Chapter 25

"MADAM,

"I trust you will pardon the liberty I take in writing to you. My excuse must be the very deep interest your book, 'A Romance of Two Worlds,' has excited in me. I, of course, understand that the STORY itself is a romance, but in reading it carefully it seems to me that it is a book written with a purpose. ... The Electric Creed respecting Religion seems to explain so much in Scripture which has always seemed to me impossible to accept blindly without explanation of any kind; and the theory that Christ came to die and to suffer for us as an Example and a means of communication with God, and not as a SACRIFICE, clears up a point which has always been to me personally a stumbling-block. I cannot say how grateful I shall be if you can tell me any means of studying this subject further; and trusting you will excuse me for troubling you, I am, Madam,

"Yours truly,

"H. B."

[Once more I may repeat that the idea of a sacrifice to appease God's anger is purely JEWISH, and has nothing whatever to do with Christianity according to Christ. He Himself says, "I am the WAY, the Truth, and the Life; no man cometh to the Father but BY ME." Surely these words are plain enough, and point unmistakably to a MEANS OF COMMUNICATION through Christ between the Creator and this world. Nowhere does the Divine Master say that God is so furiously angry that he must have the bleeding body of his own messenger, Christ, hung up before Him as a human sacrifice, as though He could only be pacified by the scent of blood! Horrible and profane idea! and one utterly at variance with the tenderness and goodness of "Our Father" as pictured by Christ in these gentle words--"Fear not, little flock; it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom." Whereas that Christ should come to draw us closer to God by the strong force of His own Divinity, and by His Resurrection prove to us the reality of the next life, is not at all a strange or ungodlike mission, and ought to make us understand more surely than ever how infinitely pitying and forbearing is the All-Loving One, that He should, as it were, with such extreme affection show us a way by which to travel through darkness unto light. To those who cannot see this perfection of goodness depicted in Christ's own words, I would say in the terse Oriental maxim:

"Diving, and finding no pearls in the sea, Blame not the ocean, the fault is in THEE." AUTHOR.]