st to damn him for holding a bad hand? Is it honest to give him hell
for not winning the game?

Let us use for a moment the cant language of theology. Let us imagine
the _vilest_ of "damned sinners" in Gehenna. Does not every scientist,
and every philosopher, know that the orb of his fate was predetermined?
Would not that "lost soul" have the right to curse his maker? Might he
not justly exclaim "I am holier than thou"?

Do not imagine, reader, that this new reading of the book of fate has no
practical significance. When we get rid of the idea of "damned sinners,"
when we abolish the idea of "sin" altogether and its correlative
"punishment," and learn to regard man as a complicated effect in a
universe of causation, we shall bring wisdom and humanity into our
treatment of the "criminal classes," we shall look upon them as moral
lunatics and deal with them accordingly. And this spirit will extend
itself to all human relations. It will make us less impatient and angry
with each other. We shall see that "to know all is to pardon all."
Thus will the overthrow of theology be the preparation for a new moral
development. Another link of the old serpent of superstition will
be uncoiled from the life of humanity, leaving it freer to learn the
splendid truth, taught by that divine man Socrates, that wisdom and
virtue are one and indivisible.

WHERE IS HELL?

This is a question of great importance, or at least of very great
interest. According to the Christian scheme of salvation, the vast
majority of us will have to spend eternity in "sulphurous and tormenting
flames," and we are naturally curious as to the situation of a place in
which we shall experience such delightful sensations.

But there is hardly any subject on which we can obtain so little
information. The clergy are becoming more and more reticent about it.
What little they ever knew is being secreted in the depths of their
inner consciousness. When they are pressed for particulars they look
injured. Sometimes they piteously exclaim "Don't." At other times they
wax wroth, and exclaim to the questioners about the situation of hell,
"Wait till you get there."

Just as heaven used to be spoken of as "up above," hell was referred to
as "down below." At one time, indeed, it was believed to be underground.
Many dark caves were thought to lead to it, and some of them were called
"Hell Mouth." Volcanoes were regarded as entrances to the fiery regions,
and when ther