Chapter XII (5)

"From records in the State archives of Hesse- "Darmstadt, dating back to the thirteenth century, "it appears that the public executioner's fee for boiling "a criminal in oil was twenty-four florins; for decapi- "tating with the sword, fifteen florins and-a-half; for "quartering, the same; for breaking on the wheel, "five florins, thirty kreuzers; for tearing a man to "pieces, eighteen florins. Ten florins per head was "his charge for hanging, and he burned delinquents "alive at the rate of fourteen florins apiece. For ap- "plying the 'Spanish boot' his fee was only two "florins. Five florins were paid to him every time he "subjected a refractory witness to the torture of the "rack. The same amount was his due for 'branding "'the sign of the gallows with a red-hot iron upon "'the back, forehead, or cheek of a thief,' as well as "for 'cutting off the nose and ears of a slanderer or

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"'blasphemer.' Flogging with rods was a cheap "punishment, its remuneration being fixed at three "florins, thirty kreuzers."

The Bible has made men cruel. It is a cruel book. And yet, amidst its thorns, amidst its thistles, amidst its nettles and its swords and pikes, there are some flowers, and these I wish, in common with all good men, to save.

I do not believe that men have ever been made merciful in war by reading the Old Testament. I do not believe that men have ever been prompted to break the chain of a slave by reading the Pentateuch. The question is not whether Florence Nightingale and Miss Dix were cruel. I have said nothing about John Howard, nothing about Abbott Lawrence. I say nothing about people in this connection. The question is: Is the Bible a cruel book? not: Was Miss Nightingale a cruel woman? There have been thousands and thousands of loving, tender and char- itable Mohammedans. Mohammedan mothers love their children as well as Christian mothers can. Mohammedans have died in defence of the Koran-- died for the honor of an impostor. There were millions of charitable people in India--millions in Egypt--and I am not sure that the world has ever

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produced people who loved one another better than the Egyptians.

I think there are many things in the Old Testament calculated to make man cruel. Mr. Talmage asks: "What has been the effect upon your children? As "they have become more and more fond of the "Scriptures have they become more and more fond "of tearing off the wings of flies and pinning grass- "hoppers and robbing birds' nests?"

I do not believe that reading the bible would make them tender toward flies or grasshoppers. According to that book, God used to punish animals for the crimes of their owners. He drowned the animals in a flood. He visited cattle with disease. He bruised them to death with hailstones--killed them by the thousand. Will the reading of these things make children kind to animals? So, the whole system of sacrifices in the Old Testament is calculated to harden the heart. The butchery of oxen and lambs, the killing of doves, the perpetual destruction of life, the con- tinual shedding of blood--these things, if they have any tendency, tend only to harden the heart of child- hood.

The Bible does not stop simply with the killing of animals. The Jews were commanded to kill their

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neighbors--not only the men, but the women; not only the women, but the babes. In accordance with the command of God, the Jews killed not only their neighbors, but their own brothers; and according to this book, which is the foundation, as Mr. Talmage believes, of all mercy, men were commanded to kill their wives because they differed with them on the subject of religion.

Nowhere in the world can be found laws more un- just and cruel than in the Old Testament.

_Question_. Mr. Talmage wants you to tell where the cruelty of the Bible crops out in the lives of Chris- tians?

_Answer_. In the first place, millions of Christians have been persecutors. Did they get the idea of persecution from the Bible? Will not every honest man admit that the early Christians, by reading the Old Testament, became convinced that it was not only their privilege, but their duty, to destroy heathen nations? Did they not, by reading the same book, come to the conclusion that it was their solemn duty to extirpate heresy and heretics? According to the New Testament, nobody could be saved unless he believed in the Lord Jesus Christ. The early Chris-

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tians believed this dogma. They also believed that they had a right to defend themselves and their children from "heretics."

We all admit that a man has a right to defend his children against the assaults of a would-be murderer, and he has the right to carry this defence to the extent of killing the assailant. If we have the right to kill people who are simply trying to kill the bodies of our children, of course we have the right to kill them when they are endeavoring to assassinate, not simply their bodies, but their souls. It was in this way Christians reasoned. If the Testament is right, their reasoning was correct. Whoever believes the New Testament literally--whoever is satisfied that it is absolutely the word of God, will become a perse- cutor. All religious persecution has been, and is, in exact harmony with the teachings of the Old and New Testaments. Of course I mean with some of the teachings. I admit that there are passages in both the Old and New Testaments against persecu- tion. These are passages quoted only in time of peace. Others are repeated to feed the flames of war.

