The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1879-05-03
Political Pulpit Palayer.

John Hemphill, by courtesy styled - reverend,
entertained his Calvary Church flock last night
with q political sermon, OF rather d palayer,
which neither honored his head nor his heart. III
some halfeducated politician should inform the
people that the movement in favor Of a new
organic law in this state Is of close kin to Russian
Nihilism or the French Commune that il Was
the intention of the gentlemen who made the new
( Constitution .. to overthrow our whole govern
ment, social. civil and religious - that the
81 entire course of the agitators is fanatical end
reasonable - and that : our liberties are en-
dangered bv the threats OF a set of idle, whisky
drinking, houseless, propertyless vandals he
would be put of BY sensible men with a emile,
and by all true American manhood with silent
contempt. John Hemphlll, by courtesy - rever-
end, , merits more pointed rebuke.
His ignorance shows how much he is out of
place in essaying instruction upon politics. and
the lntemperance and recklessness of his language
are disgraceful to his cloth, and, we hope, dis
gusting to the honest and truth-loving members
of his flock. There is, for example, nothing
reasonable in mere speech, under the law of
California or of the United States. Ii Hemphill
does not know this, he is not as well informed on
the subject of his pulpit paiaver as nine men out
of every ten of those whom he falsely character
ICES as IS whisky-drinking, idle, houseless, prop
ertyless vandals. 1t Is u notable fact that the
workingmen of this city are led by men OF marked
sobriety and industry, and If they are :. houseless
and propertyless, y 1t Is no fault of theirs, but
rather of that greedy, gambling, swindlIng. COR
rupting, dissipating rObber class in whose inter
est most of the opponents of the rev fundamental
law are operating.
Therefore it is not a matter of much surprise
that the conclusion of Hemphill's string OF false
and contemptuous ~epithets, leyeled directly at
more than 13 900 American citizens and voters
of San Francisco, was greeted from the gallery
by the words You lie =" The language was
just such as to elicit the . lie ,; from anv work.
who might chance 10 be in ear-shot of
it, though there is no excuse for the person who
gave the " lie " in the house of prayer. But is
he more culpable, is he as much to blame, as the
politician who gave the provocation by
turning his pulpit into q forum and applying
which in any other presence could not
fail to be resented for the coarseness and false
hood of them?
What right has a minister of the gospel to turn
his church and his pulpit into II political ma
He denounces the new Constitution, by
fair inference, as communistic, revolutionary,
reasonable, and leading to many great evils.
Has he ever read it? We do not believe he has.
If he has, he has wholly misunderstood it. And
this would not be strange, considering that it is
entirely out of the line of his business to inter-
such an instrument.
If he has not read it-and we don believe he
Ias-his palaver merits the severest reprobation
Is that of an arrogant, ignorant, overbearing and
bitterly prejudiced man, without q spark of
charity or sympathy for his fellow-men who hap
zen to be poor.-S. F. Chronicle.