What constructive work has been done by the church? Christianity gave us a flat world a few thousand years ago--a heaven above it where Jehovah dwells and a hell below it where most people will dwell. Christianity took the ground that a certain belief was necessary to salvation and that this belief was far better and of more importance than the practice of all the virtues. It became the enemy of investigation--the bitter and relentless foe of reason and the liberty of thought. It committed every crime and practiced every cruelty in the propagation of its creed. It drew the sword against the freedom of the world. It established schools and universities for the preservation of ignorance. It claimed to have within its keeping the source and standard of all truth. If the church had succeeded the sciences could not have existed. Freethought has given us all we have of value. It has been the great constructive force. It is the only discoverer, and every science is its child.--The Truth Seeker, New York 1890. THE IMPROVED MAN. THE Improved Man will be in favor of universal liberty, that is to say, he will be opposed to all kings and nobles, to all privileged classes. He will give to all others the rights he claims for himself. He will neither bow nor cringe, nor accept bowing and cringing from others. He will be neither master nor slave, neither prince nor peasant--simply man. He will be the enemy of all caste, no matter whether its foundation be wealth, title or power, and of him it will be said: "Blessed is that man who is afraid of no man and of whom no man is afraid." The Improved Man will be in favor of universal education. He will believe it the duty of every person to shed all the light he can, to the end that no child may be reared in darkness. By education he will mean the gaining of useful knowledge, the development of the mind along the natural paths that lead to human happiness. He will not waste his time in ascertaining the foolish theories of extinct peoples or in studying the dead languages for the sake of understanding the theologies of ignorance and fear, but he will turn his attention to the affairs of life, and will do his utmost to see to it that every child has an opportunity to learn the demonstrated facts of science, the true history of the world, the great principles of right and wrong applicable to human conduct--the things necessary to the preservation of the individual and of the state, and such arts and industries as are essential to the preservation of all. He will also endeavor to develop the mind in the direction of the beautiful--of the highest art--so that the palace in which the mind dwells may be enriched and rendered beautiful, to the end that these stones, called facts, may be changed into statues.