The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1903-12-18
AN r
'r. Buckley Returns to the Consider

Or, BUCKLEY flGtGIHS " liS
alton of Bowie and Mrs. Eddy.
From DR.. j. NJ. Buchley's "f7anaticisn
in the United States" in December Cen.
tury: This country appears to be exposed
to fanaticiSm for reasons peculiar to the
American people. 1t IS the most conglonl.
crate large nation on the globe. The free.
dom allowed and exercised, the incessant
experimenting, the extraordinary genius
of the people for free and full speech, the
immense proportion Of half educated per-
sons, the publication of all sorts of truths,
half truths, errors, and chineras, the I'M
portation of all sects in religion by i'm.
migrants from all lands, the method oil
carrying on political ca"mpaigns-munci.
pal, state and federal-by the press AND
the mails, by Il house to house canvass.
and by countless speeches under exciting
circumstances, by alarming prohecies, at.
tacks on personal and political character.
and the scattering Of distorted statements
far and wide, might naturally be expected
to generate fanatlcism.
Here scores of communities of fanatics
have been formed and have long pros
pered, several of them based upon ideas
incompatible with morality. A conspicu-
Gus example is the Oneida community,
with it's branches in Vermont and Con
necticut. This system, involving strange
and unnatural relations between the
sexes, was founded on a perverted view of
the scriptures and the doctrine of perfec-
ton by John II. Moves, an alumnus of
! Yale and a CONGREGATIONAL minister.
Here modern S~piritualism arose, and
! spread as in no other part OF the world.
+! Other forms of superstition nav monop-
oliZed many of the class which furnish
its believers, and the present generation
cannot realize how that wave, with .ts
/ eXcrescence of free love, spread through
the states, as rapidly in cultivated Mas
sachusettS as in the scattered and partly
{ pIura ted communities on he frontier
Here NornonisIn originated; and con-
trollcd, concentrated, and stimulated by
the powerful personality of Brigham
Young, has become a religion which, after
the lapse of sixty years, IN spite of the
opposition it has encountered, shows ele-
ments of p~errnanence, and sends out mis-
sionaries 10 all parts of the world.
Here the spectacular Dow.e exercises
a ~despotism over his adherents which be
comes grotesque when at his call they rise
by the hundreds and furnish the testi-
mony he needs, whether to the soundness
of his views on the eating of pork, his
financial ability, his miraculous healings,
for his being the special messenger who
was to come in the spirit and power of
Elijah. His Votaries, undismayed by his
many failures 10 heal, and not undeceived
even by the complete contrast betwecn his
methods, manners utterances and spirit,
and those of the Founder of Christianity,
do his bidding as they might had he Wis
IDLY descended from heaven In their pres
cnce. Fortunately, unlike some other re-
liaiouS fanatics, Dowie warns against
vice and inCulcates q rigid morality. His
present claims and inconsistent spirit are
the natural evolution of a career married
in every stage by evidences of intense
fanaticism.
Here Mrs Eddy succeeds in fascinating
large numbers by Il copyrighted system
in which she claims to destroy disease
without depending in the least on hygiene
or medical treatment, and to eradicate sin
and disease by steadtasIly denying their
reality. In the beginning of the chief eie-
mcnts of her control were her dominating
personality, her calm contradiction OF
natural science, and the equally calm sub
stitutlng of a half truth for the whole.
: Ever a wholesale denial Of common be-
liefs has more potency over many m?nds
than a properly limited and reasoned at
tempt to modify them. Her organization
i being perfected, she now rules by Delphic
oracles and Sibylline leaves issued by a
secluded personality, inaccessible to the
many, though at rare intervals exhibited
at state fairs as a passing show, to dem
onstrate he actually Her head is al
ready surrounded by halos of mist and
S myth, and the exalted few who mediate
: between her and the world increase the
: effect by the under-breath reverence witt
l which they speak or write of her. Hence
although she has been compelled by hel
failures ana those of her followers TO SUI
render the treatment Of physical ~injurie:
to the surgeons and to cease from treat
k ing contagious diseases: and though
S through the whole land many Of her dev
otees having thrown away the learnin:
'and experience of mankind in treating
Is diseases, are dying or making pit,ful de
= malls of their obvious debility, disease, o
the natural effects of age, such of then
as are in good health, and some who ar
not Qnany Of them highly intelligent p