06.08. It Is A Hated Book

8. IT IS A HATED BOOK

While it is a fact that no book is loved like the Bible, it is also a fact that it is the most hated book in the world. There are people today who will almost gnash upon you with their teeth if you mention it to them, they have thrust it out of their home, out of their life and out of their conversation, they will have nothing to do with it, and do not want to hear anything about it. There is a reason why this book is so terribly hated. The Bible is a photographer, it takes man’s picture but does no retouching. No one would have his picture if it wasn’t retouched. I went into one of the largest studios in America and asked for a picture to be made as quickly as possible. I was told to return at a certain time. When I came back they handed me the picture, but I did not like it; it was terribly like me, every line on my face stood out boldly. I said, "Lady, what is the matter with this picture? I don’t want a thing like that.’: She replied, "You wanted it in a hurry and we have not had time to retouch it." I left the picture, to be gone over. When we go to a photographer we want him to leave out the lines, remove the freckles, smooth out the wrinkles and camouflage all the scars, and when he presents it to us in that way, we say, "That is fine, it looks natural, I’ll take a dozen." But we know it does not, if it did we would not want them. That is the reason the slogan of every photographer is, "Where there is beauty we take it,
where there isn’t we make it." The Bible does no retouching, when it takes man’s picture it is real, and if there is a blur, a blot, a scar or wrinkle it shows it, and man doesn’t like a picture like that. The Bible takes man’s picture and reveals, "The whole head is sick, the whole heart is faint. From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it; but wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores: They have not been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment." Men don’t want a picture like that. In Jeremiah it makes an X-ray of the heart and reveals, "That it is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked." The Bible is a biographer, it writes man’s history, but without an apology. It is not an outline, it is complete. In Mr. Wells’ book you will find what he calls an outline of history, but in this book you will find an outline of Mr. Wells. When the Bible writes man’s history where does it begin? Not with atoms, and plasm, not with worms and fish, monkeys and anthropoid apes. It does not begin with the cabin home in the clearing with the old fashioned woman for a mother and the old pioneer for a father. It does not begin with the little log schoolhouse and the blue back speller. Here is where the Bible begins, "Behold they were shapen in iniquity and in sin did their mother conceive them, they go astray as soon as they be born, speaking lies, they are altogether become filthy; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulcher; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: Their feet are swift to shed blood: Destruction and misery are in their ways: There is no fear of God before their eyes and the ways of peace have they not known, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God."

Men hate this book because it tells them what they are. It never flatters, it never apologizes, it never praises man for his natural endowments and it often derides his wisdom. Even when he has climbed to the top-most bough of the tree of knowledge and there sways to the applause of the multitude, the old book seems to look up and say, "The wisdom of man is foolishness with God." It even hints that the creatures of God are capable of teaching man lessons, thus we hear him say, "Go to the ant thou sluggard," and again, "Ask the beast and he shall teach thee, the fowls of the air and they shall tell thee, the fishes of the sea and they shall declare unto thee," and with a bit of sarcasm it adds, "Yea, who knoweth not such things as these?"

Men do not hate the Bible because it is unsafe, for its influence has never been bad, its doctrines have never endangered a community and it was never known to promote vice, but they hate it because it shows up the real character of the unregenerate. A man once said to an infidel, "Why don’t you let the Bible alone? When you don’t like an editor you will not read hiseditorials, when you don’t like a book you won’t purchase it, if you don’t like the Bible, why don’t you let it alone?" and the infidel was honest enough to answer, "Because it won’t let me alone." There is the secret, there is the reason the wicked world will not let the Bible alone, because it won’t let them alone.