I find, too, that reading the Bible and believing the Bible do not prevent even ministers from telling false-

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hoods about their opponents. I find that the Rev. Mr. Talmage is willing even to slander the dead,-- that he is willing to stain the memory of a Christian, and that he does not hesitate to give circulation to what he knows to be untrue. Mr. Talmage has himself, I believe, been the subject of a church trial. How many of the Christian witnesses against him, in his judgment, told the truth? Yet they were all Bible readers and Bible believers. What effect, in his judgment, did the reading of the Bible have upon his enemies? Is he willing to admit that the testi- mony of a Bible, reader and believer is true? Is he willing to accept the testimony even of ministers? --of his brother ministers? Did reading the Bible make them bad people? Was it a belief in the Bible that colored their testimony? Or, was it a belief in the Bible that made Mr. Talmage deny the truth of their statements?

_Question_. Mr. Talmage charges you with having said that the Scriptures are a collection of polluted writings?

_Answer_. I have never said such a thing. I have said, and I still say, that there are passages in the Bible unfit to be read--passages that never should

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have been written--passages, whether inspired or uninspired, that can by no possibility do any human being any good. I have always admitted that there are good passages in the Bible--many good, wise and just laws--many things calculated to make men better--many things calculated to make men worse. I admit that the Bible is a mixture of good and bad, of truth and falsehood, of history and fiction, of sense and nonsense, of virtue and vice, of aspiration and revenge, of liberty and tyranny.

I have never said anything against Solomon's Song. I like it better than I do any book that pre- cedes it, because it touches upon the human. In the desert of murder, wars of extermination, polygamy, concubinage and slavery, it is an oasis where the trees grow, where the birds sing, and where human love blossoms and fills the air with perfume. I do not regard that book as obscene. There are many things in it that are beautiful and tender, and it is calculated to do good rather than harm.

Neither have I any objection to the book of Eccle- siastes--except a few interpolations in it. That book was written by a Freethinker, by a philosopher. There is not the slightest mention of God in it, nor of another state of existence. All portions in which

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God is mentioned are interpolations. With some of this book I agree heartily. I believe in the doctrine of enjoying yourself, if you can, to-day. I think it foolish to spend all your years in heaping up treas- ures, not knowing but he who will spend them is to be an idiot. I believe it is far better to be happy with your wife and child now, than to be miserable here, with angelic expectations in some other world.

Mr. Talmage is mistaken when he supposes that all Bible believers have good homes, that all Bible readers are kind in their families. As a matter of fact, nearly all the wife-whippers of the United States are orthodox. Nine-tenths of the people in the penitentiaries are believers. Scotland is one of the most orthodox countries in the world, and one of the most intem- perate. Hundreds and hundreds of women are arrested every year in Glasgow for drunkenness. Visit the Christian homes in the manufacturing dis- tricts of England. Talk with the beaters of children and whippers of wives, and you will find them be- lievers. Go into what is known as the "Black "Country," and you will have an idea of the Chris- tian civilization of England.

Let me tell you something about the "Black "Country." There women work in iron; there women

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do the work of men. Let me give you an instance: A commission was appointed by Parliament to ex- amine into the condition of the women in the "Black "Country," and a report was made. In that report I read the following:

"A superintendent of a brickyard where women "were engaged in carrying bricks from the yard to "the kiln, said to one of the women:

"'Eliza, you don't appear to be very uppish this "morning.'"

"'Neither would you be very uppish, sir,' she re- "plied, 'if you had had a child last night.'"

This gives you an idea of the Christian civilization of England.

England and Ireland produce most of the prize- fighters. The scientific burglar is a product of Great Britain. There is not the great difference that Mr. Talmage supposes, between the morality of Pekin and of New York. I doubt if there is a city in the world with more crime according to the population than New York, unless it be London, or it may be Dublin, or Brooklyn, or possibly Glasgow, where a man too pious to read a newspaper published on Sunday, stole millions from the poor.

I do not believe there is a country in the world

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where there is more robbery than in Christian lands-- no country where more cashiers are defaulters, where more presidents of banks take the money of depositors, where there is more adulteration of food, where fewer ounces make a pound, where fewer inches make a yard, where there is more breach of trust, more respectable larceny under the name of embezzlement, or more slander circulated as gospel.

_Question_. Mr. Talmage insists that there are no contradictions in the Bible--that it is a perfect har- mony from Genesis to Revelation--a harmony as perfect as any piece of music ever written by Beethoven or Handel?

_Answer_. Of course, if God wrote it, the Bible ought to be perfect. I do not see why a minister should be so perfectly astonished to find that an inspired book is consistent with itself throughout. Yet the truth is, the Bible is infinitely inconsistent.

Compare the two systems--the system of Jehovah and that of Jesus. In the Old Testament the doctrine of "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" was taught. In the New Testament, "forgive your "enemies," and "pray for those who despitefully "use you and persecute you." In the Old Testament

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it is kill, burn, massacre, destroy; in the New forgive. The two systems are inconsistent, and one is just about as far wrong as the other. To live for and thirst for revenge, to gloat over the agony of an enemy, is one extreme; to "resist not evil" is the other extreme; and both these extremes are equally distant from the golden mean of justice.

