Moreover, this throwing the blame upon somebody else is the very tactics which Adam and Eve resorted to. But did it help them? When Adam was asked why he ate of the fruit of the forbidden tree, he threw the blame upon his wife. When the woman was interrogated, she threw the blame upon the serpent, and now when we ask the "Lord God" why his world went to pieces so soon after he had pronounced it perfect, he throws the blame upon the devil. Well, that will not do. If shirking his responsibility did not save Adam nor his innocent progeny--the human race--why should it save the deity? The story of Cain and Abel is the first episode on, earth. The two were brothers. Abel was a shepherd; Cain, a farmer. Surely they needed each other, both commercially and socially. According to the bible, there were altogether only four people in the world, at this time, and, therefore, from every point of view, it was more than a dastardly crime to kill one of the members of this precious group. What was the cause of the hatred which led to the first bloodshed? Unfortunately these two brothers had a _religion_. But for their religion they would never have hated one another, nor would murder have stained the opening pages of history. Cain offered the Lord for a sacrifice, of the product of his farm; Abel brought to the altar a head or two of cattle. They were both trying to please the Lord, each worshiping him according to his light. Ah! but that is not enough; there is only one worship that is orthodox. All others are taboo. God accepts Abel's flesh offering, and rejects Cain's vegetables. Then the trouble begins. The murder of Abel by Cain started the religious persecutions which have blackened the face of man. To this source may be traced the inquisitions, the crusaders the wholesale massacres which have made history a horror and a shudder. The first bloodshed was in the name of religion. The first murder was committed at the altar of God. It was a religious difference which defiled with blood the cradle of the human race. But who was responsible for the first murder in the world? The deity! Had God been pleased to accept a vegetable offering with as much pleasure as roasting flesh, or, had he said, "Never mind me; be good to one another," he would have removed thereby the most powerful motive for religious persecution. The Cain and Abel story compels us to say that the first persecutor was the "Lord God" himself.