{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_64568/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_64568","id":"gutenberg_64568","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/64568","summary":null,"tags":["Agnosticism","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Free thought"],"text":"Transcriber's Notes:\n\n  Italic text is denoted by _underscores_ and bold text by\n  =equal signs=.\n\n  Small uppercase have been replaced with regular uppercase.\n\n  Blank pages have been eliminated.\n\n  Variations in spelling and hyphenation have been left as in the\n  original.\n\n  A few typographical errors have been corrected.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: _Marilla M. Ricker._]\n\n\n\n\n                         I DON'T KNOW, DO YOU?\n\n                                  BY\n\n                           MARILLA M. RICKER\n\n\n                            [Illustration]\n\n\n                               DONE INTO\n                   A PRINTED BOOK BY THE ROYCROFTERS\n                     AT THEIR SHOPS, WHICH ARE IN\n                         EAST AURORA, NEW YORK\n                                MCMXVI\n\n\n\n\n                            Copyright, 1916\n                                  By\n                           Marilla M. Ricker\n\n\n\n\n  You are what you think, and to believe in a Hell for other people\n  is literally to go to Hell yourself.--_Elbert Hubbard._\n\n  A religious man is a man scared.\n\n\n\n\nFOREWORD\n\n\n_There is in the city of Boston a memorial building to Thomas Paine.\nThis Paine Memorial was finished and dedicated forty-two years ago. It\nis the finest monument to Thomas Paine on the earth._\n\n_For twenty years Ralph Washburn Chainey has been the Manager of this\nbuilding and the Treasurer of the Paine Memorial Corporation. Under his\nwise and prudent management the building was freed from debt, and today\nit is a monument to the energy and devotion of its Manager as much as\nto the genius and labors of Thomas Paine._\n\n_Ralph Washburn Chainey is only forty-two, and as great an example of\nthrift as Ben Franklin was. Very early in life he acquired the habit of\nthrift--which is the basis of all virtues. He learned early that time\nwas money and he is always at work. He is not only able to take care\nof himself, but he can and does take care of others. He is sufficient\nunto himself, and when one is right with himself he is right with all\nthe world. I have known him intimately for more than a quarter of a\ncentury, and if he has faults I have yet to learn what they are._\n\n_In appreciation, therefore, of his great service to the cause of\nFreethought, I dedicate this volume to_\n\n       RALPH WASHBURN CHAINEY\n\n                                            --_Marilla M. Ricker_.\n\n_Dover, New Hampshire December, Nineteen Hundred Fifteen_\n\n\n\n\n  As man advances, as his intellect enlarges, as his knowledge\n  increases, as his ideals become nobler, the Bibles and creeds will\n  lose their authority, the miraculous will be classed with the\n  impossible, and the idea of special providence will be discarded.\n  Thousands of religions have perished, innumerable gods have died,\n  and why should the religion of our time be exempt from the common\n  fate?\n\n                                             --_Robert Ingersoll._\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\n  FOREWORD                                      7\n\n  CREEDS AGAINST CIVILIZATION                  11\n\n  WHAT I KNOW ABOUT SOME CHURCHES,\n  AND WHY I AM AN AGNOSTIC                     33\n\n  A LETTER AND THE REJOINDER                   55\n\n  THE HOLY GHOST                               65\n\n  HOW CAN WE \"TAKE\" CHRIST?                    71\n\n  COLONEL ROBERT G. INGERSOLL                  81\n\n  MARK TWAIN'S BEST THOUGHT                    85\n\n  AN IRRELIGIOUS DISCOURSE ON RELIGION         89\n\n  DECAY OF CHRISTIAN MORALITY                 107\n\n\n\n\n  I know of no other book that so fully teaches the subjection and\n  degradation of woman as the Bible.\n\n                                       --_Elizabeth Cady Stanton._\n\n\n  That God had to come to earth to find a mother for his son reveals\n  the poverty of Heaven.\n\n\n\n\nCREEDS AGAINST CIVILIZATION\n\n\n\n\n  Any system of religion that shocks the mind of a child can not be a\n  true system.\n\n                                                 --_Thomas Paine._\n\n\n  Hell is a place invented by priests and parsons for the sake of\n  being supported.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\nCREEDS AGAINST CIVILIZATION\n\n\nOne hundred fifty years ago, there was not a single white man in what\nis now Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. What is now the most\nflourishing part of the United States was then as little known as the\ncountry in the heart of Africa itself. It was not until Seventeen\nHundred Seventy-six that Boone left his home in North Carolina to\nbecome the first settler in Kentucky; and the pioneers of Ohio did not\nsettle that territory until twenty years later.\n\nCanada belonged to France one hundred fifty-three years ago, and\nWashington was a modest Virginia Colonel, and the United States was\nthe most loyal part of the British Empire, and scarcely a speck on the\npolitical horizon indicated the struggle that in a few years was to lay\nthe foundation of the greatest republic in the world.\n\nOne hundred fifty years ago there were but four small newspapers in\nAmerica; steam-engines had not been imagined; and locomotives and\nrailroads, and telegraphs and postal cards, and friction-matches,\nand revolvers and percussion-caps, and breechloading-guns and Mauser\nrifles, and stoves and furnaces, and gas and electricity and rubber\nshoes, and Spaulding's glue, and sewing-machines and anthracite coal,\nand photographs, and kerosene-oil, free schools, and spring-beds and\nhair-mattresses, and lever-watches and greenbacks were unknown. The\nspinning-wheel was in almost every family, and clothing was spun and\nwoven and made up in the family; and the printing-press was a cumbrous\nmachine worked by hand.\n\nDown to Eighteen Hundred Fourteen every paper in the world was printed\none side at a time, on an ordinary hand-press; and a nail, or a brick,\nor a knife, or a pair of shears or scissors, or a razor, or a woven\npair of stockings, or an ax or a hoe or a shovel, or a lock and key, or\na plate of glass of any size, was not made in what is now the United\nStates.\n\nIn Seventeen Hundred Ninety, there were only seventy-five post-offices\nin the country, and the whole extent of our post-routes was less\nthan nineteen hundred miles; cheap postage was unheard of; so were\nenvelopes; and had any one suggested the transmission of messages with\nlightning speed, he would have been thought insane. The microscope on\nthe one hand and the telescope on the other were in their infancy as\ninstruments of science; and geology and chemistry were almost unknown,\nto say nothing of the telephone and all the other various phones, and\nthe X-rays, and hundreds of other new things.\n\nIn Seventeen Hundred Sixty-two there were only six stagecoaches running\nin all England, and these were a novelty. A man named John Crosset\nthought they were so dangerous an innovation that he wrote a pamphlet\nagainst them. \"These coaches,\" he wrote, \"make gentlemen come to London\nupon every small occasion which otherwise they would not do, except\nupon urgent necessity. The conveniency of the passage makes their wives\ncome often up, who, rather than come such long journeys on horseback,\nwould stay at home. Then when they come to town they must be in the\n'wade' [probably that is where the word _swim_ comes in now], get fine\nclothes, go to plays, and treats, and by these means get such a habit\nof idleness and love of pleasure that they are uneasy ever after.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWe can all see how much improvement there has been in all things but\n_creeds_. Improvements can come, and old things go, but _creeds_ go on\nforever! A creed implies something fixed and immovable. In other words,\nit means you have a \"heel-rope on.\"\n\nThe word \"creed\" is from _credo_, \"I believe.\" We have had a great\ndeal of compulsion of belief, and a thousand years of almost absolute\nunanimity. Liberty was dead and the ages were dark. We call them\nthe Middle Ages because they were the death between the life that\nwas before and the life that came after. Then came a new birth of\nthought--a \"Renaissance\"--and after this, some reformation in the form\nof a Protestantism.\n\nSince then, the Protestants have continued to protest, not only against\nthe old, but against each other. And this is the best thing they have\ndone. Thus liberty has been saved, for each would have coerced its\nfellow organization, as did their infamous mother, the Roman Catholic\nChurch, before them. From \"creed\" comes \"credulous\" and \"credulity.\"\nAnd they have filled the world with their kind. In the United States\nalone, there are about one hundred forty types. Each is a system of\ncredulity pitted against a hundred and thirty-nine others. They all\nrest on authority. They all denounce investigation--unless it has for\nits end the support of their authority.\n\nHence, with the exception of two or three denominations, to become a\nprofessed Christian means to accept credulously and without question\na system of belief about Nature and man and the world which you would\ndeny in toto if you reasoned as you do about other things, and which\nyou do practically deny by re-explaining and refining it into anything\nbut what is stated. Down deep in your heart you do not, and never\ndid, believe it in the same honest way in which you form your other\nopinions.\n\nThink for a moment of the Christian idea of the world, its origin, its\nshape, place, importance, and its final end. Does any man or woman who\nhas been through a common-school geography believe the ideas implied in\nthe common Christian dogmas regarding the world? We must remember that\nthe world taught in the geography is not the Christian world.\n\nThe world taught in the Christian dogmas is beneath the heavens--not a\nrolling sphere flying through space. It is flat, and the sun and stars\npass over it daily. It is the chief object of God's creation on which\nto place man. It is God's footstool, and his throne is Heaven above. He\ncreated it just four thousand and four years before the Christian era\nbegan. Now we _all_ know that this is _not_ true; that there is no up\nnor down; that the earth is not the center; that it is _not_ flat; that\nthe sun does not go round it; that it is a very insignificant little\norb; that \"up in Heaven\" is an utterly meaningless expression; and that\nthe world is not a creation, but an evolution.\n\nAnd yet thousands of people credulously cling to creeds which embody\nthe notions of barbarous or uncivilized ages.\n\nTake the dogma of revelation. It tells us that the Bible is a\nrevelation of the will and wisdom of an omniscient God; that it is a\nperfect and sufficient rule of faith and practise. What, in the name\nof humanity, causes people to make such statements today? It is like\ntrying to light the house with a saucer of tallow in which a rag is\nimmersed, instead of using gas or electricity.\n\nTake an example of this Bible. In Deuteronomy xiv: 21, we read, \"Ye\nshall not eat of anything that dieth of itself: thou mayest give it\nunto the sojourner that is within thy gates, that he may eat it; or\nthou mayest sell it unto a foreigner: for _thou_ art a holy people unto\nJehovah thy God.\" In Matthew vii: 12, we read, \"Whatsoever ye would\nthat men should do unto you, even so do ye also unto them.\"\n\nWhy do you talk about the infallibility, the inerrancy, or even the\nmoral unity of a volume written by many hands at widely different\ntimes? Are such people so ignorant that they have not read the Book\nthey are swearing by? Are they moral idiots and do not know the\nplainest right and wrong? Are they scoundrels and have some deceitful\nreason for urging such a book as an authority? Or are they the dupes of\ntheir own credulity, clinging without thought to the beliefs in which\nthey have been reared? They are evidently not using commonsense in an\nhonest way.\n\nI often hear the Bible spoken of as a holy book, full of a holy\nspirit. I sometimes reply: \"Have you read the conduct of Moses, Joshua,\nSamuel, David, Solomon, and other ancient worthies, who were said to be\nmen after the heart of the bloodthirsty and avenging Jehovah? How long\nwould you keep out of prison if you took them for your models? Have you\nread the Thirty-fifth, Fifty-eighth, Sixty-ninth and One Hundred Ninth\nPsalms? If not, read them, and tell me what you think of them.\"\n\nThere never was any intrinsic reason for believing the Bible except\nthat a designing priesthood said so, and stupid people trusted them.\n\nHere, by common consent, people agree to be duped. Ages and ages ago,\nthey began to make admissions that two and two might be six, or even\nsixteen, in religion. They had sense enough to say that two and two are\nfour in other things. In Divine Revelation they shut their eyes to all\nmistakes and wilful lies. If people should deceive in other matters as\nthe priests, parsons and teachers do in religion, they would not escape\narrest.\n\nAnother central doctrine is that of the Atonement. This is derived\nfrom the moral character of the Jewish God; he governed the world of\nhumanity on the principle of primitive society. Men were responsible to\nhim in everything. Any infraction of his supposed laws rendered them\nsubject to his vengeance. That is why the Jew thought that God sent a\nthunderstorm to punish him for eating pork.\n\nWhat explanation besides credulity can be suggested for the\ncontinuation of this belief century after century? Preachers shout\nit from the pulpits, and Salvation Army people hawk it through the\nstreets. Not one of them knows what he is talking about. Each learned\nit from some one who told him to say it. They all do it because it is\na part of a system which they have inherited, but the reason for which\nthey do not know, and have never allowed themselves to seek.\n\nThis cringing credulity keeps the masses from using their powers. They\nseem to believe that if they should lose these superstitions they would\nbe lost.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAnd the dogma regarding Jesus is inextricably mixed up in Christian\ntheology with that of the Atonement. One assumption bolsters the\nother. He is made to occupy the central place in this scheme of\nblood-redemption through that other highly rational fable of the\nimmaculate conception. If Jesus was not immaculately conceived, then\nMatthew and Luke have deceived; then Jesus is not God; then he is a\nmere man; and if so, he is not the Redeemer. Man could not redeem\nhimself according to the first premise of the scheme. Man has been and\n_is_ redeeming himself by learning Nature's laws and through them\nrising to a higher life ever since he reached the stage of humanity.\nTake the theory of the Resurrection. The account of it was written long\nafter the assumed occurrence, and by credulous men with superstitious\ninclinations. Men and women of these days, understanding the laws of\nNature, can not give assent to the crude beliefs which easily commanded\nthe minds of ancient times.\n\nBoth Protestantism and Catholicism are systems built on essentially the\nsame foundation. Remove any of these stones, and the systems will have\nto be rebuilt. If there is no special revelation, there is no special\nscheme of salvation. If there is no vengeful, blood-seeking God, there\nis no theological reconciliation. If there was no fall, there is no\nhopeless depravity. If there was no immaculate conception, there is\nno Redeemer in a special ecclesiastical sense. If there is no total\ndepravity, there is no lost world. If there is no lost world, there is\nno yawning Hell. One and all, these fictions have their only ground for\ncontinuance in a _selfish_ and unreasoning priesthood and clergy, and a\ncredulous people.\n\nIn the place of the \"fall,\" science has put the \"rise\" of man. It finds\nthe Garden of Eden to have been a jungle. It finds the mythical perfect\nAdam to have been a savage. It finds the Biblical \"origin of evil\"\nto have been a puerile legend. It finds that sin and evil are made by\nthe seeing of higher states. It finds that there was no bad until the\nbetter was reached. It finds that it is the advancing good which makes\nthe existing bad. It finds that among the worst of sinners are those\nwho live in and propagate outworn doctrines upon their own and others'\ncredulity.\n\nIn the olden times, God was made a king--the world was his kingdom.\nHis powers, virtues and vices were simply those of earthly kings\nexaggerated. Jewish and Christian liturgies are full of expressions\nshowing the attitude of slaves and serfs to a tyrant. Sin has been\nmanufactured as heresy and disobedience to the so-called orthodox\nsystem instead of to the laws of Nature.\n\nScience has shown that the bottomless pit did not even have a top.\nColumbus sailed over the Western edge of the flat Christian world on\nwhich all this Christian system depended, and found that the material\nHeaven and Hell were unfounded myths; but the preachers and priests\nstill threaten _hell_ to the most ignorant and credulous, but they tell\nsome of us that there is a _final judgment_.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIn the old days, we used to hear a great deal about judgments. A\ncertain honest, good-natured, old farmer in New Hampshire, who was a\nfreethinker, but had a very pious wife, lost many cattle when the\nblack tongue was an epidemic in the State.\n\nOne day the hired man came in and told him the red oxen were dead.\n\n\"Are they?\" said the old man. \"Well, they were 'breechy cusses.' Take\noff their hides and carry them down to Fletcher's. They will bring the\ncash.