The Press. — London, England, 1858-07-03 00:00:00

68 occupy Southern settlements. That, in fact, as it appears to us, is the only course which Mr. Ritual/km YOUNG can safely pursue. No prophet, nor seer, however ancient his style, however lofty his pretensions, can contend against Destiny, especially when that personage is sup ported by eight or ten thousand riflemen. Hunger, and frost, and cold, and marauding Indians, were evidently fighting against the Gentiles, and in favour of Prophet YOUNG, but when Gentiles are found who can live upon oil and candles—who can starve a whole winter in snow and frost, bivouac in bleak plains, and make their way through intricate gorges, as brave American Gentiles have done, what can the ablest prophet do ? Resignation under arduous circumstances was the favourite doctrine of the Eastern, as it seems to be of the Western prophet. Only the force of that iron necessity which vanquished classical mythology can vanquish a mythology which is anything but classical. Mr. BRIGHAM YOUNG, having had a very peremptory summons served upon him, finding a very strong and determined company posted at the entrance of his premises, his domestic ar rangements being by no means in a satisfactory con lition, thinks it advisable to remove to the South. There are hiptorical precedents for such a course. JOHN of LEYDEN, if we remember right, removed, though disadvantageously, when the Bishop of MUNSTER took possession of the city, and Prophet SMITH also removed under equally painful but pressing circumstances. It will not, therefore, be matter of surprise that ex-President YOUNG should announce his intention of removal in his own very characteristic manner. To the Mormon congregation assembled at the Taber nacle in Utah for Sunday recreation, Mr. YOUNG is reported to have spoken as follows : " I have a good mind to tell a secret here ; I believe I will tell it anyhow. They say there is a fine country down South there. Sonora is it ? Is that your name for it ? Do not speak of this out-of-doors, if you please." -At the date of this notice, Governor CUMMING, the newly-appointed President of the territory, had made a peaceable, if not triumphal, entry into Utah. An escort of armed Danites con ducted him at night to the entrance of the Mor mon settlement. At every turn of the road par ties of armed Mormons were posted, and the Governor was received with a military salute and every demonstration ofpopular welcome. Bonfires kindled all along the hills, which were still covered with snow, lit up the marvels of the valley. On Governor CuMMING'S arrival, the records and State papers were duly delivered up in perfect preserva tion, and, with the exception of a momentary tu mult in the Tabernacle, which the new Governor somewhat needlessly provoked, there was no show of resistance. The preparations which had been made for a move evinced the still potent authority of the chiefs, and the obduracy of the Mormon fanaticism. In many of its details, this second migration reads like a chapter out of Ilerodotus or Ciesar. All those living in the southern part of the territory were directed to quit their houses first, in order that the vacant dwellings might serve as a shelter and resting place for those who should follow from the north. The roads were everywhere filled with waggons laden with provisions and household furniture --women and children, often without shoes and hats, driving the flocks they knew not where, for " It is the will of God" cried these poor miser able fanatics. On the part of the leaders, we are told, there was a good deal of stoicism. Appa rently without reluctance they resigned their spacious houses, and joined the long train of their followers. Due notice was given that the city would be burnt as soon as the Gentile army set foot in it ; and it seems by no means unlikely that a chosen band may be commanded by the shrewd Prophet to return and take advantage of any favourable juncture for repossessing them selves of the soil. Under these circumstances, the proclamation issued by the President of the United States, and the attitude of the invading army, is wise and conciliatory ; and though no more than sonic 120 have claimed the protection of the new Governor, and asked for help to enable them to return to a monogamous country, there can be little doubt that a result has been obtained by the Executive of the United States no less creditable than it is auspicious. THE. PRESS, JULY 3, 1858 BARING v. POOLE. To trace the various developments of the "odium theologicum " may be at times interest ing, but is almost invariably painful. Like leaven, it betrays its presence both by fermenta- Lion and by sourness. It excites quiet spirits to the very verge of frenzy, and imparts a strange and unpalatable acidity to even the blandest tempers. Working with an intensity which bears an inverse ratio to the importance of the questions under controversy, it distorts facts, perverts principles, uses forbidden means to attain a doubtful end, and, even while obnoxious to the gravest censures, appears to hold itself infallible and irresponsible. Your thorough paced polemical hater would deem himself de graded by looking at both sides of a question, or by imputing to his opponent anything but the worst conduct or the vilest motives. We may have outlived the times when Christians burnt their fellows, qaite persuaded 'Mit all the Apostle• would have done as they did. But upon a question of " High " or " Low," " altar ' or " table," " gown ' or " surplice," there is no lack of men who speak and act as uncharitably as if Dr. CLosit at this day put Mr. BExxErr to the question in due course of busi ness, or DENISON delivered DITCHER to the secular arm. We cannot but fear that there will be more than a common display of the merciless spirit of controversy ere the public arrive at a rational conclusion as to the nature, extent, and tendencies of confession as lately practised at Knightsbridge. " The beginning of strife is " as when one letteth out water ;" and the water in this case (with due respect to Father Thames, be it spoken) seems likely to prove of the dirtiest. We have already seen with deep regret an able, and, unless report is more than commonly false, an amiable clergyman circulating with his own endorsement charges of the most revolting kind against a minister of his own communion, upon authority obviously insufficient, and, in the view of the diocesan of the accused (certainly not too lenient a judge), exceedingly suspicious. We have seen a numerous and respectable assemblage re ceive these charges without inquiry, yet without hesitation, when, independently