elieve in
such a beastly lie. The clergy are beginning to think that it is
hardly manly to frighten children with a detected falsehood. Sheol
is a great relief. It is not so hot as the old place. The nights
are comfortable, and the society is quite refined. The worms are
dead, and the air reasonably free from noxious vapors. It is a
much worse word to hold a revival with, but much better for every
day use. It will hardly take the place of the old word when people
step on tacks, put up stoves, or sit on pins; but for use at church
fairs and mite societies it will do about as well. We do not need
revision; excision is what we want. The barbarism should be taken
out of the Bible. Passages upholding polygamy, wars of extermination,
slavery, and religious persecution should not be attributed to a
perfect God. The good that is in the Bible will be saved for man,
and man will be saved from the evil that is in that book. Why
should we worship in God what we detest in man?

_Question_. Do you think the use of the word sheol will make any
difference to the preachers?

_Answer_. Of course it will make no difference with Talmage. He
will make sheol just as hot and smoky and uncomfortable as hell,
but the congregations will laugh instead of tremble. The old
shudder has gone. Beecher had demolished hell before sheol was
adopted. According to his doctrine of evolution hell has been
slowly growing cool. The cindered souls do not even perspire.
Sheol is nothing to Mr. Beecher but a new name for an old mistake.
As for the effect it will have on Heber Newton, I cannot tell,
neither can he, until he asks his bishop. There are people who
believe in witches and madstones and fiat money, and centuries
hence it may be that people will exist who will believe as firmly
in hell as Dr. Shedd does now.

_Question_. What about Beecher's sermons on "Evolution"?

_Answer_. Beecher's sermons on "Evolution" will do good. Millions
of people believe that Mr. Beecher knows at least as much as the
other preachers, and if he regards the atonement as a dogma with
a mistake for a foundation, they may conclude that the whole system
is a mistake. But whether Mr. Beecher is mistaken or not, people
know that honesty is a good thing, that gratitude is a virtue, that
industry supports the world, and that whatever they believe about
religion they are bound by every conceivable obligation to be just
and generous. Mr. Beecher can no more