Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers

How ludicrous the priest's dogmatic roar!
The weight of his exterminating curse,
How light! and his affected charity,
To suit the pressure of the changing times,
What palpable deceit! – but for thy aid,
Religion! but for thee, prolific fiend,
Who peoplest earth with demons, hell with men,
And heaven with slaves!

Thou taintest all thou look'st upon! – The stare,
Which on thy cradle beamed so brightly sweet,
Were gods to the distempered playfulness
Of thy untutored infancy: the trees,
The grass, the clouds, the mountains, and the sea,

All living things that walk, swim, creep, or fly,
Were gods: the sun had homage, and the moon
Her worshipper.   Then thou becam'st a boy,
More daring in thy frenzies: every shape,
Monstrous or vast, or beautifully wild,
Which, from sensation's relics, fancy culls;
The spirits of the air, the shuddering ghost,
The genii of the elements, the powers
That give a shape to nature's varied works,
Had life and place in the corrupt belief
Of thy blind heart – yet still thy youthful hands
Were pure of human blood.   Then manhood gave
Its strength and ardor to thy frenzied brain;
Thine eager gaze scanned the stupendous scene,
Whose wonders mocked the knowledge of thy pride.

Their everlasting and unchanging laws
Reproached thine ignorance.
Awhile thou stood'st
Baffled and gloomy; then thou did'st sum up
The elements of all that thou did'st know.

The changing seasons, winter's leafless reign,
The budding of the heaven-breathing trees,
The eternal orbs that beautify the night,
The sunrise, and the setting of the moon,
Earthquakes and wars, and poisons and disease,
And all their causes, to an abstract point,
Converging, thou did'st bend, and called it God;
The self-sufficing, the omnipotent,
The merciful, and the avenging God!

Who, prototype of human misrule, sits
High in Heaven's realm, upon a golden throne,
Even like an earthly king: and whose dread work,
Hell gapes forever for the unhappy slaves
Of fate, whom he created in his sport,
To triumph in their torments when they fell!

Earth heard the name; earth trembled, as the smoke
Of his revenge ascended up to Heaven,
Blotting the constellations: and the cries
Of millions, butchered in sweet confidence,
And unsuspecting peace, even when the bonds
Of safety were confirmed by wordy oaths,

Sworn in his dreadful name, rung through the land;
Whilst innocent babes writhed on thy stubborn spear,
And thou did'st laugh to hear the mother's shriek
Of maniac gladness, as the sacred steel
Felt cold in her torn entrails!

Religion! thou wert then in manhood's prime;
But age crept on: one God would not suffice
For senile puerility; thou fram'dst
A tale to suit thy dotage, and to glut
Thy misery-thirsting soul, that the mad fiend
Thy wickedness had pictured might afford
A plea for sating the unnatural thirst
For murder, rapine, violence, and crime,
That still consumed thy being, even when
Thou heard'st the step of fate: – that flames might light
Thy funeral scene, and the shrill horrent shrieks
Of parents dying on the pile that burned
To light their children to thy paths, the roar
Of the encircling flames, the exulting cries
Of thine apostles, loud commingling there,
Might sate thy hungry ear
Even on the bed of death!

But now contempt is mocking thy gray hairs;
Thou art descending to the darksome grave,
Unhonored and unpitied, but by those
Whose pride is passing by like thine, and sheds
Like thine, a glare that fades before the sun
Of truth, and shines but in the dreadful night
That long has lowered above the ruined world."

Speaking of the Atheist's martyrdom in answer to the spirit of "Ianthe," Shelley makes his fairy say: —

"There is no God!
Nature confirms the faith his death-groan sealed.
Let heaven and earth, let man's revolving race,
His ceaseless generations, tell their tale;