Hands Off! – Robert Adams, 7/10/1896

Republished from our predecessor publication Lucifer the Light Bearer

With all man’s boasted liberty, he is a slave. His tyrant is a trinity of despotisms and may be named God,
Government, and Grundy. These three constitute one despot named Superstition, whose origin is from
eternity and is coexistent with man, as far as history’s researches can reach. The despot Superstition has
as its right-hand supporter and prime minister—Ignorance. Its power is dependent upon the prowess of this
attendant, who is the main reliance for withstanding the attacks of the one serious opponent of the despot
Superstition. This rival is named Knowledge and is likewise a trinity, whose persons are named Liberty,
Learning, and Love. These two powers—the one, Superstition, aided by Ignorance and manifested by the
three big G’s (God, Government, and Grundy); and the other, Knowledge, manifested as the three big
L’s (Liberty, Learning, and Love)—are ever striving: the one for man’s subjection, the other for human
emancipation. This enemy of progress may be further classified as symbolizing Religious Superstition,
Political Superstition, and Social Superstition. Superstition is defined as “a standing still over something
amazing; hence, an excessive reverence or fear of that which is unknown or mysterious.” Superstition,
being essentially standing still, is therefore the direct opposite of progress and necessarily its deadliest foe.
Man, being a sensitive animal, seeks by a law of nature to obtain pleasurable sensations. This is the cause
of progress—the desire of each individual existence to better its condition. Numerous obstacles arise in
the constitution of the universe, whereby opposing forces and rival organisms clash with human efforts
toward perfection. Many of these are formidable and can only be overcome by persistent effort; but these
antagonisms differ from the control of the despot Superstition in that the latter depends upon man’s self
-infliction or willful endurance of calamity.

Man feels his distressful condition and sees how it could be remedied, but he stands still in terror before the
phantom trinity of his own creation—God, Government, and Grundy. He desires to reason about the origin of
the world; he wishes to enjoy certain pleasures; he desires to occupy himself with work or recreation every
day. But Religious Superstition, in the name of God, says to him, “You shall be content with the reasoning
of the Hebrews; you must not do what the Hebrew Bible or God’s ministers forbid, and you must give up one
day in seven to the monopoly of ecclesiastics.” Man desires land to work and live on; he wants to own the
products of his labor; he wishes to buy supplies where they are cheapest. But Political Superstition, in the
name of Government, says, “Pay rent to landlords; accept wages from masters; pay tribute to manufacturers.”
Man desires to dress comfortably, to live economically, to marry or divorce as is mutually desirable. But Social
Superstition, in the name of Mother Grundy, says, “Dress in London and Paris fashions, spend more money
for show than your neighbor, and heed all laws and customs relating to the associations of men and women.”
People everywhere complain of this bondage; yet they are willing slaves and do not dare to rebel against this
phantom of the three big G’s and, in its place, assert the supremacy of Knowledge, with its trinity of three big
L’s—Liberty, Learning, and Love—freedom to search, guided by the light of science and inspired with the spirit
of love. Three human representatives of the phantom despot Superstition, who are the self-appointed vicegerents
of the Trinity, are three big P’s—Priest, Politician, Prude. The Priest says, “Pay me in the name of God.” The
Politician says, “Vote for me to form your government.” And the Prude says, “Follow my ideas in the name of
Mother Grundy.” So man’s effort to perfect himself is hindered by his submission to these authorities.

His thinking, working, and living are dictated to him, not by his self-perceived needs, but by laws and customs—
untrue, absurd, and injurious—to which he assents by a superstitious reverence, saying for lack of a reason what
the Chinaman expresses in pigeon English: “That belong old custom.” Now the thing to be done is to call out
to these three big P’s, “Hands off! We will no longer submit to your dictation. We will not accept your teaching,
obey your laws, or follow your fashions. We demand freedom to think, speak, read, write, observe, work, play,
eat, drink, live, and love in the way that seems to us best, as long as we do not infringe upon the equal freedom
of others. We have submitted to your meddlesome and oppressive interference with our lives long enough,
and we tell you to take your hands off our concerns. We reject your supernatural religion, we rebel against
your partial laws, and we protest against your foolish fashions.” We will say to the Priest, “We demand the
abdication of your authority as a guide to the reason and conscience of mankind, and we ask for the surrender
of the property that you have acquired by trading upon the superstitions of the people.” To the Politician we
will say, “We demand the abolition of laws that give special privileges to the representatives of religion and
capital; that allow no business but that of the priest to be exercised on Sunday; that forbid any person who
is not superstitious to give evidence in the courts of Quebec; that forbid any literature to come through the
mails that a superstitious censor in the post office does not approve; that order classic works of art to be
removed from our shop windows; that make us pay bonuses and profits to favored businessmen; that forbid
marriage without the sanction of church or state; that call the children of such unions illegitimate; and that
tax us for the profit and glory of legislators and their friends.”

To the Prude we say, “We demand the right to live our own lives in our own way and object to being ostracized
and despised because we exercise our own judgment as to what is best for our own interests and what is
agreeable to our tastes, while in doing so we harm no one else. Comfort, not propriety, is our rule of life, and
we claim to be better able to decide what is best for ourselves than you can do for us. Hands off our concerns!
Mind your own business and leave us alone.” But how are we to overcome the despotism of the Priest, the
Politician, and the Prude? It can only be by continual resistance to their demands; by constant protest against
their authority; by incessant exposure of the unreasonable nature of their claims; and, above all, by calmly and
indifferently going our own ways and leading our own lives. Submission to the powers that be and resignation
to the will of Providence are the teachings that arise from the superstitious worship of authority. Instead of these
maxims, the teaching of progressive thinkers should be: “Kick! Kick against the assumptions of the three big G’s!
Kick against the edicts of their officers, the three big P’s! Kick against all forces that oppose the three big L’s,
and while kicking shout, ‘Hands off! Leave us to the benign influence of Knowledge with its trinity of the three
big L’s—Liberty, Learning, and Love!’” The advantage of kicking is illustrated by the following story. Two frogs
fell into a pail of milk. They were unable to climb the sides or jump over the edge. At last one said, “I can kick
no longer. I must give up and die.” So he resigned himself to fate, sank to the bottom, and was drowned. But the
other frog persisted in kicking, and by so doing he gradually churned butter, which, floating to the top, gave him
a life preserver on which he managed to keep afloat until he was discovered and rescued. Moral—Let us kick!