Do we imagine that all the priests and ministers of the Christian church believe the fables of the creation and fall? I would stake my existence on it that if we were to cut off their salaries there would be barely half a dozen parsons in each denomination who would stick to their soul-saving business. Their trinity is supposed to consist of god the father, god the son, and god the holy ghost; but if we represent the first by the letter l, the second by s, and the third by d, we should be much nearer the mark. £. s. d. is the Christian trinity, and pew rents, tithes, etc., the means by which the one thing needful is kept up. Ten million pounds sterling are annually spent in supporting the clergy of the established church alone, while poverty, wretchedness and crime confront us at every turn. The struggling workers of this country, not content with having to contribute towards the payment of £29,000,000 annually, as interest on the national debt resulting from accumulated religious war charges, are foolish enough to spend more than a third of this amount in keeping a host of state-made drones, who oppose all progress, drain the hard earnings from the workers, and assume haughty airs towards their poor dupes. In the face of the depressed state of our trade, and the poverty and misery around us, it is appalling to think of the enormous quantity of money that annually drifts into the pockets of these human parasites, both episcopalian and nonconformist alike. We know well enough that the large majority of those laymen who profess to believe the fall and redemption scheme do not really believe it at all, but play the part of the believer in order to serve their own private interests. The laity may be divided into four classes:—1st, those few honest and sincere men who deceive themselves by imagining that they can really believe such unreasonable doctrines, and who attempt by their means to do what could be done so very much better without them. 2nd, those who are deficient in education and mental power, and who will accept anything the priest tells them, no matter how absurd. 3rd, those who have some little education but very little brain power, and who consider themselves very important members of society, when in reality the world does not know them even by name. They resent in their little minds the silent affront offered to them by their fellows, who, they think, ought to know their superior worth; and they look around for a little church or chapel, where the stream of intellect is sufficiently thin to allow of their feeble mental power being perceived. They join, take a leading part in the performances, carry the collecting box, open pew doors, hand hymn-books to strangers, and are happy in the consciousness of their importance, being gazed at Sunday after Sunday by an admiring congregation. Were these folk obliged to do their religious work under cover of masks, their names being at the same time studiously concealed from the congregation,