The four gospels do not even agree as to the terms of salvation. And yet, Mr. Talmage tells us that there are four cardinal doctrines taught in the Bible-- the goodness of God, the fall of man, the sympathetic and forgiving nature of the Savior, and two desti- nies--one for believers and the other for unbelievers. That is to say:

1. That God is good, holy and forgiving.

2. That man is a lost sinner.

3. That Christ is "all sympathetic," and ready to take the whole world to his heart.

4. Heaven for believers and hell for unbelievers.

_First_. I admit that the Bible says that God is

good and holy. But this Bible also tells what God did, and if God did what the Bible says he did, then I insist that God is not good, and that he is not holy, or forgiving. According to the Bible, this good God believed in religious persecution; this good

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God believed in extermination, in polygamy, in con- cubinage, in human slavery; this good God com- manded murder and massacre, and this good God could only be mollified by the shedding of blood. This good God wanted a butcher for a priest. This good God wanted husbands to kill their wives-- wanted fathers and mothers to kill their children. This good God persecuted animals on account of the crimes of their owners. This good God killed the common people because the king had displeased him. This good God killed the babe even of the maid behind the mill, in order that he might get even with a king. This good God committed every possible crime.

_Second_. The statement that man is a lost sinner is not true. There are thousands and thousands of magnificent Pagans--men ready to die for wife, or child, or even for friend, and the history of Pagan countries is filled with self-denying and heroic acts. If man is a failure, the infinite God, if there be one, is to blame. Is it possible that the God of Mr. Tal- mage could not have made man a success? Accord- ing to the Bible, his God made man knowing that in about fifteen hundred years he would have to drown all his descendants.

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Why would a good God create a man that he knew would be a sinner all his life, make hundreds of thousands of his fellow-men unhappy, and who at last would be doomed to an eternity of suffering? Can such a God be good? How could a devil have done worse?

_Third._ If God is infinitely good, is he not fully as sympathetic as Christ? Do you have to employ Christ to mollify a being of infinite mercy? Is Christ any more willing to take to his heart the whole world than his Father is? Personally, I have not the slightest objection in the world to anybody believing in an infinitely good and kind God--not the slightest objection to any human being worshiping an infi- nitely tender and merciful Christ--not the slightest objection to people preaching about heaven, or about the glories of the future state--not the slightest.

_Fourth_. I object to the doctrine of two destinies for the human race. I object to the infamous false- hood of eternal fire. And yet, Mr. Talmage is en- deavoring to poison the imagination of men, women and children with the doctrine of an eternal hell. Here is what he preaches, taken from the "Constitu- "tion of the Presbyterian Church of the United "States:"

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"By the decrees of God, for the manifestation of "his glory, some men and angels are predestinated "to everlasting life, and others foreordained to ever- "lasting death."

That is the doctrine of Mr. Talmage. He wor- ships a God who damns people "for the manifesta- "tion of his glory,"--a God who made men, knowing that they would be damned--a God who damns babes simply to increase his reputation with the angels. This is the God of Mr. Talmage. Such a God I abhor, despise and execrate.

_Question_. What does Mr. Talmage think of man- kind? What is his opinion of the "unconverted"? How does he regard the great and glorious of the earth, who have not been the victims of his particular superstition? What does he think of some of the best the earth has produced?

_Answer_. I will tell you how he looks upon all such. Read this from his "Confession of Faith:"

"Our first parents, being seduced by the subtlety "of the tempter, sinned in eating the forbidden fruit. "By this sin, they fell from their original righteous- "ness and communion with God, and so became "dead in sin, and wholly defiled in all the faculties

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"and parts of soul and body; and they being the "root of all mankind, the guilt of this sin was "imputed, and the same death in sin and corrupted "nature conveyed to all their posterity. From this "original corruption--whereby we are utterly indis- "posed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, "and wholly inclined to all evil, do proceed all actual "transgressions."

This is Mr. Talmage's view of humanity.

Why did his God make a devil? Why did he allow the devil to tempt Adam and Eve? Why did he leave innocence and ignorance at the mercy of subtlety and wickedness? Why did he put "the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" in the garden? For what reason did he place temptation in the way of his children? Was it kind, was it just, was it noble, was it worthy of a good God? No wonder Christ put into his prayer: "Lead us not "into temptation."

At the time God told Adam and Eve not to eat, why did he not tell them of the existence of Satan? Why were they not put upon their guard against the serpent? Why did not God make his appearance just before the sin, instead of just after. Why did he not play the role of a Savior instead of that of a

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detective? After he found that Adam and Eve had sinned--knowing as he did that they were then totally corrupt--knowing that all their children would be corrupt, knowing that in fifteen hundred years he would have to drown millions of them, why did he not allow Adam and Eve to perish in accord- ance with natural law, then kill the devil, and make a new pair?

When the flood came, why did he not drown all? Why did he save for seed that which was "perfectly "and thoroughly corrupt in all its parts and facul- "ties"? If God had drowned Noah and his sons and their families, he could have then made a new pair, and peopled the world with men not "wholly "defiled in all their faculties and parts of soul and "body."

