The New Gospel

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">Allow anyone to condemn you as a fool and foully maltreat you if he chooses; yes, by Heaven, suffer undaunted the shock of that ignominious cuff; for you will come to no harm if you be really a good and upright man, practicing virtue. &nbsp;</em></p>

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">Torture which uses physical or moral violence to extract confessions, punish the guilty, frighten opponents, or satisfy hatred is contrary to respect for the person and for human dignity.</em></p>

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">For added to all the rest, this is still cruelty’s greatest curse—that one must persist in it, and no return to better things is open; <strong>for </strong></em><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;"><strong>crime must be safeguarded by crime</strong></em><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;"><strong>.</strong>&nbsp; But what creature is more unhappy than the man who now cannot help being wicked? … who resorts to the sword because he fears the sword, who trusts neither the loyalty of friends … who has laid bare his conscience burdened with crimes and torturings …</em></p>

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">I am in so far in blood that sin will pluck on sin. &nbsp;</em></p>

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">I am in blood stepp’d in so far that, should I wade no more, returning were as tedious as to go o’er.</em></p>

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">Ten thousand years ago, if someone decided to use force to settle an argument, there were far fewer constraints on him — or, occasionally, her — than citizens of functioning modern states are used to.&nbsp; Most of the killing was on a small scale, in homicides, vendettas and raids, but because populations were also small, the steady drip of low-level killing took an appalling toll.&nbsp; By many estimates, 10 to 20 percent of all people who lived in Stone Age societies died at the hands of other humans.</em></p>

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">Then, too, in the case of a state in its external relations, the rights of war must be strictly observed.&nbsp; For since there are two ways of settling a dispute: first, by discussion; second, by physical force; and since the former is characteristic of man, the latter of the brute, we must resort to force only in case we may not avail ourselves of discussion.&nbsp; The only excuse, therefore, for going to war is that we may live in peace unharmed; and when victory is won, we should spare those who have not been blood-thirsty and barbarous in their warfare … Not only must we show consideration for those whom we have conquered by force of arms but we must also ensure protection to those who lay down their arms and throw themselves upon the mercy of our generals … No war is just, unless it be entered upon after an official demand for satisfaction has been given or warning has been given and a formal declaration made … The man who is not legally a soldier has no right to be fighting the foe … If, under stress of circumstances, individuals have made any promise to the enemy, they are bound to keep their word even then … In the matter of promise one must always consider the meaning and not the mere words.</em></p>

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">Every single bit of progress in humane feeling, every improvement in the criminal law, every step toward the diminution of war, every step toward better treatment of the colored races, or every mitigation of slavery … has been consistently opposed by the organized churches of the world.&nbsp; I say quite deliberately that the Christian religion, as organized in its churches, has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world.</em></p>

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">On the dogmas of religion, as distinguished from moral principles, all mankind, from the beginning of the world to this day, have been quarreling, fighting, burning and torturing one another, for abstractions unintelligible to themselves and to all others, and absolutely beyond the comprehension of the human mind.</em></p>

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">When once the Apostle Paul had posited universal love between men as the foundation of his Christian community, extreme intolerance on the part of Christendom toward those who remained outside it became the inevitable consequence.</em></p>

<p><em style="line-height: 1.5; background-color: initial;">I can muster no sympathy whatever for the misguided piety that makes a national religion from a piece of the wall of Herod, and for its sake challenges the feelings of the local natives.</em></p>