means anything I
fail to grasp it), "for by not doing so we claim self-control, which is
displeasing to God!"

I object! The lesson of self-control is precisely what we need. And when
we control ourselves and regulate our lives on principles of right and
truth, instead of allowing a Church to regulate them through a fear of
hell, we shall be a better people, and character will have a chance to
grow.

Then this same gentleman added: "We should also give him our vices, our
worry, our temper, and our passions, so that he may dispose of them."

Dispose of them yourselves! Don't try to shift your responsibilities
on to somebody else. Don't drive your tack into the brain of justice,
expecting to save your own soft skull. Don't enervate your strength
to do light by accepting the fatal doctrine of vicarious atonement. It
weakens every character that it touches.

VICARIOUS ATONEMENT NOT A CHRISTIAN INVENTION.

The doctrine of vicarious atonement is found in some form in most
religions, and it is the body and soul of ours. The idea is not a
Christian invention. It caused the Carthaginians to put to death their
handsomest prisoners if a battle were won, the most promising children
of their own nobility if it were lost. They were offerings to appease
the gods.

In old times there were peoples who believed that if a chief was guilty
of a misdemeanor it was just to punish or enslave any one of his tribe.
That was their idea of liberty and justice. If a father committed
a crime it could be expiated by the murder of his son. That was the
doctrine of vicarious atonement in all its pristine glory. So they
adopted that style of justice in our religion, and condemned the
whole lot of us to the eternal wrath of God on account of that little
indiscretion attributed to Eve. It seems a very little thing for anybody
to get so angry at us all about and stay angry so long! It doesn't seem
to me that if one of you were to eat every apple I had in my orchard, I
should want to murder and eternally damn all the folks that live in Asia
Minor. Do you think you would?

In the 11th verse of the 12th chapter of the second book of Samuel it is
claimed that God said he was going to be revenged for the crimes of some
men by a vile punishment of their wives.

Only a short time ago a man tried that same style of justice in one of
our Western towns. He claimed that Smith had alienated the affections of
his wife, so he went over to Smith's house