The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1871-06-30
COMMTTNTSH


combinations, and cabals, ostensibly insti-
tuted to promote some good and wise end,
but which are only employed to hide from
view the utter sel6shness beneath!
Under the blessed name of Christianity the |
most revolving crimes have been perpetrated,
whilst 'Liberty and Fraternity" have been
engraven upon the banners of those whose
acts have made despotism itself blush for
shame.
Therefore, in this practical age and coun-
try of ours, neither high-sounding names or
loud-sounding professions can command re-
spect unless accompanied by deeds that Illus
trate their genuineness. Communism reads
we'll and sounds well, and were the leaders
honest and true in their endeavors to fulfil in
practical results the beautiful thought con-
tanned therein, they would be entitled to the
commentator of ell good men. But, alas
for them and humanity, they have made
Communism synonym for every crime that
virtue holds in detestation. In its name they
have made war upon religion, art, literature,
and refinement, levelling its monuments and
trophies in the dust.
Actuated by fiendish spirit impossible to
comprehend, they have endeavored in one
diabolical confagrstion to commit to ashes
the fairest city in the world with its wonders
of genius, art, and refinement, that the GEN.
turies have labored to produce. Unsated with
the burning and dismantling of churches,
palaces, and temples of art, they turn from
the sanguinary contest that is going on ct the
gates of the city to imbue their demoniac
hands in the innocent blood of defenseless
men and women, whose only offense is the
contrast their pure lives afford to their own.
Even in the throes of dissolution, when their
doom was known to themselves, when the
avenging hand of the Government was about
to snatch Paris from their grasp, even then
their insatiate thirst for blood had to be ap-
peased by the cold-blooded murder of pure
and good man, whose only crime in their eyes
consisted in his being at the head of the
Church in France.
From this picture of blood, death, confla.
| grafton, and desolation, the civilized world
| turns away in sickenin9 horror. And yet,
strange as it may appear, there are men in
our midst so warped in Judgment or deficient
in moral sense as to be willing to palliate, if
not bold enough to defend, these unlicensed
cutthroats of the nineteenth century. We may
! be shocked but cannot be astonished at
the utterances of such siczly dreamers and
sentimental drivellers as Theodore Tilton,
and such impractical theorists and stilted
orators as Wendell Phillips, whose epigram-
matte utterances sound very much like those
of the late leaders of the Commune. But
when any individual or any body of men pre-
tending to represent the laboring men of our
country speak, at least in sympathy, if not
in outspoken words of commendation, of such
a wicked and abhorrent set of men as the
Communists were and are, then as journal
in sympathy with the highest aims
and truest welfare of the Anne
rican laborer, we enter a solemn
protest The few political OF criminal out
casts from abroad who a few days since assem-
bled in the city of New York, and in their
assumed authority extended sympathy to
these Partisan outlaws, no more re-
present the American mechanic, arti-
san, or laborer than does the Evil Spirit
illustrate in his wiles and workings the
noblest aims of Christianity. 1t is, perhaps,
difficult to conjecture under what dictation
these men assembled or what inspiration
prompted their utterances. One thing is GER
tain, however: they spoke by the authority of
no respectable body or class in this country.
The American worker is no Communist in
the Paris sense of the word. He knows and
appreciates what true liberty is. What he
and those dear to him desire is not conhagra-
ton, blood, and reign of terror, but con-
tinuation of that peace and good order with
which we are blessed, and above all others
his arm is ready for their defense, at the sac
rifce, if need be, of life
1t is an insult and libel to insinuate thai
he has any sympathy with agrarianism, ol
any of the other wild theories entertained by
the evil spirits who for months made Paris
pandemonium on earth. Loving and enjoy
ing liberty at home, and hoping and praying
for the elevation and enfranchisement of the
oppressed of all lands he has intelligence
enough to perceive that these pretended
friends of freedom have only the empty cloal
of liberty thrown loosely over their shoulders
that under it they may strike the NOR,
effectively at the most sacred and valuabl,
rights of humanity. He is thoughtful ant
considerate enough to discriminate between
their ltterances and their doings. He hears
them shout Liberty" and establish the mos
grinding despotism; Fraternity" while thei
hands are red with the blood of innocence
and ''Vive la Republique!" whilst their gun
are laundering from the closed gates of tn
capital against the only organized powe
that represents the will of the nation. H