fraud and deception, whose delight it was to issue orders to his enemies, which he compelled them to neglect, by "hardening their hearts," and then scourged them for disobedience. | He was, however, discomfited, for the bungling and informality of the proceedings were so glaring, as to compel the magistrate to dismiss the case. The reward of the bluecoated god-defender, was his trouble; his | summons was all vanity ;" his victory, "vexation of spirit." The turnkey of the House of Correction would have rejoiced more over the imprisonment of one blasphemer, than over ninety and nine pickpockets, whether of the church, the state, or the There is a god, whose monstrous appetite for blood, required for its gratification, during 4000 years, continual supplies of fresh victims from bands of sacrificial butchers, till the life-blood of "his only-begotten son trickled down the felon's gibbet, and which to this day, wherever his maleficent influ- | street. ence is felt, compels the sacrifice of the good and just, at the hands of his butcher-priests. There is a god, whose amusements have consisted in the measurement of dressinggowns, the stitching of breeches, the counting of buttons, the embroidering of petticoats, the sketching out of candlesticks, &c., for which dignified employment he selected his foremen, journeymen, and apprentices from a particular family or two, set apart from among the fickle, ignorant, and besotted savages, who rejoiced in the title of his "peculiar people." There is a god, whose promises unfulfilled, threats not executed, denunciations without consequences, whose alliance without strengthening, and favoritism without advantage,have stigmatised him as unsurpassed for implacable vengefulness, bitter malignity, horrible atrocity, miserable imbecility, contemptible vanity-in short, an intense concentration of the most detestable passions which have signalised the most notorious of malefactors. THAT GOD IS THE GOD OF THE CHRISTIANS! M. Q. . "HALL'S CALL TO THE UNCON VERTED" (NOT BAXTER's). ،، As man was, in the beginning [gulled], is now, and ever will be "-while christianity is part and parcel of the law of the land, so long will credulity be part and parcel of his being. These pithy remarks, and many more, equally sage, have been suggested by the abusive letters and notices in the Times, Herald, Post, and some weeklies of the same kidney, recommending persecutions for blasphemy, and conjuring up the grandiloquent victories that would be obtained were we proceeded against, if only for the nuisance created by the numbers congregated at our office window, with the rewards which would follow our certain conviction. The three policemen paid 4s. for the christian tract, vulgo, summons, which has put them in a sanguinary perspiration, called, in gospel twaddle a "bloody sweat." This was the work of the Times. The "lobsters," though boiling with rage, still look blue. Poor automatons, how they must feel their take in! Naughty godmongers! after advising these asses to adopt lions' skins, to see them cudgelled out of them without interfering, was rather too bad. These "clever idle dogs," after doffing their royal blue, and taking to their greasy jackets-after putting aside their hazel twigs," and drawing their steel-pens, and copying "What is god ?" and other "useful knowledge," from our window—and trying a hundred little maneuvres to sniff up a case of blasphemy-after all this, to be told by Midas Hall, that it "was no go," must require nearly as much philosophy as falls to our share, which is considerably more than has yet been served out to christian bludgeonmen. And we pray (for the first time) the Jew-god, not to put his light (if he has one), upon these dark and foggy nights, under a bushel, but to stick it on Waterloo-bridge, and take care that none of the force, in their new clothes, or the Vice Society, with the last quarter's report, throw themselves from its parapets, and thus deprive us of a world of fun. We must not forget, for the benefit of our readers, Mister Justice Midas Hall's definition of a thoroughfare. He said a shor window was one! So that any jolly costermonger may, if he fancies it, drive his donkey through your windows into your shop-nay, he may summons you for obstructing the thoroughfare, by putting glass in it! A pretty specimen of justice's justice. Their power, fortunately, is fast passing away-a train of ill-luck seems to attend their movements-the public mind will not sanction prosecutions-free expression has invaded the glorious rights of christianity, and, should At last the tempting bait caught a flat of a policeman, named Medlicott, whose large- other coloured clothes - the devil's livery being * The bishops' bludgeon-men should have some ness of swallow is unquestionable, and whose "blue, turned up with thunder and lightning." But nose reminds one of the Peak of Teneriffe. we suppose it is, in celestial, as in mundane matters He summoned us to Bow-street "for exhibit-spirits will ape their betters, and the "Lord of ing a certain profane paper in our window." Hosts" takes the fashion from the "Prince of Dark. negg." a coroner be shortly summoned to attend a post mortem, the word "persecution" will be found engraved on their hearts. The Atheists have done the trick, and their occupation is nearly gone-the splendiferous schemes of auto-de-faism are knocked on the head. Christianity, although still breathing, has had its teeth drawn-it can no more bite -its murky hell is now obscured-its priestly demons and lay dupes have been eclipsed by the apostles of freedom of thought-the power once vested in the hands of heaven's vice-gerents, have become "fine by degrees, and beautifully less." One striking lesson is to be gleaned from the preceding events, the utter impotence of religious efforts to