holdings of property by the Church and the corresponding decrease of the holdings of other property?

In the contemplation of the above figures we cannot too earnestly or too speedily sound the note of warning of the consequences sure to befall our country, if the aphorism that "history repeats itself." prove true with us.

Col. Ingersoll says: "If Church property is allowed to go without taxation, it is only a question of time when the Churches will own a large percentage of the property of the civilized world and thus become dangerous to the liberties of mankind."

E. J. Donnell, Esq., of New York City, says: “Taxation and the private and corporate ownership of property have always been practically recognized as inseparable conditions of industrial society. The time always comes, when society recognizes as a truth that property exempted from taxation becomes in time, in equity, the property of the whole community. The frequent confiscations of Church property during the past three or four centuries, could not have taken place without that justification. The long exemption from taxation enjoyed by the Church and the nobility in France fully justified the confiscation that took place during the great revolution. In my opinion the government stopped far short of its rights in that case."

In the New York Tribune of February 22, 1873, is a communication from a Roman Catholic clergyman, well known for his enlightened mind and public spirit. After speaking of the great wrong to the non-exempt by the exemption of Church property, he says: "The State will sell the property of its citizens for non-payment of taxes. No one questions the right of the State to do so. Well, then, if one portion of the community pays the taxes of another portion (which is practically done where the latter portion is exempt from taxation) may not such (former) portion become of right the owner of the exempted property? May it not, in justice, demand it? This is a serious view to take, but is it not equity? Any how it has often led to confiscation."

Mr. Wakeman says: "The question will have to be tried out, which is the real government of the people, the Republic or the Church?"

General Grant says: "Such vast amount of untaxed Church property, receiving all the protection and benefits of the government, without bearing its proportion of the burdens and expenses of the same, will not be looked upon acquiescently by those who have to pay the taxes; and if permitted to continue will probably lead to great trouble in our land before the close of the nineteenth century; possibly to sequestration without constitutional authority and through blood."

James Parton says: "In some countries of the old world onefourth, in others one-half, of the property of the realm was exempt from taxation. At the beginning of the French revolution two-fifths in quantity and more than onehalf in value of the real property in France belonged to the Church. . . . What was the consequence? Bankruptcy, pauperism and finally revolution and confiscation. It is a philosophical truth that the same causes, under the same circumstances, will produce the same effects. Let us then learn wisdom from the folly of others and make all property bear its share of the common burdens; and thus escape injustice, dishonesty, pauperism, as well as revolution and confiscation. We commenced wrong by exempting any property from taxation. Let us take a new departure, before it is too late."

The unjust practice of exempting Church property from taxation was part of that abominable system by which the people were forced to contribute their efforts, their influence and their money in support of the "divine right" of priests and of kings, and it is to the great Christian (!) emperor that we are indebted for inaugurating the practice.

Says Mr. Duryea: "As early as the year 359, an attempt was made to have the lands belonging to the Church exempt from all taxation. It was due to the demoralizing influence of the reign of Constantine, when the Church united in the

political intrigue of a corrupt empire. Throughout all the conflicts among nations to the present day, the evil influence of the uniting of Church and State may be traced through every Christian nation on the face of the earth."

It is difficult to understand how any honorable Christian can defend such a wrong as that of compelling non-Christians to contribute to the support of the Christian religion, unless it be that Christians regard the dogmas of the Church of more importance than principle, than justice, than constitutional provisions of law. And it is also difficult to understand how any intelligent and patriotic Christian can shut his eyes to the calamitous consequence which, in time, is sure to result from the enormous and alarming growth of the Church, by reason of the system against which this article is written as a most profoundly earnest and solemn protest.

INTOLERANCE.

"There is no religious person who, according to his temperament, does not hate, despise, or pity, the adherents of a sect different from his own."

"There does not yet exist upon the earth a true tolerance."

"The dominant religion always makes its superiority felt in a very cruel and injurious manner towards the weaker sects."

Everywhere a jealous God is worshipped."

“Each nation believes itself his friend, to the exclusion of all others."

"The founders of religions, and the priests who maintain them, have persuaded their votaries that the religions of others were ungodly and abominable."

"This is the the way religion succeeded in closing the heart.”— Jean Meslier.

THE

HERE is nothing more true of religion in general, than is stated in the above lines, but more especially is it true of the Christian religion. Christians assume a superiority of intelligence, which displays itself either in pitying, or in disdaining, or in hating, any one who does not think as they do ; while the fact is that there cannot be found, the world over, a class of persons who are so utterly ignorant as to why they believe as they do, as are Christians. They never pretend to inquire for themselves into the truth of the remarkable doctrines which they cherish; on the contrary, pride themselves that their belief is not in accordance with the teachings of reason, but that they believe by faith. This "belief by faith" is carried to the extent that the more ignorant a Christian is, the more "faith" he has in his Christianity. Ignorance is said to be the mother of devotion; so it is of intolerance. Moncure D. Conway says of intolerance, that it is "the least

pardonable form of ignorance." So it need not be wondered that, of all intolerant people, Christians are the most intolerant; as is evidenced by the fact that their persecutions have been more bitter than have been those of the adherents of any other religion. Christianity is responsible for the shedding of more blood than any other religion that ever existed. To the honor of the Buddhist religion, it may be said that it has never persecuted for opinions' sake, or shed one drop of human blood. The inhuman persecutions for witchcraft, which have so disgraced the name of Christianity, are utterly unknown in the religions of Brahma, or Zoroaster.

"All the heathen persecutions of Christians put together, are nothing in comparison with the horrors of the crusade against witches, set on foot by members of the Christian Church.”—(J. H. Long, in Popular Science Monthly for July, 1893.)

The Moors in the middle ages gave protection to the Jews from Christian persecution.

It is an historical fact that, after Christianity became ascendant in the fourth century, for more than a thousand years the light of literature became almost extinct. Its intolerance of new thought, of scientific discoveries, seriously retarded the progress of intelligence. Had it not been for the Christian bigots of those times, the great truths recently developed might have been known many centuries earlier. Europe is indebted to a rival religion (the Mohammedan) for the rescue of what intelligence Christianity permitted to remain.

And so through the history of the Christian Church, from the days of Constantine till even now, may be found a record of greater intolerance, more bitterness of feeling, more extensive and cruel persecutions, than can be found in the history of any other system that ever existed.

"The domestic unhappiness arising from difference of belief, was probably almost, or altogether, unknown in the world before the introduction of Christianity.-(Lecky.)

Protestants denounce the exhibition of intolerance displayed