\"\n\nAn hour or so later the man came back with the news that Lineback and\nhis mate were both dead.\n\n\"Are they?\" said the old man. \"Well, I took them of B---- to save a bad\ndebt that I never expected to get. Take the hides down to Fletcher's.\nThey will bring the cash.\"\n\nAfter the lapse of another hour the man came back to tell him that the\nnigh brindle was dead.\n\n\"Is he?\" said the old man. \"Well, he was a very old ox. Take off his\nhide and send it down to Fletcher's. It is worth cash and will bring\nmore than two of the others.\"\n\nHereupon his wife reminded him that his loss was a judgment of Heaven\nupon him.\n\n\"Is it?\" said the old chap. \"Well, if they will take the judgment in\ncattle, it is the easiest way I can pay it.\"\n\nBut they know no more about final judgments than they did about the\nlake of fire and brimstone which commenced to drain off in Columbus'\nday. Science has vaporized the notion of a future judgment by the same\nmethod it has that of a past Creation. From the _facts_, it has learned\n_laws_. But credulity is always half-hearted with facts. It does not\nknow enough of truth to love it. It is ever glowing over and setting\nup as a dogma the little it knows, or assumes to know, of the truth of\nformer times. It has no faith in the newly discovered, because it knows\nnothing of it.\n\nHence, age after age we see the spectacle of men who have not studied\nthe science of their own day denouncing it in pulpit and councils;\nof men who have steeped themselves in the traditions of the past\npronouncing shallow invectives against the demonstrations of (science)\nthe present.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nMany church people say immortality must be true, or the great majority\nwould not believe in it. But do they? They do not talk or write as if\nthey did. If language means anything, I think the majority believe in\nannihilation. Most people speak of the dead body of a man as though\nit were the man. They say, \"He was buried at Greenwood,\" or, \"She was\ncremated at Forest Hills.\" And we hear the \"late\" Mr. Smith left an\nimmense fortune. If Mr. Smith still exists, why do they say the _late_\nMr. Smith? If people didn't believe that the soul and body are one,\nand that life ceases and mind expires when the body dies, why do they\nsay, \"They were\"? What little the Church has learned has been by _main\nforce_ so to speak.\n\nA friend of mine many years ago was a college student. At that time\nthey were all compelled to attend the college church. On one occasion\nhe heard the preacher, who was also a college professor, make these\nstatements:\n\n_First_, that the _elect_ alone would be saved.\n\n_Second_, that among those who by the world were called Christians,\nprobably not more than one in a hundred belonged really and truly to\nthe _elect_.\n\n_Third_, that the others, by reason of their Christian privileges,\nwould suffer more hereafter than the heathen, who had never heard the\nGospel at all.\n\nThe young man made a note of these propositions, and on the strength\nof them drew up a petition to the Faculty soliciting exemption from\nfurther attendance at church, as only preparing for himself a more\nterrible future.\n\nHe said: \"The congregation here amounts to six hundred persons,\nand nine of these are the college professors. Now if only one in a\nhundred is to be saved, it follows that three even of the professors\nmust be damned, and I, being a mere student, could not expect to be\nsaved in preference to a professor.\" Far, he said, be it from him to\ncherish so presumptuous a hope. Nothing remained for him, therefore,\nbut perdition. In this melancholy state of affairs he was anxious to\nabstain from anything that might aggravate his future punishment;\nand as church attendance had been shown to have this influence on the\n_non-elect_, he trusted that the Faculty would for all time exempt him\nfrom it.\n\nThe result was he came very near being expelled from the\ncollege--simply by heeding their sermons. The professors of some\ncolleges have learned something, and do not insist on the students\nattending church.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nPonder for a moment on the many dishonest ways churches have for\nraising money. Think of the amount of money they can raise at a\nchurch-fair--alias, a confidence-game.\n\nA young man from Kentucky told me that he attended one at Chicago.\nFirst he went to the table where refreshments were sold. A beautiful\nsiren with big black eyes and small white hands spread the edibles\nbefore him. When he arose from the table he handed her a five-dollar\nbill. She put it in a little box and forgot to give him any change. She\nsmiled sweetly at him, and asked him if he would like to walk about the\nroom and look at the fancy articles, all to be sold for the good of the\nchurch.\n\nShe took his arm and murmured, \"We are not strangers; we both feel\ninterested in the church.\"\n\n\"We soon came,\" said the young man in telling me the story, \"to a\nsilver tea-set that was to be 'raffled off.' Would I take a chance? Of\ncourse I did. Then came a cake with a valuable ring concealed in it.\nWould I take a chance in that? Of course I did.\n\n\"So things glided on until I concluded if I took many more chances, my\nchances for getting home would be slim. So I refused to tempt fortune\nany further, until the little black-eyed scoundrel took me on a new\ntack. Leaning heavily on my arm, and resting her cheek on my shoulder,\nshe said, 'Please take a chance for me.'\n\n\"It is needless to add that I took the chance, and kept on taking\nchances for the beautiful and unprincipled wretch that had me in tow,\nuntil I had not a dollar left. Yes, I was penniless, and then it\nbegan to dawn on me that she was working me for the success of the\nchurch. There I was, bankrupt in money and self-respect. I had been\nrobbed--yes, robbed, for where is the difference between a pair of\npistols and a pair of black eyes in a robbery? You part with your money\nbecause you can not help it.\n\n\"I know that Society looks with lenient eyes upon church-fairs, but it\nis my opinion that all robbers will take sentence, and when that little\nChicago robber receives her sentence, she will take her place by the\nside of Jack Sheppard!\"\n\nYou see he still believes in Judgments. He is learning by main force.\n\nA very pious woman whose father was a missionary, now living in Hawaii,\nwrote not long ago that professional men flocking to the Islands will\nbe disappointed unless they are friends of old families; and the old\nfamilies are descendants of missionaries who went there in the early\ndays and took lands and everything else from the natives.\n\nThere seems to be nothing like being a descendant from a missionary\nfamily. These people, equally pious and provident, thought it a\ngood scheme to cheat the sinful savages out of all their worldly\npossessions, in order that they might be taught humility and holiness\nthrough the chastening influence of poverty. So they robbed the\nunregenerate to the glory of God.\n\nWho says it doesn't pay to save the heathen? Think of the ignorance and\nsuperstition of the majority of the preachers of the present day.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nUp in Northern Minnesota, less than fifty years ago, an old Baptist\nwas preaching on the death of Moses on the Mount, and his not being\npermitted to go over into the Promised Land. The preacher said:\n\n\"I have always felt sorry for Moses. It has seemed so hard to me that\nhe could not go over with Caleb and Joshua, the only two of the host\nwhich he had led out of Egypt, and enjoy with his people the good\ncountry towards which they had been so long traveling. When as a boy\nI read that in the Bible for the first time, I sat down and cried for\nsympathy with him. But Moses had a hard time from the first. He was no\nsooner born than his life was threatened. His mother had to hide him to\nsave it. After three months she could hide him no longer, and so she\nmade an ark of bulrushes and set him afloat on the river. Indeed, it\nseemed as though the Lord had all he could do to raise Moses.\"\n\nBut the people of this generation do not take the story of Moses so\nseriously. A bright young girl of ten, on being asked by her Sabbath\nSchool teacher, \"Where did Pharaoh's daughter get Moses?\" replied, with\nthe accent on the _said_, \"She _said_ she 'found him in the bulrushes.'\"\n\nI attended a campmeeting in North Carolina. The exhortations and\nprayers would cause a graven image to smile audibly. One old Baptist\npreacher said he always felt so sorry to think that \"Ingine corn\"\ndidn't grow in Palestine, because he would like to think that the\nlittle Jesus had a good time playing with cob-houses.\n\nBut those preachers compare favorably with the Reverend George F. Hall,\nof Decatur, Illinois, and the Reverend Doctor John P. D. John, and the\nReverend Doctor Frederick Bell, late of the Metropolitan Temple of\nSan Francisco, California, who at various times challenged Robert G.\nIngersoll to debate with them. It shows what ignorance, superstition\nand egotism combined can do.\n\nDarwin said the herding instinct in animals has its base in fear. Sheep\nand cattle go in droves, while a lion simply flocks with his mate.\nThose who wish to lead have always fostered fear, encouraging this\ntendency to herd, promising protection, and offering what they call\nknowledge in return for a luxurious living.\n\nIn other words, the men who preach and pray, always want the people\nwho _work_ to divide with them. They work on the line that fear will\ncompel men to join churches. This joining instinct is a manifestation\nof weakness. By going with a gang they hope to get to Heaven. But the\nmoment you eliminate the Devil from Christianity, there is nothing\nleft. You can not have a revival, alias an epidemic, of religion,\nwithout the Devil. If there were no Devil, there would be nothing to\npray about, and all these people who are gifted in prayer would be\nwithout a job.\n\nThink of the chaplains of the Army and Navy, in Congress and in the\nLegislatures being turned out to browse for themselves. Think of their\nbeing obliged to earn an honest living. They could not do it. I am\namused when I think of the prayers that are exchanged in war times. One\nside will pray that the wrath of Heaven will descend on the other, and\nthe other side will return the compliment with ten per cent interest.\n\nI remember when I was a child of reading the prayer of a Hungarian\nofficer. He said: \"O Lord, I will not ask thee to help us, and I know\nthat thou wilt not help the Austrians. But if thou wilt sit on yonder\nhill, thou shalt not be ashamed of thy children.\"\n\nThe famous Bishop Leslie prayed before a battle in Ireland, \"O God, for\nour unworthiness we are not fit to claim thy help, but if we are bad,\nour enemies are worse, and if thou seest not meet to help us, we pray\nthee help them not, but stand thou neutral this day, and leave it to\nthe arm of flesh.\"\n\nAll this dramatic power would be lost without the Devil. So it behooves\nthe Christian churches to hold fast to the Devil. Get a good grip on\nhis hoofs, horns and tail, for without him they would be relegated to\n\"innocuous desuetude.\" He should be incorporated as the fourth person\nin the Orthodox Godhead, and respectfully addressed as \"Holy Devil.\"\n\n  _There is no truth in the dogma of the divinity of Jesus, no sense\n  in it, no religion in it. It is the product of mythology and has no\n  claim upon this age._\n\n\n\n\n  This is my doctrine: Give every other human being every right\n  you claim for yourself. Keep your mind open to the influences of\n  Nature. Receive new thoughts with hospitality. Let us advance.\n\n  The man who does not do his own thinking is a slave, and is a\n  traitor to himself and to his fellowmen.\n\n  As far as I am concerned, I wish to be out on the high seas. I wish\n  to take my chances with wind and wave and star. And I had rather\n  go down in the glory and grandeur of the storm, than to rot in any\n  orthodox harbor whatever.\n\n                                             --_Robert Ingersoll._\n\n\n\n\nWHAT I KNOW ABOUT SOME CHURCHES AND WHY I AM AN AGNOSTIC\n\n\n\n\n  The ignorance of the masses insures abundant contributions to the\n  clergy and to religion.--_Ralph W. Chainey._\n\n  The mother who teaches her child to pray makes a mistake.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nWHY I AM AN AGNOSTIC\n\n\nThe Millerites--or Second Adventists, as they now call themselves--are\nthe first sect that I remember. They are a people of remarkable vigor:\nthey have been at work for seventy years to bring this world to an end,\nand although they have been wrong in their arithmetic all these years,\nthey rub out the slate and begin again.\n\nAnd they prove everything by the Bible, as all other denominations do.\nThe \"time\" has been set at least twenty times since I can remember. I\nrecollect having awful palpitations in the kneepans upon one of the\neventful days, and crawling under the barn so as not to be in the\nway. They used to congregate on the height of land near my father's,\n\"to go up,\" and one man climbed upon an old shed, and fell and broke\nhis hip; he fainted, and they thought he was dead. As soon as he had\nrevived a little, they asked him if he had any requests to make before\nhe died. He replied, \"I want you to work in 'durn fool' somewhere on\nmy tombstone.\" He recovered, and lived many years, but he was cured of\nMillerism.\n\nA large share of the students of the Second Advent doctrine came into\nthis world, not only naked, but without any brains, nor any place\nsuitable to put any; and the first business they do is to wonder about\ntheir souls and talk about being \"born again.\" They never seem to\nrealize that to be well born is much more essential than to be \"born\nagain.\" I never knew immortality to be secured at the second birth.\n\nI attended one of their meetings this year, and asked one of the\nsisters for their _creed_. She said, \"Our creed is the whole Bible,\nfrom the first book of Genesis to the last word of the last chapter of\nRevelations.\"\n\nI thought of what a boy said when the Baptist Elder came and took tea\nat his home, and asked a \"blessing.\"\n\nThe boy said: \"Is that the way you ask a blessing? My father doesn't\nask it that way.\"\n\n\"How does he ask it?\"\n\n\"Oh, he sat down to the table the other evening, and looked it all\nover, and said, 'My God, what a supper!'\"\n\nAnd I thought, \"My God, what a creed!\"\n\nI was tempted to ask the Millerite sister what she thought of the\ndiscrepancy between the first and the second chapter of Genesis. In the\nfirst chapter Man and Woman were a simultaneous creation. In the second\nchapter, Woman was an afterthought. But I had the deep sagacity to\nhold my tongue, and leave her and her _creed_ in peace.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe second church that I remember anything about is the Free-Will\nBaptist. My mother was a devout member of that church. I have heard\nthousands of times, \"Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit,\nhe can not enter into the Kingdom of God.\" And man included woman--it\nalways did, so far as pains and penalties were concerned.\n\nI remember distinctly a sermon I heard on Hell. You younger people can\nnot have the faintest idea of the terrific sermons that were preached\nin those days.\n\nThat sermon commenced in this wise:\n\n\"Now we will look into Hell and see what we can see. It is all red-hot\nlike red-hot iron. Streams of burning pitch and sulphur run through it.\nThe floor blazes up to the roof. Look at the walls--the enormous stones\nare red-hot. Sparks of fire are always falling down from them. Lift\nup your eyes to the roof of Hell. It is like a sheet of blazing fire.\nHell is filled with a fog of fire. In Hell, torrents not of water, but\nof fire and brimstone, are rained down. You may have seen a house on\nfire, but you never saw a house made of fire. Hell is a house made of\nfire. The fire of Hell burns the devils, who are spirits, for it was\nprepared for them. But it will burn the body as well as the soul.\nTake a little spark out of Hell--less than the size of a pin-head--and\nthrow it into the ocean, and it will not go out. In one moment it\nwould dry up all the waters of the ocean, and set the whole world in a\nblaze! Listen to the terrific noise of Hell--to the horrible uproar of\ncountless millions of tormented creatures, mad with the fury of Hell!\nOh, the screams of fear, the groanings of horror, the yells of rage,\nthe cries of pain, the shouts of agony, the shrieks of despair, from\nmillions on millions. You hear them roaring like lions, hissing like\nserpents, howling like dogs, and wailing like dragons! And above all,\nyou hear the roaring of the thunder of God's anger, which shakes Hell\nto its foundations. Little children, if you go to Hell, there will be a\ndevil at your side to strike you. How will you feel after you have been\nstruck every minute for a hundred millions of years? Look into this\ninner room of Hell, and see a girl of about sixteen. She stands in the\nmiddle of a red-hot floor; her feet are bare; sleep can never come to\nher; she can never forget for one moment in all the eternity of years.\"\n\nAnd so this description of Hell went on for nearly two hours. Do you\nwonder that I, a child of ten years, said to my father, who was a\nfreethinker, infidel, atheist, or whatever else you please to call him:\n\"I _hate_ my mother's church. I will _not_ go there again!\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe next church I became acquainted with was the Calvin Baptist Church.\nThat church seemed to think that the most of us were born to be damned\nanyway!\n\nThe great Ingersoll had it right when he said it was the\ndamned-if-you-do-and-the-damned-if-you-don't church.