on
with the mental freedom of the race.

Salvation through slavery is worthless. Salvation from slavery is
inestimable.

As long as man believes the bible to be infallible, that is his master.
The civilization of this century is not the child of faith, but of
unbelief--the result of free thought.

All that is necessary, as it seems to me, to convince any reasonable
person that the bible is simply and purely of human invention--of
barbarian invention--is to read it. Read it as you would any other
book; think of it as you would any other; get the bandage of reverence
from your eyes; drive from your heart the phantom of fear; push from
the throne of your brain the cowled form of superstition--then read the
holy bible, and you will be amazed that you ever, for one moment,
supposed a being of infinite wisdom, goodness and purity to be the
author of such ignorance and of such atrocity.

Our ancestors not only had their God-factories, but they made devils as
well. These devils were generally disgraced and fallen gods. Some had
headed unsuccessful revolts; some had been caught sweetly reclining in
the shadowy folds of some fleecy clouds, kissing the wife of the God of
gods. These devils generally sympathized with man. There is in regard
to them a most wonderful fact: In nearly all the theologies, mythologic
and religious, the devils have been much more humane and merciful than
the gods. No devil ever gave one of his generals an order to kill
children and to rip open the bodies of pregnant women. Such
barbarities were always ordered by the good gods. The pestilences were
sent by the most merciful gods. The frightful famine, during which the
dying child with pallid lips sucked the withered bosom of a dead
mother, was sent by the loving gods. No devil was ever charged with
such fiendish brutality.

One of these gods, according to the account, drowned an entire world,
with the exception of eight persons. The old, the young, the beautiful
and the helpless were remorselessly devoured by the shoreless sea.
This, the most fearful tragedy that the imagination of ignorant priests
ever conceived, was the act not of a devil, but of God so-called, whom
men ignorantly worship unto this day. What a stain such an act would
leave upon the character of a devil! One of the prophets of one of
these gods, having in his power a captured king, hewed him in pieces in
the sight of all the people. Was ever any imp of any devil guilty