The Leavenworth weekly times., 1879-07-17
The LeavenwOrth Seanees.
kansas Churchman.l

The papers OF the State have have been
quite filled, within the last month, with &C
counts of what they called a "spiritua
Wedding" in the city of Leavenworth, in
which noted politician Of the State fg
ures largely. A daughter Of the gentleman
referred to was the repuied bride, and a son
# the late President Pierce was the reputed
bridegroom. Both OF the personagss have
been dead for more than thirty years. The
bridal parties were also present at feast
prepared for them, mot a spiritual feast
however, but one If substantial earthly
food, and showed themselves in cabinet
to their waiting friends. How lar these
people were the juggleries Of the cabinet,
which have been 30 often exposed, or how
fsy in their case morbid imagination in
famed by highly excited condition Of the
nervous system may have induced the h.l-
lucination Of a temporary insanity, We do
not propose to discuss.
Our only object is by this example to
show the ereduiity in religious matters Of
those who reject the Gospel. There is no
folly to which such persons, however intel
ligeut iu other respects, may not be degrsd-
ed. For men must have a religion. The
sIiiituslist, the iniidel, even the atheist
must have religion. II ne will not take
Christianity, he gets up a religion of his
own. He must have some belief ~ to prov
idence, a. to duty and as to the future which
follows death. Now the great object to
Christia ianity, in the case Of those who are
not Christians, il its con,rol and abnega-
tion of the will Of the Hesh-in other words
its real spiritu Atty, az it calls upon men TO
deny the ilesh, to ''crucify the flesh with the
affections and lus,s," and to live under
purer law-the Law of the mind
or of the spirit. And under this
objection, men, inventing their own relig
ions, always give to these religions carnal
character, providing for the indulgence Of
the asshly appetites, and making their fu-
ture state but an imitation or reproduction
Of the ileshly indulgencies of time. Thus
the Mohammedan peoples his paradise with
the beautiful houries who are TO minister to
his carnal lusts in the world to come. Thus
the wild Indian, loving war and the chase,
talks of the "happy hunting grounds" I"
where his enemies are turned into women
| to serve him, and where be can follow out
the ruling tastes and propensities Of his
| early life. Thus the old psgsns clothed
their Gods with the brutal desires Of sensual
men, and de6ed the appetites and passions
Of cious self-indulgence for the coming
immortality. And 40 the "Spiritualism" Of
to. day, developed from the same causes,
is but the reproduction Of the
old Paganism and of the
modern Heaiheni ,m. And now the last de-
| velopment of this system, following out the
Law Of the ages and our corrupted nature,
| i. the Sesnce of Lesvenworth, making
| Heaven 10 its sensuousness but the duplics-
tion or the mimicry of earth. Such il the
credulity Of those who turn aside from
| Christ.
Take away the Gospel from the world,
and how soon would the bJas,ed cisilizs-
tion of the nineteenth century pas. away !,
How soon would our culture relapse into
barbarian, So to-day, Chri.tisnity il con-
tending with barbarism in the very me-
tropolis Of this State, and in all our land.
| Ii ia the only leaven Of good in the seeth-
ing mass OF humanity, struggling With the
tendencies downward-the only power that
lifts up man where every thing else de-
grades.
Standing upon the Divine plan of Chris
tianity, We beg the deluded adherents Of
this last phase Of credulity to reconsider
their course, and to hear the words OF the
Son of God, given eighteen hundred years
ago to the counterpsrts Of these novel ia
natics,-words sounding 40 pure amid the
dismal impuri,ie, Of this speculative age,
words revealing the lofty spirituality OF the
Christians Heaven: "The children of this
world marry and are given in marriage,
but they, which shall be accounted worthy
to obtain that world, and the resurrection
from the dead, neither marry nor are given
in marriage, neither can they die any more,
for they are equal unto the angels, and are
the children OF God being the children Of
the resurrectiOn-St. Luke, 29: "a SO.