\n\nThe only difference between the Free-Will Baptists and the Calvin\nBaptists that I can see, is, that you are allowed to exercise your\n_will_. The Free-Will Baptists will damn you if you wish to be, and the\nCalvinists will damn you anyway!\n\nThe next church to which I was introduced was the Congregationalist,\nalias the Orthodox. Their creed is rather complex from a mathematical\nstandpoint. They seem to think that three Gods are one God, and one God\nis three Gods.\n\nI, having been taught that figures don't lie, couldn't understand it,\nuntil I thought of a boy who said to his teacher when she explained to\nhim that figures didn't lie: \"You should see my sisters at home, and\nthen on the street. You will find that figures do lie.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nI then went to Italy, and became conversant with the _outside_\ndoings of the Roman Catholic Church. I visited many of them, saw the\nbeggars eating crusts at the doors, and the well-fed priests saying\nmasses inside; saw the white hand of famine always extended, in\nbitter contrast to the magnificent cathedrals; saw well-dressed,\nintelligent-looking men and women going upstairs on their hands and\nknees, and saw hundreds of them kissing the toe of the bronze statue of\nSaint Peter; saw monks of every shade and description; and all begging\nfor the Holy Catholic Church!\n\nI attended a church festival at Rome at the Ara C\u253c\u00f4li, where the most\n\"Holy Bambino\" is kept, a little wooden doll about two feet long. It is\nsaid to be the image of Jesus. It had a crown of gold on its head and\nwas fairly ablaze with diamonds. It has great power to heal the sick.\nIt is taken to visit patients in great style--that is, if the patients\nare rich. The Bambino is placed in a coach accompanied by priests in\nfull dress. The Great Festival of the Bambino is celebrated annually.\nMilitary bands and the Soldiers of the Guard dance attendance. Saint\nGennaro is held to be the guardian saint of Naples. The alleged miracle\nby which the blood of this holy person, contained in a glass tube,\nchanges from a solid to a liquid state, is well known. Thousands go to\nsee the miracle performed. When the priest first held up the sacred\nvial with its clotted contents we could hear all about us: \"Holy\nGennaro, save and protect us! Bless the City of Naples, and keep it\nfree from plagues and earthquakes and other ills. Do this miracle so\nthat we can see that thy power and thy favor are still with us.\" And\nso it went on for an hour or more, until the great throng was nearly\nhysterical.\n\nAt last the priest stepped forward, showing that the blood flowed\nfreely in the tube, and then such a shout went up from the big crowd as\none hears only in Southern climes.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nI have never been introduced to the Church of England, alias, the\nEpiscopalian, but I've always thought if a man had a good voice, and\nunderstood the mysteries of the corkscrew, he would make a good rector.\n\nI became acquainted with a High-Church Episcopalian woman not long ago,\nand she showed me a prayer-rug and praying-costume imported from Paris.\nI told her that she looked like an angel in it, as she ought after\ngoing to all that expense and trouble; if she didn't, dressmakers might\nas well give it up and wait for Gabriel. The attitude of prayer threw\nthe back breadths of the skirt into graceful prominence, and hence the\nnecessity (which will be at once recognized by all the truly _pious_)\nof increased attention to the frills and embroidery required by the\nreligious attitude of prayer.\n\nAn old farmer in Indiana said he was a \"Piscopal.\"\n\n\"To what parish do you belong?\"\n\n\"I don't know nothing about parishes.\"\n\n\"Who confirmed you?\"\n\n\"Nobody.\"\n\n\"Then how do you belong to the Episcopalian Church?\"\n\n\"Well, last Winter I went down to Arkansas visiting, and while I was\nthere, I went to a church and it was called 'Piscopal,' and I heard\nthem say that they had done the things they ought not to have done, and\nleft undone the things they ought to have done, and I says to myself,\n'That is my fix exactly,' and ever since then I've considered myself a\n'Piscopal'!\"\n\nAnd I came to the conclusion that that is why the membership of that\nchurch is so large!\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nI know but little about the Methodists, but I do know that John Wesley,\none of the founders of that church, believed in witchcraft, and was one\nof the latest of its supporters.\n\nHistory tells us that Brother Wesley preached a sermon entitled, _The\nCause and Cure of Earthquakes_. He said that earthquakes were caused\nby sin, and the only way to stop them was to believe in his theology\nand teachings, thus showing great knowledge of seismology; but people\nwho bank on gullibility are usually safe. I know the Methodists make a\ngreat hullabaloo about their religion, and appear to think their God is\ndeaf.\n\nThe Methodist Conference has refused to allow women to be delegates to\nthe General Conference. The Methodist sisters should discipline the\nChurch.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWhat I know about the Universalists I like. They seem to think that\nwe are all in the same boat, and that one stands as good a chance as\nanother, of which I approve. When I was a child, Sylvanus Cobb, at that\ntime the great Universalist preacher, preached in the adjoining town.\nOne Sunday, my father and I went to hear him. His sermon caused a great\ncommotion, and the Baptist who preached that terrific sermon about Hell\nsaid to my mother, \"There is a wicked man about here preaching that\neverybody is to be saved; but, Sister Young, let us hope for better\nthings!\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nI believe that the Unitarians, as a class, think for themselves. I\napprove of that, and the Evangelical Alliance disapproves of them. That\nis in their favor.\n\nI taught school at Lee, New Hampshire, fifty years ago. One of the\ncommittee was a Unitarian, and one was a Quaker. I was tired of\nselecting suitable reading matter from that obscene old book, the\nBible, and I suggested that we read from some other book, which we did\nfor two mornings, when the Unitarian materialized at the schoolhouse,\nand with much suavity suggested that we read from the Bible every\nmorning, and recite the Lord's Prayer; and I, teaching school for my\nbread and butter, bowed to the suggestion, and the next morning said:\n\"Pupils, Mr. Smith prefers that we read from the Bible. Therefore, we\nwill this morning read the startling and authentic account of Jonah\nwhilst he was stopping at the submarine hotel.\" That is the most\nnarrow-minded thing I ever knew about a Unitarian; but I always thought\nMr. Smith voiced the opinion of the parents of the pupils rather than\nhis own.\n\nI am somewhat acquainted with the Church of the Latter-Day Saints,\nalias the Mormons. They are a prudent, industrious, painstaking people,\nand only about two per cent of them ever _did_ practise polygamy, and\nthat is a very small proportion for any Christian church. Brigham\nYoung never did have but seventeen wives, but Solomon had five hundred\nwives, and one thousand other lady friends, and David, whose honor\nand humility show greater in his psalms than in the history of his\nordinary, every-day life, was, as the Bible says, a man after God's own\nheart.\n\nI am sure that Brigham Young compared favorably with David. And if God\ninterviewed Moses, why shouldn't he have interviewed Joe Smith?\n\nThere are more than one thousand religions. They are founded mostly on\nfraud. All their saviors had virgins for mothers, and gods for fathers.\n\nThe churches own more than thirteen billions of property, and they are\n_all_ too dishonest to pay honest taxes. Many of the churches couldn't\nbe run three weeks without the women. They do all the work, for which\nthey get no credit.\n\nThe churches claim all the distinguished people, especially after\nthey are dead and hence can not deny their claims. They have many\ntimes claimed that Abraham Lincoln was a churchman. The Honorable\nH. C. Deming, of Connecticut, an old friend of Lincoln, said it is\nfalse. Lincoln belonged to no church, and at one time said, \"I have\nnever united myself to any church, because I have found difficulty in\ngiving my assent without mental reservation to the long, complicated\nstatements of Christian doctrine, which characterize their articles of\nbelief, and confessions of faith.\" But still they claim him. Honest,\nvery!\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nNo institution in modern civilization is so tyrannical and so unjust to\nwomen as is the Christian church. The history of the Church does not\ncontain a single suggestion for the equality of woman with man, and\nstill the Church claims that woman owes her advancement to the Bible.\nShe owes it much more to the dictionary.\n\nHistory, both ancient and modern, tells us that the condition of women\nis most degraded in those countries where Church and State are in\nclosest affiliation (such as, Spain, Italy, Russia and Ireland), and\nmost advanced in nations where the power of ecclesiasticism is markedly\non the wane. It has been proved that, whatever progress woman has made\nin any department of effort, she has accomplished independent of, and\nin opposition to, the so-called inspired and infallible Word of God;\nand that the Bible has been of more injury to her than has any other\nbook ever written in the history of the world.\n\nWilliam Root Bliss, in his _Side Glimpses From the Colonial\nMeetinghouse_, tells us many startling truths concerning the Puritans,\nand reminds me of what Chauncey M. Depew said--that the _first_ thing\nthe Puritans did, after they landed at Plymouth, was to fall on their\nknees, and the _second_ thing was to fall on the Aborigines.\n\nThe business of trading in slaves was not immoral by the estimate of\npublic opinion in Colonial times. A deacon of the church in Newport\nesteemed the slave trade, with its rum accessories, as home missionary\nwork. It is said that on the first Sunday after the arrival of his\nslaves he was accustomed to offer thanks that an overruling Providence\nhad been pleased to bring to this land of freedom another cargo of\nbenighted heathen to enjoy the blessings of a Gospel dispensation.\n\nAt a Bridgewater town meeting of the year Sixteen Hundred Seventy-six,\na vote was called to see what should be done with the money that was\nmade from selling the Indians.\n\nJohn Bacon of Barnstable directed in his will that his Indian slave\nDinah be sold and the proceeds used \"by my executors in buying Bibles.\"\nBy men who sat in the Colonial meetinghouse, the first fugitive-slave\nlaw was formed. This law became a part of the Articles of Confederation\nbetween all the New England Colonies.\n\nThe affinity between _rum_ and the religion of Colonial times was\nexemplified in the license granted John Vyall to keep a house of\nentertainment in Boston. He must keep it near the meetinghouse of the\nSecond Church, where he extended his invitation to thirsty sinners who\nwere going to hear John Mayo or Increase Mather preach.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe importation of slaves began early. The first arrival at Boston\nwas by the ship _Desire_, on February Twenty-sixth, Sixteen Hundred\nThirty-seven, bringing negroes, tobacco and cotton from Barbados. She\nhad sailed from Boston eleven months before, carrying Indian captives\nto the Bermudas to be sold as slaves, and thus she became noted as the\nfirst New England slave-ship.\n\nIn time, slaves were brought to Boston direct from Africa.\n\nAdvertisements of just-arrived negroes to be sold may be seen in the\nBoston _News Letter_ of the years Seventeen Hundred Twenty-six and\nSeventeen Hundred Twenty-seven. The pious Puritans did not hesitate to\nsell slaves on the auction-block. I find in the Boston _News Letter_\nof September Nineteenth, Seventeen Hundred Fifteen, a notice of an\nauction-sale at Newport, Rhode Island, of several Indians, men and\nboys, and a very likely negro man. They were treated in all respects as\nmerchandise, and were rated with horses and cattle.\n\nPeter Faneuil, to whom Boston is indebted for its Cradle of Liberty,\nwas deep in the business. In an inventory of the property of Parson\nWilliams of Deerfield, in Seventeen Hundred Twenty-nine, his slaves\nwere rated with his horses and cows. \"Believe and be baptized\" is all\nthat was essential. I think many of them would have been improved by\nanchoring them out overnight.\n\nA negro preacher whom I knew came to me when I was in Florida, and\nsaid: \"What shall I preach about tomorrow? I'se done preached myself\n'plumb out.' I'se worked on election sanctification and damnation\npredestination till I can't say another word to save my life.\"\n\nI said, \"Preach a sermon on 'Thou shalt not steal' for a text.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" he said, \"that certainly _is_ a good text, but I am monstros\n'fraid it will produce a coolness in my congregation!\"\n\nDoubtless it would produce a coolness in many a congregation today.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nNow I want to talk a little about _law_ and its penalty. We want to\nconsider the invariable laws of Nature. Let us look at it in the way in\nwhich we became acquainted with it--through experience.\n\nTo the child, law is an educator; he plays with fire and is burned.\nLaw and its penalty have done their work. A burnt child dreads the\nfire. On that point his education is complete. He cuts himself with a\nknife; again the law works. Do not play with edged tools is the lesson.\nAnd so, whenever he comes in contact with external objects, he learns\nsomething very definite from them; and if he has any sense, he soon\nconforms to the order which he sees in force all around him. He does\nwhat he can to act in such a way as not to run counter to Nature's\nlaws; or, at least, Nature teaches him to do so by repeated suffering\nwhen he acts otherwise. The law thus far is all in favor of life,\nand is teaching the child to preserve it. He must eat not to starve;\nhe must be clothed not to freeze; he must not be burned, or cut, or\ncrushed. In one word, he must take care of himself, and be careful of\nexternal objects, or he must be hurt.\n\nBut his education has another connection with law. If he has proper\nparents he learns that he can not lie, or steal, or do many other\nthings without suffering a penalty. If he has no home education in\nthis matter, the reform-school and the jail step in and take up the\nlesson.\n\nAnd so the law teaches him that his actions must be of a certain\nquality, both with respect to external Nature and his fellowmen, or\nthat he must pay a penalty.\n\nThus he comes to man's estate, and law has been to him an educator and\na good one. He has learned that Nature's law means punishment every\ntime it is violated, and that man's law, whatever it may attain to,\n_aims_ at the same object as Nature's law.\n\nBut neither his education nor his contact with law ends with his\nyouth. Hitherto he has obeyed blindly for fear of the penalty. He now\nobeys intelligently, and connected with the penalty to be incurred by\ndisobedience is the reward to be obtained through obedience. He finds\nthat every act, every thought, of his brings him in direct contact\nwith law. He can not elude it by standing still, for no man can stand\nstill. He must go forward, or backward. This is an inexorable law;\nwith progress, improvement; without progress, what? Rest? Repose?\nNo! Deterioration. No man can stand still in this universe for a day\nwithout losing something. The man who means to do anything in life must\ngo forward; if he falters, another goes ahead; and then he learns that\nthe penalty of faltering is failure.\n\nNature works no special miracles in any one's favor. Nature works\nno miracles, anyway. The sun and the moon did _not_ stand still at\nJoshua's command!\n\nNo riches and influence can buy exemption from Nature.\n\nLaw says to the poor man who is dependent on his daily toil: \"You have\nonly yourself to rely upon. Take care of your health; be temperate,\nhonest and industrious, for sickness, imprisonment, idleness, mean to\nyou death.\"\n\nIt says to the rich man: \"Inherited wealth has exempted you from\n_daily_ labor of body, but it has not earned for you rest. Go to work;\ndo something, or your mind and body will be enfeebled; your sympathies\nwill disappear; you will become dry as the summer's dust; you will sink\ninto a nonentity.\"\n\nThe whole cry of Nature's law is onward and upward. Evolution is the\nword--there is no God about it. It is not alone the survival of the\nfittest--that is only a part of the process. It is the fittest of one\ngeneration becoming something better and higher for the next.\n\nIt is the fashion now to say that the struggle for existence becomes\nyearly more fierce, but that is not so. The truth is that those who\nstruggle become with each survival fitter to struggle, and that for\nwhich they struggle is placed one step forward. Men used to want\nthousands and hundreds of thousands; now, they want millions and\nhundreds of millions. They used to want general knowledge; now, they\nare all specialists, and cry out that life is too short. Steam used\nto content them; now, electricity does not satisfy them, and they are\ngrasping at the possibilities of the mighty currents of air caused by\nthe revolutions of the earth itself.\n\nThe law of progress is not limited to the mind. The body shares in\nit. Men are stronger, larger, longer-lived than they have ever been.\nEven with the animals, finer, better breeds are constantly producing\nthemselves under law.\n\nThis law of the survival of the fittest and the elevation of the type\nof the fittest pronounced against slavery, and a nation paid the\npenalty in blood, as Spain has, and other nations will pay it. It has\npronounced against the subjection of women, and let those who stand in\nthe way, beware, lest some ruin crush them as it falls!