Jehovah learned nothing by experience. He per- sisted in his original mistake. What would we think of a man who finding that a field of wheat was worthless, and that such wheat never could be raised with profit, should burn all of the field with the exception of a few sheaves, which he saved for seed? Why save such seed? Why should God have pre- served Noah, knowing that he was totally corrupt, and that he would again fill the world with infamous

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people--people incapable of a good action? He must have known at that time, that by preserving Noah, the Canaanites would be produced, that these same Canaanites would have to be murdered, that the babes in the cradles would have to be strangled. Why did he produce them? He knew at that time, that Egypt would result from the salvation of Noah, that the Egyptians would have to be nearly de- stroyed, that he would have to kill their first-born, that he would have to visit even their cattle with disease and hailstones. He knew also that the Egyptians would oppress his chosen people for two hundred and fifteen years, that they would upon the back of toil inflict the lash. Why did he preserve Noah? He should have drowned all, and started with a new pair. He should have warned them against the devil, and he might have succeeded, in that way, in covering the world with gentlemen and ladies, with real men and real women.

We know that most of the people now in the world are not Christians. Most who have heard the gospel of Christ have rejected it, and the Presby- terian Church tells us what is to become of all these people. This is the "glad tidings of great joy." Let us see:

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"All mankind, by their fall, lost communion with "God, are under his wrath and curse, and so made "liable to all the miseries of this life, to death itself, "and to the pains of hell forever."

According to this good Presbyterian doctrine, all that we suffer in this world, is the result of Adam's fall. The babes of to-day suffer for the crime of the first parents. Not only so; but God is angry at us for what Adam did. We are under the wrath of an infinite God, whose brows are corrugated with eternal hatred.

Why should God hate us for being what we are and necessarily must have been? A being that God made--the devil--for whose work God is responsible, according to the Bible wrought this woe. God of his own free will must have made the devil. What did he make him for? Was it necessary to have a devil in heaven? God, having infinite power, can of course destroy this devil to-day. Why does he per- mit him to live? Why did he allow him to thwart his plans? Why did he permit him to pollute the inno- cence of Eden? Why does he allow him now to wrest souls by the million from the redeeming hand of Christ?

According to the Scriptures, the devil has always

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been successful. He enjoys himself. He is called "the prince of the power of the air." He has no conscientious scruples. He has miraculous power. All miraculous power must come of God, otherwise it is simply in accordance with nature. If the devil can work a miracle, it is only with the consent and by the assistance of the Almighty. Is the God of Mr. Talmage in partnership with the devil? Do they divide profits?

We are also told by the Presbyterian Church-- I quote from their Confession of Faith--that "there "is no sin so small but it deserves damnation.'' Yet Mr. Talmage tells us that God is good, that he is filled with mercy and loving-kindness. A child nine or ten years of age commits a sin, and thereupon it deserves eternal damnation. That is what Mr. Talmage calls, not simply justice, but mercy; and the sympathetic heart of Christ is not touched. The same being who said: "Suffer little children to come unto me," tells us that a child, for the smallest sin, deserves to be eternally damned. The Presbyterian Church tells us that infants, as well as adults, in order to be saved, need redemption by the blood of Christ, and regen- eration by the Holy Ghost.

I am charged with trying to take the consolation

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of this doctrine from the world. I am a criminal because I am endeavoring to convince the mother that her child does not deserve eternal punishment. I stand by the graves of those who "died in their "sins," by the tombs of the "unregenerate," over the ashes of men who have spent their lives working for their wives and children, and over the sacred dust of soldiers who died in defence of flag and country, and I say to their friends--I say to the living who loved them, I say to the men and women for whom they worked, I say to the children whom they edu- cated, I say to the country for which they died: These fathers, these mothers, these wives, these husbands, these soldiers are not in hell.

_Question_. Mr. Talmage insists that the Bible is scientific, and that the real scientific man sees no contradiction between revelation and science; that, on the contrary, they are in harmony. What is your understanding of this matter?

_Answer_. I do not believe the Bible to be a sci- entific book. In fact, most of the ministers now admit that it was not written to teach any science. They admit that the first chapter of Genesis is not geo- logically true. They admit that Joshua knew nothing

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of science. They admit that four-footed birds did not exist in the days of Moses. In fact, the only way they can avoid the unscientific statements of the Bible, is to assert that the writers simply used the common language of their day, and used it, not with the intention of teaching any scientific truth, but for the purpose of teaching some moral truth. As a matter of fact, we find that moral truths have been taught in all parts of this world. They were taught in India long before Moses lived; in Egypt long be- fore Abraham was born; in China thousands of years before the flood. They were taught by hundreds and thousands and millions before the Garden of Eden was planted.

