Morning journal and courier., 1883-11-08
He had forgotten to plug up his ears.
The Mormon Phenomenon. From khe London Daily EeEs.1

From the London Daily News
 Of all the phenomena of our age, Mormon ism is in one sense the most remarkable. Here, before the sstonished eyes of scienti- fic age, has new religion come into being, a religion with full blown supernatural pre- tensions. Here, too, in the face of society constantly becoming more truly human, is Q new religion of which the main attraction is that 1t repu3iates one of the chief conquests of civilization. the homogeneous family Odd and unaccountable as these phenomena seem, these oriental phenomena occurring in the furthest west, Mormonism is really evolved from very well known and familiar human conditions. We have seen that missionaries are not sent to Roman Catholic countries, and have inferred that in Roman Catholic coun- tries missionaries of Mormonism would meet with no success. Why not {? Clearly because NIormonism appeals to passionate and uned- ucated people, who know nothing but the Bible, and lowing to their general lack of cultivation) know that wrong. In Roman Catholic countries the corresponding class does not know even the Bible. Only among the countries of the reformation do we find men and women whose only reading has been the Bible, and who have searched the scrip lures with eyes unpurged, attracted and fss- cinated not by the spiritual sense, but by the prophecies of earthly glories. Ignorant of history of geography, of the science of lan- guaRe, a certain number of persons in Pro- S66tAlG COunEE19S are EGhQ1y ChEEl0A away bJ anyone who interprets prophecy so as to make it bear on the events of the moment and who interprets history so as to connect it with all the mysterious lost tribes. This class is the ready prey of Mormon missiona- ries, who found in America especially an eager public The dark past of the American continent, that continent so rich in relics of races who have left no name, nothing but mounds and palaces, and indec1pherable hieroRlyphics, naturally excites curiosity in imaginative people. Smith satisfied that cu- riosity In the way most readily appreciated, by connecting all the past of America with the chosen people of Israel. Joseph Smiths revelation fascinates his disciples, as the 'sAnglo Israel" theories delight harmless en- thusiasts Normens and 'tAnglo-Israelites" both believe, and rejoice to believe, that they are in direct contact with, in direct descent from, the people of the mysterious destiny, the chosen people. The Mormons take up the succession of the American Israelite Christians whose last army fell before the "Lamanites' at Cummorah, in New York State, in 1884 A. D. One of tho remnant who escaped the "Kamanite" (for Red Indian) scalpina knife was Maroni, and Maroni left the golden plates from which Joseph Smith deciphered the history of the spiritual anees- tors of the Mornons of America. Now all this romance about American Israel, and about Nephi "a Jew who discovered America about the time of the Lydian empire, has no attraction for uneducated Catholics. They have not made the Old Testament their con- stant companion; they have no curiosity about the prehistoric past of America ana they do not want to hear about Lamar, who rebelled against Nephi, and whose children are under curse as red men. The whole narrative could only win credence from peo- ple at once curious and ignorant; people who knew the Old Testament in sort Of way, and knew no other history nor literature
 Mormonfsm has been tolerably successful with this c;ass in Protestant countries, espe- cia1ly Git is sometimes sald) In Wales' wnere perhsps the stories of Madoc and of the Welsh Mandan Indians get mixed up with the revelations of the Golden Bible. Mormonlsm has other very notable attractions. She offers a kind of Eheocracy and continued stream of supernatural influences and supernatural events, to disciples who miss these in the re- lipions and governments of Protestant Eu- rope. The Mormon in Salt Lake City fatters himself that he is living under dispensation very like that which Israel enjoyed under the judges. Thas the believer connects himself with the only past he ever heard of, and he certainly is more like an old Hebrew than modern admirers of culture are like old Greeks. The permission of polYgamy remains ss the coarsest and most vulgar part of the charm which Mormonism exercises. Polyga- my itself is only ''revival'' of ancient Sem itic practice, but it does not always do to revive the practices of Semites and HeHenes. To ladies loverless, and never likely to be welded in Europe the limited matrimonial rights offered them by Mormonism seem bot ter than none at all, while men of certain type are allured by opportunities practically unlimited. These are the chances of Mor- monism in securing converts more or less sincere. Smith and the faith he has founded would have been quite normal in Hlndcstan, where crowds of saints are now living, and when dead will be deiied. The phenomena are startling because they occur in America, but after all they only prove that human credul- ity is much what it has always been, where It thrives on rich soil ofignorance.
 J. D. Marks, of Collinsyille, has won $20O in prizes at rife matches this summer.