\n\nThe type of sympathy has become higher and tenderer. Sweet hands of\nmercy are now stretched down even to the brutes. Let those lovers of\nthe past who can see no progress in the present, who would question\nthis onward tendency, and the result of law, let them remember\nthat they must run rapidly to keep from being overwhelmed by the\n_expansionists_.\n\nNature's law teaches us that like begets like. You plant a grain of\nwheat, and you reap wheat. You breed Morgan stock and the foal is of\nMorgan blood. The child is the offspring of certain parents, and it\ninherits their blood. If parents choose to unfit themselves to be\nhealthy parents, who shall be blamed?\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nShall gravitation cease as I go by? Teach children that no amount of\nso-called religion will compensate for rheumatism; that Christianity\nhas nothing to do with morality; that \"vicarious atonement\" is a fraud,\nand a lie; that to be born well and strong is the highest birth; that\nto be honest and pay one's debts spells peace of mind; that the Bible\nis no more inspired than the dictionary; that _sin_ is a transgression\nof the laws of life, and that the blood of all the bulls and goats\nand lambs of ancient times, and the blood of Christ or any other man,\nnever had, and never can have, the least effect in making a life what\nit would have been had it obeyed the laws of life. If you have marred\nyour life, you must bear the consequences. If you have made a mistake,\nbe more careful in the future. Let the thought that the past is\nirretrievable make you more careful in the present and for the future.\n\nAnd, above all, teach children that prayer is idiotic. There may be\none God or twenty. I do not know or care. I am not afraid, and no\npriest or parson can make me believe that my title to a future life, if\nthere be one, is defective. And the great and good man Thomas Paine,\nwho wrote the _Age of Reason_, and said, \"The world is my country, and\nto do good my religion,\" is a good enough god for me. And the great\nIngersoll, who said, \"I belong to the great Church that holds the world\nwithin its starlit aisles; that claims the great and good of every\nrace and clime; that finds with joy the grain of gold in every creed\nand floods with light and love the germs of good in every soul,\" is\nin my opinion an excellent god--as good as any that ever lived, from\nConfucius to Christ. A friend of mine said to me, \"Ingersoll should\nhave been a Christian.\" I replied, \"The dog-collar of Christianity did\nnot belong on his neck: he preached the truth; he preferred that to the\nBible. I can not imagine the great Ingersoll preaching from II Kings\nxiv: 35.\"\n\n  _When I was a child I heard very little about Christmas and nothing\n  about Lent and Easter. I was taught to be honest and truthful and\n  to pay one hundred cents on a dollar. In my opinion there is no\n  Bible extant so good as Ingersoll's Complete Works._\n\n\n\n\nA LETTER AND THE REJOINDER\n\n\n\n\n  Fear paralyzes the brain. Progress is born of courage. Fear\n  believes--courage doubts. Fear falls upon the earth and\n  prays--courage stands erect and thinks. Fear retreats--courage\n  advances. Fear is barbarism--courage is civilization. Fear believes\n  in witchcraft, in devils and in ghosts. Fear is religion--courage\n  is science.\n\n  There are real crimes enough without creating artificial ones. All\n  progress in legislation has for centuries consisted in repealing\n  the laws of the ghosts.\n\n                                             --_Robert Ingersoll._\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nA LETTER AND THE REJOINDER\n\nA LABOR OF FOLLY\n\n_From the Portsmouth \"Times\"_\n\n\nOur old friend, Marilla M. Ricker, of Dover, lifelong advocate of\n\"woman's rights,\" zealous champion of \"freethought,\" admirer of Bob\nIngersoll, worshiper of Tom Paine, and collaborator of Elbert Hubbard,\nwho fears neither God, man nor the Devil, because she does not believe\nparticularly in any of them, is engaged in a labor of folly, in that\nshe is fighting the doctrine of the immortality of the human soul.\n\nIn the prosecution of her warfare she has gone into print and issued\na pamphlet in which she takes issue, primarily, with one Elder E. A.\nKenyon upon his proposition of a universal consciousness that \"if a man\ndie he shall live again,\" and even goes so far as to assert that the\nmajority of mankind believe in annihilation. Moreover, she pronounces\nthe doctrine of personal immortality \"a most selfish and harmful one,\"\n\"pernicious in its results,\" and operating for the enslavement of\nmankind, filling the world with gloom and making of man a crawling\ncoward.\n\nWe invite no controversy with Marilla, and will have none. We concede\nher right to believe anything, or nothing, to say what she thinks,\nwrite what she pleases, get it printed where she may, and circulate\nit as she can; but our advice to the dear sister is to \"let up\" on\nthis contention, wherein she is out-Ingersolling Ingersoll. He did not\nbelieve in immortality, but he did not deny it. He claimed that he did\nnot know, and that no man could know it to be a fact; but he never\nsought to blot out hope. And the truth is that but for this hope of\nimmortal existence, entertained by the vast majority of the race, in\nall lands and ages, life would not be worth living, and men and women\neverywhere would lie down and perish in despair. It is this hope, or\nfaith, or consciousness--however we may express it--of life beyond\nthe grave, or the immortality of the soul, that inspires mankind to\nall that is noble and heroic in the great struggle for progress and\ndevelopment here. Without it there would be no incentive effort beyond\nthat which impels the brute. Without it, in fact, man would be mere\nbrute, and nothing else.\n\nThat the horrid doctrines of Calvinism were dinned into Mrs. Ricker's\nears in childhood, and the fear of eternal torment held up before her,\ninstead of the infinite love of a God of Mercy and Justice, may have\nimpelled her to repudiate all idea of God or Justice, or life to\ncome; but she ought to be intelligent enough to sift the error from\nthe truth and cling to the latter. If not, she should at least be\nwilling to allow others to do so. She may repudiate the old Calvinism,\nor even Christianity itself. She may become a Mohammedan, a Buddhist,\nan Agnostic or an out-and-out \"heathen\" if she will. She may accept\nannihilation as the universal fate of humanity; but she should be\nwilling to allow mankind in general its indulgence in that one \"Great\nHope,\" which has illumined with immortal splendor the darkest passages\nof human life, and sustains the soul of man and woman in the severest\ntrials and conflicts of earth.\n\n\nTHE REJOINDER\n\n(_From the Portsmouth \"Times\"_)\n\nI was amused when I read in the Portsmouth _Times_ an article from my\nfriend Metcalf, entitled, A _Labor of Folly_. The genial Henry said\nI was a lifelong advocate of \"woman's rights,\" which is true. And an\nadmirer of Ingersoll. Could any one help admire that great and good\nman? And a worshiper of Thomas Paine. Worship is rather a strong word\nto apply to me, but I think the man who said, \"The world is my country,\nand to do good my religion,\" and who did more than any other man to\nput the stars on our flag and to give that flag to the breeze, should\nbe loved and respected.\n\nHe, the aforesaid Henry, said I collaborated with Elbert Hubbard. I am\nproud of that, whether it is true or not.\n\nI consider Hubbard the most brilliant writer in this country.\n\nHenry also said I feared neither God, man nor the Devil, because I did\nnot believe particularly in any of them. If he would add an \"o\" to\nGod and make it good, take the \"d\" from devil and make it evil, then\nI would have something tangible to write about besides man, in whom I\nbelieve.\n\nHenry also said that I was engaged in a \"labor of folly,\" fighting the\ndoctrine of the immortality of the soul.\n\nI simply expressed my opinion on the subject. My friend Henry wrote me\nnot long ago that there was no earthly need of a Freethought paper;\nthat thought was as free as air always and everywhere. I take issue\nwith him there, and I call his attention to the _Little Journey_ to\nthe home of Copernicus--of January, Nineteen Hundred Five--by Elbert\nHubbard. Copernicus was the founder of modern astronomy.\n\nIf Henry will read his life he can see what freethought meant at that\ntime. I also call his attention to Giordano Bruno. He can see what\nhappened to him and how free thought was at that time. Henry said I\ncould write what I pleased, and get it printed where I could.\n\nThat was well added, for I could not in the year Nineteen Hundred Nine,\nin the city of Dover, New Hampshire, get my article on Immortality\nprinted in the only paper in the city; so you see how freethought is up\nto date.\n\nI certainly \"take issue\" with Henry, \"That the hope or consciousness\nof life beyond the grave, or immortality of the soul, inspires mankind\nto all that is noble and heroic in the great struggle for progress and\ndevelopment here.\"\n\nRobert Ingersoll did not believe in immortality, but he was a great,\ntender-hearted man, full of kindness, full of generous impulses. No man\never loved the true, the good and the beautiful more than he. He would\ntake the case of a poor man into court without pay; he would give a\nyoung reporter an interview when he could sell every word he spoke for\na dollar; he would present the proceeds of a lecture to some worthy\nobject as though he were throwing a nickel to an organ-grinder; and\nwhen there was persecution he was on the side of the persecuted.\n\nI do not believe in individual immortality, but I do the best I can,\npay one hundred cents on the dollar, and I am not afraid to die. I\nknow thousands who believe as I do.\n\nJohn Wesley, the founder of Methodism, believed in the immortality\nof the soul--so do his followers. He also believed that sin was the\ncause of earthquakes, and the only way to stop them was to believe in\nthe Lord Jesus Christ. He didn't know much about seismology, but he\ncertainly had faith, plus.\n\nJohn Calvin founded the Presbyterian Church; he believed in the\nimmortality of the soul. So do his followers; but Calvin was a murderer.\n\nHenry, it is absurd to say that without hope of immortality we should\nbe degraded to brutes; in my opinion it is not true. What we want is a\nreligion that will pay debts; that will practise honesty in business\nlife; that will treat employees with justice and consideration;\nthat will render employers full and faithful work; that will keep\nbank-cashiers true, officeholders patriotic, and reliable citizens\ninterested in the purity of politics (and the woman citizen will\nbe)--such a religion is real, vital and effective. But a religion that\nembraces vicarious atonement, miraculous conception, regeneration by\nfaith, baptism, individual immortality and other monkey business is, in\nmy opinion, degrading, absurd and unworthy.\n\nHenry, you say you want no controversy with me. I enjoy controversy,\nbut if you are averse to it I'll stop and we will unite in singing one\nstanza of that Christian hymn:\n\n    King David and King Solomon\n      Led merry, merry lives\n    With their many, many lady friends\n      And their many, many wives;\n    But when old age came o'er them\n      With its many, many qualms,\n    (It was said)\n    King Solomon wrote the Proverbs\n      And King David wrote the Psalms.\n\nBut did they?\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\n  Where religion is afraid of liberty, liberty should be afraid of\n  religion.--_Lemuel K. Washburn._\n\n  So long as man believes that he has an immortal soul, he will fear\n  the future.\n\n\n\n\nTHE HOLY GHOST\n\n\n\n\n  For ages, a deadly conflict has been waged between a few brave men\n  and women of thought and genius upon the one side, and the great\n  ignorant religious mass on the other. This is the war between\n  Science and Faith. The few have appealed to reason, to honor,\n  to law, to freedom, to the known, and to happiness here in this\n  world. The many have appealed to prejudice, to fear, to miracle,\n  to slavery, to the unknown, and to misery hereafter. The few have\n  said, \"Think!\" The many have said, \"Believe!\"\n\n                                             --_Robert Ingersoll._\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nTHE HOLY GHOST\n\n\nOf all the weird, fanciful and fabulous stories appertaining to\nthe gods and other pious frauds, that concerning the Holy Ghost\nranks them all! Now listen to what the Bible has to say about\nthat mythical personage--alias, the Holy Ghost. You will see that\nscarcely any two references to it agree in assigning it the same\ncharacter or attributes. (It reminds me of what an old lady said at a\nprayer-meeting: \"Dear brothers and sisters, it seems to me that there\nare no two of a mind here tonight, nor hardly one!\")\n\nIn John xiv: 26, the Holy Ghost is spoken of as a person or personal\nGod. In Luke iii: 22, the Holy Ghost changes and assumes the form of\na dove. In Matthew xiii: 16, the Holy Ghost becomes a spirit. In John\ni: 32, the Holy Ghost is presented as an inanimate senseless object.\nIn I John v: 7, the Holy Ghost becomes a God--the third member of\nthe Trinity. In Acts ii: 1, the Holy Ghost is averred to be a mighty\nrushing wind. In Acts x: 38, the Holy Ghost, we infer from its mode\nof application, is an ointment. In John xx: 22, the Holy Ghost is the\nbreath, as we legitimately infer by its being breathed into the mouth\nof the recipient after the ancient Oriental custom. In Acts ii: 3, we\nlearn the Holy Ghost \"sat upon each of them.\" In Acts ii: 1, the Holy\nGhost appears as cloven tongues of fire. In Luke ii: 26, the Holy Ghost\nis the author of a revelation or inspiration. In Mark i: 8, the Holy\nGhost is a medium or element for baptism. In Acts xxviii: 25, the Holy\nGhost appears with vocal organs and speaks. In Hebrews vi: 4, the Holy\nGhost is dealt out or imparted by measure. In Luke iii: 22 the Holy\nGhost appears with a tangible body. In Luke i: 5, we are taught that\npeople are filled with the Holy Ghost. In Matthew xi: 15, the Holy Ghost\nfalls upon the people as a ponderable substance. In Luke iv: 1, the Holy\nGhost is a God within a God--Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost.\n\nThese are only a few quotations. There are many more, but we can all\nsee what a multifarious personage, or rather _he_, _she_, or _it_ the\nHoly Ghost is.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nI remember hearing much about the unpardonable sin against the Holy\nGhost. The sin against the Holy Ghost consisted in resisting its\noperations in the second birth--that is, the regeneration of the heart\nor soul by the Holy Ghost. And it was considered unpardonable simply\nbecause as the pardoning and cleansing process consisted in, or was at\nleast always accompanied with, baptism by water, in which operation\nthe Holy Ghost was the agent in effecting the \"new birth,\" therefore,\nwhen the ministrations or operations of this indispensable agent were\nresisted or rejected, there was no channel, no means, no possible mode\nleft for the sinner to find a renewed acceptance with God.\n\nWhen a person sinned against the Father or the Son, he could find a\ndoor of forgiveness through the baptizing processes, spiritual or\nelementary, of the Holy Ghost. But an offense committed against this\nthird limb of the Godhead had the effect of closing and barring the\ndoor so that there could be no forgiveness, either in this life or in\nthat which is to come.\n\nTo sin against the Holy Ghost was to tear down the scaffold by which\nthe door of Heaven was to be reached. This _sin_ against the Holy Ghost\nhas caused thousands of the disciples of the Christian faith the most\nagonizing hours of alarm and despair.\n\nIt has always been my opinion that many people who thought they had\nsinned against the Holy Ghost simply had dyspepsia.\n\n  _If people should deceive in other matters as the priests, parsons\n  and teachers do in religion, they would not escape arrest._\n\n\n\n\n  The destruction of religions and superstition means the upbuilding\n  of charity and ethics.--_Ralph W. Chainey._\n\n  Superstition is nothing but a misplaced fear of some fancied\n  supernatural phantasm of divinity.\n\n\n\n\nHOW CAN WE \"TAKE\" CHRIST?\n\n\n\n\n  All that is good in our civilization is the result of commerce,\n  climate, soil, geographical position, industry, invention,\n  discovery, art and science. The Church has been the enemy of\n  progress, for the reason that it has endeavored to prevent man\n  from thinking for himself. To prevent thought is to prevent all\n  advancement except in the direction of faith.\n\n                                             --_Robert Ingersoll._\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nHOW CAN WE \"TAKE\" CHRIST?\n\n\nI receive many letters from various people telling me that Christ is\nmine if I will only take him. I am always amused at the solicitations\nof these people and feel as President Taft did when Peary \"laid the\nPole\" at his feet. Taft replied he had no idea what he should do with\nit. I should not know what to do with Christ if I took him.\n\nWhat can they mean by taking Christ? The word Christ is used to\ndesignate a certain individual who died, if he ever lived, nearly two\nthousand years ago. Now to take this person we should have to take\nhim from the earth where he was buried. I am at a loss to comprehend\nwhat Christians mean when they offer Christ to any one. What right has\nan individual today to offer another a person who has been dead two\nthousand years? I fail to see any sense in such an offer.\n\nCertain men and women go about the world asking people to come to\nChrist, to accept Christ. What do they mean--do they know?