Ashtabula weekly telegraph. [volume] (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1853-1873, 1871-05-13
ASHTABULA, OHIO, SATURDAY, MAY l3, 1871

OmnipOtcnt as well as Omnipresent. they may
now appear. Judaism had its day, but where
is Judaism now 7 The world Outgrew IL and il
! died. Cbfbtlahiiy too had its epoch But
sin and Satan became too powerful for il and
u too succumbcd and finally surrendered,
| Catholic and Protestant. Before the eti Of
intcmperence, slavery and war IL trefnbled and
at length yielding until, instead Of rebuklDg
and defying the sin, IL became itself the chief
OF fsinners and we had 10 go outside the church
and form associations and armies to make war
on these gigantic enemies Of the human race
And 50 of licentiOusness, inordinate selfshness,
aristocracy, caste, and oppression of labor by
capital, the worst form, the high art Of slavery;
what has the church ever done, or proposed
against these scourgcs and curses Of our com
mon humanity
| In all these behold the enemy, and the
work and warfare Of that which is 10 be, in
stead of the old. Warfare on these worse
than apocalyptc dragons cxterminating
warfare upon the whole army Of them, is To be
the very worship Of the new religion, until
! the whole world. church and all, are redeemed
out of their hand /; and until all the old creeds
and systems are cXiinguished, as the rising sun
| pnis out the crawling glow Of the
| night.
The present prevailing religion postpones
! its heaven, and its hell, also, to an uncertain,
distant future, to commence in full fruiion of
! JOY or sorrow, not until this earth and these
heavens shall pass away. What could be more
unreasonable, not TO say absurd Have any
| of you, especially you who still adhere to the
| popular religious faith, ever seriously thought
of ii? How old do you expect this globe
will be when it gives up the ghost? How
old do you expect ii was on last New Years
| day ! How prepOstorOus 10 be pOstpOning
present concerns, vast as the interests of hu-
manity for consideration about the future or
| past which, as long as eternity is eternity,
can never be. Unless circle have an end
eternity can have no beginning and If ii have
no beginning, it can have no end, and to it
there is no future, no past, and you, dear
friends, are revolving with it and the present,
the Now. should be all your care. Learnt
to-day, if you know ii not before, and you
have that, you are that which is to be instead
Of all church organizations, Christian or
jewish, since man or time began. And now
what of those texts away back there, nearly
out of sight
Almost the whole Interpretation of the Bible
is made to turn on the future 4; and hence its
uncertainty, and hence, also, its unimpOrtlnce
10 rejecting minds. And yet it will be found
book of mighty, perhaps matchess power,
when the reader and interpreter shall appear
to unloose its seals. As the poor, dark Aus
traliun has wandered over and among the
gold and gems of her native soil for ages. all
unconscious of their worth and beauty, SO has
the christian church been blind as bats and
owls to the treasured riches of her own written
scriptures ; the written biography and record
! of experiences of Il few. Alas that they are
so few but a few of the braYest, nObest m n
and women, too, who ever hOnOred humanity
by honest, earnest, noble lives, and firm, heroic
martyr deaths Resisting Moses, Aaron,
Priest, Levite, unto blood, under the ola dis
pensaiion and chief priests, scribes, Phari-
sees, hypOcritcs, under the new until they
nailed them, in battalions, to the cross
, And SO, too, as the Australian gold and
| (IOlrDudn 0iamnnnS rock
and impurcst earths, so are the gems of the
Bibles of all nations, our own included, COW
cred deep in dunghills of every villany, vice,
cruelty, sin, shame of which man was capa-
ble in all the lowest as well as higher degrees
of development through which he has passed
The first passage read was !: Behold, j
create new heavens and new earth and the
former shall not be remembered, nor come into
mind"
And the second "Eye hath not seen, nor
ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart
of man to conceive the things which God hath
prepared for them that love him."
Oh, could We but ppi away NIL thought OF
any application or reference of these pro-
phetic strains to n future state of existence,
and set about realizing them here, and now,
as fast rs human energy, skill and power
sanctified and set on fire by IA faith which all
history shows can remove mountains, what
might We not achieve beneath, these suns
| tneSe SbaFS anu SSleS i Hc new JPTuStieLD
seen IN the visions of PatmOS descending from
God out OF heaven, with its all nIatchless
mysterious g!Orics, might he no more Il vision,
but a reality in every land, even to its gates Oi
pearl, and streets paved with precious stones
; and gold as ii were transparent glass" Once
journeyed among the masniSccnt fields, vine
yards and valirs in the north of France.
Nothing in America, it seems to me, can com
pare with them for marvellous beauty BOTH of
nature and art. And yet all those fields had
been often bathed in battle blood for most of
their history for seven hundred years has been
but n tale OF war And almost all the men
| saw were either soldiers carrying deadly
weapons, or gloomy, dismal, black-rohed
? priests, armed with theology more dcstruc-
live still. Only WOMEN were usefuly, hon
Orlbly employed. Poor, tanned, Drowned,
bowed down, sad, o how sad and yet meek
eyed, patient, submissive, they looked and
seemed rs they plowetlt spaded and howed in
the vineyards and moved and rakcd the
meadows QOr SAW them doing all this by
hundreds, if not by thousands } l thought o
God of heaven, if there be God, and for The
sake of those poor women ! hoped there
was, and hope so still if with half these men
butchers OF buttfes, and the other half destroy
eTs of souls, as trade, and nearly none but
women and children toll, these hills and fields
these vineyards and valleys can sIll be made
to blaze with beauty and loveliness, and rich
ness too, SURPRISING all fabled fields Elysiar
and gardens OF Eden, what visions of golden
glory should not behold, were all soldiers
civilized into brothers: and all reverend
priests exalted into human men and should
all war cease and grim and gloomy priest
hoods be no more, and all men, women anC
children live with one another, loving one an
another, helping one anotherf and dwelling in
universal brotherhood, laboring together tC
promote the health, harmony, happiness, pros
perity and peace of the whole human race
Tell me: would not q new heaven and
earth soon TO be created the like of which eJt
hath not seen, nov human heart conceived
Then there need be no dream Of future hea
vens, nor dread of coming hellss
1--WE shall not all sleep, but we shall all be
changed" was another scripture read rs
part of our point of departments and one
more
The lasS enemy that shall be destroyed il
death"
That the generation of his followers con
temporary with, and hnmedatelY succeeding
Jesus, lived in constaEt expectation OF his
return TO set up an earthly kiagdom, admits
of scarce doubt. And that tie dead ol
those that "slept,p as the apostolic expires
sion is would be raised to life and TO rclgr
, | of plory with thpiE poHal king. was also be-