The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1876-01-06
Conway 10 Lecture ut the Opera
House.


As announced in our local columns
yesterday the Rev. NJ. D. Conway, OF
Lsndon, is to deliver his lecture on the
"Devil" at the Opera House in this city
on the Goth inst. This is the lecture that
he has been delivering at Cincinnati, Chi
cago, New York and other places, and
that as learned and novel specimen OF
literature has been highly spoken OF by
the newspapers. The author is Unita-
rian clergyman of the rockingham
School, or, to speak more intelligibly, OF
the Theodore Parker School, which
again means that lie is clergyman
who plays Hamlet with Hamlet left out.
By this, in plain English, is meant that
he is a clergyman, who, when he'mouns
the pulpit, is Just as apt to take his text
from the Koran or the Zend Avcsta as
from the Bible, and who breaches the doc
trine that all religions have in them the
"soul of good" and that all OF them so far
as they contain truth are inspired.
This is n very latitudinarian creed for
man with the title Of reverend prefix
cd to his name to hold, and it is no Won
der that such reverend finds himself
equally at home in the company of Moh-
amedan, a Buddhist or Christian. He
breaches to curious company in London,
not n few OF whom are Orientals who
have come to London like Magi from the
far east, and who puzzle everybody there
with their mystic theological lore. Con.
way has cultivated these Orientals for
years past and has CLEARED from them
vast stores oflcgendary theology, partic.
ularly in regard to the origin OF evil in
the world, the philosophy oft, and like.
wise the personiications of it under the
general name OF Demonology. Perhaps
no man in modern times has studied this
particular subject more exhaustivcly than
Conway. Hehas written atgreat length
and most Interestingly on tho subject to
the Cincinnati Commercial from London,
where, in addition to his other labors, he
has acted as correspondent for that pa
per. His letters have prepared the peo-
Pile in this country for the lectures he is
now delivering on the Devil and kindred
topics. He processes to have traced Aryan
and Semitic myths away back to the eat
liest dawn of legendary history, and to
have discovered the eras when the idea OF
personal devil crept into the various
religions OF the human race. 1t is said
that he pours out food OF interesting
information on this point and astonishcs
even the savans at the extent Of his
knowledge. gl
According to the theories that this Gu
rious reverend" has constructed Satan
isa bugaboo, fixed up many years ago,
with no more reliable origin than Santa
Claus. His workshop and fire works uni
der ground have astriking analogy to the
mythology ftllC Greeks and Romans, and
more especially to that OF the orientals,
whose gods Of evil were always at work
getting up volcanic eruptions for the pun
"hment' Of mortals, or Turing the un.
wary into deep caverns from which
emaAa'ed dreadful noises in the shape Of
thunder.
1t is eharaoteristic Of the freedom Of
thought in our time that a platform
speaker, who is really a good scholar and
a close thinker, should gravely set to
work to shatscr- an objective creation
which plays most important part In
theology and has been held to be a
particle, ii not an article, of faith. Quite
in keeping with the bearing of Mr., Con.
ways lecture is the tenor Of newspaper
comment upon it, 1t is not Venerally
treated seriously, and still in no such
fashion aa to intimate that many people
will be shocked at the news. We find
that he is reproved for attacking his
satanic Majesty, and the question nut as
oWhat harm the gentleman in black ba,
aone him. or what he anticipates here.
alter, that he should thus assail him. OF
course such passing and jeating pura.
graphs seem trivial, and IL NAV +. ~,