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AUSTRALIA. 67
That reigning Protestant Christian, Henry VIII., issued,
in harmony with Bible commands, this edict —
:
"If any person, by word, WTiting, &c., da preach, teach, or hold opinions,
that in the blessed sacrament of the altar, under form of bread and
wine, after the consecration thereof, there is not present, really, the nat-^
ural body and blood of our Saviour Jesus Christ, or that in the Jlesh, under
form of bread, is not the very blood of Christ, or that with the blood, under the
form of wine, is not the very flesh of Christ, as well apart as if they were
both together, then he shall be adjudged a heretic, and suffer death by
burning." *
When persecuting " Bloody Mary " — a devoted Christian
by profession — was reproved for those merciless butcheries
perpetrated for Christ's sake, she replied, " As the
souls of heretics are hereafter to be eternally burning in hell,
there can be nothing more proper than for me to imitate the
divine vengeance by burning them on earth."
Wherever a purse-proud Christianity has gained the most
power, it has most obstructed the march of civilization, as in
Spain and Italy. Guizot, the great historian "of civilization
in France, tells us that " when any war arose between power
and liberty, the Christian Church always planted itself on
the side of power, against liberty." This churchal Christianity
in our midst is the
importation of the dark ages, the
horrid nightmare of the world. It is immoral in its tendency
; for it sends good moral men. to hell, and the lifelong
wicked to heaven, if soundly orthodox. According to the
sectarist's belief, a man may commit all manner of crimes, —
lie, swear, cheat, steal, and murder,— then comply with the
." conditions of salvation," and swing from the gallows to
glory
Consult the records of capital punishment. Nearly every
victim attended, during the last weeks of imprisonment, by
the clergy, makes full confession, repents, believes, and with
a spasm leaps from hemp to heaven. For proof, we are
* Pickering's Statutes, voL iv., p. 471.