It seems to us that the doctrine of vicarious atonement is not only immoral, but demoralizing. It represents God as punishing the innocent for the guilty to make it possible to forgive the guilty. This is inconsistent with the eternal principles of justice and rightfulness. It must have a demoralizing influence upon the mind and conscience of the sinner, to be told that his sins are already atoned for, and he only need to be cleansed by the blood of Christ; and this is to be obtained by simple faith and trust! Believe that Jesus shed his blood for you, and that he is waiting and anxious to apply it in washing away your guilt, and it is done! Then as often as you sin afterward you need only go through the same process to secure pardon! The easiness with which sins may be blotted out and washed away must have a demoralizing influence upon uneducated minds, though truly intelligent persons may not reason in this way. The low state of morals among those who really believe in this device for the forgiveness of sins may thus be accounted for. The numerous defalcations and downright thefts among the higher classes of Christians, and the petty lying and stealing among the great mass of Catholics and Protestants, are notorious, and can be traced, we think, to the easy methods of getting rid of the consequencees of wrong-doing. Our prison-statistics are truly suggestive, and should be carefully studied. Freethinkers are far in advance of Christians in the matter of practical morality. Many of those whom the courts exclude as witnesses, because they do not accept certain religious dogmas, are pre-eminently truthful, and would sooner die than tell a falsehood. They do not rely upon the blood of Jesus to wash away the vilest sins and make them white as snow. Our statesmen are beginning to find out that our system of _pardon_ is most pernicious. To relieve from the consequences of wrong-doing through a divine contrivance of the vicarious sufferings of an innocent person, and that human disobedience is made all right as to consequences by this obedience of a divine-human person, does not commend itself to the intelligence of this nineteenth century. The answer of theologians to this charge is familiar and specious enough, but it is not practically accepted by the common people. When a child enters the Sunday-school room, and his eyes rest upon the conspicuous placard, “_Jesus Paid it All_” the natural inference is there is nothing more to pay, nothing to do but to accept the free gift.