s with suns, thy worshipers stand
erect. They do not bow or cringe or crawl or bend their foreheads to
the earth. Thy dust hast never borne the impress of lips, upon thy
sacred altars mothers do not sacrifice their babes, nor men their
rights. Thou askest naught from man except the things that good men
hate, the whip, the chain, the dungeon key. Thou hast no kings, no
popes, no priests to stand between their fellow-men and thee. Thou
hast no monks, no nuns, who, in the name of duty, murder joy. Thou
carest not for forms nor mumbled prayers. At thy sacred shrine
hypocrisy does not bow, fear does not crouch, virtue does not tremble,
superstition's feeble tapers do not burn, but reason holds aloft her
inextinguishable torch, while on the ever-broadening brow of science
falls the ever coming morning of the ever better day.

Ingersoll on The Chinese God

Messrs. Wright, Dickey, O'Conner and Murch, of the select committee on
the causes of the present depression of labor, presented the majority
special report upon Chinese immigration.

These gentlemen are in great fear for the future of our most holy and
perfectly authenticated religion, and have, like faithful watchmen from
the walls and towers of Zion, hastened to give the alarm. They have
informed Congress that "Joss has his temple of worship in the Chinese
quarters, in San Francisco. Within the walls of a dilapidated
structure is exposed to the view of the faithful the god of the
Chinaman, and here are his altars of worship. Here he tears up his
pieces of paper; here he offers up his prayers; here he receives his
religious consolations, and here is his road to the celestial land."
That "Joss is located in a long, narrow room, in a building in a back
alley, upon a kind of altar;" that "he is a wooden image, looking as
much like an alligator as like a human being;" that the Chinese "think
there is such a place as heaven;" that "all classes of Chinamen worship
idols;" that "the temple is open every day at all hours;" that "the
Chinese have no Sunday;" that this heathen god has "huge jaws, a big
red tongue, large white teeth, a half-dozen arms, and big, fiery
eyeballs. About him are placed offerings of meat, and other
eatables--a sacrificial offering."

No wonder that these members of the committee were shocked at such a
god, knowing as they did that the only true God was correctly described
by the inspired lunatic of Patmos in the following words: