Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1884-08-17
WHAT MoRMoNIsNT IS.
A Lfcentious Asiatic Practice Its Effect
on Children.


on Children.
A good Mormon, says the Salt Lake Tri-
6uae, said to the writer of this the other
day: 'sWhy do you denounce our side Of
the question so bitterly? Suppose Nor
mon has more than one wife how does
that concern you? If you do not like it,
there is nothing catching about it; why
can you not let things work their way
| quietly and leave time to establish which
is rightP' The man is an honest man and
deserves a candid answer. The reason
Mormonism has such horror to us is be-
cause 1t aims mortal double blow at our
| government. 1t breaches the right of a
creed to absolute rule, and it takes the
sanctity from home. 1t is an exotic
transplanted from Asiatic soil. 1t lacks
| the humaniZing instincts which make
Christianity possible, and which never
bore fruit through Christianity even until
1t was engrafted afresh by the more gener-
GUS nations of Europe. A most gifted
writer says: ''The most pitiful thing in
the Bible is the conspicuous absence of
the tireside. Look at poor Apostle Peter
beneath the palace, at the kitchen fire on
the ground, among the servants, warming
his blood to fortify his faith-it sends
cold chill through the whole plan of saliva
ton. Every one knows that Christianity
had no peoples music-fOr the Psalms
and songs were priestly-no hymns, no
chants, no conquering measure of martial
tramp till itmet the fireside men of the fur
clad North. Tie inspiration of our best
heart music is the march of Valhalla and
the wall Of the Valkyrias-love and war;"
And, continuing, hesays: ''What | wish
to say is: That civil liberty, civilization,
Christianity are upheld by the family
circle, and ! think the most evil infidelity
is lack Of faith in the virtues OF ones
ancestors"
Now, we hold that had the Christian
church been confined to the soil of Asia it
would, through the manipulation of Asia
tics, by this time have been as cruel and
licentious creed as the Mohammedan
creed Is. 1t took ON its gentleness when
rough but tender souls of Northern
Europe interpreted around their firesides
the Masters words. In the homes of
Europe Christianity was humanized, and
at the same time the liberty-loying races
that humanized it RELOCATED it to its pro-
per place-gave it charge of the hearts
and souls OF men, and made it remove its
control from the civil government. 1t
took centuries to accomplish this; it
caused the sacrifice of millions of lives;
but on that stubborn ground it was fought
out, and the triumph was won because
the homes were kept sacred and children
learned at the same time reverence for
their ancestors, reverence for religion,
and reverence for law. This thing called
the Mormon Church is but a return to the
Asiatic system, and seeks directly to
break down reverence for home, reVer-
ence for law, ard to bind the brains of
men to accept without reason the arbi-
trary dictates of creed. 1t seeks to undo
all the progress of the last thousand years,
and to make man the miserable nOmad of
old Vhnra q cinnapn bo II Of
think this is so, but the system has con-
tinued long enough to make clear its
tendency. In young Utah how much !
reverence is there for ancestors? Three !
out OF four of them curse the crime that |
caused them to be born in shame. How
many of them remember their early homes !
with any thought but that of relief that !
the miserable history is for them past? |
Now, when man has no respect for his |
ancestors and no reverence for the home |
that he was born in, he is not citizen !
whom his country could in an emergency !
depend upon. If a child never learns to |
love the law of home he will never accept |
graciously the restraints which the civil |
laws draw around every citizen. He is |
inclined to become a law to himself And |
it is to precisely this position that Utah is |
swiftly graYitating. At the same time
the young of both sexes here are following |
in the lead which all pOlvgamOus cOun-
tries gravitate to. The young men, as a
whole, are not so scrupulOusly honest as
their fathers were, and a greater proper
ton of the young women are going to the
bad, than in the old days of their mothers.
Young people cannot be trained from
childhood to deride the laws of their coun-
try, except, that as a penalty, it will be
found they deride all other restraints. 1t
is for these reasons that we abhor Nor
monism. 1t destroys home; it breaks
down reverence for holy things; it teaches
defiance to the laws; it strikes at virtue
in woman, because it degrades her; it
strikes at honor in man, for it chains him
to superstition which, while offering
a belief that he is not bound by the
restraints which civilization imposes, it
is the planting on American soil of a
worse than upas tree, which poisons all
the atmOSDhpre