prevent the march of mind. The sword of the god of the christians has been shivered on our shield of truth-the "all in all" has fallen before the arrows of inquiry-and we have now given to slavery, despotism, and monkish frauds their just characters, and designated them by their proper names. perish all religions! So ANTI-PERSECUTION UNION. PUBLIC MEETING. A PUBLIC MEETING in connection with the above society, was held at the Social Institution John-street, Tottenham Courtroad, London, on Monday, Dec. 5, at halfpast eight, p.m. Mr. HETHERINGTON in the chair. The Chairman opened the business of the meeting in an effective speech. Mr. LLOYD JONES moved the first resolution, as follows:- "That all legal interference with the free expression of speculative opinions, is both impolitic and unjust impolitic because, though potent to make hypocrites, it never can make converts; unjust because it retards the progress of truth, and inflicts a gross private injury without producing any general good; that the true and just application of the law is to protect the weak and the minority, in the annunciation of their opinions, and the only legitimate tribunal is the public voice after full and free discussion." Seconded by Mrs. CHAPPLESMITH, and carried unanimously.., . Mr. J. C. BLUMENFIELD, said-Blasphemy! persecution! It is strange, that one should be the consequence of the other; it is strange to see bricklayers and carpenters, whom I would have supposed to be apprentices of the devil, if I was a believer, building prisons out of ideas and words of a blasphemer; it is strange, that a blasphemer, who refuses to go to heaven with a set of 427 rogues (denying such a thing as heaven), ost of which they did not know how to escape. I don't know if they feared to be hung or smothered, or that their pockets might be emptied; what they feared, I don't exactly know; this I know, that in consequence of some fear or other, they adopted the stratagem to prosecute their prosecutors, and thus save themselves. The affair I learnt afterwards was this: Messrs. Southwell and Holyoake presented themselves in a house as clerks, with valuable articles, and very cheap too, from the old established house of Reason and Co. The customer answered them, that he had been already supplied with much superior articles, of course much dearer, from the house of god and co. "Why," exclaimed Messrs. Southwell and Holyoake, "you have been humbugged, sir, such a house does not exist, and the articles you bought are not worth a hungry dog's dream." The clerks of god and co. denied, and the Infidels maintained, the fact. Both parties then applied to an honest old merchant of the city, who was to decide the question. "Why," said the merchant, "the house of Reason and Co. I know very well, it is in London, in Manchester, in Dublin, in Paris, and in Constantinople; but where does the house of god and co. exist? We may at once write to this house, and thus ascertain the truth or falsehood of the assertion of these two Infidel gentlemen." It is in heaven, was the answer of the clerks of god and co. 66 Heaven, indeed, I never could make out where such a place could exist. Can you show it me on the maps " The poor clerks of god and co., thus pressed and puzzled by the questions of the merchant, and not being able to prove the existence of the house of god and co., and to establish their honest character as clerks of the same house, brought an action against Messrs. Southwell and Holyoake, charging them with having calumniated god and co. This maneuvre of the heavenly clerks, although not of a nature to prove that they were not rogues, inasmuch that their god, the calumniated individual, has not himself signed the action brought against Messrs. Southwell and Holyoake (for I read, ever since, every day, the Times paper, and never saw the signature of god himself), was, according to their judgment, qualified enough to deliver them for a moment from the scrape they had been brought into by the two Infidels. I, however, was not of their opinion. I was convinced that these unmasked rogues, covered with every crime and human blood, must be hanged or smothered, or sent with empty pockets to the tread-mill. What was, my astonishment, when I heard, that not the swindling priests, but the honest Messrs. Southwell and Holyoake had been committed to prison. I asked a clever advocate the reason of such a strange event, and he told me this: you must know that the fraudulent trade with heaven has been carried on for centuries, not alone by the priests, but by millions of other descriptions, and that, therefore, the important discovery of Messrs. Southwell and Holyoake, was such a dreadful thing as to raise, not alone the priests, but the whole world of lords, ministers, kings, and queens, who were engaged in that trade, and to effect thus a general bankruptcy amongst them. To prevent such an alarming monster-bankruptcy, they threw Messrs. Southwell and Holyoake as the evidence against their pick-. pocket gods, into prison. This is the affair whieh passed between the reason and religion traders. Those who have ears may hear, those who have eyes may see and judge. At the last and true judgment, however, the victims for reason and love, and justice, and humanity, will be released from their prisons, and the swindling priests, with their catechisms, with their churches, with their devils, with their god, with their hell, and with their heaven, will disappear from the earth for ever. With this sweet hope, let us embrace and console our noble sufferers, Southwell and Holyoake, and wait for a better time. Let us study, let us read, Reason's scriptures, reason's creed, And the wolfish priests will die, Mr. Blumenfield concluded by moving— "That CHARLES SOUTHWELL and GEO. JACOB HOLYOAKE now undergoing sentences