entitled to
express his opinion as to the genuiness of a pretended revelation from
God? Common sense belongs exclusively to no tongue. Logic is not
confirmed to, nor has it been buried with, the dead languages. Paine
attacked the Bible as it is translated. If the translation is wrong,
let its defenders correct it.

The Christianity of Paine's day is not the Christianity of our time.
There has been a great improvement since then. It is better now
because there is less of it. One hundred and fifty years ago the
foremost preachers of our time--that gentleman who preaches in this
magnificent hall--would have perished at the stake. Lord, Lord, how
John Calvin would have liked to have roasted this man, and the perfume
of his burning flesh would have filled heaven with joy. A Universalist
would have been torn to pieces in England, Scotland, and America.
Unitarians would have found themselves in the stocks, pelted by the
rabble with dead cats, after which their ears would have been cut off,
their tongues bored, and their foreheads branded. Less than one
hundred and fifty years ago the following law was in force in Maryland:

"Be it enacted by the right honorable, the lord proprietor, by and with
the advice and consent of his lordship's governor, and the upper and
lower houses of the assembly, and the authority of the same: That if
any person shall hereafter, within this province, willingly,
maliciously, and advisedly, by writing or speaking, blaspheme or curse
God, or deny our Savior, Jesus Christ, to be the son of God, or shall
deny the Holy Trinity, the Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost, or the
God-head of any of the three persons, or the unity of the God-head, or
shall utter any profane words concerning the Holy Trinity, or the
persons thereof and shall therefore be convicted by verdict, shall, for
the first offense, be bored through the tongue, and fined L20, to be
levied on his body. As for the second offense, the offender shall be
stigmatized by burning in the forehead the letter B, and fined L40.
And that for the third offense, the offender shall suffer death without
the benefit of clergy."

The strange thing about this law is, that it has never been repealed,
and was in force in the District of Columbia up to 1875. Laws like
this were in force in most of the colonies and in all countries where
the church had power.

In the Old Testament the death penalty was attached hundreds of
offenses. It has been t