Ashtabula weekly telegraph. (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1880-1886, 1880-12-17
The Greed Of the InndeI.

THAT book is to him an imposture
and pretended revelation which fur
nishes the only explanation ever offered
Of human misery, suffering and death;
which responds to man universal crav-
ing for Immortality and gives tran
iscendant glimpses of a future state;
which presents the sublimest views of
the compassion of the Creator; which
paints picture of man which has an
exact transcript in the history Of all
Nations, and on behalf of which myriads
rise up to testify that it has been a
ceaseless impulse 10 aspirations, COM
fort in their trials and has taken away
the fear of death.
He believes that the earliernarratives
of the Bible were fabrications intended
20 gloriiy the Jewish NatiOn; but some-
how these fabricatiOns are totally un-
like the legendary traditions of Greece
and Rome, for instead of making their
ancestors gods and heroes, they make
them slaves, and tell history Of Jacob
and his sons which cover their progeni-
tors with infanlyi and, strange to say,
these fabricatiOns imposed on later
prophets who were the Bternest de-
nounoers Of falsehood, and are now i'm
posing upon six millions of Jews, who
with a tenacity unparalleled, and sAcri-
iices eeaseless, cling to the ritual and
history of their ancestors.
He believes that, by some unaccount-
able species of literary deception, un-
lettered or fanaticai men have pre-
tended 10 give four narratives of the
Founder Of Christianity, which the
greatest modern critics confess are ''the
very gold of simplicity, integrity and
truthfuiness,n and which present an
image of Jesus Christ that brings most
vividly into view the very perfection of
humanity, that has furnished model
for the noblest spirits among men, and
that surpasses in beauty and grandeur
all that poetry ever sung, or human
genius ever conceived
lie believes chat the writers of the
New Testament were either knaves or
fools, and yet they taught the purest,
wisest, most elevated and most self
sacrificing system Of morals the world
has ever seen. *. -.a-
He believes that in the most enlieht-
sned and skeptical age OF the Roman
Empire thousands OF men were such
arrlnt fools as to give credence to his
toryof Christ which was full of lies, and
to a record Of miracles which had never
been worked, and this at q time 80 near
TO the events that an imposture could
not have escaped detaction for an hour.
lie believes with M. Roman that the
resurrection Of Christ rested on the
testimony of a sentimental woman; or
with the author OF "Supernatural
Religion" that the deception had its
origin in "nOtoriously superstitious
age and yet that men of the noblest
Intellect have held for centuries that no
historical incident has received such
ample and powerful support; that II
completely revolutionized the bearing
of the original witnesses who affirmed
that they had seen Christ after the
resurrection, and that the resurrection
has offered the most magnificent con-
ISOLATION to sufferers and martyrs for
TRUTH has never been disproved by the
ingenuity Of opponents, and has been
felt TO raise the whole sum OF human
life 70 a loftier, sublimer and enduring
attitude. 1T
He believes that "vast multitude"
of Roman Greeks and Jews deserted,
for fanatioal superstition, the
splendid temples OF their fathers, the
schools of philosophy of which they
had been proud, and the religion Of
their ancestors, which had been enriched
by the grandest historical associations
He believes that the early propagation
Of Christianity and the believers IN Il
acted altogether contrary TO ordinary
motives of weak or bad menj that they
embraced a creed which, instead o.
gaining them aught, exposed them tC
Che most diabolioal crueltes. and held
their testimony in the face of tortures
banishment and a shameful death.
lie believes that, although Chrlatiani
ty Is a lying system of priestism oi
ianatioism, 1t nevertheless, according q
irTefutable testimony, abolished the
ferociOus deeds of the amphitheater
Dverthrew the horrid rites of pagapism
introduced an era Of beneyolence, hnt
marked a new starting point Of progress
for the human race, &
He believes that twelve obscure
eenniless Jews, with higher wisdom
Than was claimed by Socrates, Cicero
or Plato, taught the only religion which
has been proved 10 be adapted 10 every
country and every condition of man on
the surface of the wide globe. ia
He believes that the Christian Sab.
bath, or the weekly seventhrdAy rest, is
an institution indispensable 70 the
present physical condition Of men and
animals, that without It modern, ciVili-
cation would bring to myriads Of men
and beasts unbroRen toll, disease and
premature death, but that this seventh
day rest Is purely human institution,
having come, he scarcely knows how,
from men who were foisting on the