It would be impossible to prove the truth of a revelation simply because it contained moral truths. If it taught immorality, it would be absolutely certain that it was not a revelation from an infinitely good being. If it taught morality, it would be no reason for even suspecting that it had a divine origin. But if the Bible had given us scientific truths; if the ignorant Jews had given us the true theory of our solar system; if from Moses we had learned the nature of light and heat; if from Joshua we had learned something of electricity; if the minor pro-

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phets had given us the distances to other planets; if the orbits of the stars had been marked by the barbarians of that day, we might have admitted that they must have been inspired. If they had said any- thing in advance of their day; if they had plucked from the night of ignorance one star of truth, we might have admitted the claim of inspiration; but the Scriptures did not rise above their source, did not rise above their ignorant authors--above the people who believed in wars of extermination, in polygamy, in concubinage, in slavery, and who taught these things in their "sacred Scriptures."

The greatest men in the scientific world have not been, and are not, believers in the inspiration of the Scriptures. There has been no greater astronomer than Laplace. There is no greater name than Humboldt. There is no living scientist who stands higher than Charles Darwin. All the professors in all the religious colleges in this country rolled into one, would not equal Charles Darwin. All the cow- ardly apologists for the cosmogony of Moses do not amount to as much in the world of thought as Ernst Haeckel. There is no orthodox scientist the equal of Tyndall or Huxley. There is not one in this country the equal of John Fiske. I insist, that the

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foremost men to-day in the scientific world reject the dogma of inspiration. They reject the science of the Bible, and hold in utter contempt the astronomy of Joshua, and the geology of Moses.

Mr. Talmage tells us "that Science is a boy and "Revelation is a man." Of course, like the most he says, it is substantially the other way. Revelation, so-called, was the boy. Religion was the lullaby of the cradle, the ghost-story told by the old woman, Superstition. Science is the man. Science asks for demonstration. Science impels us to investigation, and to verify everything for ourselves. Most pro- fessors of American colleges, if they were not afraid of losing their places, if they did not know that Christians were bad enough now to take the bread from their mouths, would tell their students that the Bible is not a scientific book.

I admit that I have said:

1. That the Bible is cruel.

2. That in many passages it is impure.

3. That it is contradictory.

4. That it is unscientific.

Let me now prove these propositions one by one.

First. The Bible is cruel.

I have opened it at random, and the very first

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chapter that has struck my eye is the sixth of First Samuel. In the nineteenth verse of that chapter, I find the following:

"And he smote the men of Bethshemesh, because "they had looked into the ark of the Lord; even he "smote of the people fifty thousand and three-score "and ten men."

All this slaughter was because some people had looked into a box that was carried upon a cart. Was that cruel?

I find, also, in the twenty-fourth chapter of Second Samuel, that David was moved by God to number Israel and Judah. God put it into his heart to take a census of his people, and thereupon David said to Joab, the captain of his host:

"Go now through all the tribes of Israel, from "Dan even to Beersheba, and number ye the people, "that I may know the number of the people."

At the end of nine months and twenty days, Joab gave the number of the people to the king, and there were at that time, according to that census, "eight hundred thousand valiant men that drew the "sword," in Israel, and in Judah, "five hundred "thousand men," making a total of thirteen hundred thousand men of war. The moment this census was

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taken, the wrath of the Lord waxed hot against David, and thereupon he sent a seer, by the name of Gad, to David, and asked him to choose whether he would have seven years of famine, or fly three months before his enemies, or have three days of pestilence. David concluded that as God was so merciful as to give him a choice, he would be more merciful than man, and he chose the pestilence.

Now, it must be remembered that the sin of taking the census had not been committed by the people, but by David himself, inspired by God, yet the people were to be punished for David's sin. So,, when David chose the pestilence, God immediately killed "seventy thousand men, from Dan even to "Beersheba."

"And when the angel stretched out his hand upon "Jerusalem to destroy it, the Lord repented him of "the evil, and said to the angel that destroyed the "people, It is enough; stay now thine hand."

Was this cruel?

Why did a God of infinite mercy destroy seventy thousand men? Why did he fill his land with widows and orphans, because King David had taken the cen- sus? If he wanted to kill anybody, why did he not kill David? I will tell you why. Because at that

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time, the people were considered as the property of the king. He killed the people precisely as he killed the cattle. And yet, I am told that the Bible is not a cruel book.

In the twenty-first chapter of Second Samuel, I find that there were three years of famine in the days of David, and that David inquired of the Lord the reason of the famine; and the Lord told him that it was because Saul had slain the Gibeonites. Why did not God punish Saul instead of the people? And David asked the Gibeonites how he should make atonement, and the Gibeonites replied that they wanted no silver nor gold, but they asked that seven of the sons of Saul might be delivered unto them, so that they could hang them before the Lord, in Gibeah. And David agreed to the proposition, and thereupon he delivered to the Gibeonites the two sons of Rizpah, Saul's concubine, and the five sons of Michal, the daughter of Saul, and the Gibeonites hanged all seven of them together. And Rizpah, more tender than them all, with a woman's heart of love kept lonely vigil by the dead, "from the beginning of har- "vest until water dropped upon them out of heaven, "and suffered neither the birds of the air to rest upon "them by day, nor the beast of the field by night."

