"A most amazing book. It is a direct and unqualified attack upon the Christian religion, upon 'free will, the sense of sin, the belief in a Heavenly Father and a future recompense.' Mr. Blatchford writes in terse, vigorous and pungent style, well adapted to his readers. Moreover he is honest and well-intentioned up to his lights. He lives straight and tries to help his fellows, and the fact must be admitted and squarely faced that he is one of the factors of the religious life of the day." -The British Friend
"An eloquent exposition of the Humanist religion....No preacher of a new gospel ever showed such results in his own lifetime. No writer in the history of literature ever won so vast or so devout a clientage for serious essays on social and economic reform....The fundamental cause of the 'common people's' devotion to Blatchford is the unmistakable sincerity and fervor of his devotion to them. He has known the miseries that his books denounce. When he pleads for the suffering little children, his pen is prompted by remembrance of his own childhood. When he tells the horrors of poverty, he is thinking of his mother." -T. P.'s Weekly
"Mr. Blatchford can say in one sentence what the gentlemen who write for The Times and other classical works take half a column to put down. If the best literary style is the style that is clearest, beyond all possibility of misunderstanding its meaning (which is not a bad test for people who set out to say something), then Mr. Blatchford writes better English than any other master except Shakespeare and the author of the Bab Ballads. Whether you agree with him or not, you certainly cannot misunderstand him. -George Robert Stirling Taylor, 'Leaders of Socialism, Past and Present'
CONTENTS
PREFACE
FOREWORDS
THE SIN OF UNBELIEF
ONE REASON
WHAT I CAN AND CANNOT BELIEVE
THE OLD TESTAMENT
IS THE BIBLE THE WORD OF GOD?
THE EVOLUTION OF THE BIBLE
NOTES ON THE MOSES MYTH.
THE UNIVERSE ACCORDING TO ANCIENT RELIGION AND MODERN SCIENCE
JEHOVAH THE ADOPTED HEAVENLY FATHER OF CHRISTIANITY
THE BOOK OF BOOKS
OUR HEAVENLY FATHER
PRAYER AND PRAISE
THE NEW TESTAMENT THE RESURRECTION THE GOSPEL WITNESSES
THE TIME SPIRIT IN THE FIRST CENTURY
CHRISTIANITY BEFORE CHRIST
OTHER EVIDENCES OF CHRIST'S DIVINITY
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION WHAT IS CHRISTIANITY?
DETERMINISM
CHRISTIAN APOLOGIES
CHRISTIANITY AND CIVILISATION
CHRISTIANITY AND ETHICS
THE SUCCESS OF CHRISTIANITY
THE PROPHECIES
THE UNIVERSALITY OF RELIGIOUS BELIEF
SPIRITUAL DISCERNMENT
SOME OTHER APOLOGIES
COUNSELS OF DESPAIR
CONCLUSION THE PARTING OF THE WAYS