confirmed to, nor has it been buried with, the dead languages. Paine
attacked the Bible as it is translated. If the translation is wrong,
let its defenders correct it.

The Christianity of Paine's day is not the Christianity of our time.
There has been a great improvement since then. It is better now because
there is less of it. One hundred and fifty years ago the foremost
preachers of our time--that gentleman who preaches in this magnificent
hall--would have perished at the stake. Lord, Lord, how John Calvin
would have liked to have roasted this man, and the perfume of his
burning flesh would have filled heaven with joy. A Universalist would
have been torn to pieces in England, Scotland, and America. Unitarians
would have found themselves in the stocks, pelted by the rabble with
dead cats, after which their ears would have been cut off, their tongues
bored, and their foreheads branded. Less than one hundred and fifty
years ago the following law was in force in Maryland:


"Be it enacted by the right honorable, the lord proprietor, by and with
the advice and consent of his lordship's governor, and the upper and
lower houses of the assembly, and the authority of the same: That if
any person shall hereafter, within this province, willingly,
maliciously, and advisedly, by writing or speaking, blaspheme or curse
God, or deny our Savior, Jesus Christ, to be the son of God, or shall
deny the Holy Trinity, the Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost, or the
God-head of any of the three persons, or the unity of the God-head,
or shall utter any profane words concerning the Holy Trinity, or the
persons thereof and shall therefore be convicted by verdict, shall, for
the first offense, be bored through the tongue, and fined L20, to be
levied on his body. As for the second offense, the offender shall be