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I want to know if the following, from the fifteenth chapter of First Samuel, is inspired:

"Thus saith the Lord of hosts; I remember that "which Amalek did to Israel, how he laid wait for "him in the way when he came up from Egypt. Now "go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that "they have, and spare them not, but slay both man "and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, "camel and ass."

We must remember that those he was commanded to slay had done nothing to Israel. It was something done by their forefathers, hundreds of years before; and yet they are commanded to slay the women and children and even the animals, and to spare none.

It seems that Saul only partially carried into exe- cution this merciful command of Jehovah. He spared the life of the king. He "utterly destroyed all the "people with the edge of the sword," but he kept alive the best of the sheep and oxen and of the fat- lings and lambs. Then God spake unto Samuel and told him that he was very sorry he had made Saul king, because he had not killed all the animals, and because he had spared Agag; and Samuel asked Saul: "What meaneth this bleating of sheep in mine "ears, and the lowing of the oxen which I hear?"

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Are stories like this calculated to make soldiers merciful?

So I read in the sixth chapter of Joshua, the fate of the city of Jericho: "And they utterly destroyed "all that was in the city, both man and woman, "young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the "edge of the sword. And they burnt the city with "fire, and all that was therein." But we are told that one family was saved by Joshua, out of the general destruction: "And Joshua saved Rahab, the harlot, "alive, and her father's household, and all that she "had." Was this fearful destruction an act of mercy?

It seems that they saved the money of their victims: "the silver and gold and the vessels of brass "and of iron they put into the treasury of the house "of the Lord."

After all this pillage and carnage, it appears that there was a suspicion in Joshua's mind that somebody was keeping back a part of the treasure. Search was made, and a man by the name of Achan admitted that he had sinned against the Lord, that he had seen a Babylonish garment among the spoils, and two hundred shekels of silver and a wedge of gold of fifty shekels' weight, and that he took them and hid

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them in his tent. For this atrocious crime it seems that the Lord denied any victories to the Jews until they found out the wicked criminal. When they dis- covered poor Achan, "they took him and his sons "and his daughters, and his oxen and his asses and "his sheep, and all that he had, and brought them unto "the valley of Achor; and all Israel stoned him with "stones and burned them with fire after they had "stoned them with stones."

After Achan and his sons and his daughters and his herds had been stoned and burned to death, we are told that "the Lord turned from the fierceness of "his anger."

And yet it is insisted that this God "is merciful, "and that his loving-kindness is over all his works." In the eighth chapter of this same book, the infi- nite God, "creator of heaven and earth and all that is "therein," told his general, Joshua, to lay an ambush for a city--to "lie in wait against the city, even be- "hind the city; go not very far from the city, but be "ye all ready." He told him to make an attack and then to run, as though he had been beaten, in order that the inhabitants of the city might follow, and thereupon his reserves that he had ambushed might rush into the city and set it on fire. God Almighty

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planned the battle. God himself laid the snare. The whole programme was carried out. Joshua made believe that he was beaten, and fled, and then the soldiers in ambush rose out of their places, enter- ed the city, and set it on fire. Then came the slaughter. They "utterly destroyed all the inhabit- "ants of Ai," men and maidens, women and babes, sparing only their king till evening, when they hanged him on a tree, then "took his carcase down "from the tree and cast it at the entering of the "gate, and raised thereon a great heap of stones "which remaineth unto this day." After having done all this, "Joshua built an altar unto the Lord "God of Israel, and offered burnt offerings unto the "Lord." I ask again, was this cruel?

Again I ask, was the treatment of the Gibeonites cruel when they sought to make peace but were denied, and cursed instead; and although permitted to live, were yet made slaves? Read the mandate consigning them to bondage: "Now therefore ye "are cursed, and there shall none of you be freed "from being bondmen and hewers of wood and "drawers of water for the house of my God."

Is it possible, as recorded in the tenth chapter of Joshua, that the Lord took part in these battles, and

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cast down great hail-stones from the battlements of heaven upon the enemies of the Israelites, so that "they were more who died with hail-stones, than "they whom the children of Israel slew with the "sword"?

Is it possible that a being of infinite power would exercise it in that way instead of in the interest of kindness and peace?

I find, also, in this same chapter, that Joshua took Makkedah and smote it with the edge of the sword, that he utterly destroyed all the souls that were therein, that he allowed none to remain.

I find that he fought against Libnah, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and utterly destroyed all the souls that were therein, and allowed none to remain, and did unto the king as he did unto the king of Jericho.

I find that he also encamped against Lachish, and that God gave him that city, and that he "smote it "with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that "were therein," sparing neither old nor young, help- less women nor prattling babes.

