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Sirs: Thank you very much for publishing my letter of recent date in your "worthy" magazine. I consider it a great compliment, but would appreciate your reply as to your reason for labeling it as "Humbug" and for leaving out passages which I considered essential toward bringing out my point. My opinions are always subject to correction, and if there is any suggestion you have to offer as to why they are faulty, I shall be very grateful to you. Can you furnish any sound reason as to why I should embrace a deity which offers no evidence of existence ? If I should place my faith in this deity, why wouldn't it be just as logical to place my faith in Santa Claus as well? In fact the latter gentleman ought to command more respect, as he at least shows some signs of life when Christmas gets around. In that respect the children show more signs of intelligence than their elders. They believe in St. Nick and at least have something to show for their beliefs, while what can their elders show for their belief in His Celestial Majesty? Belief in the former has always brought joy and good fellowship, while belief in the latter has brought nothing but strife and bloodshed ever since the race succumbed to its dread influence. Kindly look up the following citations: Gen. 38: Ezek. 16: Gen. 19:30-38; 20:18; 25:24-26; Ezek. 33:23; Lev. 15:16-33: Deut. 23:1; 2:13; 25:11-12; 1 Sam. 25:22; 2 Sam. 11:2-5; 1 Kings 14:10; 16:11; 21:21: Job. 40 :16-17 ; Luke 1:41-44 ; Rom. 1:26-27. Wonderful moral lessons might be learned from these. If you print this letter which you are at liberty to do, you might better exclude these citations as they might open some people's eyes and thus make infidels of them, thereby jeopardizing their happiness in the world to come.
May I have a reply at your earliest convenience ? STANLEY B. ALTMAN
Albany, N. Y.
Too Abrupt
Sirs:
Kindly discontinue my subscription to TIME. Your magazine is too abrupt and uninteresting.
JACK GLASS
Detroit, Mich.
Carter Praised
Sirs:
The Forum is the last magazine in the world to protest at honest difference with its authors' opinions, but it really must insist that the facts stated shall have some relation to the facts as they exist.
John Carter [TIME, May 9] is not a reporter, but the assistant editor of the [New York] Sunday Times Book Review. He is a contributor to various magazines as well as to the Forum, and his weekly critical articles in the Times make him at least as well known as any other writer of open letters. He has been in the American Diplomatic Service, he has written a book on international politics, and he specialized in history at Yale, both as an undergraduate and as a graduate student.
These facts have an obvious bearing on your story, but are not mentioned. They are readily ascertainable by all who are familiar with American journalism, among whom, I fear, the writer of TIME'S article is not to be included.
JOHN BAKELESS
Managing Editor The Forum, New York, N. Y.