New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1877-08-31
DEATHS DfEORCES.

DEATHS DIVORCES
The death of the Mormon Patriarch will be
discussed everywhere and in all Christian
countries men will have their little iests at his
neculiar domestic relations. Very few people
will think to be worth considering that hotch-
notch Of notions, of assertions, and OF prophetic
pretensions which he called religion, and winch
depended mainly upon the cunning OF us
priests and the ignorance OF It's ncophyteS'
The origin of the whole deluson is too well
known to give occasion for much difference OF
epnion among sensible people, and the cheat
in which the Church (sO-caled) Of the Latter
Day Saints originated, has been exposed over
and over again, in courts of justice and by the
dispositions of Joseph Smiths cOnfederates.
Whether the Book of Mormon was written by
Solomon Spauldng or by somebody else, 1t IL
a piece of clumsy and ridiculous fiction when
has had very little influence in shaping the
charactcristics of modern M0nn0nism. Indeed
if lacks the revelation with which Joseph smith
supplemented its drcary narratyc-the divine
authorization of pOlygamy. UnqueSuonably
thc doctrine had its origin in the vulgar lust
of the early leaders of MOrmOnsm. While the
new lights were at NauvOO, the theory was re-
~
laws against il lent force but Brigham Young
it with other herarchical follies ana
crimes. and maintained it against the express
protest of the more decent or timld members
of the congregation. Ii was one OF the pro-
vacations which brought upon the Mormon
confessors the weight of popular violence ana
ultimately drove them to the wilderness OF the
salt Lake Valley. 1t is but Justice to the
memory of Young to say that he did not org
mate if. though the thin and silly cOrollary
may have been his that the heavenly status
of a saint will he fixed by the number OF his
terrestrial wives and children. He made 1t
part of the polity of his province, and estab-
lished il as n general practice, himself setting
the example so audaciOusly that he gave two
of his own daughters, on the same day to the
same husband.
Ii is not without reason that the pOlygamy OF
Utah has attracted so great share OF the pub
lie attention, for not only is it opposed to the
theory and practice of Christianity, but it has
been for centuries extremely disgusting to all
the Western nations Nor was it tolerated by
the more enlightened of the ancents, if we
except the Hebrews, by whom in the time of
Christ it had been substantially abandoned.
= matter of climate, and it certainly has
adopted itself most generally to the effemlnate
and luxurious and self-indulgent customs of
the East. But it is evident that the habits OF
the ancents are of no more authority in set
Ting the morality of pOlygamy than would be
the appetites of the South Sea Islanders in de-
trrmining the propiiety of eating human flesh.
The perpetuity Of polygamy in Utah does not
depend upon the ways of Jewish patriarchs,
nor upon the absence of a definite prohibition
in the Holy Scriptures, but upon the opinion
! Of the whole country in the nineteenth cen
! tury. The institution of marriage is either main
| tanned in its purity or it is abandoned alto
! cether Nor does it rest in its integrity upon
! tho laws enacted in its defence. 1t is grounded
upon the habits, the tastes, the preference
! and the conscience Of a majority so large that
| the minority, if there be one, is not worth con-
sidering at all. If all laws protecting it were
perchance repealed to-day, society would de-
mand their reenactment tomorrow.
1t has been usually supposed that with the
death of Brigham Young would begin the
change of the Mormon organization into some
thing less repugnant to the religious and moral
feeling of the country. Allowance must be
made for the simple fanatclsm of many of
his followers, and the domestic arrangements
of tho Mormons are of too complicated char
acter to be entirely altered in the present gen
Grafton But succession of leaders as clever
and cunning as the impostor who has just gone
to his account could not maintain pOlygamy
in any territory of the United States for more
than limited period. Tolerated or even ap-
proved by the law, 1t must disappear as civil
ization advances. The same influences which
drove it from Illinois must ultimately drive it
from Utah But the Monnons of that Terri
tory will be much more likely to give up their
harems than their habitatons. They have
tasted of the pleasures of repose and Of pros
perity, and they will stay where they are. If
they can only do so by yielding an unreserved
obedience to the laws, they will become ODE
dent, and as. one by one, the fathers Of this
foul faith disappear. the absurdities which