Primavera by Sandro Botticelli

 

THE OPEN ROAD

peace, love, happiness & understanding

 

March 5, 2026

 

some thoughts on Humanism

 

All deities reside in the human breast….

God only Acts & Is, in existing beings or Men.

 

—William Blake, from “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell”

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Numberless are the world’s wonders, but none more wonderful than man.

 

Sophocles, from “Antigone”

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In all people I see myself, none more and not one a barley-corn less…

 

–Walt Whitman, from “Song of Myself”

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What a piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god, the beauty of the world, the paragon of animals…

 

–William Shakespeare, Hamlet speaking in “Hamlet,” Act Two, scene two

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Inspired by Sarah Bakewell’s book Humanly Possible: Seven Hundred Years of Humanist Freethinking, Inquiry and Hope, I hosted a Zoom conversation about Humanism on February 14th. I enjoyed reading and thinking about Humanism in preparation for the Zoom event.

 

Humanism can mean a lot of different things. I think of it as related to the word “humane.” A humanistic attitude is one that considers human beings to be basically good. It tends to be optimistic about human potential, and about education, progress, reason and science. Humanists tend to be against war and against capital punishment. In one way, “humanism” must be as old as humanity. 

 

As a historical movement, Humanism is associated with the Renaissance, and an interest that some writers and artists took in classical Greece and Rome. The poet Petrarch (1304-1374) is often cited as the father of Humanism. For a thousand years in Europe, it was dangerous to espouse “heretical” views. From the beginning until now, humanists have promoted freedom of thought, freedom of speech and freedom of religion. We tend to take these things for granted, but in some countries atheism or homosexuality are punishable by death.

 

For many many people in the Middle Ages (and many people today) our life on Earth is a kind of prison house or purgatory, which serves only as a misery which we must endure in preparation for a glorious eternal afterlife in Heaven. Humanists are pretty unanimous in their belief that our human life on Earth is to be cherished—and some go as far as to believe that when we die we’re dead.

 

Modern Humanism includes Feminism and Human Rights. Perhaps the most important modern document which could not have been imagined without centuries of humanist influence is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Here’s a link:

 

https://openroadpdx.com/event/peace-love-happiness-understanding-9-2-21/

 

The Multnomah County Library is a temple of Humanism. Here’s a poem I wrote recently:

 

Ode to Humanists

 

Thank you

brave humanists

for making it possible

for us to read 

whatever 

we want to read

to think 

our own thoughts

to imagine

to dream

to say 

whatever 

we feel like saying

to write and publish

our ideas and imaginings

to go 

where we want

and do 

whatever 

we feel like doing.

 

If not for you

we would have

only one book

and the world 

would be 

flat.

 

Although some modern humanists are generally hostile to religion, since Humanism is fundamentally open to the free exchange of ideas and beliefs, that includes the right of people to think things and believe things that you don’t. A “Declaration of Modern Humanism” from a General Assembly in Glasgow, United Kingdom in 2022, agreed that “…we are committed to the unfettered expression and exchange of ideas, and seek to cooperate with people of different beliefs…” They also said, “We recognize that we are part of nature and accept our responsibility for the impact we have on the rest of the natural world.”

 

I’ll conclude these thoughts on Humanism with something that gives the essence of many humanist values. It’s from the Nineteenth Century agnostic who gave the eulogy at Walt Whitman’s grave—Robert G. Ingersoll. The full essay is called “The Liberty of Man, Woman and Child.” Below is an abridged version of “The Liberty of the Child” along with an abridged version of his conclusion to the whole essay:

 

THE LIBERTY OF CHILDREN

 

If women have been slaves, what shall I say of children?….

 

I tell you the children have the same rights that we have, and we ought to treat them as though they were human beings. They should be reared with love, with kindness, with tenderness, and not with brutality. That is my idea of children….

 

When your child commits a wrong, take it in your arms; let it feel your heart beat against its heart; let the child know that you really and truly and sincerely love it….

 

Do you know that I have seen some people who acted as though they thought that when the Savior said “Suffer little children to come unto me, for of such is the kingdom of heaven,” he had a raw-hide under his mantle, and made that remark simply to get the children within striking distance?

 

Give them a little liberty and love, and you can not drive them out of your house. They will want to stay there. Make home pleasant. Let them play any game they wish….

 

Let children have some daylight at home if you want to keep them there, and do not commence at the cradle and shout “Don’t!” “Don’t!” “Stop!” That is nearly all that is said to a child from the cradle until he is twenty-one years old, and when he comes of age other people begin saying “Don’t!” And the church says “Don’t!” and the party he belongs to says “Don’t!”

 

I despise that way of going through this world. Let us have liberty—just a little. Call me infidel, call me atheist, call me what you will, I intend so to treat my children, that they can come to my grave and truthfully say: “He who sleeps here never gave us a moment of pain. From his lips, now dust, never came to us an unkind word.”

 

People justify all kinds of tyranny toward children upon the ground that they are totally depraved. At the bottom of ages of cruelty lies this infamous doctrine of total depravity. Religion contemplates a child as a living crime—heir to an infinite curse—doomed to eternal fire….

 

Sabbaths used to be prisons. Every Sunday was a Bastille. Every Christian was a kind of turnkey, and every child was a prisoner,—a convict. In that dungeon, a smile was a crime.

 

It was thought wrong for a child to laugh upon this holy day. Think of that!

 

A little child would go out into the garden, and there would be a tree laden with blossoms, and the little fellow would lean against it, and there would be a bird on one of the boughs, singing and swinging, and thinking about four little speckled eggs, warmed by the breast of its mate,—singing and swinging, and the music in happy waves rippling out of its tiny throat, and the flowers blossoming, the air filled with perfume and the great white clouds floating in the sky, and the little boy would lean up against that tree and think about hell and the worm that never dies.

