hast in the field; for upon every man and beast which shall be found in the field, and shall not be brought home, the hail shall come down upon them and they shall die?–Yes.

Is it a fact that some of them regarded the word and fled?–Yes.

Do you consider it probable that they fled away after they had been killed. Don’t you consider that an improbability though the book states it? –The book does not state that.

Read it. Read all relating to the cattle fleeing out of the field, and see if it doesn’t.–There is no occasion to read anything besides what you have read.

Is it true that later than that, God destroyed the firstborn of man and beast throughout the whole of the land of Egypt?–Yes.

All the cattle having been previously dead?–All that did die.

The words are: "And all the cattle of Egypt died." Read from the 2nd to the 6th verse, and say if it don’t mean all the cattle?–It means all the cattle that were meant.

How much less than "all"? Is not all the money in my pocket all the money?–That is a trifling way of putting it.

Can anything be trifling that helps to clear up God’s Word?–In the abstract, of course not.

Then please clear up how all the cattle can mean less than all the cattle.–If I knew all the circumstances which the writer had before his mind, in their details, I could do so.

Oh, that is your answer, is it?–My answer is that the book, being otherwise proved reliable, my ignorance of the details does not preclude my believing it to be a divine revelation.

You said, last night, you had enough of evidence of the divinity of the book in the establishment of Christianity by miracle: is it not a fact that all people who pretended to perform miracles pretended to perform them by supernatural power?–No doubt.

Does the Bible say that the serpent was condemned to go on his belly as punishment?–Yes.

Do you think that, before his condemnation, he went on his head, his tail, or his back?–I don’t know.

And I am sure I don’t–(laughter). Do you hold that, at some time in the history of the world, there was an actual tree bearing fruit, the eating of which would give a man education?–I must know in what sense you use the word education.

If you ask me, it means knowledge: "The tree of knowledge of good and evil": was there such a tree?– Yes.

Do you think there are similar trees existing to-day?–No.

In your opinion, what has become of the genus?–It was not a genus.

Then what has become of the individual specimen?–I fancy it must have gone long ago.

So do I–(laughter). Will you kindly tell me how you make three days and three nights between late on Friday night and early on Sunday morning?–I don’t make it.

Is it true, as the gospels represent, that Joseph of Arimathea begged the body of Jesus on Friday evening? –No.

When was it?–Thursday.

Where shall I find that?– In Luke 24.

In the 24th of Luke I don’t see anything about Thursday. I know where it is written, "We trusted it had been he. Besides all this, to-day is the third day?"–"The third day SINCE"; consequently Saturday was the second day "since", and Friday the first day "since", and Thursday the day itself.

When it says that Joseph of Arimathea begged the body, according to the 23rd of Luke 50-54, it was in the evening, as "the Sabbath drew on"?–That was the Sabbath connected with the Passover. Two Sabbaths came together.

Will you kindly give two Sabbaths.–You will find it in Matt. 28: 1.

(Looks.) There is only one Sabbath mentioned in Matt. 28: 1.–The word is plural in the Greek. There is my Greek Testament (producing a book).

I have nothing to do with the Greek. We have agreed to take the authorised English version throughout. I asked, as my first question, if we were to be bound by the authorised English version, and it is simply a trick to refer to the Greek Testament when we have debated on the authorised version all through.– (Time called.)

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