The Skeptical Era in Modern History.

skepticism, scepticism, Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot, EncyclopedistsTHE SKEPTICAL ERA IN MODERN HISTORY; or The Infidelity of the Eighteenth Century, The Product of Spiritual Despotism, by T. M. Post. Among Freethinkers the later part of the Eighteenth Century is known as "The Golden Age of Freethought" as it was a time of rapid advance of progressive and scientific social change in American society. After the American Civil War, as after every war, there was a rapid advance in Atheistic ideas and organizations. Wars break the chain of family indoctrination and the young men who are away from home for long periods lose the simple beliefs instilled in them by family and church indoctrination. And they see the horrors of war, and know if there were a good and kind guiding force these things could not happen. And so there was a time of real social and Freethought progress in the United States, and this was achieved in spite of the Comstock Laws, and Anthony Comstock, that pitted the entire United States Post Office Department, and the Federal Government, against any progress in religious philosophy, and sent many leading freethinkers to prison on one unconstitutional charge or another. This books is a very good History of that era of great progress in progressive religious ideas and Atheism.
Emmett F. Fields