Part 16 (2/2)

I. HYPATIA [Footnote: See Author's, The Martyrdom of Hypatia.] was dragged into a Christian church by monks in Alexandria, and before the altar she was stripped of her clothing and cut in pieces with oyster sh.e.l.ls, and murdered. Her innocent blood stained the hands of the clergy, who also handle the Holy Sacraments. She was murdered not by a crazed individual but by the orders of the bishop of Alexandria. How does the true story of Hypatia compare with the fable of ”a nude woman placed on a pedestal in the city of Paris?” The Reverend must answer, or never tell an untruth again.

Hypatia was murdered in church, and by the clergy, because she was not orthodox.

II. POLTROT, the Protestant, in the 16th century a.s.sa.s.sinated Francois, the Catholic duke of Guise, in France, and the leaders of the church, instead of disclaiming responsibility for the act, publicly praised the a.s.sa.s.sin, and Theodore Beza, the colleague of Calvin, promised him a crown in heaven. (_De l'etat etc, P. 82._ Quoted by Jules Simon.)

III. JAMES CLEMENT, a Catholic, a.s.sa.s.sinated Henry III. For this act the clergy placed his portrait on the altar in the churches between two great lighted candle-sticks. Because he had killed a heretic prince, the Catholics presented the a.s.sa.s.sin's mother with a purse.

(_Esprit de la Ligue I. III. P. 14._)

If it was unbelief that inspired the murder of McKinley, what inspired the a.s.sa.s.sins of Hypatia and Henry III?

We read in the Bible that Gen. Sisera, a heathen, having lost a battle, begged for shelter at the tent of Jael, a friendly woman, but of the Bible faith. Jael a.s.sured the unfortunate stranger that he was safe in her tent. The tired warrior fell asleep from great weariness.

Then Jael picked a tent-peg and with a hammer in her hand ”walked softly unto him, and smote the nail into his temples, and fastened it into the ground...So he died.”

The BIBLE calls this a.s.sa.s.sin ”blessed above women.” (_Judge IV. 18, etc._) She had killed a heretic.

In each of the instances given above, the a.s.sa.s.sin is honored because he committed murder in the interest of the faith. We ask this clergyman and his colleagues who are only too anxious to charge every act of violence to unbelief in their creeds--What about the crimes of _believers_?

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