“Leave polemic folios in their dust,
But this point hold, howe’er each sect may brawl,
When pure the life, when free the heart from gall
What e’er the creed, Heaven looks with love on all.”
“As to the communion. This was a ceremony observed among the heathen long before Jesus was born, signifying friendship and a devotion to each other’s interests, and it is observed even now by the wildest tribes of men as a sign or proof of kindness and friendship. Among some people it is customary at their funerals for a cup of wine to be passed, and each one present to take a sip in memory of the dead. At first it was only a simple custom, a rite in memory of friendship, but how it has been transformed and degraded! At a Roman Council, Berengar, who had denied transubstantiation, was compelled to swear that ‘the very body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ are not only sensibly in the sacrament, but in truth are handled in the hands of the priest, and broken and crushed by the teeth of the faithful.’
“What can be more sacrilegious and disgusting than such a doctrine? Is it strange that thinking men become infidels when such stuff is forced upon them? or that a Muhamedan sage remarked: ‘So long as Christians worship what they eat, let my soul dwell with the philosophers.’
“Baptism and communion are only rites, with a meaning, and well to be observed, but have no power in themselves, and are no more divine than are the various ceremonies among men. I claim that all forms and observances that tend to elevate and bless mankind are in a sense divine, good or Godlike, the one as another. We might say that the light of the sun, or the rain, or the cooling winds, are among the divinest gifts to mankind. So any good impulse in the hearts of men, and every noble deed, is a divine gift ordained or given from God, our Heavenly Father. Why restrict His divine gifts or ordinances to two mere ceremonies, and not include all that is good? The universe is alive with God. The thing that is natural is none the less divine and worthy of our love and reverence. Every scientific fact, or we might say, everything good, all is of divine origin.”
He asked, “Don’t you believe that the Church was specially established by God?”
“No,” said I, “not more than any other good society. In fact, I have more faith in the divinity of an association that would establish a soup kitchen to feed the starving poor, or one that would clothe the naked, or another that would help them to a means of livelihood, or for the education of their children.”
“Does not the church do this?” he asked.