"Then the mind's independence insensibly sinks The taint of one portion enfeebling the whole, Till oppression, preparing the doubled-twined links, King and priests draw their victim down--body and soul."
But you forget the immensely different degrees of evil occasioned by the inventions of theology; in England, Ireland, and Wales,* alone, the enormous sum of nine millions nine hundred and twenty thousand pounds is annually squandered in pampering and enriching the dignitaries, and maintaining the rest of a body of ecclesiastics, about thirty thousand in number. This sum is considerably more than half of all the clerical revenues of Christendom; and cannot possibly have any other source than the industry of the people, who, in return for their toil and starvation, are robbed of their senses, their judgments, and their liberties. That religion which attempts, through the aid of civil tyranny, to enforce the belief or acquiescence in the truth of its dogmas, virtually gives a premium to falsehood--renders truth injurious in society, and, by these very actions, proves itself false.
MOD.--The religions of antiquity must have been a down-draught upon industry also, and were used wholly for the purpose of deception. The dominant superstition of a country will always be taken into partnership by the political rulers; not because they think it true,** but as an auxiliary and pillar of government, which confers upon the professors thereof many privileges and immunities, in return for their support.
* To these countries nothing has been more burdensome and ruinous than the expense of worshipping their gods.
** Wherever truth is compelled to hide her head, there is necessarily a vicious order of things, both political and moral. If instructors and governors were themselves possessed of knowledge and virtue they would govern men more easily, and much better, by realities than by fables.
LUCIAN.--The Athenians never had an established priesthood, that overwhelming master-curse of modern times; and as for that of the Romans, it did not, from the Pontifex Maximus, down to the lowest priest, exceed from fifty to sixty persons; and as the dignitaries at the head of these were always amongst the first men of the state, their offices were purely honorary. Under these circumstances it was quite impossible that the whole institution could be either oppressive upon industry or dangerous to liberty. As the Roman superstition was supported by the state for no other purpose than that of deception, to serve the ends of political jugglery, or as a means of enabling generals of armies to restrain the rashness of their troops, or excite them to fight with enthusiasm when required; so, in like manner, are the more recently-invented deceptions of theology supported, and from the same motive, by the different nations of Europe, but in a degree, and with effects infinitely more degrading and oppressive to all the real wealth-producers. _Of all deceivers who have plagued the worlds none are so deeply ruinous to human happiness, or so deserving of universal execration, as those impostors who pretend to lead men by a light above Nature_.