Back of all that is—back of all events—Christians put an infinite Juggler who with a wish creates, preserves, destroys. The world is his stage and mankind his puppets. He fills them with wants and desires, with appetites and ambitions—with hopes and fears—with love and hate. He touches the springs. He pulls the strings—baits the hooks, sets the traps and digs the pits.

The play is a continuous performance.

He watches these puppets as they struggle and fail. Sees them outwit each other and themselves—leads them to every crime, watches the births and deaths—hears lullabies at cradles and the fall of clods on coffins. He has no pity. He enjoys the tragedies—the desperation—the despair—the suicides. He smiles at the murders, the assassinations,—the seductions, the desertions—the abandoned babes of shame. He sees the weak enslaved—mothers robbed of babes—the innocent in dungeons—on scaffolds. He sees crime crowned and hypocrisy robed.

He withholds the rain and his puppets starve. He opens the earth and they are devoured. He sends the flood and they are drowned. He empties the volcano and they perish in fire. He sends the cyclone and they are torn and mangled. With quick lightnings they are dashed to death. He fills the air and water with the invisible enemies of life—the messengers of pain, and watches the puppets as they breathe and drink. He creates cancers to feed upon their flesh—their quivering nerves—serpents, to fill their veins with venom,—beasts to crunch their bones—to lap their blood.

Some of the poor puppets he makes insane—makes them struggle in the darkness with imagined monsters with glaring eyes and dripping jaws, and some are made without the flame of thought, to drool and drivel through the darkened days. He sees all the agony, the injustice, the rags of poverty, the withered hands of want—the motherless babes—the deformed—the maimed—the leprous, knows the tears that flow—hears the sobs and moans—sees the gleam of swords, hears the roar of the guns—sees the fields reddened with blood—the white faces of the dead. But he mocks when their fear cometh, and at their calamity he fills the heavens with laughter. And the poor puppets who are left alive, fall on their knees and thank the Juggler with all their hearts.

But after all, the gods have not supported the children of men, men have supported the gods. They have built the temples. They have sacrificed their babes, their lambs, their cattle. They have drenched the altars with blood. They have given their silver, their gold, their gems. They have fed and clothed their priests—but the gods have given nothing in return. Hidden in the shadows they have answered no prayer—heard no cry—given no sign—extended no hand—uttered no word. Unseen and unheard they have sat on their thrones, deaf and dumb—paralyzed and blind. In vain the steeples rise—in vain the prayers ascend.

And think what man has done to please the gods. He has renounced his reason—extinguished the torch of his brain, he has believed without evidence and against evidence. He has slandered and maligned himself. He has fasted and starved. He has mutilated his body—scarred his flesh—given his blood to vermin. He has persecuted, imprisoned and destroyed his fellows. He has deserted wife and child. He has lived alone in the desert. He has swung-censers and burned incense, counted beads and sprinkled himself with holy water—shut his eyes, clasped his hands—fallen upon his knees and groveled in the dust—but the gods have been silent—silent as stones.

Have these cringings and crawlings—these cruelties and absurdities—this faith and foolishness pleased the gods?

We do not know.

Has any disaster been averted—any blessing obtained? We do not know.