\n\nIn my opinion the supreme dogma of Christianity is the divinity of\nJesus. If Jesus was a man, all that was related of his divine acts\nin the four Gospels is false. How would a person like the Nazarene\npeasant be accepted today were he to play the part of a god?\n\nSuppose a person who had lived in our neighborhood should come to us\nand say, \"I am God, and I want you to help me save the world; quit your\nwork and follow me.\" What would you think of him? Would any one pay\nthe least attention to him, except to think he was insane and have him\nplaced in an asylum for safety?\n\nThe people who are preaching the divinity of Jesus know nothing about\nhim except what they read in a book that was written by unknown\nauthors. Jesus is the last hope of Christian theology. He is the only\nsolution of the divine problem that Christianity has to offer. Is\nnot the direction of the world's most rational thought away from the\nChristian notion of Jesus? In my opinion it is.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nLet us look at the once famous stronghold of New England Orthodoxy, the\nAndover Theological Seminary, which was chartered on June Nineteenth,\nEighteen Hundred Seven, and opened for instruction on September\nTwenty-eighth, Eighteen Hundred Eight. I think it was about seven years\nago that it was transferred to Cambridge and became a part of Harvard\nUniversity. At that time the school consisted of seven instructors,\ntwelve students and a library of sixty-five thousand books, with an\nendowment of eight hundred fifty thousand dollars in productive funds\nand an annual income of thirty-five thousand dollars.\n\nIt has been said that the highways were scoured every Summer for\nstudents, and enticing scholarships held out, but to no avail. No\nstudents materialized.\n\nWhy is this? In my opinion it is the rising generation's\ndissatisfaction with traditional theology; they have outgrown it.\nIngersoll said that once in five years the President of the Seminary\nsummoned his professors before him to make oath that they had learned\nabsolutely nothing during the preceding five years and would not learn\nanything for the next five years. And that promise was not subject to\nrecall.\n\nBut even Andover couldn't remain in that condition. In Eighteen Hundred\nEighty-six it announced its new system of \"progressive orthodoxy.\" This\ncreated a division between the Old School and the New, and marked the\nbeginning of the end of Andover; and after much litigation it consented\nto be \"gathered in\" by Harvard or \"swallowed,\" or perhaps they would\nsay \"merged.\"\n\nThey have now a new building located upon land adjacent to that of\nHarvard University, and the last account from the \"Great Seminary\" was\nthat they had twenty-four pupils. The library of the Seminary and\nthat of the Harvard Divinity School have been combined and are housed\ntogether in Bartlett Hall.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe defenders of the Gospel of Christ don't seem to be increasing;\non the contrary, there seems to be great depression in matters\necclesiastical these days, even in puritanical New England. It\nplainly shows that the young men of the present day are not anxious\nto wear the \"Dog-Collar of Christianity,\" and as far as I've heard no\nChristian arose to remark that the morals of the \"Reverend\" Clarence\nRicheson were contaminated by reading the words of Thomas Paine, Robert\nIngersoll, Elbert Hubbard or Lemuel K. Washburn. The Reverend Clarence\nseemed to be a product of the Christian Bible, and talked to the last\nof his God and his Bible.\n\nWhat is left of Christianity? Who wrote the Christian Bible? The\nsmallest child in a Sunday School would answer the question by saying\n\"God,\" but the most learned person on the globe would say, \"I do\nnot know.\" It is being admitted by thinking persons that answers to\nreligious questions possess nothing more than a religious value. When\na person is graduated from a Sunday School he is wiser than he will be\nafter he has lived forty years, provided he learns anything by living.\n\n\"God\" is a term used to express what man does not know, but it does\nnot seem to me necessary to assign to the Bible divine authorship, as\nit can be accounted for on other grounds. It is certain that men and\nwomen have written books. It is not certain that there is a God and,\nif so, that he has written a book. If man could write the Bible, there\nseems to be no need for God to do so. It is a fact that no one knows\nwho wrote a word of the Bible, and yet it will require many more years\nto kill the foolish superstition that God inspired certain men to write\nthis book.\n\nNothing grows slower than truth, and nothing faster than superstition.\nFalsehood was never known to commit suicide. Unknown men wrote the\nChristian Bible, not an unknown God.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nNot many years ago I saw that a teacher in the Holyoke (Massachusetts)\nHigh School was dismissed for saying that Jesus was one of a family of\nten. Jesus is a word that paralyzes the mental faculties. As to the\naccuracy of the statement we have only the Gospels for authority. At\nany rate, if Matthew and Mark are reliable he had four brothers and\nsisters.\n\nIn Matthew xiii: 54 we read: \"Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not\nhis mother called Mary, and his brethren, James, and Joseph, and Simon,\nand Judas? And his sisters, are they not all with us?\"\n\nMark confirms Matthew about the size of Mary's family.\n\nI tried to learn something concerning this case, but silence a yard\nwide lay all about it. I fancy the teacher was silenced in some way.\nLeastwise I could learn nothing.\n\nIt doesn't take much to silence a teacher, or it didn't fifty years\nago, especially if she were dependent upon teaching for her bread and\nbutter, which I was.\n\nI, at one time, tried to substitute one of Ralph Waldo Emerson's books\nto be read in school in the morning instead of the Christian Bible. I\nwas informed by one of the committee that the Bible must be read every\nmorning and the Ten Commandments repeated. The next morning I selected\nthe \"truthful\" and startling account of Jonah whilst he was sojourning\nat the Submarine Hotel. I at that time made up my mind that if I were\never financially independent I'd say what I thought concerning the\nChristian religion, and no one doubts that I've done so.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nJesus is the last hope of Christian theology. It can be but a few years\nat most when faith in Jesus as God will be the mark of intellectual\nstupidity. It seems to me that mankind will soon be sensible enough to\ndismiss this dogma to eternal oblivion.\n\nIt is the last relic of heathen mythology that clings to modern\ncivilization. The Christian church is put to its utmost ingenuity to\nhide the absurdity in this dogma.\n\nThe dogma of the divinity of Jesus rests upon fictitious events, and\nhence its fate is sealed.\n\nMany persons regard any one that calls Jesus a man as a blasphemer.\nThere is a great amount of pious nonsense in the world, and there\nis more connected with Jesus than with any other character whom\nChristendom honors.\n\nThe reverence paid to Jesus by Christians is the homage of idolatry.\n\nThe first thing for people to do is to get rid of the silly notion that\nthere is anything holy in the name of Jesus any more than in the name\nof Hercules, Bacchus or Adonis. All the gods of the past are myths to\nthe present. Jesus stands in the way of the world's advancement. The\npath of civilization is over his grave. The mind has been fettered by\nworship of this myth. We want to get rid of the Christian superstition.\n\n  _Isn't it astonishing that many children should be taught about the\n  \"resurrection\" before they can spell cat?_\n\n\n\n\n  Whenever a man believes that he has the exact truth from God, there\n  is in that man no spirit of compromise. He has not the modesty\n  born of the imperfections of human nature; he has the arrogance of\n  theological certainty and the tyranny born of ignorant assurance.\n  Believing himself to be the slave of God, he imitates his master,\n  and of all tyrants the worst is a slave in power.\n\n  When a man really believes that it is necessary to do a certain\n  thing to be happy forever, or that a certain belief is necessary to\n  insure eternal joy, there is in that man no spirit of concession.\n  He divides the whole world into saints and sinners, into believers\n  and unbelievers, into God's sheep and Devil's goats, into people\n  who will be glorified and people who will be damned.\n\n                                             --_Robert Ingersoll._\n\n\n\n\nCOLONEL ROBERT G. INGERSOLL\n\n\n\n\n  We need no myths, no miracles, no gods, no devils.--_Robert\n  Ingersoll._\n\n  The world is my country and to do good is my religion.--_Thomas\n  Paine._\n\n  The presence of a hypocrite is a sure indication that there is a\n  Bible and a prayer-book not very far away.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nCOLONEL ROBERT G. INGERSOLL\n\n\nIt is difficult to sketch this many-sided man. He was full of pity and\nsympathy for the poor and unfortunate. He was great enough to applaud\nthe good, and good enough to forgive the erring. He could charm a child\nwith his speech, or sway thousands by his magic words. He was the\nsupreme philosopher of commonsense.\n\nHe knew how to answer a fool, but he never forgot to be courteous to\nan opponent. He would take the case of a poor man into court without\npay; he would give a young reporter an interview when he could sell\nevery word he spoke for a dollar; he would present the proceeds of a\nlecture to some worthy object as though he were throwing a nickel to\nan organ-grinder; he would lead a reform with a dozen workers if he\nbelieved them in the right, just as if he had a million followers;\nand where there was persecution he was on the side of the persecuted.\nIngersoll was the truest American that America ever bore.\n\nHe was the orator of her rivers and mountains, of her hills and dales,\nof her forests and flowers, of her struggles and victories, of her\nfree institutions, of her Stars and Stripes--the orator of the home,\nof wife and child, of love and liberty. The head, heart and hand of\nIngersoll were perfectly united and worked together. As he thought\nhe acted; when he had anything to say, he said it aloud. He was not\nashamed of his thoughts. He did not hide or go around the corner, or\nbeat about the bush. He spoke honestly what he saw, what he thought,\nwhat he knew.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nMARK TWAIN'S BEST THOUGHT\n\n\n\n\n  The entire New Testament is the work of Catholic\n  Churchmen.--_Lemuel K. Washburn._\n\n  God is not a fact; nothing that can be seen, heard or felt; nothing\n  that can be found out or in. God is a verbal content.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nMARK TWAIN'S BEST THOUGHT\n\n\nThe best thing Mark Twain ever said was, \"I should like to see the\nballot in the hands of every woman.\" Freethinkers should also remember\nhim with gratitude; he said enough from our point of view to warrant\nthat. \"Give me my glasses,\" were his last words. It will be but a short\ntime before some pious evangelical hypocrite will add, \"I want to\nread my Bible!\" They are already writing about his \"highest sphere of\nthought,\" namely, his religious thought.\n\nI remember when a Presbyterian deacon said of him, \"I would rather\nbury a daughter of mine than have her marry such a fellow.\" The church\npeople are all anxious to avoid their own history concerning Mark Twain\nand many other people.\n\nThe Reverend Doctor Twitchell said at Mark's funeral that a simple soul\nhad gone trustingly to the beyond. He didn't mention where the beyond\nwas, and he prayed to the Christian God that courage in the faith of\nimmortality be given to those who mourn.\n\nThrough all these Christian notices runs an undercurrent that Mark\nTwain was only secondarily a humorist. I knew him somewhat in the old\ndays and have heard him lecture. He certainly laughed superstition from\nthe minds of thousands, and the most of his books bear witness to his\nbroad and liberal views.\n\nThe Reverend Doctor Van Dyke mixed much religious sophistry with\nhis remarks at the funeral of Twain, but the reverend doctor is a\ntheological acrobat.\n\nHe preached once on the Atonement, and said there are a thousand\ntrue doctrines of the Atonement, which is saying substantially that\nno doctrine specifically is true--for instance, the doctrine of the\nWestminster Confession, to which Van Dyke pledged loyalty when he\nwas ordained a Presbyterian minister. He at that time ripped up the\nWestminster settlement, and reopened the whole question for discussion.\n\nAny preacher who believes in the geology of Moses, the astronomy of\nJoshua, and the mathematics of the Trinity, must do an immense amount\nof \"side-stepping.\"\n\n  _Christianity is only a bubble of superstition, and Jesus is\n  reduced to a toy god of the Sunday School._\n\n\n\n\nAN IRRELIGIOUS DISCOURSE ON RELIGION\n\n\n\n\n  Religion is inherited fear.--_Lemuel K. Washburn._\n\n  In my opinion a steeple is no more to be excluded from taxation\n  than a smokestack.\n\n  Faith is the cross on which man crucifies his liberty.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nAN IRRELIGIOUS DISCOURSE\n\n\nWe are living in the Twentieth Century of what is called the Christian\nEra, and we have not outgrown the superstitions of the First Century.\nAnd worse than this, we have not had the courage to abandon the\nfictions of the Book of Genesis for the truths of modern science. Just\nwhat the world is afraid of, that it fears to trust its senses, its\nreason, its knowledge, surpasses my understanding.\n\nOne of the first things that men and women should learn is, that there\nis nothing in the universe to be afraid of; that all the malignant\ndeities are dead; that the ancient gods that presided over the destiny\nof earth and of earthly things have all fallen from the sky; that in\nthe realm of Nature everything is natural, and that no man is pursued\nby a god of wrath and vengeance who would punish him for his unbelief.\nEvery god that can not hear the truth without getting mad should be\ndethroned. Every priest who can not join in singing the songs of\ncivilization should be warned to look out for the engine while the bell\nrings.\n\nThis world of ours is a world to be enjoyed, but it can not be enjoyed\nif we fear every manifestation of Nature and if we put a cruel god\nbehind every cloud.\n\nLet us live without fear, without superstition, without religion.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThere is nothing above, beneath or around you that cares whether you\nare a Christian or an unbeliever. The real reason why a priest hates an\nunbeliever is that he can not get a dollar out of him. He damns those\nwho know better than to swallow his say-sos. But it still remains a\nfact that an infidel can raise as many bushels of potatoes to the acre\nas can the Roman Catholic. The sun will not wrong an honest man. The\nstars will not punish a single human being for telling the truth. The\nsky will not persecute a person who gives his thoughts, his talents,\nhis time, to finding ways to help mankind.\n\nEverything that man believes in that can not be found, that can not be\nproved, that can not stand the test of commonsense: everything that\ncontradicts Nature, that is opposed to established facts, that is\ncontrary to the laws of the universe, must be given up.\n\nWe must have a new man: the man born of woman, not the man made by\nGod; the man who has been growing better ever since his advent on\nearth, not the man who has been growing worse; the man who started\nwith nothing and has conquered the earth, the sea and the air; not\nthe man who began perfect and has not got halfway back; the man who\nmade the telescope, the steam-engine, the power-loom, the telephone and\nthe wireless telegraph; not the man who made the thumbscrew, the rack,\nthe ducking-stool and the stocks; the man who has carried the torch\nof liberty to enlighten the world, not the man who has carried the\ncrucifix to enslave mankind.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt is quite common to be told what Moses said or what Jesus said. Now,\nif all that these two Hebrew gentlemen (who in my opinion never lived)\nsaid, is preserved in the Bible, I appeal from what they said to those\nwho know more. I assert that Moses said a lot of stuff that isn't so,\nand a lot more that never was so, and that all that Jesus is said to\nhave said is practically worthless to the world today; that there is\nnot in all of his utterances a single word that will help man to get a\nliving, a single word that will aid man in his struggle for knowledge;\nthat there is not a statement of a single scientific fact, or a plea\nfor human liberty in all his language. He told his generation nothing\nthat was not already known, except a mess of superstitious nonsense\nabout angels and devils, heavens and hells. His so-called gospel of\nsalvation was to follow him, and he landed on a cross.\n\nThe truth is this: the world has outgrown Moses and Jesus. It does\nnot take commands from either. This age believes in work, not worship;\nin deeds, not prayers; in men, not monks; in liberty, not in pious\nobedience; in human rights, not in submission; in knowledge, not in\nrevelation.\n\nFor hundreds of years man was bound by a religious faith, and the\npriest was his cruel master. He dared not doubt; he dared not rebel;\nhe dared not dream of freedom; but there came a time when religious\ntyranny could no longer be borne. Then Mankind cried out to the Church:\nGive back man's brain to man; restore to him the mind you have robbed\nhim of; take from his head and heart the paralyzing fear that makes him\na coward and a slave, and leave to him the liberty with which Nature\ndowered him, that his mind may discover and preserve those mighty\nthoughts which make man brave, honest, free and happy.