For many years religious journals and ministers have been circulating certain pretended accounts of the frightful agonies endured by Paine and Voltaire when dying; that these great men at the moment of death were terrified because they had given their honest opinions upon the subject of religion to their fellow-men. The imagination of the religious world has been taxed to the utmost in inventing absurd and infamous accounts of the last moments of these intellectual giants. Every Sunday school paper, thousands of idiotic tracts, and countless stupidities called sermons, have been filled with these calumnies. Paine and Voltaire both believed in God--both hoped for immortality--both believed in special providence. But both denied the inspiration of the Scriptures--both denied the divinity of Jesus Christ. While theologians most cheerfully admit that most murderers die without fear, they deny the possibility of any man who has expressed his disbelief in the inspiration of the Bible dying except in an agony of terror. These stories are used in revivals and in 449 Sunday schools, and have long been considered of great value. I am anxious that these slanders shall cease. I am desirous of seeing justice done, even at this late day, to the dead. For the purpose of ascertaining the evidence upon which these death-bed accounts really rest, I make to you the following proposition:-- First.--As to Thomas Paine: I will deposit with the First National Bank of Peoria, Illinois, one thou- sand dollars in gold, upon the following conditions: This money shall be subject to your order when you shall, in the manner hereinafter provided, sub- stantiate that Thomas Paine admitted the Bible to be an inspired book, or that he recanted his Infidel opinions--or that he died regretting that he had dis- believed the Bible--or that he died calling upon Jesus Christ in any religious sense whatever. In order that a tribunal may be created to try this question, you may select one man, I will select another, and the two thus chosen shall select a third, and any two of the three may decide the matter. As there will be certain costs and expenditures on both sides, such costs and expenditures shall be paid by the defeated party. In addition to the one thousand dollars in gold, I 450 will deposit a bond with good and sufficient security in the sum of two thousand dollars, conditioned for the payment of all costs in case I am defeated. I shall require of you a like bond. From the date of accepting this offer you may have ninety days to collect and present your testi- mony, giving me notice of time and place of taking depositions. I shall have a like time to take evi- dence upon my side, giving you like notice, and you shall then have thirty days to take further testimony in reply to what I may offer. The case shall then be argued before the persons chosen; and their decisions shall be final as to us.