nothing; all that His adorers have ascribed to Him being mere
amplification of human powers, human ideas, and human passions. The
Bible Deity 'has mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he
hardeneth;' is 'jealous,' especially of other Gods; changeful,
vindictive, partial, cruel, unjust, 'angry with the wicked every day;'
and altogether a Being far from respectable, or worthy to be considered
infinite in wisdom, power, and goodness. Is it credible that a Being
supernaturally wise and good, proclaimed the murderous adulterer David,
a man after his own heart, and commanded the wholesale butchery of
Canaanites? Or that a God of boundless power, 'whose tender mercies are
over all his works,' decreed the extermination of entire nations for
being what he made them? Jehovah did all three. Confessedly a God of
armies and Lord of Hosts; confessedly, too, a hardener of men's hearts
that he might destroy them: he authorised acts at which human nature
shudders, and of which it is ashamed: yet to love, respect, yea,
reverence Him, we are commanded by the self-styled 'stewards of his
mysteries,' on peril of our 'immortal souls.' Verily, these pious
anathematisers ask our credulity a little too much.' In their zeal for
the God of Israel, they are apt to forget that only Himself can compass
impossibilities, and altogether lose sight of the fact that where, who,
or what Jehovah is, no man knoweth. Revelation (so-called) reveals
nothing about the imagined creator of heaven and earth on which a
cultivated intellect can repose with satisfaction. Men naturally desire
positive information concerning the superhuman Deity, belief in whom is
the _sine qua non_ of all religion. But the Bible furnishes no such
information concerning Jehovah. On the contrary, he is their pronounced
'past finding out,' incomprehensible, and the like. 'Canst thou, by
searching, find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty to
perfection?' are questions put by an 'inspired writer,' who felt the
cloudy and unsatisfactory nature of all human conceit about Gods.