\n\nThat cry was heard far. It was heard by glad ears, and liberty sprang\nfrom the ground like the warriors from the fabled dragon-teeth of\nCadmus. The war between liberty and tyranny, between fact and fable,\nbetween truth and falsehood, between man and priest, was on, and for\ncenturies this war has raged, nor is it yet over. Freedom still lies\nbleeding, but victory for the right will sooner or later be won.\n\nThat victory will not be complete until every man will dare to say:\nLet come what will come, no man, be he priest, minister or judge, shall\nsit upon the throne of my mind, and decide for me what is right, true\nor good. I am my own master, my own teacher, my own guide. I will keep\nmy reason free from control and will never surrender my own convictions\nto the dictates of another.\n\nNature has made every man commander of his own destiny.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nBut we are yet victims of ecclesiastical villainy. The priest is still\nthe worst enemy of mankind. His church is like that monster of fiction\nwhich lived on little children. In the name of the children I protest\nagainst the action of the Church in stealing their tender brains, in\nmaking them slaves of superstition before they are old enough to know\nto what they are doomed.\n\nThe age of consent to a religious faith should be determined by law,\nif necessary. Today any boy or girl may be the victim of a designing\npriest or clergyman, or of a designing religious system.\n\nNo person under eighteen years of age should be allowed to join a\nchurch or consent to a statement of faith. Mental purity should be\nguarded and protected as well as physical purity.\n\nWhile the Church is powerful in numbers and while its religion is\nsupported by wealth and fashion, the world is becoming more and more\nemancipated from its pernicious influence. The light that truth gives\nis still ahead of us, but _it is there_, and some day the world will\ngrow warmer under its rays and men become better and kinder to one\nanother.\n\nA hundred years ago the God worshiped in orthodox churches went about\ndrowning little boys and girls who went skating on Sundays. Those were\nthe \"good old days\" when men and women had religion for breakfast,\ndinner and supper, and took it to bed with them. It takes a long time\nto get such a horrible religion out of the system.\n\nMen and women still have a mean faith, a faith which can see others\ndamned with satisfaction if they can only be saved. Nothing but a mean\nreligion could make men and women as mean as that. I would rather\nstarve than preach the doctrine of endless pain for a human being--or\neven for a dog. I believe that this world is hard and dark and cruel\nenough without borrowing suffering from another world to make darker\nand harder the road of life and add torture to the nights of pain and\nmisery.\n\nA church must be sunk pretty low when it lives on the fears and tears\nof mankind; but what lower depths of degradation does it sound when it\ncan deliberately create fears and tears that it may live and thrive\nin its vile and cruel business! A human being without pity should be\nshunned and despised; but a human being who can fill the heart with\nterror should not be allowed in a civilized community.\n\nThe mind today wants to get out into the open, into the free daylight,\nwants to walk the earth, look at the stars and sky, feel the warmth of\nthe sun and smell the odor of the ground; it has become tired of being\nshut up in a faith, in a creed, in a church; tired of being kept in\nthe darkness of the past, in the tomb of dead thoughts, in the moldy\ncaskets of unreal things, and in the dungeon of fear.\n\nThe mind is striving to break the chains of the priest and be free from\nthe bonds of the Church.\n\nYou can not have men free where the priest demands and claims their\nobedience. The greatest menace to our national institutions is the\npower that controls men; that controls their thoughts, their actions\nand their destinies. Liberty can survive only where men are free:\nfree to think, free to read, free to speak and free to act. The mind\nmust not be bound by any vow of obedience. One man, no matter what\nhis office, what his position, what his rank, has no right to compel\nanother's obedience. This is the worst oppression on earth.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWhat is needed in this country is more men who dare think and speak\nfor themselves; who dare belong to no church; who dare work for the\nright as they see it, and speak the truth as they understand it; who\ndare live their own lives independent of fashion's demands or society's\nusages; who dare put liberty above conformity, and who dare defy\ncustoms, law and religion in their zeal to help their fellow-beings.\n\nThere is more than one liberty--more than the liberty to do right--that\nis partly won for every civilized being. There is another liberty that\nis dangerous and that persists even where civilization exists--the\nliberty to take another's liberty from him. This liberty is usually\ntaken from another in the name of God and what is called holy; but\nthere is nothing on earth so holy as liberty, and he who takes it from\nanother robs him of the dearest right possessed by man. Binding a human\nbeing with the chains of faith before that being is old enough to judge\nwhether the faith is reasonable or true is the assassination of freedom.\n\nThe greatest danger which confronts our nation today is not political\nbut religious, and the preservation of our free institutions does not\ndepend upon our army and navy, but upon the emancipation of the human\nmind from ecclesiastical slavery. As Thomas Paine well said, \"Spiritual\nfreedom is the root of political liberty.\" You can not have free\nschools, free speech and a free press where the mind is not free.\n\nThere is too much faith in this country and too little sense. Men have\ngiven up about everything they possess to be saved; but it is more\nnecessary, and more commendable in the workingmen of this nation, to\nsave their dollars than to save their souls.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nA subject that needs to be investigated quite as much as, if not more\nthan, the high cost of living is the high cost of worship. There may be\nsome justice in the criticism of the price of meats. We must remember,\nhowever, that we do get something for our money when we buy meat, but\nlet us not forget that we get absolutely nothing for the money spent\nfor worship. Money given to the Church is lost to the world. It is\nnot used to improve homes; to help the poor and needy; to alleviate\nsuffering; to bring hope to the sick or to give a few comforts to old\nage. It goes into the pocket of ecclesiastical greed.\n\nThis country just at present is suffering from those twin curses of\nhumanity--religion and Bull-Mooseism. The priest and Bull-Mooseism\nare the two worst trouble-makers in this country. To get rid of this\nprecious pair of knaves would be to bring peace on earth and hasten the\ndawn.\n\nI don't know which is the bigger knave, the priest or the Bull-Mooser,\nbut I do know that the priest is engaged in the meaner business of the\ntwo.\n\nWhen a man tries to sell me a mouse-trap to catch elephants, I am\nsuspicious of his mental sanity; and when a man tells me that eternal\nhappiness can be won by enlisting in his salvation army, I question\nhis moral sanity. I know that religion is offered at cut rates, but\nthere is no discount on morality. You can not have the reward of good\nbehavior unless you behave. You may save your soul by saying, \"I\nbelieve,\" but you have to _do_ something to save your body.\n\nThere is too much of this \"believe-in-me\" business. You don't want to\nbelieve in any one you know nothing about. The faith of a little child\nin its parents is beautiful, but the faith of a grown-up man in a\npriest is idiotic. Faith has ruined more than it has saved. With faith\ngoes obedience, and he or she who obeys is lost.\n\nThere is no honest call today to believe, because there is opportunity\nto know. Faith is hatched in the nest of imposition. He who yields\nobedience is a fool, and he who demands it is a scoundrel.\n\nIn this age, as in the past, a lie made \"holy\" is allowed to\nassassinate the truth. Nothing is cursing this nation; nothing is\ncursing human life; nothing is cursing honest effort and brave striving\nso much as what is called holiness. It is holy to believe all you are\ntold; holy to wear the robes of hypocrisy; holy to rob the poor in the\nname of God, and holy to put the poison of faith to the lips of a\nchild. It is holy to repudiate Nature and make a lie of your body, your\nmind, your life. To purify the dwelling-place of man, it is necessary\nto drive from the earth everything that religion has made holy.\n\nThe only really sacred things were holy before a church was ever built,\nbefore there was a priest on the globe.\n\nHuman love and the home which human love built for its offspring were\nthe first holy things which men and women knew, and it is this human\nlove of ours which is holier than mosque, temple or church; holier than\npriestly robe or ecclesiastical rite; holier by far than all the holy\nthings of faith.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe Church has always lived by robbing the home; the priest has always\nlived on the wages of the toiler. The gods of religion have never done\naught to lighten the heavy load on the shoulders of labor. The priest\nhas said to mankind that his Lord left this consolation to the world:\n\"Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden and I will give\nyou rest.\"\n\nWhat the priest really means is this: Come unto me and I will do the\nrest; and by the time he has done it, there is nothing of manhood left.\n\nThe priest also teaches that his Lord and Master said, \"Ask and ye\nshall receive,\" and adds, \"The Lord will provide.\" How many poor\nwretches have believed those words; but their outstretched hands\nwithered away day by day, and at last dropped empty by their sides.\nThere they lay white and cold, holding not the bread they fondly\nexpected, but holding the hand of death.\n\nIt may be pious and it may be beautiful to say, \"The Lord will\nprovide,\" but it is a lie just the same. When, the other day, the\nbodies of a mother and her two children were being carried to the\ngrave with the words, \"starved to death,\" written on their faces, but\nnot written on their caskets, it was a sufficient refutation of the\nreligious teaching that \"The Lord will provide.\" It is the plain,\nunvarnished truth that the Lord will _not_ even provide the coffin for\nthe poor victim of such a false, deceptive, religious faith.\n\nIn olden times it was customary for the Church to say, God's light\nlights the world. Not so today. God's light has gone out. It is man's\nlight that lights the world and the Church too. Our enlightenment is\nhuman, not divine. No altar of religion burns with the fire of truth.\nScience carries the torch of knowledge: liberty is the way and truth is\nthe goal.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nOn our earth gods no longer make their homes. It was not safe for them\nto live any more. Their sons may once have married the daughters of\nmen, but they can not get a license to do so today. Parents will not\nstand for it.\n\nSo the gods have gone, bag and baggage. Where they have gone, no one\nknows. The skies give no sign that they are hiding up there. The\ntelescope has found _seventy million stars, but not one god_.\n\nIt is time for the pulpit to stop repeating the old superstitions about\nGod and about what he has done for man. He has never done any more\nfor man than he is doing today; never spoken to man any more than he\nis speaking today; never revealed himself to anybody any more than he\nstands revealed to you and me and to every human being everywhere.\n\nEvery word that ever came from the mouth of God man put in his mouth,\nand every book revealed by God was written by man.\n\nHalf the work of man for the next one hundred years will be to kill the\nlies told about what God has done.\n\nWhether there is in all the vast universe a higher and nobler being\nthan man, I don't know. Whether there is in all the vast universe a\nbetter place for man to live than on this earth, I don't know. And no\none knows any more about these matters than I do.\n\nWe have found out much that is not so; now we want to find out all\nwe can that is so. And it is of no use to go to the Church to learn\nanything. The Church is only a place where falsehoods are kept in cold\nstorage. The man who thinks and studies is the man who is helping the\nworld most, not the man who preaches and prays. To find the truth one\nneeds to get as far from the Church as possible.\n\nChristians of all denominations have lots of pity for the man without\na church. Let me assure these persons that the man without a church\ndoesn't want one. As a rule, he is satisfied with what he has. He\nhas a home, which is better than a church. If those persons who are\npitying men and women for not having a church would, instead, pity\nthe man without a home, and pity him enough to help him get one, they\nwould show much better sense and manifest a truer sympathy with their\nfellow-beings.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nI can not see any good in painting a thing white that is black, or\ncalling a thing beautiful that is ugly. There are persons who talk as\nthough they believed that a Northeast storm was sunshine. I am not made\nthat way. I am as ready and as willing as anybody to acknowledge the\ngood in Nature, or the good in life, but I do not believe in lying, in\nsaying that wrong is right, or that suffering is to be enjoyed. There\nare lots of hard things in our life, and it does not alter facts to\ncall them by some other name. A man dying with a cancer can not be made\nto believe that he is having a good time.\n\nThe most that any man can do who goes through this earthly existence\nis to use his fellow-mortals right and square; to give them an honest\nday's work when he works for them and an honest day's pay when he hires\nthem; to say nothing to hurt them and everything he can to assist them;\nto help them out of trouble and not get them into trouble. If one does\nthis, and does no more than this, he has done what beats every religion\non earth.\n\nWe have got to deal with men and women as they are and where they are.\nThe man who is natural; the man who has not been made a fool of by a\npriest or parson; the man who has not swapped his commonsense for a\nfoolish belief; the man who has not had his mind stuffed with religious\ndope, knows that this life on earth is the important life, and that it\nis a higher work to determine his fate here than anywhere else.\n\nThere is not a person living who would not be well and strong and\nhappy here rather than hereafter. I would rather have the power to\nmake every cripple straight and whole; every poor, unfortunate man\nand woman prosperous and contented; every sick person well, every\nbad person good, and every slave to vice master of his appetite and\npassions, in this life on earth, than to save the human wrecks, the\nhuman unfortunates, the human victims of vice and crime, for another\nlife somewhere else.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWhat men and women want is happiness, not Heaven. They want a good\nhome on this globe, not a loafing-place in Abraham's bosom. They want\nthe opportunity to enjoy the good things of this life, not the promise\nthat they will hear the angels sing. They want better wages for their\nwork, better treatment from their employers, and better things to\neat and drink and wear. They want better things here, not hereafter.\nThey want to be happy while they are living on earth, not have the\nassurance of happiness after they are dead. If I ever attempt to write\nmy creed, I shall say: I believe in so much that I can hardly expect to\nexpress all of my faith in one statement. I am all the time believing\nin something new. But there is one thing that I most heartily believe\nin now and have believed in ever since I was a child, and that is,\nSUNSHINE--external and internal and eternal sunshine.\n\nSunshine is the joy of the universe, and joy is the sunshine of the\nhuman heart. Let us be bright and cheerful. Let us be happy. Let us\ngive to the world the sunshine of our hearts.\n\n  _A male trinity is repulsive; Father, Mother and Child is the\n  sacred triad. The Christian trinity is a monster._\n\n\n\n\nDECAY OF CHRISTIAN MORALITY\n\n\n\n\n  Nature has no need of a Holy Ghost.--_Lemuel K. Washburn._\n\n  All progress has been due to the Devil. He was the first\n  investigator.--_Ingersoll._\n\n  God takes care of the weed. Man must take care of the corn.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nDECAY OF CHRISTIAN MORALITY\n\n\nThere is a great deal of exaggerated rhetoric employed in praising what\nis called \"Christian Morality.\" I have examined with considerable care\neverything that may justly come within the meaning of this expression,\nand I am bound to say, out of respect for the truth, that such morality\ndoes not deserve praise and can not be praised by the honest lips of an\nhonest person.\n\nI am perfectly aware that I have made a statement which challenges the\nsincerity of the Christian pulpit, but every one knows that there is\nnot a minister in Christendom whose practise agrees with his preaching.\n\nWhile it is common to hear a clergyman in pious ecstasy exhaust the\nvocabulary of laudation in his praises of the beautiful morals of the\n\"Sermon on the Mount,\" it is exceedingly rare to see one of these\nparsons sacrifice his commonsense to the nonsense of Jesus.\n\nWe are learning that the theological morality of the Christian faith is\nnot the right kind of morality to make manhood and womanhood. The great\nweakness of Christian morality is this: It depends upon the Christian\nidea of Jesus, and when the world has outgrown the superstition about\nthis person, all of his moral precepts will lose their value and their\nsplendor.