of the high charac ter borne by the accused, and of what we cannot but feel to be the inherent improbability of several counts of the indictment, the commonest regard for the law of evidence should have compelled a verdict of "not proven." We have seen what is still too often the "leading'' journal first volunteer its services as " avocato del diavolo," improving the occasion with pestilent ingenuity, and then insinuate a partial recantation without a word of apology or even regret for having dis seminated charges certainly grievous, and which may turn out to have been cruelly false. No wonder that we have also seen such attacks as we have described expanded into circumstantial libels, and made the basis of persecution by pam phlets. The first assailant may claim the excuse (valeat quantum) of thinking he did Gan ser vice; those who have followed him have "bet tered the instruction," in a spirit of hostility, not only to one set of religious views, but to religion in general. If we turn to the other side of the question, we see less of acerbity, and far more decorum. Yet candour must admit that if Mr. POOLE appears to have suffered wrong with more than average patience, those who think and feel with him have not always exhibited the spirit of martyrdom. The letter of the Rev. F. A. MAiintorr, for instance, has a good deal of the " agro-dolce" flavour—a strong dash of bitterness blended with the milk and honey of meek resig nation under injuries. And generally Mr. PooLE's advocates forget that the harshness with which that gentleman has been judged is not directed against himself personally, but against an apparent approach to a system to which Eng lishmen have a strong, and we believe uncon querable, aversion. If the practice of confession in the parish which has been deprived of his ministrations did not outstep the bounds of a pious discretion, it seems admitted that it fully reached them. The coachman► who undertook to drive his master within three inches of a preci pice might be a steady as well as bold driver, but nevertheless the preference for his rival who " liked to keep as far off as he could" represents a general and not irrational tendency. English Protestants have no wish to try how near they can approach to the system which has proved so baneful to morality in the Church of Rome. At this point we gladly turn from the per sonalities which have been unfortunately im ported into the question, to consider it dispassion ately on its own merits. Some of the leading points on both sides have been ably, as well as temperately and courteously, brought forward in the recent correspondence in the Times between the Rev. Mr. LIDDELL and a gentleman whose nom de plume of " Paterfamilias" we accept as fairly indicating his position in the controversy. It is consolatory to observe that the views of the two parties, calmly and deliberately stated, ex hibit no violent repugnancy. Mr. LIDDELL gives up the Confessional as a system frankly—we had almost said unreservedly. " Paterfamilias" does not damage his cause by denying that cases may and do arise where a particular confession from a particular person may be desirable. We would remark, however, in passing, that the latter scarcely gives his opponent full credit for his admission of the exceptional character of con fession, and seems needlessly suspicious in doubt ing that his rule would allow a veto to a husband as well as to a natural guardian. Mr. LIDDELL, on the other hand, does not show with satis factory clearness the practical working of his own limitations. He does not offer sufficient warranty that his school would not—perhaps we may say, do not—allow the occasional confession to pass first into a habit and then into a system. Yet here lies the actual, and we believe solid, ground for the fears which he wishes to allay. The question is not (save in the eyes of a few fanatical partizans) of priestly sacrifice and victim, of the deliberate perversion of a sacred confidence, but of human weakness and human frailty, of a feeble mind seeking relief by the imagined delegation of its own responsibilities ; or a strong one uncon sciously rejoicing in the acquisition of power for good or evil, and assuming against probabilities that its exercise will be beneficial. Speaking in the interest of the weaker sex, we say that our clergy—those of " Low" as well as those of" High" Church views—have already quite enough of personal influence with the female members of their congregations; and we believe that in nine cases out of ten the influence acquired by a minister in the course of frequent confession will be principally personal. To argue this out in detail is as needless as to a delicate mind it would be distasteful. We will, however, observe that we do not agree with those who consider that the dangers of the Confessional are dimi nished by the celibacy of the clergy. No doubt some trifling social evils attendant on the system are thereby avoided, but on the whole we believe that a married or marriageable clergyman would be a far safer confessor than a Popish priest. And if there is one circumstance more than another calculated to arouse English suspicion against the modified form in which a numerous school of able and earnest men would sanction confession, it is that too many of that school would dis courage, if not absolutely forbid, the marriage of our clergy. Our limits would forbid us to enter on the theological argument, eN en had we the inclina. tion. We believe, however, that the one text which bears most directly upon the question of confession suggests a fair inference as to the limits within which it should be confined. Christians arc exhorted to confess their sins one to another ; we cannot, therefore, as Christians forbid clergymen to hear a confession appropriately addressed to them. But it may also be fairly argued that confession in general, as distinguished from the seeking of ghostly counsel on some parti cular question which troubles die conscience of the penitent, is not more appropriately addressed to a clergyman than to any other fellow-Christian. Ile holds an exceptional, not a general privilege. He will not be the safer adviser because he inter cepts an avowal more fitly due to those with whom we are closely connected in the order of GoD's providence—to whom our love, our respect, our confidence, belong in the daily relations of life. Ile will not be the better servant of the State because he is made the depositary of secrets which he may long to disclose fur the public good, and yet feel bound in official duty to sup press. He will not be the more acceptable peace