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progress in man's general welfare. Even when Christians themselves 

 in days long gone by, attempted to introduce any useful reform, their 

 church invariably persecuted them, as for instance Copernicus, Galileo, 

 Bruno, Luther, etc.; and the only Christian priest who ever propounded 

 any theory which was calculated to be a lasting boon to society was 

 Malthus, who declared that over population was the great cause of all 

 misery, and that until people were taught conjugal prudence it was 

 useless to attempt to ameliorate their social condition. This friend of 

 humanity was bitterly denounced by the church, and to this day his 

 followers are held in contempt, notwithstanding that the Malthusian 

 principles are now endorsed by the leading social scientists, and that 

 it is as clear as the sun at noon day that within the short space of 45 

 years the present population of this country now about 36,000,000 

 will have doubled itself. The people now cannot support themselves, 

 so how they will manage when the population is 72,000,000 it is hard 

 to say. What with over population and land monopoly the future has 

 indeed some terrible social evils in store for us. 



Individual Christians undoubtedly have done something towards 

 making their fellows happy, but not so Christianity, as witness the 

 Inquisition and other enormities of the middle ages. But do the Jews, 

 Unitarians and Infidels of to day do nothing for their fellows ? What 

 about Sir Moses Montefiore, who rejects the atonement ? Have not 

 the Agnostics just founded the Whitminster College for purely secular 

 education ? And what do we not owe to those heterodox scientists 

 just mentioned ? It is the fashion with some people to give the name 

 of Christianity to the morality of this century ; but this very ingenuous 

 attempt to clothe one of the most immoral of the world's religions with 

 the garment of righteousness carries no weight for the scholar and the 

 historian. There is as much difference between the morality of to day 

 and the genuine Christian religion as there is between the north and 

 south poles. The two are the exact antitheses of each other. The real 

 reason that the human race has in the last hundred years so rapidly 

 advanced in intellectual qualities and moral progress is not because it 

 has become more Christian in its character but because it has gradually 

 shaken off the yoke of Christianity piece by piece. The whole Mosaic 

 cosmogony, with its flat earth theory, creation of man, etc., as taught 

 in Genesis, has been destroyed by Copernicus, Newton, Laplace and 