\n\nMen and women of any intellectual penetration know that the New\nTestament story is founded upon unreliable tradition; that its heart is\na myth.\n\nWhere men live independent of the foolish faith of the Gospels, there\nis a character of self-reliance which towers like a mountain-peak\nabove the dead level of Christian endeavor. The person who accepts the\nChristian theology is no more in sympathy with the best thought of the\nage than is the man who wanders about the streets, begging his food and\nsleeping wherever he can, in harmony with the highest comforts of our\ncivilization.\n\nThere is a nobler purpose in a train of cars carrying grain and produce\nacross the continent than in a conference of clergymen trying to keep\nalive a theology which teaches that God was born of a Jewish maiden\nwho lived and died in Palestine, and devising ways to make the people\nbelieve the ridiculous superstition.\n\nTruth is born where men are allowed to think and speak their thoughts.\nError can not be maintained where man is permitted to ask questions.\nThe only way to preserve Christianity is to put it in a tin can and\nhave it hermetically sealed.\n\nWe are getting a new examination of the universe as a basis for our\nphilosophy. The telescope has afforded man visions far beyond the\nseventh heaven of the Apocalypse. The genesis of things is found to lie\nmillions of years back of the Genesis of the Bible. The chaos out of\nwhich this world was made has been discovered to be a previous state of\nexistence.\n\nScience is laying the new foundation for our faith, and knowledge is\nbuilding the new temple of the mind.\n\nMen and women everywhere are stating their opinions, and the world\nrecognizes that there is to be a religious controversy upon this earth\nwhich will shake to its base everything that is not true. Not one\nstone of falsehood will be left standing upon another. Every dogma of\nsuperstition must find a grave, and truth alone be reverenced by man.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe world has taken a step forward of Christianity, and in its march of\nadvancement has left behind the Christian God, the Christian Savior,\nthe Christian Bible, and the Christian Faith. But the world will not\nstop here. It must go further. The question which the human mind wants\nanswered today is this: Is the decay of Christian theology to be\nfollowed by the decay of Christian morality?\n\nI think that it is, and I also think that this morality is about as\nnear dead now as it can be.\n\nIt is true that the author of this morality is painted in divine colors\nfor human adoration Sunday after Sunday, and that his other-world\nethics are inculcated by the pulpit; but beyond these attempts to\ngive the peculiar moral teachings of Jesus the show of life, there is\nabsolutely no sign of them in the world of man.\n\nThe morality of the Christian system is not designed for humanity in\nits present condition, nor does it possess the elements necessary\nto make man into the image of any higher virtue. It is, in fact, an\nunreal, unnatural morality which Jesus taught, and the notion that men\nand women do not practise it because it is too far above them, depends\nupon an estimate of this morality which we are not willing to allow.\n\nI do not wish to be misunderstood on this point. I want to say that\nthe general moral duties of man, as they have been taught for ages by\nteachers of every race and of every religion, are not Christian, and\nthat Christian ethics are found in the code of moral duties taught by\nJesus _which are different from the recognized standard of morality\nadopted by mankind generally_. Christian morals are Christian _only\nwherein they differ from all other morals_.\n\nIt is because they are peculiar to Christianity that they are\nChristian.\n\nBecause I do not believe in Christianity--in the Christian theology and\nin Christian morals--I do not wish it said that I do not believe in\nmorality, for I do. I believe that man can be good and true and that he\ncan do right, and I believe that he ought to do right.\n\nI do not say that every one can reach the same moral altitude. I do\nnot even say that every individual can be good and true. Some persons\ndo not seem to be morally adjusted. I think, however, that we do not\ntrespass beyond the domain of truth when we predicate the power of man\nto be moral.\n\nThe notion that man can not be good has been the apology of half the\ncriminals of the world. It is the creed of all crime. If we affirm the\nidea of human depravity, we may as well erase our statutes, for, if man\ncan not be good, it is the height of folly to expect him to be so.\n\nThe healthy faith of man is faith _in_ man.\n\nThe theology which has been preached for the past few centuries is\nnot calculated to make men moral. Those ministers who have shouted\nthemselves hoarse for the salvation of the soul, and who have made no\naccount of man's behavior in their scheme to save the race, are the\nones who have rubbed humanity in the dirt and undermined the moral\nfoundations of the world.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nEvery ethical principle that supports our social structure is\nindependent of ecclesiastical relations, and it is not essential that\nwe recognize any theology in order to comprehend the necessity of moral\nobedience.\n\nThere is no sympathy between right, truth and justice, and the\n\"Apostles' Creed.\" We may go so far as to say that the attempt to\nestablish a perpetual union between Christianity and morality would\nresult in an absolute divorce of these two forces.\n\nI wish to make it plain beyond a question that the Christian faith, in\nitself, is entirely distinct from all moral effort on the part of man.\n\nTo believe that Jesus was the Christ does not carry any obligation to\ndo right; does not make it incumbent upon the believer to do a single\nmoral action.\n\nIt is sufficient to establish our predication that not a single church\nin Christendom makes moral character the condition of membership, or\ngood behavior the way to Heaven.\n\nThere is a code of Christian morals which has been taught, but never\npractised. The special duties which Jesus enjoined upon his followers\nhave never been reduced to conduct. It is not too much to say that\nthe moral precepts of Jesus, if carried into action, would cause\nsocial revolutions beyond precedent, and produce a state of existence\ncompared with which anarchy would be government, and confusion would be\norder.\n\nBut, before we undertake to examine the Christian morals, let us shed\na few tears of rejoicing upon the grave of Orthodox theology. We do\nnot ask to have a coroner's jury decide what caused the death of this\ntheology. We bless the cause, whatever it was. We only wish to feel\nassured that it is really, truly dead, and the fact that \"not a single\ntreatise written by a New England Puritan is a living and authoritative\nbook\" seems to prove it beyond a question. The persons who still preach\nthis theology and profess to believe it are only \"sitting up with the\ncorpse.\"\n\nWhile it is asserted that a wrong interpretation of this theology sent\nit out of the world, it is pretty evident that a right understanding of\nit inspires no wish to have it back. Much of the superstition in morals\nsprang from fear of God, which the Christian church has inculcated as\nthe highest incentive to right doing.\n\nThe truth, broadly and frankly stated, is this: God is no longer the\ninspiration of morality. Fear of God does not check the actions of man\ntoday, nor is the attempt to make human and divine interests identical\nsufficient to insure obedience to moral laws. The ancient basis of\nmorals is gone, and another and better one must be found to inspire a\nfreer life, a fuller life, a better life, and a higher.\n\nWe who have rejected the Christian theology are looked upon as orphans.\nBut, if I understand the position of freethinkers, the question of a\nsupreme power is neither affirmed nor denied by those who wish to have\nno further business with the God of Orthodoxy.\n\nWe read that, \"the fool hath said in his heart there is no God,\" but\nwe prefer to say nothing about the matter. Theologies may come, and\ntheologies may go, but humanity goes on forever, and so we do not deem\nit as important to worship the fleeting shadows of the universe which\nare cast upon the minds of men as it is to hold fast to those realities\nwhich make human existence a blessing and \"a joy forever.\"\n\nWe are called \"infidels\" and denounced as \"unbelievers\" because we\nwill not march in the ranks of hypocrisy, and dance to the music of\nOrthodoxy. We believe no statement which our reason can not approve; we\naccept no doctrine which is contrary to commonsense; we have confidence\nin human nature; we believe in truth, justice and love; we accept life\nas a blessing, and try to make it so; we believe in taking care of\nourselves, in helping others and in being just and kind to all, and we\nsay to the Christian Church, \"If this be Infidelity, make the most of\nit.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt is suggested by some that if man's exact relation to the Deity\nwere understood, the whole question of morals would be settled at\nonce. But would it not be truer to say that if man's exact relation to\nhis fellowmen were understood and respected, the highest individual\nwelfare, no less than the general good, would dictate the morality\nwhich the world needs? And is not this the grand task for the human\nrace, to rightly interpret the effect of human action upon the\nindividual and the community, and to deduce from human experience the\nrules for human conduct?\n\nI do not know that I owe to God any duty. I do know that I owe a duty\nto my neighbor. I plead total indifference to the demands of divine\nethics, but I trust that I am not completely callous to the wants of\nmy fellow-beings. I owe it to myself to be moral. I owe it to my race,\nto every man and woman that I meet in life, to be as honest, as true,\nas upright, as my nature will permit. I can comprehend and appreciate\nobligations to humanity, but moral indebtedness to the Deity I know\nnothing about.\n\nThe Christian morals are founded upon the assumption that the work of\nman here is to do something that he may escape punishment hereafter,\nand hence the morality of the Christian Church has had little\nreference to the concerns of the present life.\n\nChristian morality is based upon the Christian faith that the human\nrace is under the curse of God, and that, to evade the penalty\npronounced upon him, man must perform certain duties--these duties\nbeing taught as paramount to all we owe to self, to family, to society,\nand to the world.\n\nBut an almost universal disbelief of the Christian dogmas prevails\ntoday, and, consequently, a new morality, with man's welfare for\nits supreme object, is fast supplanting the outworn and valueless\nperformances of Christian duties.\n\nThe moral teaching of the New Testament may be the highest and purest\nof its kind of teaching, but it is not the kind which is needed today.\nIt is a false morality, yea, a dead morality for the most part, which\nthe Christian Church demands of men. The general conviction is that\nno salvation is needed by man, and that all the virtues advertised as\nrequisite for such safety as the Church is prepared to secure, are\nspurious virtues.\n\nThose actions which advance man along the way of general prosperity,\nwhich make it easier to live and get a living on the earth, which have\ntheir value determined by their respect for human beings, are what the\nworld needs.\n\nThe generally acknowledged author of Christian morals offers no\nsalient points for criticism, as he can not be regarded as a historical\nperson whose career has been carefully followed and marked by the\nbiographer. He is a mythological man, with a little less of the\nfabulous and a little more of the real than attaches to the gods and\ngoddesses of ancient Greece and Rome.\n\nThe name of Jesus adorns an anatomy of words. It pictures a person,\nnot of flesh and blood, but of faith and fancy. Jesus is a man of the\nimagination; but mythical as he is, certain men and women believe\nin him in their own way, and are not over-tolerant of those who are\ndisposed to ask for the proofs of his life and works.\n\nThis person has left no more marks of his living upon the earth than\nhave the birds the marks of their flight through the air. The New\nTestament is no more history than is Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_.\nWe can not make any positive assertions in regard to the life and\ncharacter of a man when we do not know who was his father, where or\nwhen he was born, with whom he lived, nor when he died. The only\nhistorical fact connected with Jesus which is not disputed is that Mary\nwas his mother. This is a very important point in his history, but it\nis not sufficient to constitute a biography.\n\nNotwithstanding the fact that the entire narrative of Jesus is without\na single chronological date, and the vastly more significant fact that\nnot a single incident connected with the career of Jesus is mentioned\nin contemporaneous history, we must perforce speak of him as a person\nwhose life was watched and noted from his miraculous advent to his\nmiraculous ascension, and look upon his disciples as so many Boswells\nready to mirror to the world his every speech and act.\n\nWe must do this--Why? Because the world will not candidly and\ncritically study the gospel-story.\n\nFor the present, then, we will speak of Jesus as a man, and accept him\nas the author of the moral code in the New Testament. But a word or\ntwo about the man. The Christian world sets him apart as the model of\nthe race, as the masterpiece of Nature, as the utmost which earth can\nproduce. Every man must here fetch his word of praise, and every word\nbe a mountain to meet the demand of the Christian Church for reverence\nof Jesus.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nI do not believe in the infallibility of any man, but I believe in\nthe improvability of all men. Is man no longer heir to the virtues of\nlife, that he must erect monuments of praise forever over the name of\nJesus? I shall take the liberty to express my dissent from the common\nexpressions of admiration for this man. I can not praise everything\nwhich he did, nor can I think that every word he uttered is a star of\nwisdom. He said some good things, but much of what he said is good\nfor nothing. His theology will do for Sunday Schools, but it will not\nstand half a dozen questions by commonsense. His Hell is barbarous,\nhis Heaven childish, and his ideas of humanity show but a superficial\nknowledge of human nature. His life can not be imitated with advantage\nto the race, and his notions of human existence are wholly inadequate\nto the complex, varied civilization of this age.\n\nLet us see what he did. He paid no filial respect to his parents; he\nrefused to acknowledge his mother and his brothers; he lived a roving,\nwandering life; he paid no heed to the laws of his country; he placed\nno value upon industry, and even went so far as to tell men and women\nthat God would feed and clothe them; he helped himself to the property\nand possessions of other people without paying for them, and destroyed\nwhat belonged to others without offering an equivalent; he had no\nproperty, no home, not a place to lay his head; he hated the rulers,\nyet sought to establish a kingdom for himself; he failed to reach the\nthrone he sought, and died upon the malefactor's cross.\n\nIs this the man for the Twentieth Century to honor? Is this the man for\nmen to follow in this age? Is this the man whose life all should strive\nto imitate?\n\nThe man who took the life of Jesus for a model would hate father and\nmother, brother and sister; he would have neither wife nor child; he\nwould live from place to place; he would be a lawbreaker and an idler;\nhe would live the life of a wanderer and die the death of a criminal.\n\nHave I put a false color in this picture which I have painted? Have I\nmisrepresented the life of Jesus? Read the four Gospels and see. I find\nthis character sketched in the New Testament, and it is there called\nJesus, and it is this character which we are adjured to imitate if we\nwould be perfect.\n\nTo the man or woman who declares that the life of Jesus is the way to\nsalvation, I have only this to say, \"Why then do you not imitate it?\"\n\nNow, I wish to ask, \"What kind of morals would such a man as we have\nsketched naturally teach?\"\n\nYou will answer, \"The morals he lived.\" At least, we find such morals\ntaught in the New Testament.\n\nMy point here is: If the life of Jesus was an honest, faithful exponent\nof his moral teachings, then such a morality as he practised is not\nwanted today--and that such a morality is not wanted is shown by the\nfact that no one practises it.\n\nI know that it is considered respectable and pious to profess great\nadmiration for the doctrines taught by Jesus, and the world has paid\nthem the outward compliment of profession, saying that the moral\ncode of the New Testament was the despair of man; but it has never\nseriously set to work to reduce this code to practise, which proves\nthat such profession is only a part of the universal accomplishment of\nfashionable hypocrisy.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nDo not understand me as saying that there is no moral precept contained\nin the Gospels which is worthy of being practised. I make no such\ndeclaration, and wish no such construction put upon my words. What I\ndesire to enforce is this: That the morality of Jesus sprang from a\nphilosophy which has passed away, and therefore, that it is, for the\ngreater part, obsolete and worthless. That Jesus shared the general\nbelief of his age that the world was soon to be destroyed, is shown by\nhis estimate of earthly things; and that a morality founded upon such a\nbelief should survive and outlast the faith which inspired it reveals\na condition of things that is not flattering to our intellectual\nperception or to our moral sense.