Kansas agitator. [volume] (Garnett, Kan.) 1890-1905, 1899-07-28

coined into money, Is being rendered
more and more valuable every day. A
single glance at any comparative tabla
Of prices during the past quarter of a
century will fully bear out this last
statement.
That 1t is within the legitimate prov
ince Of the church to arrest the fuy-
Their progress Of this Crime against
Mankind is evinced by the opinions Of
the canonists, many Of whom have re-
corded their protests against payments
in specific moneys; whilst among the
pcDes of Rome, Innocent III. and Greg
DRY TX. have specifically ratified by
their pontifical DEGREES this repeated
opinion of the learned.
Money Is a measure of value (held
the fathers), and like other measures,
it belongs to the public, because it IS
q public measure-mensura publica-
AID no individual has a right to alter
1t, either by boarding, exporting, or
melting down coins, so as to deprive
the debtor of his option of species"
or to increase his debt by shrinking
the national volume Of money. To
sell by shrinking bushel measure, or
q shrinking yard stick, are offenses OF
a character that have never failed to
be stamped with ecclesiastical condem-
nation; but what are these petty Of
lenses compared with the colossal
crime Of secretly altering the measure
of value employed in the various states
of Chrlstendom; and what injury can
they infiict compared with the financial
ruin that is now being visited upon the
Christian world through the insiduous
agency Of altered species?
l appeal from the false verdicts
which have been wrung from nations
too recently autonomous to draw upon
their own store Of experience in this
matter, tothat church in whose ample
archives is to be found the garnered
wisdom of ages. l appeal to her, as
the universal tribune Of the people, to
interpose her potent veto to the further
preparation of this enormity. She has
but to give the command; 1t will not
fail to be obeyed.
If it be alleged in extenuation of this
gold standard" scheme that its object
is not to Cypress debtors by depriving
them of their option of Species" or
by rendering money scarce, but to es-
tablish a universal money, the answer
is that universal money, without uni
versal government, is a chimera; that
money owes its efficacy to coinage, de-
nomination and numbers; that these
are subject to the regalian prerogative
and to domestic law; that the state
which is ready to relinquish it's control
of money must be prepared to resign
its independence in other matters; that
there is no precedent, no experience,
to justify the experiment; that it was
not begun openly, but clandestinely,
and that thus far its operation has
been to create a few millionaires
and consign the generality to poverty
and misery.
Whether the motive was good or bad,
whether the theory is sound or I'M
sound the practical result of the move
ment Is that through its agency prop
erty is being transferred so rapidly
from debtors to creditors and from the
industrial to the idle classes, that
should it not be arrested, the entire
wealth of the civilized world must
eventually become vested in COM
paratively few hands and the masses
will be reduced to a condition little
better than that of serfs.
What, then, will be the fate OF Chris
tianity? What will be the position of
the church, when the majority of its
votaries are reduced to Indulgence, and
it is obliged to receive the revenues of
charity as dole from the reluctant
hand" of usury?
But this is not all; another danger
awaits the church. The silver which
Christian Europe has rejected is being
rapidly absorbed by pagan Asia, who,
under the stimulus of rising prices is
awakening to new prosperity and
raising it's idolatrous head to assume a
part in the councils of the West.
Asiatic laborers, and with them their
degrading mummeries, are already to
be seen in all our large cities; and it
cannot be doubted that their numbers
will increase with the means of escap-
ing from their native lands. Shall the
church take no part in arresting this
movement until in the place of Chris
tian missions in India we are asked to
accord a. standing to Hindoo missions
in Europe? What has hitherto re-
these votaries of darkness has
not been any lack of faith in idolatry,
or any want of confidence in sorcery,
slavery and the degradation Of wom-
an, but simply absence of means.
Every agency that tends to enrich Asia
will bring these abominable institutes
nearer to our doors, within which if
there is not already enough of filth,
there will soon be enough of Indulgence