of
such savagery?

One of these gods is reported to have given the following directions
concerning human slavery: "If thou buy a Hebrew servant six years
shall he serve, and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. If
he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself; if he were married,
then his wife shall go out with him. If his master have given him a
wife, and she have borne him sons or daughters, the wife and her
children shall be her master's, and he shall go out by himself. And if
the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife and my
children; I will not go out free; then his master shall bring him unto
the judges: he shall also bring him unto the door, or unto the
doorpost; and his Master shall bore his ear with an awl; and he shall
serve him forever."

According to this, a man was given liberty upon condition that he would
desert forever his wife and children. Did any devil ever force upon a
husband, upon a father, so cruel and so heartless an alternative? Who
can worship such a god? Who can bend the knee to such a monster? Who
can pray to such a fiend?

All these gods threatened to torment forever the souls of their
enemies. Did any devil ever make so infamous a threat? The basest
thing recorded of the devil, is what he did concerning job and his
family, and that was done by the express permission of one of these
gods and to decide a little difference of opinion between their serene
highnesses as to the character of "my servant Job."

The first account we have of the devil is found in that purely
scientific book called Genesis, and is as follows: "Now the serpent was
more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made,
and he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, ye shall not eat of the
fruit of the trees of the garden? And the woman said unto the serpent.
We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden; but of the fruit of
the tree which is in the midst of the garden God hath said, Ye shall
not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die. And the serpent
said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die. For God doth know that
in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened and ye shall
be as gods, knowing good and evil. And when the woman saw that the
tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a
tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof and
did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her, an