He also vanquished Horam, King of Gezer, "and "smote him and his people until he left him none "remaining."

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He encamped against the city of Eglon, and killed every soul that was in it, at the edge of the sword, just as he had done to Lachish and all the others.

He fought against Hebron, "and took it and "smote it with the edge of the sword, and the king "thereof,"--and it appears that several cities, their number not named, were included in this slaughter, for Hebron "and all the cities thereof and all the "souls that were therein," were utterly destroyed.

He then waged war against Debir and took it, and more unnumbered cities with it, and all the souls that were therein shared the same horrible fate--he did not leave a soul alive.

And this chapter of horrors concludes with this song of victory:

"So Joshua smote all the country of the hills, and "of the south, and of the vale, and of the springs, "and all their kings: he left none remaining, but "utterly destroyed all that breathed, as the Lord "God of Israel commanded. And Joshua smote "them from Kadeshbarnea even unto Gaza, and all the "country of Goshen, even unto Gibeon. And all these "kings and their land did Joshua take at one time, "because the Lord God of Israel fought for Israel." Was God, at that time, merciful?

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I find, also, in the twenty-first chapter that many Icings met, with their armies, for the purpose of overwhelming Israel, and the Lord said unto Joshua: "Be not afraid because of them, for to-morrow about "this time I will deliver them all slain before Israel. "I will hough their horses and burn their chariots "with fire." Were animals so treated by the com- mand of a merciful God?

Joshua captured Razor, and smote all the souls that were therein with the edge of the sword, there was not one left to breathe; and he took all the cities of all the kings that took up arms against him, and utterly destroyed all the inhabitants thereof. He took the cattle and spoils as prey unto himself, and smote every man with the edge of the sword; and not only so, but left not a human being to breathe.

I find the following directions given to the Israel- ites who were waging a war of conquest. They are in the twentieth chapter of Deuteronomy, from the tenth to the eighteenth verses:

"When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight "against it, then proclaim peace unto it. And it "shall be, if it make thee an answer of peace, and "open unto thee, then it shall be that all the people

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"that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, "and they shall serve thee. And if it will make no "peace with thee, but will war against thee, then "thou shalt besiege it. And when the Lord thy "God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt "smite every male thereof with the edge of the "sword; but the women, and the little ones, and "the cattle, and all that is in the city, even the spoil "thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou "shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the "Lord thy God hath given thee. Thus shalt thou "do unto all the cities which are very far off from "thee, which are not of the cities of these nations." It will be seen from this that people could take their choice between death and slavery, provided these people lived a good ways from the Israelites. Now, let us see how they were to treat the inhabit- ants of the cities near to them:

"But of the cities of these people which the Lord "thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou "shalt save alive nothing that breatheth. But thou "shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, "and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, "the Hivites and the Jebusites, as the Lord thy God "hath commanded thee."

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It never occurred to this merciful God to send missionaries to these people. He built them no schoolhouses, taught them no alphabet, gave them no book; they were not supplied even with a copy of the Ten Commandments. He did not say "Reform," but "Kill;" not "Educate," but "Destroy." He gave them no Bible, built them no church, sent them no preachers. He knew when he made them that he would have to have them murdered. When he created them he knew that they were not fit to live; and yet, this is the infinite God who is infinitely merciful and loves his children better than an earthly mother loves her babe.

In order to find just how merciful God is, read the twenty-eighth chapter of Deuteronomy, and see what he promises to do with people who do not keep all of his commandments and all of his statutes. He curses them in their basket and store, in the fruit of their body, in the fruit of their land, in the increase of their cattle and sheep. He curses them in the city and in the field, in their coming in and their going out. He curses them with pestilence, with consumption, with fever, with inflammation, with extreme burning, with sword, with blasting, with mildew. He tells them that the heavens shall be as brass over their heads

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and the earth as iron under their feet; that the rain shall be powder and dust and shall come down on them and destroy them; that they shall flee seven ways before their enemies; that their carcasses shall be meat for the fowls of the air, and the beasts of the earth; that he will smite them with the botch of Egypt, and with the scab, and with the itch, and with madness and blindness and astonishment; that he will make them grope at noonday; that they shall be oppressed and spoiled evermore; that one shall be- troth a wife and another shall have her; that they shall build a house and not dwell in it; plant a vine- yard and others shall eat the grapes; that their sons and daughters shall be given to their enemies; that he will make them mad for the sight of their eyes; that he will smite them in the knees and in the legs with a sore botch that cannot be healed, and from the sole of the foot to the top of the head; that they shall be a by-word among all nations; that they shall sow much seed and gather but little; that the locusts shall consume their crops; that they shall plant vineyards and drink no wine,--that they shall gather grapes, but worms shall eat them; that they shall raise olives but have no oil; beget sons and daughters, but they shall go into captivity; that all

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the trees and fruit of the land shall be devoured by locusts, and that all these curses shall pursue them and overtake them, until they be destroyed; that they shall be slaves to their enemies, and be constantly in hunger and thirst and nakedness, and in want of all things. And as though this were not enough, the Lord tells them that he will bring a nation against them swift as eagles, a nation fierce and savage, that will show no mercy and no favor to old or young, and leave them neither corn, nor wine, nor oil, nor flocks, nor herds; and this nation shall besiege them in their cities until they are reduced to the necessity of eating the flesh of their own sons and daughters; so that the men would eat their wives and their children, and women eat their husbands and their own sons and daughters, and their own babes.

