Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1885-09-11

DO"
tFrom the Boston Sunday Herald.l
When a young woman, well born, highly
educated beautiful In person, deliberately,
In her utter despair Of being able to support
herself, ties a cloth over her mouth to stop
scream, and browns herself, as did Misc Lau-
ra H. Nourse at Louisville, KY, last week,
leaving behind her a letter in which, to use
her own words, she denounced God as a
fraud, in whom she had trusted all her life,
but who would not help her in trouble and
distress" the most thoughtless nature Is ar
rested and forced 10 ask q few point blank
questions Was there here but one more VIC
tim of a false and pernioious religious teaoh-
ing2 Or is all religious teaching but folly
and a snRre2 II is plain enough what ideal
conception was still lingering In this poor
orazed young womsn's mind, the conception
OF a Being meroiful and tender able 10 bless
to the uttermost, and there was she, ever
loyal to him, left to drink the last dregs Of
misery, 10 be engulfed in the blaokness Of
despair. No good and Rll.powerful being
could permit this. And 30, in the wild and
whirling delirium of her brain, she denouno-
cd the whole God-idea as q fraud and lie,
and plunged into the river 10 get out Of such
a hideous world.
People ought to be set thinking by such a
case az this. There is no end OF teaching
| from inc pulpit LnhL ~ NhltulhNbu W DNluk
| the mind TO Just such q state Of possible
heart break and despair. II Is born OF q still
| lingering faith in the ideas Of an age Of mir
acle that outward earthly deliveranoe and
suooor are the sole proof Of divine pTOvi-
| dence, and will surely come to the righteous
| something tsntamouut TO ravens 10 feed
them in times Of famine, angels to unbar the
| gateg Of the dungeons into which they are
thrown, material prosperity to inevitably
crown their honest efforts. No wonder this
belief Is 30 rapturously embraced by ardent
minds. The most intolerable OF all thoughts
! to the reason and the heart Is that there Ia
no divine order and no divine love embrao-
ing every contingency Of life And 30,
swiftly does the mind fly TO millennial dreams
of the one and only way in which this divine
| order and divine love must manifest them.
selves Man surges at pain, pines under
loneliness and desertion, easily despairs al
obstacles, Graves sunshine, laughter, freedom
and repose and 80, depressed in spirits OF
bitter in mood, easily springs to the oonclu
sion Either the good God will put a stop to
all this misery soon, and thus inspire conf
dence in himself, or expect 10 see the las
remnant OF faith in him suffer shipwreck II
my case.
VERY we'll, then, II such be your solf-as
sorting mood of mind, faith will have TO sufIei
shipwreck in your case !" How often doe
the pulpit come out with clear and resoluts
ring in the enunoiAtion Of this sharp and sal
utary warning How often does Il Tesolute
ly face the facts of existence and declare
Yes, human life is oftentimes an appalling
thing 30 much as 10 look at the seed of thi
righteous go begging bread the widow AM
the orphan are robbed, innocence is seduced
the good are mAlgned and prosecuted tn
wisest and purest are raoked with disease
pinched with poverty, despised and rejecte'
of men All this is one indubitable side o
the facts Of human experience. Now, wha
do you mean TO do with them Follow Job
wife with her embittered taunt "Dost tho
still retain thy credulity ? curse God ant
die !" or follow Job with his answer: Tho
spoakest az one OF the foolish women speah
eth" One thing is adAmantine certainty
namely, that there Is no debating terms
| the power that orders the course of thi
world. Socrates must drink the hemloch
and Christ be nailed to the cross, Stephe
stoned to death, and Paul beheaded with tn
sword. Had either one Of these taken hi
stand and cried TO the being In whom he ha
trusted Either send an angel with an ant
| dote for poison, OF case my limbs In invisib
, | armor that not spike will pierce, or max
those stones but thistle down either do tn
i or will die denouncing thy name a. frau
; TO all the generatioDs-why, then, all Il
difference would have been that he woul
have died leaving behind him the recor
of one more Of his class who break down NJ
der the trial Of their faith, instead Of one {
, the triumphant spiritual heroes whose clario
y voice to the ages is Nay, in all these thing
y we are more than conquerOrs through hi
that loved US.
Pathetic enough, indeed, is the story {
this poor, despairing young woman, and nj
a human heart 1t did not make cry Woul
God / could have been on hand to hel
Ii strengthen and tide her over TO the perhaI
e but few weeks ahead when brighter da!
y would have come, and with them wor
D" friends, Joy, and who knows but long yea
of happy wifehood and motherhood b.
to make such test a crucial test of God or n
I. God, as the poor half-crazed creature di
- herself, is to confound sanity and insanity, e
during reason and temporary delirium. II SUI
An example has any lesson 10 teach, 1t Ia tn
of the wild folly Of all such tests. The oI
thing for any man or woman 10 do
p" to cling to the higher intimations in the sol
% do his best to steer through thick and tn
with them, and see how he will finally con
u out. Any shape of religion that sends Il
young out into the world with the false i'd
j. that they are the children of q God too tel
der and merciful to suffer them to encount
the days and years, perhaps, OF misery, q
sertion, gloom and anguish the highest 81
8. noblest have had to go through with, Ia
wrong and cruelty TO them. The religio
III question is TO be solved on no such luxurio
y, terms as this, nor would the solution
al worth much, at least TO those who have
meet life's sterner trials, II It could be. Ea
30 enough would 1t be 70 believe In immortal
if nobody ever died, easy enough to belle
in divine goodness if there were no mig
and crying and moaning, easy enough TO
brave and patient IL work never failed a
prosperity always smiled. But as long
children, wives and mothers will die, q
distress will come, the only people that h'
all the world a whit TO believe that "for a Il
and a that" life may still be q grand 8
h, from a sublime source are, TO say the lea
not the despairing ones who go and dro'
themselves. Nor in literature, any mt
than in life, are these helpers the men
genius who, like Goethe in his age OF wei
ly sentimentalism, emphasizes 80 pathetic
ly the sorrows of poor young Werther as
make no end of sympathetic maidens In Il
With death, but the men who, like the 81
same Goethe, see the day when they
Of heartily ashamed of such emasculating ira
,tc and strive to brace and nerve the strong
in man to live resolutely for goodness, tr