"Faith" and "belief" seem to be among the most important words in the Christian New Testament. No words are much more frequently used. They occur in nearly every chapter, and are used more than two hundred times. The following is a specimen of the manner in which these words are used:—

"He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned." This text, and the sentiment it contains, have caused more misery, cruelty, and more butchery than all the edicts of any king that ever sat on the throne of England. Never did a more delusive and fatal error find lodgment in the human mind than the idea couched in this text. Terrible have been the denunciations, punishments, and cruelties poured upon the unbelievers in the popular creed, though that creed has been one thing one day, and something else the next. No matter how honest, how upright, how benevolent, or how righteous a man proved himself in his practical life, he was doomed to the dungeon, the fagot, and the halter, if his creed was not conformable to the orthodox faith then in power. Men and women have been condemned and punished for assuming the right to doubt the truth of any doctrine of the popular creed,—an egregious mistake, showing a profound ignorance of the nature of the human mind. All persons versed in the science of mental philosophy now know that a man has no more control over his doubts and beliefs than he has over the blood that courses through his veins: for, without evidence, he can not believe; and, with it, he can not disbelieve, as every one will find who will examine this matter critically. Consequently it is as unreasonable to condemn a man for his belief or disbelief, as to condemn him for the color of his hair. Doubt, so far from being restrained, should be cultivated, as being the first step toward the attainment of knowledge and progress; for a man never makes any advancement or improvement in his views on any subject till he begins to doubt the correctness of his present views, or, at least, doubts their being perfect, or being incapable of improvement.

Who, then, can not see that to threaten a man for disbelief is tyranny and injustice, inasmuch as it has a tendency to make him a slave, and to repress the growth of his mind? Condemning a man for disbelief is virtually offering a premium for hypocrisy, as it has the effect to make thousands profess to believe doctrines which they do not, and which their consciences really condemn, in order to avoid the frowns and ill-will of their neighbors. And, as hypocrisy is a greater evil in its practical effects upon society than unbelief, it can be seen that the practice of erecting a standard for belief and disbelief is wrong, and mischievous in its effects.

The Bible declares that "faith is the gift of God." It is evident, that, if this be true, no responsibility can attach to faith or religious belief; but all responsibility rests with the being who gives it.

Two great blunders have been committed by faith-dealers: First, in assuming that belief is of the nature of a coat, which can be put on and off at pleasure,—i.e., that a man can believe what he pleases or wishes to believe. The second is, that knowledge and belief are synonymous terms, which is very far from being true. Knowledge begins where faith and belief end. Belief is that uncertain state of the mind which is experienced in the absence of knowledge; and, when that knowledge is obtained, the belief may prove to have been entirely erroneous. Belief implies uncertainty; knowledge implies certainty. There is this wide difference between them. We believe a thing when we do not know whether it is so or not; consequently the belief may be true or false. How egregious, then, the blunder of the orthodox world in condemning for disbelief! Belief, then, is a state of guessing. We will illustrate the position of orthodox Christendom: A boy throws up a copper coin, and cries, "Heads, or tails?" A by-stander, believing from its construction that "heads" will come up, cries out, "Heads!" Now, according to the logic of the orthodox, if he guesses wrong, he should be damned eternally for it.

When you say to a man, "You shall believe this, or you shall believe that," you bind his soul in chains, and reverse the wheels of his progress, and push him toward the "dark ages."

The fear that it would be a sin to doubt, causes religious ignorance; and a man will never abandon his religious errors and superstitions while he fears to doubt their truth. A man's belief and creed grow shorter as his knowledge increases. And the time is not far distant when philosophers and men of science will have no religious belief: all will be knowledge.

It can be seen from the above exposition, that it is folly and consummate ignorance to attach so much importance to religious belief, inasmuch as it is impossible to know whether it is right or wrong.

As the doctrine that belief is a virtue, and unbelief a crime has inundated the world with persecution, misery, and blood, it is time to abandon it.

Those Christians who assume that belief is under the control of the will can settle the matter by trying the following experiment upon themselves: Let them try to believe, for only five minutes, that Mahomet was a true prophet, and Jesus Christ was an impostor. If they can do this, it will settle the question, and prove that man is responsible for his belief: otherwise he is not.

Some persons adhere to the Bible upon the plea that "it is safest to believe it, and unsafe to disbelieve it." But he who can believe an error or absurdity, or, rather, profess to believe it because he is afraid to disbelieve it, has not a soul big enough to be saved, and will be certain to miss it; or, if he could be saved, no man of sense would want to live in a heaven made up of such moral cowards and moral dwarfs. And, besides, the only way to make a safe thing of being saved on this ground, is to swallow all the two thousand systems of religion in the world,—six hundred Christian creeds, and fourteen hundred heathen traditions; and, to do this, a person must have a very capacious stomach.