James Hervey Johnson was born August 2, 1901 . His grandfather being a Methodist minister, he was brought up in the Christian religion, attending church and Sunday School until he was 14. He finished high school at 15. After studying the works of Thomas Paine, Robert G. Ingersoll and Charles Darwin as well as other scientific subjects, he saw the falsity of religion and rejected it entirely. He had carefully studied the Bible and other religious books.

For many years he conducted a successful real estate business and was prominently associated with good government and tax reduction movements.

He contributed to The Truth Seeker when Charles Smith was the publisher, and became publisher and editor upon Smith's death in 1964.

He continued in these positions until his own death in 1988.

 

God, according to the Christians, has created men who are atheists, who do not believe what the priests and preachers tell them; he has created sinners who do not know or do not understand his many conflicting commands.

Then God condemns all these persons to eternal hell fire, torture, and suffering. He is not satisfied with killing them, but wants to see them suffer for eternity. What an example of cruelty and hatred for a People to have set before them! What a fine way to encourage tolerance and a better world!

A sensible god, all-powerful and all-good, would have made a world for human beings with no wars, no sickness, no dishonesty, no killing, no crime, no noxious insects, no sorrow, no trouble, no worries, no earthquakes, no poison snakes, no animals nor men tearing one another to pieces. All would have been peace and quiet, happiness, and enjoyment

The priests have built up a fabulous monster who delights in making men sinful, and then punishing them by eternal torment in hell for their so-called wrongdoing. What man would want to punish his enemies forever and ever? Of course, the truth is that the original priests or religious leaders knew that there was no such thing as a god, and they built their monster on the basis of their own imaginations. The god they talk about is a god who will send to hell anyone who has the intelligence and courage not to believe in the priests' fables.

Naturally the priests want people to do as they say and the way to get them to do it is to threaten them with eternal torment after death. The priests could not demonstrate their God by having him strike unbelievers dead, so they had to reserve punishment for the atheists until after death. No one returned to say that they had not been punished, so many people were impressed by the claim that they had been sent to hell.

Any of the moronic church followers can see that good men suffer and criminals prosper on earth. So the only thing the priest could say was, "Just wait until they die, then they will suffer."

Good men can only look forward to happiness in heaven, because often they are robbed while alive. And the priest fills his pockets at the expense of the believing fools who want to stand on the right side of their religious leaders while alive, and of the God-Demon after death.

THE PHILOSOPHY OR ETHICS OF ATHEISM

The most intelligent men have developed the highest philosophy of life, the best code of ethics, the best rules of the interassociation of men.

These rules, principles, and philosophies have been developed by the reason of these intelligent men, based on the thousands of years of history of the human race. The mistakes of the past, the religions of the past, the philosophy of the past have been considered as a part of the mass of knowledge from which reason has chosen those moral practices which are best for humanity.

These results have been reached not by superstition, fanaticism, miracles, bloodshed, terrorism, or compulsion, but by the calm reasoning faculties of the most intelligent men.

No priest, church, pope, bishop, devil, savior, hell, heaven, ritual or special day is necessary to aid the establishment or practice of this set of principles.

Intelligent men believe in the Golden Rule of treating others as you want them to beat you.

They believe in honesty. Honesty among men saves time, prevents misunderstanding, provides security in dealing and living with others.

They do not lie or misrepresent. They do not cheat, steal, rob or assault others. These acts are not necessary for the comfort of men willing to work for what they need.

Work is not disagreeable for those who are well trained, and any man can be trained for what he is best fitted.

They seek to cooperate for the best interests of all, to aid progress and science and to assist in obtaining better things for all men.

They are opposed to wars, except for defense, but believe in being in a position to protect themselves from those who are aggressors or who seek selfish and unfair advantages.

They favor justice for all; no discrimination, freedom of thought, speech, writing, including freedom (now denied) of radio broadcasting and moving picture propaganda, separation of church and state, no special tax or other exemptions or privileges, equal opportunity for all.

Above all, they believe that men's minds should not be forced into superstitious channels when they are too young to reason.

Atheists believe in tolerance, that advances should be made by education rather than by force, and that tax exemption of churches is wrong.

They believe that every person should do his share for the common good, that each man should earn his own way, that there is no place in society for loafers, chiselers, and cheaters who want to live at the expense of those who provide for themselves.

They believe in courage, forthrightness and energetic support of their principles.

Weak-kneedness, pussyfooting, cowardice, appeasement of those who do wrong are not approved by atheists.

The atheist approves of those things which benefit humanity—he disapproves those things which are a detriment to it.

The atheist believes the highest aim of all mankind is happiness— having what we want, here in this life on this earth, now.

The atheist believes in reason, he disapproves superstition, religion, all forms of supernaturalism, fables, myths, miracles, heavens, hells, purgatories, gods, angels, devils, witches, wizards, and all the imaginative paraphernalia associated with them.

Originally published as Superior Men by Truth Seeker, 1949

---