This book, the Bible, has persecuted, even unto death, the wisest and
the best. This book stayed and stopped the onward movement of the human
race. This book poisoned the fountains of learning and misdirected the
energies of man.
This book is the enemy of freedom, the support of slavery. This book
sowed the seeds of hatred in families and nations, fed the flames of
war, and impoverished, the world. This book is the breastwork of kings
and tyrants--the enslaver of women and children. This book has corrupted
parliaments and courts. This book has made colleges and, universities
the teachers of error and the haters of science. This book has filled
Christendom with hateful, cruel, ignorant and warring sects. This book
taught men to kill their fellows for religion's sake. This book founded
the Inquisition, invented the instruments of torture, built the dungeons
in which the good and loving languished, forged the chains that rusted
in their flesh, erected the scaffolds whereon they died. This book
piled fagots about the feet of the just. This book drove reason from the
minds of millions and filled the asylums with the insane.
This book has caused fathers and mothers to shed the blood of their
babes. This book was the auction block on which the slave-mother stood
when she was sold from her child. This book filled the sails of the
slave-trader and made merchandise of human flesh. This book lighted
the fires that, burned "witches" and "wizards." This book filled the
darkness with ghouls and ghosts, and the bodies of men and women with
devils. This book polluted the souls of men with the infamous dogma
of eternal pain. This book made credulity the greatest of virtues, and
investigation the greatest of crimes. This book filled nations with
hermits, monks and nuns--with the pious and the useless. This book
placed the ignorant and unclean saint above the philosopher and
philanthropist. This book taught man to despise the joys of this life,
that he might be happy in another--to waste this world for the sake of
the next.
I attack this book because it is the enemy of human liberty--the
greatest obstruction across the highway of human progress.
Let me ask the ministers one question: How can you be wicked enough to
defend this book?