Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1855-08-25
FAITH AND THE FUTURE.
BY

The sky was dark. The heavens void. The
people strangely ~agitated, or ~stupidly motionless.
Whole nations disappeared. Others raised their
heads, as if to view OF their face. Throughout
the world was Leard a dull sound, as Of dissolu-
ton. All trelnbled, earth and heaven. Man was
hideous to the sight. Placed between two infnis
ties, he was not conscious Of either: neither of
his past, nor of his future. There was no more
belief in the gods, nor in the republic-nor in any
thing whatever. Society no longer existed
There existed a power sitting in blood. or de-
b~auchery o senate, which miserably parOdied
the past, and voted statues and millions to the
tyrant, prmtorians, who despised the first, and
killed the second denunciators, and a mob Of APP
~plauding slaves.
Principles existed no more. There existed only
material interest. The country was dead. The
grand voice of Brutus had declared upon its tomb,
that virtue was extinct.
The good departed to avoid contact with the
world. Nerva allowed himself to perish with hun,
ger. Thraseas poured out his blood, n lihation to
Jupiter, the liberator. The soui had fed. The
senses reigned alone. The masses demanded
bread, and the games of the Circus. Philosophy
had become first scepticism, then epicureanism-
then words alone. Poetry was satire.
Yet there were moments when men trembled,
and felt their loneliness and recoiled before the
desert. Then cries of terror were heard in the
streets at night. Then men embraced their cold
and naked statues, and demanded of them a spark
Of moral lie, n little life, n few Illusions. And
they turned away with despair in their souls, and
blasphemy on their lips, Such were the times
which so much resembled our own.
Now, all that was not the death agony of the
world it was the end Of one evolution of the
world, after having attained its highest degree Of
expansion. a great epoch had had its day-il
was vanishing to give room for another, tie wills.
pering Of which was heard in the North and
which but awaited the %initiator to appear. He
came. Is was the hottest, the most sacredly virtu.
Gus, the most God-inspired soul, which has yet az
peared on earth-the Christ. :
He bent over the corpse Of the world, and muir
INJURED n word of faith. lie took his clay, which
had nothing left of man but the movements anC
the form, and spoke over it words until then un
known-love Seyotednes,, heavenly origin. Ant
the corpse arose. And a new life informed thu
clay, which philosophy alone had been able to re
animate. From this corpse arose the Christian
world-the world of liberty and equality. From
this clay arose mailman, the divine image an,
precursor Of humanity. The Christ was dead. Ii
order to save mankind, and accomplish all thes,
things he had, as Lammcnais says, but asked 0
them q cross on which to die. But before diving
he had announced the good tidings to the people
to those who demanded Of him from whence he
had received it, he had answered, from God th
Father; from the height of his cross no had in
voked him twice. 1t was for this that from tn
height of that cross commenced his triumph. /
was for this that it endureth still.
Have then faith, you who suffer for the nobl
9 cause, apostles Of a truth which the world as We
t comprehends not, soldiers of the sacred fghl
whom yet it stigmatizes in the name of rebels
Tomorrow, perhaps, this world, now incredulour
d or Indifferent, will PROSTATE itself in holy enthusi
t asm before you. Tomorrow, victory will hay
} blessed your crusade's flag. March on in faitl
e and fear not. That which Christ has done hi
: mainly can do. Believe, and you will conquer
q Believe, and you will arouse the people on you
d path. Believe, and act. Action is the word
= God, thought alone it is but his shadow. Thos
> who separate thought and action, dismember d
& vinity, and deny Unity. Reject them from you
ranks, for they do not believe who are not ready
o bear witness to their faith with their blood.
From the height Of your cross Of sorrow an
: persecution declare, all of you, the belief of I'll
: age-yet q little while, and it will receive the col
secration of faith. Let them hear from your lip
D not the hateful cry of reaction, nor the solem
. formula Of the conspirator; but the calm and SC
d emn words of the future. From the height of o,
e cross of misery and prescription, we men of ext
representing by our heart and our belief, the G
shaved races, millions of men who are silent, "
answer to your words, and say to our brethren ::
The Alliance is cemented. Answer your persec
tors with the formula God and Humanity. In va
will they raise their hoary heads, and mutter 81
rilege. The masses will bow before il.
One day ut Rome, in the sixteenth centuI
some men called inqnisitors, who pretended to he
their mlsslon OF power and science iromsdod, VIC
lc- assembled to decree the immobility of the ear
lg A prisoner stood before them. His forehe
IL. beamed with genius. He has gone beyond m
* and time, and revealed the secret of n world.
ID was Calico. =
The old Nan shook his bald and venerable he,
His soul revolted against the absurd violence
* these men who sought TO force him TO deny
.te truth he had learned from God. Bot long S
in. fering had shaken bic pristine energy, lie v
isl crushed beneath the monastic menace. lie raj
his hand also 10 affect the immobility Of the ear