 

The laugh of a child will make the holiest day-more sacred still….

 

Do not treat your children like orthodox posts to be set in a row. Treat them like trees that need light and sun and air. Be fair and honest with them; give them a chance. Recollect that their rights are equal to yours. Do not have it in your mind that you must govern them; that they must obey. Throw away forever the idea of master and slave.

 

In old times they used to make the children go to bed when they were not sleepy, and get up when they were sleepy. I say let them go to bed when they are sleepy, and get up when they are not sleepy….

 

I believe in allowing the children to think for themselves. I believe in the democracy of the family. If in this world there is anything splendid, it is a home where all are equals.

 

You will remember that only a few years ago parents would tell their children to “let their victuals stop their mouths.” They used to eat as though it were a religious ceremony—a very solemn thing. Life should not be treated as a solemn matter. I like to see the children at table, and hear each one telling of the wonderful things he has seen and heard. I like to hear the clatter of knives and forks and spoons mingling with their happy voices. I had rather hear it than any opera that was ever put upon the boards. Let the children have liberty. Be honest and fair with them; be just; be tender, and they will make you rich in love and joy….

 

CONCLUSION.

 

I have given you my honest thought. Surely investigation is better than unthinking faith. Surely reason is a better guide than fear. This world should be controlled by the living, not by the dead. About this world little is known,—about another world, nothing.

 

Our fathers were intellectual serfs, and their fathers were slaves. The makers of our creeds were ignorant and brutal. Every dogma that we have, has upon it the mark of whip, the rust of chain, and the ashes of fagot.

 

Our fathers reasoned with instruments of torture. They believed in the logic of fire and sword. They hated reason. They despised thought. They abhorred liberty.

 

Superstition is the child of slavery. Free thought will give us truth. When all have the right to think and to express their thoughts, every brain will give to all the best it has. The world will then be filled with intellectual wealth….

 

As long as woman regards the Bible as the charter of her rights, she will be the slave of man. The Bible was not written by a woman. Within its lids there is nothing but humiliation and shame for her. She is regarded as the property of man. She is made to ask forgiveness for becoming a mother. She is as much below her husband, as her husband is below Christ. She is not allowed to speak. The gospel is too pure to be spoken by her polluted lips. Woman should learn in silence.

 

In the Bible will be found no description of a civilized home. The free mother surrounded by free and loving children, adored by a free man, her husband, was unknown to the inspired writers of the Bible. They did not believe in the democracy of home—in the republicanism of the fireside.

 

These inspired gentlemen knew nothing of the rights of children. They were the advocates of brute force—the disciples of the lash. They knew nothing of human rights. Their doctrines have brutalized the homes of millions, and filled the eyes of infancy with tears.

 

Let us free ourselves from the tyranny of a book, from the slavery of dead ignorance, from the aristocracy of the air.

 

There has never been upon the earth a generation of free men and women. It is not yet time to write a creed. Wait until the chains are broken—until dungeons are not regarded as temples. Wait until solemnity is not mistaken for wisdom—until mental cowardice ceases to be known as reverence. Wait until the living are considered the equals of the dead—until the cradle takes precedence of the coffin. Wait until what we know can be spoken without regard to what others may believe. Wait until teachers take the place of preachers—until followers become investigators. Wait until the world is free before you write a creed.

 

In this creed there will be but one word—Liberty.

 

Oh Liberty, float not forever in the far horizon—remain not forever in the dream of the enthusiast, the philanthropist and poet, but come and make thy home among the children of men!

 

I know not what discoveries, what inventions, what thoughts may leap from the brain of the world. I know not what garments of glory may be woven by the years to come. I cannot dream of the victories to be won upon the fields of thought; but I do know, that coming from the infinite sea of the future, there will never touch this “bank and shoal of time” a richer gift, a rarer blessing than liberty for man, for woman, and for child.

 

—Johnny Stallings

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Speaking of miracles…well, I find the word ‘miracle’ too loaded with religiosity, so I will dub those events as ‘moments of awe,’ both outward(ly) and inward(ly). 

 

Last night the brilliant full moon lit up Mt. Hood like it was the middle of the day. I could see Tie-In Rock, Langille Glacier, Eliot Glacier, Illumination Rock (so aptly named), Barrett Spur—every feature on the northeast side of the mountain, where we are, lit up as bright as day. At ten o’clock at night!  Right there, the moon, and the mountain, a moment of awe. And then, then! from 4-5 a.m., I watched the lunar eclipse and watched and felt the shadow of our earth passing between the sun and the moon. Those who got to witness the solar eclipse in 2021 spoke often of having a spiritual experience during the moments of totality. This lunar eclipse brought forth the same kind of feeling in my being. I feel—graced—to witness moments like these. 

 

I mentioned moments of awe both outwardly and inwardly—the ‘inwardly’ part is…the body, the human body. It is…awesome. I tutored a high school student who had cerebral palsy. I helped him study anatomy and physiology because he wanted to be a personal trainer. (Yes.) We studied every system of the human body, the nervous system, skeletal, circulatory, endocrine, digestive, respiratory, etc. You name it, we studied it, and learned it. I was blown away, studying alongside Daniel. Just for one example, the functioning of the liver is so elegant! And complex, that it defies belief!  I was constantly shaking my head and laughing at the awesomeness of each part and each function, down to the cellular level. And the whole body is like that! 

 

But you know what? The moon, the mountain, stars, the human body, trees, rocks, grass, light, dark, raindrops, birdsong, bird poop…it’s all damned miracle. An awesome miracle. There, I said it.

 

—Jude Russell