Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1880-01-11
MiLIGNING DEITY.

theories of the modern church that all chast-
ening, all affections, come from the Lord.
He is held responsible for everything of
evil that befails those who profess to worship
him and to believe in his name. If q Chris
tan, or one protesting to be such, meets
with reverses in his business, he charges the
blame to deity, although others can see that
his embarrassments have been caused by his
own ignorance or disregard of ordinary busi-
ness principles-by reckless speculations or
the lack of proper precautions in making
purchases and sales. 4 mother exposes her
child to the rigors of the climate, setting at
defiance the best known sanitary and
hyglenic rules that she may crafty her
vanity so far as to have the credit of being
the mother of q beautiful and delicate
child. A pulmonary complaint succeeds
as natural consequence, and the little
one is carried off, a martyr to the mothers
she leans over the coffin containing all
that is earthly of her darling, she murmurs
through her tears, "The Lord gave and the
Lord has taken away; blessed be the name
of the Lord" And the minister, called to
consign the remains to earth, echoes the in
suit to deity with all the JUNCTION of which
he is capable. A woman binds up her
form in the highest of corsets and fills
her stomach with food that an ostrich
could scarce digest. AS result she be-
comes dyspeptic, her vital organs be-
come impaired and cannot perform their
proper functions, and she becomes con-
mourns her inability to participate in the
scenes of gaiety going on around her, she
exclaims, "This Christening is of the Lord. y
In fact she is herself responsible
for all her suHerings. If she
had clothed herself in proper
manner, eaten wholesome and nutritious
food and abstained from late hours and the
stimulations of the dance, she would today
be in the enjoyment of the best of health.
Men, too, abuse their physical systems.
Whatever gratifes the palate is taken into
the stomach, and dyspepsia, rheumatism, govt,
and organic Affections are SO common as to
be scarcely worthy of mention. All these
ills, the direct results of a disregard of the
laws of health, are attributed to deity, and
when death comes at an untinely hour the
hollow mockery-the blasphemous insult
ascends to heaven, "The Lord gave, and the
Lord has taken away
The apostle Paul records that he was
given thorn in the flesh to restrain his
pride. OF late years every protesting
Christian considers it his or her inalienable
right to have a similar thorn. If they have
been created healthy, they proceed, by a
systematic course of treatment, to make
themselves unhealthy so that they may be
constantly reminded that all flesh
is grass. Not only do they affiict
themselves with physical infrmities, but they
transmit them in magnifed form to their
progeny. Thousands of children are born
into the world every day, puny, delicate crea-
lures, with the seeds of disease, the fruits of
their parents neglect or dissipation, already
developed in their system. When one notes
the habits of life of the adult population he
ceases to wonder at the fearful infantile
mortality recorded in our vital
statistics. 1t is physical impossibility for
sickly parents to produce healthy children,
and in nine cases out of ten the infrmities
of the parents, transmitted to the children,
are the consequences of their own foolish
ness with which deity has nothing to do, and
it is a gross and wicked libel upon his char
acter and attributes.
When will the religious community, more
especially those who set themselves up as
teachers of religious truth, become imbued
Is deity to be held to an account
for all the foolish and
sinful acts of his creatures? If man or
woman willfully sets about running his or
her health and suffers the inevitable conse-
quences, is deity to be blamed because he
refuses to reverse the laws of nature for
their special accommodation Can a man
expect to thrust his hand into the fire and
AOt 10 OulACus ohu 40 dCAty W Uc-
cause he does not take from the flames the
power to harm?
The truth is that vast majority of our
Affections are of our own seeking, and can
be averted by due regard for certain i'm
mutable and Interchangeable laws. That we are
fast becoming nation of dyspeptics and
consumptives is not due to any special dis
pensations of Providence, but to our own
foolishness. There are few instances in
which man need suffer want if he uses the
intelligence with which he has been en-
dowed in the conduct of his business
or the pursuit of Ibis trade. Man is
emphatically the architect of his own fortune.
If he disregards well-esta blished rules of the
business world, he must expect to suffer loss.
If he violates sanitary laws he must expect
to suffer physical distress. If mother per-
mits her child to go into the street with in
sufficient protection against the inclemency
of the weather, she must expect to be called
to mourn over its lifeless corpse. If she
abuses herself by errors in dress, diet, or
habits, she must expect that her children
will share her weaknesses and either die an
untimely death or live on aiburden to them
selves and all around them. What are called