t make any God happy by fasting. Let
us have good food, and let us have it well cooked--and it is a thousand
times better to know how to cook it than it is to understand any
theology in the world. I believe in the gospel of good clothes. I
believe in the gospel of good houses, in the gospel of water and soap.
I believe in the gospel of intelligence, in the gospel of education.
The school-house is my cathedral. The universe is my Bible. I believe
in that gospel of justice that we must reap what we sow.

I do not believe in forgiveness. If I rob Mr. Smith and God forgives
me, how does that help Smith? If I, by slander, cover some poor girl
with the leprosy of some imputed crime, and she withers away like a
blighted flower, and afterward I get forgiveness, how does that help
her? If there is another world we have got to settle. No bankrupt
court there. Pay down. The Christians say, that among the ancient
Jews, if you committed a crime you had to kill a sheep, now they
say,--"Charge it." "Put it upon the slate." It won't do, for every
crime you commit you must answer to yourself and to the one you injure.
And if you have ever clothed another with unhappiness, as with a
garment of pain, you will never be quite as happy as though you hadn't
done that thing. No forgiveness. Eternal, inexorable, everlasting
justice. That is what I believe in. And if it goes hard with me, I
will stand it, and I will stick to in logic and I will bear it like a
man.

And I believe, too, in the gospel of liberty, in giving to others what
we claim for ourselves. I believe there is room everywhere for
thought, and the more liberty you give away the more you will have. In
liberty, extravagance is economy. Let us be just. Let us be generous
to each other.

I believe in the gospel of intelligence. That is the only lever
capable of raising mankind. Intelligence must be the savior of this
world. Humanity is the grand religion, and no God can put another in
hell in another world who has made a little heaven in this. God cannot
make a man miserable if that man has made somebody else happy. God
cannot hate anybody who is capable of loving anybody.

So I believe in this great gospel of generosity.

"Ah! but," they say, "it won't do. You must believe. I say no. My
gospel of health will bring life. My gospel of intelligence, my gospel
of good living, my gospel of good-fellowship will cover the world with
happy homes. My doctrine