.

The church has pursued Paine to deter others. The church used
painting, music, and architecture simply to degrade mankind. But there
are men that nothing can awe. There have been at all times brave
spirits that dared even the gods. Some proud head has always been
above the waves. Old Diogenes, with his mantle upon him, stiff and
trembling with age, caught a small animal bred upon people, went into
the Pantheon, the temple of the gods, and took the animal upon his
thumb nail, and, pressing it with the other, "he sacrificed Diogenes to
all the gods." Just as good as anything! In every age some Diogenes
has sacrificed to all the gods. True genius never cowers, and there is
always some Samson feeling for the pillars of authority.

Cathedrals and domes, and chimes and chants, temples frescoed and
grained and carved, and gilded with gold, altars and tapers, and
paintings of virgin and babe, censer and chalice, chasuble, paten and
alb, organs, and anthems and incense rising to the winged and blest,
maniple, anice and stole, crosses and crosiers, tiaras, and crowns,
mitres and missals and masses, rosaries, relics and robes, martyrs and
saints, and windows stained as with the blood of Christ, never, never
for one moment awed the brave, proud spirit of the infidel. He knew
that all the pomp and glitter had been purchased with liberty, that
priceless jewel of the soul. In looking at the cathedral he remembered
the dungeon. The music of the organ was not loud enough to drown the
clank of fetters. He could not forget that the taper had lighted the
fagot. He knew that the cross adorned the hilt of the sword, and so
where others worshiped, he wept and scorned. He knew that across the
open Bible lay the sword of war, and so where others worshiped he
looked with scorn and wept. And so it has been through all the ages
gone.

The doubter, the investigator, the infidel, have been the saviors of
liberty. The truth is beginning to be realized, and the truly
intellectual are honoring the brave thinker of the past. But the
church is as unforgiving as ever, and still wonders why any infidel
should be wicked enough to attempt to destroy her power. I will tell
the church why I hate it.

You have imprisoned the human mind; you have been the enemy of liberty;
you have burned us at the stake, roasted us before slow fires, torn our
flesh with irons; you have covered us with chains, treated us as
outcasts; you have filled the world