h the clergy. They looked so helpless and talked in
such a weak, wandering, and wobbling kind of way that I felt as
though I had been cruel. From the papers I see that they are busy
trying to find out who the wife of Cain was. I see that the Rev.
Dr. Robinson, of New York, is now wrestling with that problem. He
begins to be in doubt whether Adam was the first man, whether Eve
was the first woman; suspects that there were other races, and that
Cain did not marry his sister, but somebody else's sister, and that
the somebody else was not Cain's brother. One can hardly over-
estimate the importance of these questions, they have such a direct
bearing on the progress of the world. If it should turn out that
Adam was the first man, or that he was not the first man, something
might happen--I am not prepared to say what, but it might.

It is a curious kind of a spectacle to see a few hundred people
paying a few thousand dollars a year for the purpose of hearing
these great problems discussed: "Was Adam the first man?" "Who
was Cain's wife?" "Has anyone seen a map of the land of Nod?"
"Where are the four rivers that ran murmuring through the groves
of Paradise?" "Who was the snake? How did he walk? What language
did he speak?" This turns a church into a kind of nursery, makes
a cradle of each pew, and gives to each member a rattle with which
he can amuse what he calls his mind.

The great theologians of Andover--the gentlemen who wear the brass
collars furnished by the dead founder--have been disputing among
themselves as to what is to become of the heathen who fortunately
died before meeting any missionary from that institution. One can
almost afford to be damned hereafter for the sake of avoiding the
dogmas of Andover here. Nothing more absurd and childish has ever
happened--not in the intellectual, but in the theological world.

There is no need of the Freethinkers saying anything at present.
The work is being done by the church members themselves. They are
beginning to ask questions of the clergy. They are getting tired
of the old ideas--tired of the consolations of eternal pain--tired
of hearing about hell--tired of hearing the Bible quoted or talked
about--tired of the scheme of redemption--tired of the Trinity, of
the plenary inspiration of the barbarous records of a barbarous
people--tired of the patriarchs and prophets--tired of Daniel and
the goats with three horns, and the image with the clay feet,