Frostburg mining journal., 1883-11-10
CORRESPONDENCE
FROSTBURG LIBERALS.
Fourth-Rate Ingersolls and Paines.

exists second-rate hotels, third
rate orators, "first-class BEATS" and in
fact in every occupation, calling or
walk in life, good and bad are relative
terms, and everything runs in
"classes." Frostburg has had several
third-class theatrical shows lately.
We also havea fifth-class water works,
and great many second-class poll
ticians. Furthermore, we have (and
this is the class of which we shall
speak, quite a number of fourth-rate
metaphysicians, "liberals," "free-
thinkers" infdels, or whatever they
may be. Bigotry calls them infidels
without stopping to inquire into the
meaning of the term, and they call
themselves "free- thinkers" which they
are with the exception that in
stead of being free they are slaves of
the worn-out ideas of Payne and In
gersoll, and they are utterly incapable
of really thinking in earnest. The
amphibians which compose this coterie
are with but few exceptions youths
whose adolescent brains have not yet
attained to the dignity of minds, but
who having heard of Hudson Tuttle,
having read Of Huxley, and probably
having managed to wade through
Draper by skipping the ''hard words"
they fondly imagine that by seeming
to adopt their ideas they partake to a
certain extent of the genius and learn
ing of these master scoffers. AS q
general thing these pigmies, these
would be giants-these Frostburg Glib
eralsn-cannot tell the difference be-
tween q mouse and molecule, and
imagine that ''protoplasm" is some new
brand of chocolate creams. Their
own existence seems to refute the
doctrine of the Survival of the fittest,"
and their only conception of the Dar-
winian theory is consciousness that
the monkey should have been their
starting-point whether it was or not.
Men who have made metaphysics q
life study, who have qualified them
selves for the work by research,
reasoning and cultivation of thought
If these men after such thorough
training reject generally accepted
doctrines and creeds, and whistle
orthodoxy down the wind, this class
of skeptics stand on their own
foundation of individuality and brains
and are true liberals and free-thinkers.
But their feeble-minded followers
whose minds are in formative state
whose intellects have not the
scope to grasp such momentous sub
jects or to mentally discuss them pro
and con-these fellows who deride be-
liefs that they cannot fathom, who
ridicule ideas they cannot understand
these fellows would benefit the
world more by few more brilliant
flashes of silence than by all their
vaporings and silly talk. They should
remember that their infantile and
futile attempt at reasoning is a matter
of no interest or concern to the public
at large. They forget this when they
infict their "ideas" on the unoffending
listeners. We have yet to hear a
blind man boast that he cannot view
the grand and glorious objects of
nature, and those who are deficient in
hearing do not often say they are
"deaf as a post" and men who feel
their mental inferiority are not in the
habit of giving the unsolicited inform
alton that they have no sense. 1t is only
the very young or the very simple who
insist upon vaunting their deficiencies
and airing their weaknesses in public.
A mans inability to even family grasp
the grand idea of the wondrous SOme-
thing that unites him to the infinite
should be a subject OF regret and not
q matter of which to boast. These
small fry liberals who are always on
the alert to assume consequential
air and chirp ~ am an agnostic,"
strangely resemble the thievish cur OF
Esop which displayed the heavy clog
about its neck as mark of distinction
instead Of infamy. If these Lillipu-
tian Paynes would confine themselves
to such milk for babes as Peck's Bad
Boy and wait for the vacuum in their
heads to fill up before tackling Renan
the public would be spared the vain
babbling of their infant minds.
Remember, boys, that Andrew Jack
son Davis has been read and laughed
at--yes, laughed at-by men who for
get more every sixty minutes than you
will ever live to learn. Recollect that
minds, compared to which yours is ''as
moonlight unto sunlight" is as water
unto wine-recollect that these minds
have studied the leviathans of infdelity
that you have barely heard of, and
these minds are neither agnostic or
skeptical. If you must read such
works try and keep quiet so that peo-
pie will not know how little you under
stand them, and do not force your
crude "ideasn ON innocent persons