The petty salvation offered by Christianity is not much sought after to-day, while the world is bending its mighty energies in the direction of knowledge as never before, and the glory of the electric light, the song of the steam-whistle, the music of the telegraph, the chorus of machinery and the grand anthem of countless enterprises tell of a bright and golden future time when man will master the elements of Nature and guide his life through its course of years in perfect safety and security and step down at the end of it,—“Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch about him and lies down to pleasant dreams.” WHO CARRIED THE CROSS Who carried the cross upon which Jesus was crucified? Such a question ought to be easy to answer, if the event ever occurred. There ought to be no disagreement upon so simple a matter as this. But there is disagreement, and quite a serious one at that. Three of the gospels declare that Simon carried the cross, while the fourth gospel says that _Jesus_ himself carried the cross upon which he was crucified. Now, which is right? Is John right? If so, then Matthew, Mark and Luke are wrong. If Simon carried it, Jesus could not have done so; and if Jesus carried it, then Simon did not. That there is such a discrepancy in the accounts of this alleged event does not so much indicate that one is right and the others wrong in regard to the carrying of the cross as that none is right. To our mind this disagreement of the gospels is an indication that no such event as the carrying of a cross upon which to crucify Jesus ever occurred. Christians put forth the Bible as a work which in some way came from God; as a book which is reliable in its statements, and correct in its narrative of events. Now, it is patent to everyone that in the gospels there are two distinct accounts of the carrying of the cross. How can Christians reconcile this fact with their theory that God is the author of the Bible? It must be admitted by all that one mind could not have written or inspired both of these stories, and it must also be admitted that if one is true the other is false. What is the natural conclusion that an unprejudiced mind would arrive at after reading the account of the carrying of the cross for the crucifixion of Jesus in the four gospels? Is it not that no such cross was ever carried for any such purpose? There are too many gospels, too many stories of Jesus. It would have been better for Christianity had all but one of these narratives been destroyed. They contradict each other in so many essential points as to make them totally unreliable as records of facts. It is plain that _not one of the writers of the four gospels knew of what he was writing_. We must in honesty say that no one knows who carried the cross on which Jesus was crucified, and no one knows whether Jesus was crucified or not, and no one knows whether any such person as Jesus ever lived, to be crucified.