bly in times
of prolonged drought, became a terrible demon, and as Baal or Moloch was
worshipped with cruel and bloody rites. The corruption of the best
is the worst; beneficence changes to malignity. Thus fire, which is a
splendid servant, is an awful master. The very wild beasts dread it.
Famishing lions and tigers will not approach the camp-fire to seize
their prey. Men have something of the same instinctive apprehension. How
soon the nerves are disturbed by the smell of anything burning in the
house. Raise the cry of "Fire!" in a crowded building, and at once
the old savage bursts through the veneer of civilisation. It is
helter-skelter, the Devil take the hindmost. The strong trample upon the
weak. Men and women turn to devils. Even if the cry of "Fire!" be raised
in a church--where a believer might wish to die, and where he might feel
himself booked through to glory--there is just the same stampede. People
who sit and listen complacently to the story of eternal roastings in an
everlasting hell, will fight like maniacs to escape a singeing. Rather
than go to heaven in a chariot of fire they will plod for half a century
in this miserable vale of tears.

Man's dread of fire has been artfully seized upon by the priests. All
over the world these gentlemen are in the same line of business--trading
upon the credulous terrors of the multitude. They fill Hell with fire,
because it frightens men easily, and the fuel costs nothing. If they
had to find the fuel themselves Hell would be cold in twenty-four hours.
"Flee from the wrath to come," they exclaim. "What is it?" ask the
people. "Consuming fire," the priests exclaim, "nay, not consuming; you
will burn in it without dying, without losing a particle of flesh, for
ever and ever." Then the people want to get saved, and the priests issue
insurance policies, which are rendered void by change of opinion or
failure to pay the premium.

Buddhist pictures of hell teach the eye the same lesson that is taught
the ear by Christian sermons. There are the poor damned wretches rolling
in the fire; there are the devils shovelling in fuel, and other devils
with long toasting-forks thrusting back the victims that shove their
noses out of the flames.

Wherever the priests retain their old power over the people's minds they
still preach a hell of literal fire, and deliver twenty sermons on Hades
to one on Paradise. Hell, in fact, is always as hot as the people will
stand it. The priests