The Labor enquirer., 1884-02-23

soul which the body issupposed to contain.
None Of this class so far have discovered
the exact location Of the soul. hope for
the benefit Of the heretics they viii some
day discover it. The food required for
the sustenance of the soul is called
spiritual food; every church, 50 to speak, is
restaurant for the soul, and the preacher
is the cook. Dear reader this may be
blasphemy, but it is nevertheless true.
men pay various prices for spiritual food.
The mechanic, the laborer, the coal miner
pay all the way from $40 up to $50 per
year. The bloated bond holders, bankers,
railroad magnates, stock gamblers, produce
gamblers and land grabbers pay consider
ably me-. Their souls require more food
to appease the wrath of the unknowable
for their eternally stealing from and grind
ing the people. You are prepared and
fitted out for another life, another world of
which they know nothing about. 1t is all
guessing, and if anyone undertakes to do
his own guessing in this direction. he is at
once set down upon by the reverends as
the slum of society. \ ~
The Rev. De La Matyr takes to task one
of Colorado's citizens because he had the
courage to speak his honest thought. His
name is paraded from the pulpit and the
hypocritical press feasts on the doctors
denunciation of Chaffee. Whatever the
character of Chaffee as a statesman, the
Torquemanda of Denver would shear the
ears of him if he had the power for daring
to say II do not believe your doctrines, l
do not believe in the ehurc hes" Doctor
there are thousands of men and wome n in
Colorado who will compare faVorably with
you as moralists and citizens who say the
same thing. But the doctor fears tn at
such expressions will harm society. If
you have truth on your side you have
nothing to fear. 1t is only institutions
that are bolstered up by lies and fraud
that fear assault.
Doctor, why do you not court discussion
in religion as you courted it in politics?
If you were as valiant a defender of
religion as you were of greenbackism you
would have mounted the Tabor stage and
divided time with Ingerson on Modern
Theology" Your chances will be good
tomorrow to prove to the people of Denver
that you have the ability and daring to
defend your religion with B. F. Underwood.
Do not wait as you did with Ingersoll,
until he has left the city and, when he is
safe away, mount your pulpit and empty
your slop and filth upon him, and all who
do not believe as you do.
But the doctor comedies that Chaffee has
right to his religious opinions and to
express them; "but he cannot consistently
complain if he is held responsible for his
utterances before the public, whose suf-
RACES he has generously shared and expects
to again" In this sentence, doctor, you
have given US true picture of the malig-
nant spirit of the church.
Cbaffee then to go back to congress must
retain the dust of by pocrisy on his knees
Doctor, you ought to remember that con-
sistency is a jewel. You left the pulpit,
clothed yourself in the robes of states
man and championed the peoples cause
Did the inf dels refuse to vote for you
because you were Christian, and formerly
a preacher? No; neither did they maIign
or traduce your name
1t may be considered presumption on
the part of a man that is graduating in a
Coal mine to criticise so learned a gentle
man, who is wading through Greek and
Latin every day, but so faulty is the doctor
in some of his statements that l cannot
pass them by. He says unlike any other
form of government ours rests solely on
the moral sentiment of a majority of our
people, and that sentiment is based on
religious principles; on no other basis could
they abide for day" This is history read
backwards, this government never would
have been instituted had not religion been
forgotten for the time. The men who first
conceived the thought of making this
republic were driven from their native
lands for religious opinion. They colo
nized on the eastern coast. They were all
amenable to the English government
While Puritans, Quakers, Catholics, Metho-
dists, Episcopalians were prosecuting one
another, they said let US quit and worship
one grand religious liberty. They did so,
and succeeded in driving the enemy from
the land. They got their heads together;
they knew full well the evils of blending
church and state they knew if they
allowed God in American politics they
would in time be prosecuted again So
they framed government, the only one In
the world to-day whose machinery can be
run without the assistance of heaven.
Every man and woman can worship at
what shrine they please; they can have
one God, one hundred or none, just as 1t
suits them. Bishop Haven, the pope OF
the Methodist church in his day, and his
representative preachers, of whom the
doctor is one, made a spasmotic effort to
put God in the constitution. If the senti-
meut of the American people is based on
religious principles why did they say, we
shall not have him there?1
"That contempt for Christianity is ram