, or by slander. You will not threaten him with
punishment--here or hereafter. You will give him your thought,
your reasons, your facts; and there you will stop. This is
intellectual hospitality. You do not give up what you believe to
be the truth; you do not compromise. You simply give him the
liberty you claim for yourself. The truth is not affected by your
opinion or by his. Both may be wrong. For many years the church
has claimed to have the "truth," and has also insisted that it is
the duty of every man to believe it, whether it is reasonable to
him or not. This is bigotry in its basest form. Every man should
be guided by his reason; should be true to himself; should preserve
the veracity of his soul. Each human being should judge for himself.
The man that believes that all men have this right is intellectually
hospitable.

_Question_. In the sharp distinction between theology and religion
that is now recognized by many theologians, and in the liberalizing
of the church that has marked the last two decades, are not most
of your contentions already granted? Is not the "lake of fire and
brimstone" an obsolete issue?

_Answer_. There has been in the last few years a great advance.
The orthodox creeds have been growing vulgar and cruel. Civilized
people are shocked at the dogma of eternal pain, and the belief in
hell has mostly faded away. The churches have not changed their
creeds. They still pretend to believe as they always have--but
they have changed their tone. God is now a father--a friend. He
is no longer the monster, the savage, described in the Bible. He
has become somewhat civilized. He no longer claims the right to
damn us because he made us. But in spite of all the errors and
contradictions, in spite of the cruelties and absurdities found in
the Scriptures, the churches still insist that the Bible is
_inspired_. The educated ministers admit that the Pentateuch was
not written by Moses; that the Psalms were not written by David;
that Isaiah was the work of at least three; that Daniel was not
written until after the prophecies mentioned in that book had been
fulfilled; that Ecclesiastes was not written until the second
century after Christ; that Solomon's Song was not written by Solomon;
that the book of Esther is of no importance; and that no one knows,
or pretends to know, who were the authors of Kings, Samuel,
Chronicles, or Job. And yet these same gentlemen still cling to
the d