Amid the storms of a winter night, a traveler, perishing with cold and hunger, knocks at your door and begs for food and shelter. You interrogate him as to his religious belief, and finding that he is not a member of your church you forbid him to enter. In the morning when you discover his lifeless body by the roadside, how impressed you will be with the transcendent beauty of Bible morals!
Paul preached a sermon on charity, and then wrote to the Galatians as follows:
“If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed” (Gal. i, 9).
From the same pen, too, came this sneaking, infamous hint:
“I would they were even cut off which trouble you” (Gal. v, 12).
What ghastly fruits these teachings have produced! We see earth covered with the yellow bones of murdered heretics and scholars; we see the persecutions and butcheries of Constantine, of Theodosius, of Clovis, of Justinian, and of Charlemagne; we see the Crusades, in which nearly twenty millions perish; we see the followers of Godfrey in Jerusalem—see the indiscriminate massacre of men, women, and children—see the mosques piled seven deep with murdered Saracens—the Jews burnt in their synagogues; we see Cœur de Lion slaughter in cold blood thousands of captive Saracens; we see the Franks in Constantinople, plundering, ravishing, murdering; we see the Moors expelled from Spain; we see the murder of the Huguenots and Waldenses—the slaughter of German peasants—the desolation of Ireland—Holland covered with blood; we witness Smithfield and Bartholomew; we see the Inquisition with its countless instruments of fiendish cruelty; we see the Auto-da-fé, where heretics, clad in mockery, are led to torture and to death; we see men stretched upon the rack, disjointed, and torn limb from limb; we see them flayed alive—their bleeding bodies seared with red-hot irons; we see them covered with pitch and oil and set on fire; we see them hurled headlong from towers to the stony streets below; we see them buried alive; we see them hanged and quartered; we see their eyes bored out with heated augers—their tongues torn out—their bones broken with hammers—their bodies pierced with a thousand needles; we see aged women tied to the heels of fiery steeds—see their mangled and bleeding bodies dragged with lightning speed over the frozen earth; we see new-born babes flung into the flames to perish with their mothers, or with their mothers sewed in sacks and sunk into the sea; in short, on every hand, as a result of this book’s teachings, we see hate, torture, death!
But, thanks to the brave Infidels who have gone before, you, Bible moralists, can use these instruments of cruelty to silence heretics to Christianity no more.
“Where are the hands which once for this foul creed,
’Mid flame and torture, made an Atheist bleed?
Gone—like the powers your fathers used so well