es it up, and
the river rolls on down the centuries; let the Inquisition tell over its
victims; let Spain reckon her murdered ones, 31,912 burnt alive in that
one land alone; let the Netherlands speak of their slain sons and
daughters; let France and Italy swell the tale; nor let England and
Scotland be forgotten, nor the blood-roll of Ireland be missed; Catholic
murdering Arian; Arian slaying Catholic; Romanist burning Protestant;
Protestant hanging Romanist. The names of those who obey God's command
may be changed, but they all do the same accursed work, spreading
religion everywhere with fire and sword; nor does the harm confine
itself to Jews and Christians only, for Mahomet, the prophet of Arabia,
catches up the teaching of Moses and re-echoes it, and the Moslem
follows on the inspired path, and stains it once again with human blood.
A God, a Bible, a priesthood--how have they ruined the world; how fair
and bright might earth have been had there been no teachers of religion!

"How powerless were the mightiest monarch's arm,
Vain his loud threat and impotent his frown!
How ludicrous the priest's dogmatic roar!
The weight of his exterminating curse
How light! and his affected charity,
To suit the pressure of the changing times,
What palpable deceit! but for thy aid,
Religion! but for thee, prolific fiend,
Who peoplest earth with demons, hell with men,
And heaven with slaves!
Thou taintest all thou look'st upon......."

--("Queen Mab," by P.B. Shelley; can. 6. Collected works, p. 12, edition
1839.)

Deuteronomy xxi. 10-14 instructs the Hebrew that if, after victory, he
sees a beautiful woman and desires her, he may take her, and if later,
"thou have no delight in her, then thou shalt let her go whither she
will," to starvation, to misery, what matter, after God's chosen is
satisfied. Deut. xxiii. 2 punishes a man for that which is no fault of
his, his illegitimate birth. We have omitted many absurd precepts found
in this Mosaic code, and have only chosen those which are grossly
immoral, and can be defended by no kind of reasoning as to "defective,"
or "imperfect" morality, "suited to a nation in a low stage of
civilisation."

These laws not only fall short of a perfect morality, but they are
distinctly and foully immoral, and tend directly to the brutalisation of
the nation which should live under them. It is true that there is much
pure morality in this code, and some refined feeling her