\n\nThe morals of the New Testament are founded upon a theory of the\nuniverse which is found now only in creeds--those epitaphs of religion.\nThe most superficial observation is sufficient to enable us to perceive\nthat theology can no longer be the basis of morality, and that the\nauthority of the New Testament can not be accepted on this question.\n\nThere is nothing more firmly impressed upon the mind of man than the\nfact of the stability of the universe, notwithstanding an occasional\nearthquake; and the value of earthly things has a higher moral\nsignificance consequent upon the assurance of material existence.\n\nMorality must have a physical basis; that is, the moral code which man\ncan practise to his safety and his honor must not contradict human\nnature. The defeat of the New Testament morals is assured by their\nantagonism to the nature of man. The morals of Jesus were designed\nto fit man for what he called the \"Kingdom of Heaven,\" but the only\nmorality which is worth the name is that which fits man for living his\nlife on earth.\n\nJesus constantly urged men to the performance of moral duties that they\nmight be rewarded by their \"Father in Heaven.\" Such a motive for good\nbehavior is offensive to the rational mind, and moral commandments\nwhich are enforced with a Heaven and a Hell do not spring from an\nopinion of human nature which deserves our respect.\n\nThe most comprehensive criticism which one can make upon the morals of\nthe New Testament is, that they are not practicable. Is the character\nof Christians fashioned by the power and influence of the words\nwhich Jesus left in the world? This question should be pressed to an\nanswer, and honesty would answer it in a way which would shake every\nchurch-building in the land and tear the mask from the face of every\nChristian worshiper on the globe.\n\nJesus taught that men and women were to love him more than father or\nmother, son or daughter. Imagine human beings loving a man whom they\nknow nothing about, and consequently can care nothing about, and who\nhas no more claim to their affections than has the ghost in Hamlet,\nbetter than they love parent or child! Such morality as this is not fit\nfor a Hottentot.\n\nIf any command is implanted in our nature and is a part of the bone\nand fiber of our very being, it is to love beyond all else those who\nhave borne us and cared for us through infancy and childhood, and\nthose whose existence depends upon us, and to whom we stand pledged\nby the holiest ties of our beings, to watch over and protect, to care\nfor and love, to the last days of our lives. It is love of parent and\nchild which is alike the supreme obligation and the supreme benefaction\nof our humanity. No being has walked this earth who had the moral\nright to demand a greater love than is due to father and mother, son\nand daughter; and if Jesus claimed such affection, his claim is an\nimpertinence which we are bound to treat with indignation and scorn.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nFor the Christian Church to make of the words of Jesus commands to the\nworld is to deserve the severest condemnation. Jesus taught that men\nwere not to make for themselves a home, not to cultivate those virtues\nwhich blossom into the family, and not to save the fruits of their toil\nto make old age with its tottering form and feeble limbs less liable to\nthe hardships of the world, but he summed up all the duties of life in\nthese words: \"Sell what thou hast and give to the poor, and come follow\nme.\"\n\nTo obey such teaching as this would overturn every monument of\nprosperity upon the earth, blight every feeling of happiness that\ngladdens the heart of man, and convert the busy, working, loving world\ninto one vast army of tramps, following a king without a kingdom, a\nleader without a purpose, a commander with nothing to give those who\nfollowed his command.\n\nJesus taught that we were not to resist evil; that is, that if a thief\nstole our watch and chain, we were bound to run after him and give him\nour purse also; that if a man took away our coat, we should wrong him\nif we did not send him the balance of the suit; that if a man struck\nus on one side of the face, we were to invite him to strike us on\nthe other side also; that if, as it were, the armies of some foreign\npowers were to invade our land, and burn and destroy our cities and\ntowns, pillage our homes and murder our families, we were in duty bound\nto look upon them as benefactors and thank them for their work of\ndestruction, and ask them to come and do it again.\n\nSuch moral teaching as this would make a nation of cowards and slaves.\n\nIt is our duty to punish thieves and robbers, not to reward them; to\nresist wrong and injustice, not to submit to them like cravens; to\nprotect our country from foes, even though we are obliged to shed their\nblood and our own in so doing.\n\nIs there a Christian on the globe who pays the least heed to a single\none of the moral commands of Jesus? You all know there is not.\n\nI need not tell the Christian Church that the morality taught by Jesus\nis decaying when every church is its coffin, and every minister its\ngrave-digger.\n\nIf you wish to see how much respect for the moral teachings of Jesus\none of his professed followers has, just steal his coat, and if he\ngives you his cloak also, as he is commanded to do by his Lord and\nMaster, please publish his name in the daily papers--for the benefit of\nothers who wish to get a cloak.\n\nWe find among the express commands of Jesus this advice: \"Lay not up\nfor yourselves treasures upon earth.\" The most liberal translation of\nthis counsel can not make it anything but poor advice. Every material\nblessing of mankind has come from the savings of human labor, and the\nvalue of laying up treasures upon earth is more evident than that of\nlaying up treasures in Heaven, whatever this saying may mean. When\nevery Christian tries as hard to be poor as he tries now to get rich,\nwe shall think that he has some regard for the moral teachings of Jesus.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt must be apparent to all that what may be claimed as Christian\nmorality is not only decaying, but that it ought to decay. There is\nno sense in it. Imagine a man telling people in the Twentieth Century\nto \"take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat or what ye shall\ndrink, nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on,\" and endeavoring\nto prove that because the fowls of the air do not have to broil a\nbeefsteak for their breakfast or make biscuit for tea, human beings\nwill be fed whether they provide anything for their appetites or not.\n\nJesus tells us that our Heavenly Father will feed us because we are\nbetter than the fowls of the air, and that he will clothe us because he\nclothes the grass of the field. Our earthly fathers seem to have done\nmore in the way of providing food and clothing for us before we were\nable to take care of ourselves than any Heavenly Father. Others may put\ntheir trust in God for something to eat and drink and wear, if they\nwish to, but I prefer to give the matter a little thought myself.\n\nJesus concludes these admonitions by saying, \"Take no thought for the\nmorrow.\" This is bad counsel, and it shows the good sense of mankind\nthat it has never been followed. The whole world lives in what one of\nour poets called, \"The bright tomorrow of the mind.\"\n\nWe will refer to only one more of the peculiar moral injunctions of\nJesus. In the fifth chapter of Matthew, in the forty-fourth verse,\nwe read, \"Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to\nthem that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and\npersecute you.\"\n\nIf we were to do as herein commanded, we should have an inverted\nmorality which would place the crown of virtue upon the forehead of\nvice.\n\nLet us see if the preacher of this doctrine practised it.\n\nDid Jesus bless the Scribes and Pharisees when they refused to\nacknowledge his claim to be the Messiah? This is the blessing which he\npronounced upon them: \"Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,\nfor ye devour widows' houses and for a pretense make long prayers;\ntherefore ye shall receive the greater damnation.\" \"Ye serpents, ye\ngeneration of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of Hell?\" That is\nnot a very sweet blessing!\n\nAnd these men did not curse Jesus. They only did not agree with his\nopinions. Jesus, also, in his wrath against his enemies, calls them,\nin the seventeenth and nineteenth verses of the twenty-third chapter\nof Matthew, \"Ye fools and blind,\" forgetting, doubtless, that he had\npreviously declared, when preaching on the Mount, \"Whosoever shall say,\n'Thou Fool,' shall be in danger of hell-fire.\"\n\nThe moral teachings of Jesus were inspired by a false estimate of all\nearthly things. There is no doubt that Jesus believed the world was\ncoming to an end in his generation. How to get into the Kingdom of\nHeaven was of more consequence than how to reform mankind, or improve\nthe world, since the end of earthly things was near at hand. This\nappears to have been the thought of Jesus, and explains much of his\nlanguage.\n\nBut today we do not believe that the earth has run its course, and\nthat the end of all material things is near at hand. We are living\nwithout fear of failure on the part of the universe, and are giving our\nattention more to human wants than to divine commands.\n\n_Not fear of offending God, but fear of wronging man, is the highest\nbasis of morals._ We have reached a time when apologies are not\nrespected, when repentance is looked upon as the mask of villainy,\nwhen the stature of life is most shorn of manliness by prancing in\nthe garb of humility, when a brave facing of life's trials and demands\ncounts for more than cowardly surrender in the name of God. In fact,\nwe have come to say to the world of humanity, \"Be moral, and you need\nnot be religious.\" Work for man is coming to be a sufficient excuse for\nneglect of God.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nBut we want no cheap moral duties held up for man to perform. It is\nserious business to live this life of ours and live it well, and it\nis hard work to do it. Morality sets us as high a task as we are able\nto perform, and a higher task than has yet been performed by most of\nmankind. The effort of this age is to expose the sham of what is called\nholiness, and make sacred the surroundings of human beings. We must\nthrow off the past, and stand upon that sunlit height where we can feel\nthat \"somehow life is bigger after all than any painted angel, could we\nsee the man that is within us.\"\n\nThis is the moral duty of the world: to respect the man that is within\nus. We ought to rear on the earth a range of moral Alps that would\nstand and command the admiration of the world as long as eye could see\nand heart could feel. We need a rational hope and a burning purpose in\nthis century, something noble to live for and the courage of nobility\nto work and win it.\n\nThe improvement of the world is the only object of life worthy of man.\nDo and say nothing that will not improve mankind. Were this simple\nadmonition heeded, we should have the key to the kingdom of the only\nheaven that man needs in our own pocket.\n\nIt is time for the reign of commonsense to begin on earth; time for\nmen to elevate morality above religion; and time for us to say,\n\"Millions for the world, not a cent for the Church.\" The battle between\nFreedom and Christianity has begun, and I believe that when it ends\nChristianity will be buried beneath the ruins of its own dogmas, there\nto remain forever. It possesses no spirit that can rise again from its\nashes and mount on wings of flame to a higher life. When superstition\ndies, it dies to the root.\n\nThe Christian minister can not arrest the march of liberty by crying,\n\"Infidelity!\" and threatening with everlasting cremation all those who\nrefuse to heed his words.\n\nBut let there be no base understanding of freedom. The new John the\nBaptist must not be a cowboy, saying, \"The kingdom of highwaymen is at\nhand.\" As a person when in perfect bodily health knows not from any\nintimation from the respective parts that he has a stomach, a brain,\nor a heart, so a person when living in perfect freedom is unconscious\nof law, of creed, of custom. The healthy man physically is the free\nman physically; the healthy man mentally is the free man mentally; the\nhealthy man morally is the free man morally; liberty of the individual\nis health of the individual, and a free man means a man who is true and\nobedient to all natural laws.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThere is a misunderstanding of freedom upon the one side, and a\nmisrepresentation of it upon the other, that make it hazardous for one\nto employ the word. To connect this word with morality in the eyes of\nmany is to confound the Madonna with Mary Magdalene. It is to start the\nghost of Don Juan.\n\nThe conservatism of society has ever regarded liberty as the black flag\nof the moral marauder, the emblem of a piratical intention upon the\ncasket of the world that contains the jewels of honor, justice, virtue\nand social order.\n\nSo persistently and malignantly has freedom been represented as a\nwrecker's light, kindled only to lure to destruction, that to represent\nit as worthy to be trusted is to arouse the spirit which pursued\nVoltaire to his grave with a lie, erected a shaft of calumny over the\ntomb of Paine, and which now, with the coward's weapon of slander,\nattacks the living who refuse to acknowledge that the voice of the\nChurch is the voice of God.\n\nBut nevertheless we believe with Burns that:\n\n    Upo' this tree there grows sic fruit,\n    Its virtues a' can tell, man;\n    It raises man aboon the brute,\n    It maks him ken himsel', man;\n    Gif ance the peasant taste a bite,\n    He's greater than a lord, man,\n    And ni' the beggar shares a mite\n    Of a' he can afford, man.\n\nAnd so we exclaim in the words of one of our own true poets:\n\n    Always in thine eyes, O Liberty!\n    Shines that high light whereby the world is saved,\n    And though thou slay us, we will trust in thee.\n\nYou have all heard of the man who refused to open his eyes for a year,\nand who declared that during that time nothing could be seen on account\nof the darkness. But the endeavor to perpetuate old errors by keeping\nthe eyes closed to the facts of science, the truths of philosophy, and\nthe progress of the human race, has not been crowned with success.\nThe further attempt to convert the world to what James Parton calls a\n\"kitchen religion\" is merely waste of power.\n\nThe preaching of Christianity is making \"much ado about nothing.\" What\nwe want is manhood and womanhood.\n\nIt is said by the Church that the man who lives for his family and\nbrings all that he can win of what is fair and bright and glad to those\nhe loves, may be a good man, but he is not a Christian, and therefore\nhas no religion.\n\nGive me then the man who is not a Christian, and who has no religion,\nfor if the man who loves his wife and children, who gives to them the\nstrength of his arm, the thought of his brain, the warmth of his heart,\nhas not religion, the world is better off without it, for these are the\nhighest and holiest things which man can do.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\n  There is only one thing worth praying for: to be in the line of\n  evolution.--_Elbert Hubbard._\n\n  Jesus as Savior of the world is a theological creation, and not a\n  historical character.\n\n\n\n\n  SO HERE THEN ENDETH THAT GREAT AND GOOD BOOK \"I DON'T KNOW--DO\n  YOU?\" WRITTEN BY MARILLA M. RICKER, AND PRINTED AND BOUND FOR HER\n  BY THE ROYCROFTERS AT THEIR SHOP, WHICH IS IN EAST AURORA, ERIE\n  COUNTY AND STATE OF NEW YORK, MCMXVI.\n\n\n\n\nTHOMAS PAINE\n\n\n  Born Jan 29, 1737.\n\n  Friend and adviser of Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Monroe,\n  etc., etc.\n\n  Author of _Common Sense_, _The Crisis_, _Rights of Man_, and _The\n  Age of Reason_;\n\n  Editor of _Pennsylvania Magazine_;\n\n  Enlisted in Continental Army; appointed Aide-de-Camp to General\n  Nathaniel Greene;\n\n  Secretary of Committee on Foreign Affairs, Congress and\n  Pennsylvania Assembly;\n\n  By his writings did more for the American cause in the Revolution\n  than any other one person;\n\n  First proposed American Independence;\n\n  First suggested the Federal Union of States;\n\n  First proposed the abolition of Negro slavery;\n\n  First suggested protection for dumb animals;\n\n  First proposed arbitration and international peace;\n\n  First suggested justice to women;\n\n  First pointed out the reality of human brotherhood;\n\n  First pointed out the folly of hereditary succession and\n  monarchical government;\n\n  First proposed old-age pensions;\n\n  First suggested international copyright;\n\n  First proposed the education of the children of the poor at public\n  expense;\n\n  First suggested a great republic of all the nations of the world;\n\n  First proposed \"the land for the people\";\n\n  First suggested \"the religion of humanity\";\n\n  First proposed and first wrote the words, \"United States of\n  America\";\n\n  Founder of the first Ethical Society;\n\n  Proposed the purchase of the Louisiana Territory;\n\n  Inventor of the iron bridge, the hollow candle--principle of the\n  modern central-draft burner, etc., etc.\n\n  Died June 9, 1809.\n\n\n=_This is history. But this great and good man was called \"a filthy\nlittle atheist\" by a hyphenated Dutch-American._=","title":"I don't know, do you?","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":25144}