theologians, God, the father of us all wrote a letter
to His children. The children have always differed somewhat as to the
meaning of this letter. In consequence of these honest differences,
these brothers began to cut out each other's hearts. In every land,
where this letter from God has been read, the children to whom and for
whom it was written have been filled with hatred and malice. They have
imprisoned and murdered each other, and the wives and children of each
other. In the name of God every possible crime has been committed,
every conceivable outrage has been perpetrated. Brave men, tender and
loving women, beautiful girls, prattling babes have been exterminated
in the name of Jesus Christ. For more than fifty generations the
church has carried the black flag. Her vengeance has been measured
only by her power. During all these years of infamy no heretic has
ever been forgiven. With the heart of a fiend she has hated; with the
clutch of avarice she has grasped; with the jaws of a dragon she has
devoured, pitiless as famine, merciless as fire, with the conscience of
a serpent. Such is the history of the church of God.

I do not say, and I do not believe, that Christians are as bad as their
creeds. In spite of church and dogma, there have been millions and
millions of men and women true to the loftiest and most generous
promptings of the human heart. They have been true to their
convictions, and with a self-denial and fortitude excelled by none,
have labored and suffered for the salvation of men. Imbued with the
spirit of self-sacrifice, believing that by personal effort they could
rescue at least a few souls from the infinite shadow of hell, they have
cheerfully endured every hardship and scorned danger and death. And
yet, notwithstanding all this, they believed that honest error was a
crime. They knew that the bible so declared, and they believed that
all unbelievers would be eternally lost. They believed that religion
was of God, and all heresy of the devil. They killed heretics in
defense of their own souls and the souls of their children. They
killed them, because, according to their idea, they were the enemies of
God, and because the bible teaches that the blood of the unbeliever is
a most acceptable sacrifice to heaven.

Nature never prompted a loving mother to throw her child into the
Ganges. Nature never prompted men to exterminate each other for a
difference of opinion concerning the b