All these curses God pronounced upon them if they did not observe to do all the words of the law that were written in his book.

This same merciful God threatened that he would bring upon them all the diseases of Egypt--every sickness and every plague; that he would scatter them from one end of the earth to the other; that they should find no rest; that their lives should hang in perpetual doubt; that in the morning they would

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say: Would God it were evening! and in the even- ing, Would God it were morning! and that he would finally take them back to Egypt where they should be again sold for bondmen and bondwomen.

This curse, the foundation of the _Anathema maranatha_; this curse, used by the pope of Rome to prevent the spread of thought; this curse used even by the Protestant Church; this curse born of barba- rism and of infinite cruelty, is now said to have issued from the lips of an infinitely merciful God. One would suppose that Jehovah had gone insane; that he had divided his kingdom like Lear, and from the darkness of insanity had launched his curses upon a world.

In order that there may be no doubt as to the mercy of Jehovah, read the thirteenth chapter of Deuteronomy:

"If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy "son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or "thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee "secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, "which thou hast not known, thou nor thy fathers; " * * * thou shalt not consent unto him, nor "hearken unto him; neither shall thine eyes pity him, "neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal

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"him; but thou shalt surely kill him: thine hand "shall be first upon him to put him to death, and "afterwards the hand of all the people; and thou "shalt stone him with stones that he die, because he "hath sought to entice thee away from the Lord thy "God."

This, according to Mr. Talmage, is a commandment of the infinite God. According to him, God ordered a man to murder his own son, his own wife, his own brother, his own daughter, if they dared even to sug- gest the worship of some other God than Jehovah. For my part, it is impossible not to despise such a God--a God not willing that one should worship what he must. No one can control his admiration, and if a savage at sunrise falls upon his knees and offers homage to the great light of the East, he can- not help it. If he worships the moon, he cannot help it. If he worships fire, it is because he cannot control his own spirit. A picture is beautiful to me in spite of myself. A statue compels the applause of my brain. The worship of the sun was an exceedingly natural religion, and why should a man or woman be destroyed for kneeling at the fireside of the world?

No wonder that this same God, in the very next chapter of Deuteronomy to that quoted, says to his

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chosen people: "Ye shall not eat of anything that "dieth of itself: thou shalt give it unto the stranger "that is within thy gates, that he may eat it; or thou "mayest sell it unto an alien: for thou art a holy "people unto the Lord thy God."

What a mingling of heartlessness and thrift--the religion of sword and trade!

In the seventh chapter of Deuteronomy, Jehovah gives his own character. He tells the Israelites that there are seven nations greater and mightier than themselves, but that he will deliver them to his chosen people, and that they shall smite them and utterly destroy them; and having some fear that a drop of pity might remain in the Jewish heart, he says:

"Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor "show mercy unto them. * * * Know therefore "that the Lord thy God, he is God, the faithful God, "which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that "love him and keep his commandments to a thousand "generations, and repayeth them that hate him to "their face, to destroy them: he will not be slack to "him that hateth him, he will repay him to his face." This is the description which the merciful, long-suffer- ing Jehovah gives of himself.

So, he promises great prosperity to the Jews if

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they will only obey his commandments, and says: "And the Lord will take away from thee all sickness, "and will put none of the evil diseases of Egypt "upon thee, but will lay them upon all them that "hate thee. And thou shalt consume all the people "which the Lord thy God shall deliver thee; thine "eye shall have no pity upon them."

Under the immediate government of Jehovah, mercy was a crime. According to the law of God, pity was weakness, tenderness was treason, kindness was blasphemy, while hatred and massacre were virtues.

In the second chapter of Deuteronomy we find another account tending to prove that Jehovah is a merciful God. We find that Sihon, king of Heshbon, would not let the Hebrews pass by him, and the reason given is, that "the Lord God hardened his "spirit and made his heart obstinate, that he might "deliver him into the hand" of the Hebrews. Sihon, his heart having been hardened by God, came out against the chosen people, and God delivered him to them, and "they smote him, and his sons, and all his "people, and took all his cities, and utterly destroyed "the men and the women, and the little ones of "every city: they left none to remain." And in this

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same chapter this same God promises that the dread and fear of his chosen people should be "upon all the "nations that are under the whole heaven," and that "they should "tremble and be in anguish because of" the Hebrews.