ing about and in believing
in another world. There the prisoner expects to be free; the slave
to find liberty; the poor man expects wealth; the rich man happiness;
the peasant dreams of power, and the king of contentment. They
expect to find there what they lack here. I do not wish to destroy
these dreams. I am endeavoring to put out the everlasting fires.
A good, cool grave is infinitely better than the fiery furnace of
Jehovah's wrath. Eternal sleep is better than eternal pain. For
my part I would rather be annihilated than to be an angel, with
all the privileges of heaven, and yet have within my breast a heart
that could be happy while those who had loved me in this world were
in perdition.

I most sincerely hope that the future life will fulfill all splendid
dreams; but in the religion of the present day there is no joy.
Nothing is so devoid of comfort, when bending above our dead, as
the assertions of theology unsupported by a single fact. The
promises are so far away, and the dead are so near. From words
spoken eighteen centuries ago, the echoes are so weak, and the
sounds of the clods on the coffin are so loud. Above the grave
what can the honest minister say? If the dead were not a Christian,
what then? What comfort can the orthodox clergyman give to the
widow of an honest unbeliever? If Christianity is true, the other
world will be worse than this. There the many will be miserable,
only the few happy; there the miserable cannot better their condition;
the future has no star of hope, and in the east of eternity there
can never be a dawn.

_Question_. If you take away the idea of eternal punishment, how
do you propose to restrain men; in what way will you influence
conduct for good?

_Answer_. Well, the trouble with religion is that it postpones
punishment and reward to another world. Wrong is wrong, because
it breeds unhappiness. Right is right, because it tends to the
happiness of man. These facts are the basis of what I call the
religion of this world. When a man does wrong, the consequences
follow, and between the cause and effect, a Redeemer cannot step.
Forgiveness cannot form a breastwork between act and consequence.

There should be a religion of the body--a religion that will prevent
deformity, that will refuse to multiply insanity, that will not
propagate disease--a religion that is judged by its consequences in
this world. Orthodox Christianity has taught, and still teaches,