heaven, but individual Frenchmen; and it is not China which attains nirvana, but Chinamen.
During this epoch of struggle — as in most religious struggles — the judgments passed by the innovators on the less-developed religious forms were very severe. The condemnation of idolatry pervades the Bible; and there are traces of a recoil which go further: “I hate, I despise your feast days,” writes Amos, speaking in the name of Jehovah.
Such criticism is wanted. Indeed history, down to the present day, is a melancholy record of the horrors which can attend religion: human sacrifice, and in particular the slaughter of children, cannibalism, sensual orgies, abject superstition, hatred as between races, the maintenance of degrading customs, hysteria, bigotry, can all be laid at its charge. Religion is the last refuge of human savagery. The uncritical association of religion with goodness is directly negatived by plain facts. Religion can be, and has been, the main
