Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1881-06-11

" two men rob yon in a dark lane, and
" then quarrel over the plumber, so that you
get chance to escape with your life, you
will of course be very grateful to each of
" them for having prevented the other from
killing you; but you would be much
"more grateful to policeman who locked
'' them both up. Two powers have sought
sto enslave the people, and have quarreled
with each other; certainly we are very
"much obliged to them for quarreling, but
ga condition of still greater happiness and
security would be the non existence OF
'both.
Dr.. Beecher has sought to show that the
doctrine of universal salvation had q firm
hold in the patristic period, but there
seems no good reason to believe that 0rigen
and his school ever acquired much popu-
larity. The more truculent the theory,
the better it suited the times, and it is
hard to say whether the teachers or the
taught displayed most eagerness in APP
plying the detestable principles of their
! devilish faith. As the centuries rolled on,
hell assumed a more and more lurid and
dreadful prominence. Lecky states that
the agonies of hell seemed then the cen.
"tral fact of religion, and the perpetual
subject of the thoughts of men. The
"whole intellect of Europe was employed
:" in illustrating them. All literature, all
painting, all eloquence, was concentrated
'upon the dreadful theme" The concep-
ton of hell was vivid and real to the masses
of men, and the thought of what the lost
must enduresteeled their breasts against the
sulferings of heretics. A new ideal OF
Deity was erected. There was no longer a
benefcent and loving and forgiving God
over the world, but hideous Moloch of a
Supreme Being, who took delight in the
infinite torments of his creatures, who was
gratified by wholesale murder, who snuffed
the smoke of human sacrifices with salts
faction, who caused untold millions to be
born into the world for no other purpose
than that he might plague them through
eternity.
This religion was not and could not be a
"pillar of civilization" What it did do
for Europe may be gathered from the fol-
lowing remarks of Lecky {" Ii you make
the detailed and exquisite torments OF
multitudes the habitual object of the
thoughts and imaginations of men, you
twill necessarily produce in most of them
''a gradual indifference to human suffer-
sing, and in some of them disposition to
regard it with positive delight. If you
"end your teaching by telling them that
"tbe Being who is the ideal of their lives
confines His affections to the members
"of single church, that He will torture
forever all who are not found within its
"pale, and that His children will forever
Contemplate those tortures in state OF
unalloyed felicity, you will prepare the
"way for every form of persecution that
"can be directed against those who are
without" Such persecution was among
the great ends of life during by far the
greater part of the history of Christianity.
| This doctrine is what produced, to cite
Lecky once more, "that horrible detailed
persecution that stained almost every
province of Europe with the blood of
"Jews and heretics, and which exhibits
an amount OF cold, passionless, studied
"and deliberate barbarity unrivaled in
the history OF mankind" Nor can it be
said that as civilization advanced the
church abandoned its bloody and brutal
dogma. On the contrary, it had to be
forced from every position, and it never
ceased to prosecute until the sword and
torch dropped from its nerveless hand
The abolition of torture in Europe is
due to Voltaire and his school. Beccaria,
whose treatise on punishment had so large
an influence on the penal code of his day,
was of this liberal school. The abolition
of the medieval conception OF hell is due
also to the same external enlightening in
fuences. The church did not grow of its
own volition. 1t was simply left behind,
and it had to abandon its obsolete hypo.
theses or surrender its hold upon mankind.
1t has modified the hell-fre doctrine with
out conviction, and as matter of neces-
sity, and there are still Christian ministers
who think it no shame to congratulate
themselves because the old watchword OF
persecution and symbol of all that is
most brutal and cruel in human nature,
has been retained by the revisers of the
New Testament. It would have been
more to their credit had they expunged
that relic of barbarism, for it can only
serve as reminder of the gross fetch.
ism which has characterized Christianity
during nearly the whole Of its course, and
which has retarded civilization and
poisoned the human mind. 1t is true that
the era of hell has passed. 1t has most
happily been outlived, with many other de-
grading and mischievous superstitions. But
We cannot hail the church that employed
it for SO many centuries as an excuse for
murder, as a "pillar of civilization nor
can we approve the stupid conservatism
which thinks it necessary or desirable to
Aaunt this revolving Renaissance before
the eyes of an emancipated generation.
He'll is discarded, but no thanks to the
church. Civilization has advanced, but
not with the goodwill of the Christian
hierarchy.
THE BRIBERY CHARGE AT albany.
A new sensation has been introduced to
the situation at Albany by the charge of
Assemblyman Bradley that Senator Ses-
sions gave him So 500 to change his vote
from Conkling to Depew The making of
this statement by Bradley of course neces.
STATED an inquiry, and it has been followed
by several other accusations, involving
probably other members. It is of course
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