of fine and imprisonment, for the obscure, doubtful, and undefinable crime called blasphemy, are victims of irrational, vindictive, and savage laws-the dicta of bigotted judges in a superstitious period, and utterly at variance with the improved spirit of the age." Mr. J. CAMPBELL, General Secretary to the National Charter Association, seconded the resolution, which was carried. Mrs. MARTIN moved the next resolution "That Messrs. Southwell, Holyoake, &c., having set aside private and personal considerations for the advancement of a great public principle, by conscientiously expressing and unflinchingly promulgating their honest convictions, are (whether right or wrong in those opinions) entitled to the sympathy and support of this meeting, which determines on an immediate subscription in their behalf-and the adop tion of a petition to her majesty, to be signed by the chairman." Mr. G. SIMKINS seconded it.-Carried. A Memorial to the Queen was also adopted. A collection was made in aid of the objects of the Union, and the meeting separated, after a vote of thanks to the chairman. Why is it supposed, that if men were not held responsible for their conduct, that vice would go unchecked ? men weaken the force of necessary restraints which just laws impose, without first abolishing the necessity for such restraints, by improving the condition, and, as a consequence, the morals of the people; but many depraved men have made of law the mere instrument of vengeance, ever ready to glut their diabolical appetite for cruelty, so that the law, which should be respected by all as a guardian angel, or genius of protection, has been abhorred as a foul and most ugly fiend. We are, therefore, advocates of la w and order of the former, because it will produce the latter if wise and salutary-as it is clear, that without some stringent regulation society would go to pieces, and return to anarchy; but then no laws should be framed in a vindictive spirit, or savour of cruelty; men should be made to suffer for their misdoings, but none should be punished. In Russia, where a darkness that may be felt reigns over the land, and men are less free and happy than brutes, the laws are framed in a savage, harsh, and brutal spirit, for the wisdom of the Russian legislator has not yet reached the great truth, that human beings are made to be what they are, and that it is far easier to check the growth of crime by humanising the people, by early training and implanting good habits, than by attempting to stem the torrent of crime, which flows from their accursed institutions, as from an inexhaustible fountain. The French criminal code is, to our shame be it spoken, the least harsh and cruel in Europe, perhaps, in the world, and sheds more lustre on the memory of Napoleon than did his most brilliant victories. Australitz will be forgotten when the code of Napoleon will live in the minds of men, unless, as we are told by Shakspere, men's virtues live in sand, and their vices in marble. Because it is said, that it would be inconsistent to make men suffer for their misconduct, seeing that they cannot help acting as they do, yet those who urge this, would not hesitate if they saw a man, drunk or mad, about to swallow arsenic, to dash it from his lips, even though they should knock a tooth or two down his throat in so doing-still less would they hesitate so to act if they saw him about to administer the poison to another-as the loss of a tooth would be as a feather in the scale, when weighed against the great good of preserving a fellow-creature's life. Again, if a child, knowing nothing of the nature of powder, should prepare to let off squibs and crackers in a powder magazine, would our knowledge that the child was as innocent as the unfledged bird prevent us using all necessary means to prevent the destruction of life and property? It would be but one step farther in folly, to say that none hereafter should kill fleas, because, poor things, they are not responsible, and can't help biting. Our knowledge that vice is madness, will not abate one jot our horror of those who practice it, or lead to the abolition of a wholesome and necessary restraint, but redouble our vigilance, lead to a discovery of the causes of crime, and the practical adoption of the simple but invaluable principle, that "prevention is better than cure," that all law being, at best, but a necessary evil, is only defensible on the score of its utility, and is rather tolerated than admired; so that those men who glorify the law, and are filled with a kind of wild fondness-like misers, who gloat over their shining heaps are so lost in the worship of means as to forget the end. Hence the rant of idle declaimers, when they cry out, "let the world be destroyed, so that the law be maintained," as though the law was Has made countless thousands mourn! anything more than a human invention, to keep vice in check and hold out inducements Did such mischievous reasoners understand to virtue, by throwing the shield of its pro- that society, as a whole, makes its members tection over the innocent, and striking terror good or bad, virtuous or vicious, it would at into the hearts of evil-doers. Hence it folonce dart upon them, that the only way to lows, that the law, like an external covering, reduce the amount of human vice, and its should be worn as long as it affords us pro- inseparable companion, misery, would be by tection and warmth, but be thrown aside, like the removal, as far as practicable, of poverty, an old garment, when worn out and useless. and giving to all a sound knowledge of men We may sum up by observing, that the term and things, which will call into existence law signifies a rule or regulation established that self-respect which is the parent of all by man for the guidance of man, the osten- good