Transcriber's Notes: Italic text is denoted by _underscores_ and bold text by =equal signs=. Small uppercase have been replaced with regular uppercase. Blank pages have been eliminated. Variations in spelling and hyphenation have been left as in the original. A few typographical errors have been corrected. [Illustration: _Marilla M. Ricker._] I DON'T KNOW, DO YOU? BY MARILLA M. RICKER [Illustration] DONE INTO A PRINTED BOOK BY THE ROYCROFTERS AT THEIR SHOPS, WHICH ARE IN EAST AURORA, NEW YORK MCMXVI Copyright, 1916 By Marilla M. Ricker You are what you think, and to believe in a Hell for other people is literally to go to Hell yourself.--_Elbert Hubbard._ A religious man is a man scared. FOREWORD _There is in the city of Boston a memorial building to Thomas Paine. This Paine Memorial was finished and dedicated forty-two years ago. It is the finest monument to Thomas Paine on the earth._ _For twenty years Ralph Washburn Chainey has been the Manager of this building and the Treasurer of the Paine Memorial Corporation. Under his wise and prudent management the building was freed from debt, and today it is a monument to the energy and devotion of its Manager as much as to the genius and labors of Thomas Paine._ _Ralph Washburn Chainey is only forty-two, and as great an example of thrift as Ben Franklin was. Very early in life he acquired the habit of thrift--which is the basis of all virtues. He learned early that time was money and he is always at work. He is not only able to take care of himself, but he can and does take care of others. He is sufficient unto himself, and when one is right with himself he is right with all the world. I have known him intimately for more than a quarter of a century, and if he has faults I have yet to learn what they are._ _In appreciation, therefore, of his great service to the cause of Freethought, I dedicate this volume to_ RALPH WASHBURN CHAINEY --_Marilla M. Ricker_. _Dover, New Hampshire December, Nineteen Hundred Fifteen_ As man advances, as his intellect enlarges, as his knowledge increases, as his ideals become nobler, the Bibles and creeds will lose their authority, the miraculous will be classed with the impossible, and the idea of special providence will be discarded. Thousands of religions have perished, innumerable gods have died, and why should the religion of our time be exempt from the common fate? --_Robert Ingersoll._ CONTENTS FOREWORD 7