The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1882-03-19

i Wordy representation of the evils
attending persecution is common
place and universal, and no sect or
party, in its days iof weakness
and humility, bat what has
advocated the rights Of con-
science and the liberty of the mind.
Yet how soon are such teachings
forgotten in prosperity. No sooner
is power and security gained than
the view insensibly changes. The
heaven Of greed and ambition dark
line the prospect, and the coniSca-
lions, beheadingS and lustful
tyranny OF a Henry are followed by
the bleoted burnings of Smithfield,
the legitimate offspring of the sim
cere fanaticism of Mary. EpiscJ-
paIlan tyranny was repaid by Puri-
Tan rapacity and godly blOod-thirsti-
ness; again to Ibe atoned by the in
human cruelties and legal murders |
of Jefreys, melted by the bigoted |
James, in the "BloOGy Asslzes,"
where the executioner of con-
demned criminals stood ankle deep
in human blood, surrounded by the
several quarters and disemboWeled
remains Of freebOrn Englishmen,
while hundreds were torn from
family and home and sent to toll in
slavery in the West Indian Islands,
years in cruelty and sick
ness, after a passage more horrible
than death itself. Female chastity
and childish innocence diSregarded
and made mOckery, and a desola-
ton made Of hundreds of the fairest
homes of England. The godly
William Penn, refusing to take off
his hat in the presence of princes,
has been accused by MacaHley, has
tlly, perhaps, without sufficient
proof, of bending to the storm he
dare not face and pandering to the
rapacity and greed Of vile set OF
paint-bedaubed maids of honor,
from the fears Of loving
parents, to save their little daugh-
tiers, gold, to supply their courIly
revelS.
In contests between religious
sects and parties, the crueltieS en- !
joined by creed are more taught j
and practiced, than their charity
and kindness. Mosaic sternneSs Z
AID unfeeliug authority, are more
lnculcated than Messiannic meek I
ness, humility and brOtherly regard,
so eloquently put forth by the {
gospels. The black drop of human
permeateS and spreads, at
times, throughout the hole social
fabric; and in rearing the eternal
edifice of salvation, The humber
claims Of human lie. and love and
sympathy, are too often forgotten
and neglected. A Calvin, secure
from persecution and strong in the
plenitude of his power, can con-
denim to death at the stake, his rival :
with the same gOdly !
fervor and disinteTestedneSs that :
the council of Constance devoted to I,
gentle HuSs, to the same fate, as a :
sacrifice to POpish power and hate.
While it is cIeditable not to bow
down i'll the house of Rlmmon, it is
less so TO be merciful and Just?
While honoring the Puritan fathers I
of America for their faith and
frmness in banishing themselves
from civilization to the wilderness
Of our eastern coasts, can we honor
their prosecutions of harmless innO-
cence ard conscientious belief that
bowed not down to them? Was the
of Cotton Mather against
noncOnformity, witches and war
locks. equally meritOrious with the
labors of a Roger Williams in es-
an asylum for religious
belief? Yet it is from the darkness
Of these contests, the miseries of
those banishments and burnin9s.
hanging and quarterings that the
light of liberation springs and the
happiness of modern religious soci-
ETY. was born; and all causes that
initiate against this peace. this Sc
curity and this cooperation of So
cial purity and friendly Intercourse,
is a departure from the civilization
of the present day, back to the mis-
rule and chickering's and barbarisms
of past ages.