and virtuous acts. When this is, at all sible object of which is the good of all and events, attempted by statesmen and legis the injury of none. Nor would any but mad-lators, then and then only will a ray of hope Why are severe penal laws still advocated by many well-meaning individuals? Because they hold the doctrine that the human heart is naturally depraved, which depravity can only be held in check by practising upon the fears of men, hence torments the most exquisite have been invented, and Man's inhumanity to man illumine the darkness that surrounds us, nor will virtue much longer be a shadow, which eludes the grasp, but a living reality-and jails, gibbets, and other instruments of death and torture, will be pointed at as things that were-relics of a barbarous age. THE NEW ARGUMENT FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD. III. And I will send a lying spirit into the mouths of their prophets.-JEW-BOOK. AND, in accordance with this spirit, they have all gone astray, 66 speaking lies," to prove the existence of god-and, as lies never serve a good purpose, so we find, in this instance, that they only serve to make darkness visible. Even Origen Bacheler, in his discussion with Dale Owen, proves just the contrary position to that which he affirmed he would prove. Indeed, discussions are strange things; in looking over them, it will generally be found that one of the combatants, and of course him who feels his inability most, while he makes a great noise about the victory, is actually playing the game of the sailor in his flight from the bear, first throwing down a cap, and then a shoe, and then a glove, to take off his opponent's attention from the main point, and thus keeps up a running fire to such a length, that many parties doubt on which side the victory is. instead of taking advantage of the tactics of his opponent, joins issue on the minor points of accountability, thus leaving the real point at issue between them, out of the question. Bacheler says (p. 5), "were all things in accordance with the limited wisdom of man, there would be reason to suppose they were not contrived by wisdom superior to his; and consequently not contrived by infinite wisdom, and, therefore, that there is no infinite wisdom-no god." Thus, at once, it appears to us, involving the most egregious contradictions. He (Bacheler) would have it, it would be evidence against the existence of that was man able to perceive this wisdom, god, and therefore that the non-perception is proof of deity's existence, and yet this very assumed consciousness or proof, or whatever else it may be called, must needs rest on the basis that man does perceive so much; for even Bacheler is not a god, and thus the argument pokes out one eye of his deity in the very act of pointing to the other. And all this is finished off, aptly enough (page 6), with the assertion, that the apparent imperfections in the universe, tend to corroborate that evidence of a deity's handy work to be drawn from the perfections thereof! while the very expression, apparent imperfections, raises the inference that they are not such in reality, but are, in fact, perfections, which, as such, in time destroys the evidence sought to be drawn from them in their contrary character, as well as confirming the position that all things are in accordance with man's limited wisdom-inasmuch as he can see through the apparent imperfections, and therefore, forming evidence against the existence of any higher wisdom, and, according to his own argument, evidence against god. Now, let us look again at this matter. Bacheler, in analysing what he calls the position of the Atheist, asserts that all things are in accordance with infinite wisdom, and as he asserts this in the plenitude of his own (man's) limited wisdom, it follows that, according to his own showing, they were not contrived by wisdom superior to his, and consequently not contrived by infinite wisdom, and therefore, that there is no infinite wisdom-no god. And again (page 9), he says, "There is or there is not a god,' and he makes it a duty on the part of his op ponent to decide this one way or the other, as if it were a tangible problem for mathematical solution; or, as if he was not nearer truth who believed not at all, than he who believed erroneously. Owen answers this by saying, "There may, or there may not be one, or a thousand and one, superior existences to man in the univerise; there may he inhabitants in the sun, but that it is impossible to stretch anaolgy from We complain, however, of both the dis-earth to heaven, and he sees по reason putants in the debate referred too, for Owen, to assert or deny." Owen might have put This is Origen Bacheler's game. He opens the debate referred to, as god's champion, and it was, of course, for him to adduce proof of his master's existence. Instead, however, of doing this, he begins by analysing an adverse position, and one set up by himself, too (see p. 5). Now this is begging the question to begin with, and may, account for his attack on the other side. Why did he not stand up like a man, and if in god's employ bring out the agreement; why not give us the witnesses at once, that such a firm as father, son, and holy-ghost existed, and had engaged him as copying clerk or amanuensis, to write their letters? Even had he overthrown his opponent, his conclusion does not follow, for it might be that both were wrong. We remember an account of a debate amongst the students of the Epicurean philosophy-whether the vicious are more deserving of indignation or contempt. It was carried on for a long time, neither party supposing there could be more than two sides to the subject, when it was suggested, that the master always treated them with compassion, and the third side was immediately voted victorious. " |