1) I have got nothing against the usual assembling of people confessing the Christian doctrine on Sundays in halls that they call churches. But I think, that these assemblies ought not to be devoted, as they usually are, to public and uniform public prayers, firstly, because the repetition on Sunday in the same words is perfectly useless, as it very soon becomes a mechanical procedure; secondly and chiefly, because in the Gospels this error is plainly pointed out and it is there definitely said (Math. VI), that one should not pray in public places, but in solitude, which is corroborated both by the reason and the experience of every man, who has ever sincerely prayed to God, as the assembly of people only distracts, makes one’s thoughts wander and diverts them. I think that Sunday rest and dedication of this day to spiritual exercise may take place in the most various forms. One may suggest, that men of the same spirit, meeting together on Sunday, should bring to their meeting such religious books or articles which they find in ancient and modern literature and read and discuss them together; one may suggest, that meeting together on Sunday men of the same spirit should arrange dinners for the poor and themselves serve those dinners; one may suggest, that meeting together men of the same spirit should confess their sins to each other and discuss them. In short one can think of a hundred different forms of worship, which should all have for their aim a mutual spiritual help and should not be mechanical, but sensible.
2) Do I believe in the resurrection and that there is a hereafter? I believe in true, i. e. indestructible life which Christ has disclosed to us and for the which death does not exist. But this life should in no-wise be understood as a resurrection to future life, as a hereafter. One cannot be too cautious in the use of terms for the definition of the true, indestructible, eternal life. If we were to say, that it will be a personal life, that we shall pass into other bodies or beings, as the Buddhists understand it in their metam-psychosis, we should be making a gratuitous assertion. If, on the other hand, we were to assert, that death destroys all that which composes our «ego», it would be a yet more gratuitous assertion altogether contrary to reason, for in our «ego», as in all which exists, there is a certain element, which is true and abiding. And if I accept as my «ego» this abiding element, it is evident, that that, which I consider as my «ego», will not be
