THE MORAL VALUE OF HELL FIRE. 531 



same manner I maintain that even should the present 

 generation be injured by the abolition of existing faiths, 

 yet abolition would be justified. Succeeding generations 

 would breathe an atmosphere of truth instead of being 

 reared in an atmosphere of falsehood, and we who are so 

 deeply indebted to our ancestors have incurred obliga- 

 tions towards our posterity. Let us therefore purify 

 the air, and if the light kills a few sickly plants which 

 have become acclimatised to impurity and darkness, 

 we must console ourselves with the reflection that in 

 Nature it is always so, and that of two evils we have 

 chosen that which is the least. But the dangers of 

 the Truth are not so great as is commonly supposed. 

 It is often said that if the fears of hell-fire were sud- 

 denly removed men would abandon themselves with- 

 out restraint to their propensities and appetites ; 

 recklessness and despair would take possession of the 

 human race, and society would be dissolved. But I 

 believe that the fears of hell-fire have scarcely any 

 power upon earth at all, and that when they do act 

 upon the human mind it is to make it pious, not to 

 make it good. A metaphysical theory cannot restrain 

 the fury of the passions : as well attempt to bind a 

 lion with a cobweb. Prevention of crime it is well 

 known depends not on the severity but on the certainty 

 of retribution. Just as a criminal is often acquitted by 

 the jury because the penalties of the law are dispro- 

 portioned to the magnitude of the offence, so the 

 diabolic laws which inflict an eternal punishment for 

 transitory sins have been tempered by a system of free 

 pardons which deprive them of any efficiency they 

 might have once possessed. What would be the use of 

 laws against murder if the condemned criminal could 

 obtain his liberty by apologising to the Queen ? Yet. 



