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Blue-grass blade (Lexington, Ky.): n. Sunday, December 16, 1906.

Blue-grass blade (Lexington, Ky.): n. Sunday, December 16, 1906. Blue-grass blade (Lexington, Ky.). 400dpi TIFF G4 page images Blade Publishing Co., Lexington, KY 1906 blu1906121601 These pages may be freely searched and displayed. Permission must be received for subsequent distribution in print or electronically. Blue-grass blade (Lexington, Ky.): n. Sunday, December 16, 1906. Blue-grass blade (Lexington, Ky.). Blade Publishing Co., Lexington, KY 1906 $IMLS This electronic text file was created by Optical Character Recognitio n (OCR). No corrections have been made to the OCR-ed text and no editing has be en done to the content of the original document. Encoding has been done through an automated process using the recommendations for Level 1 of the TEI in Librar ies Guidelines. Digital page images are linked to the text file. f r Jif1 v BdJ GRASS BLADEParker r As i1acr 8ub apt fa WE AIM TO OUT DOWN ERROR AND ESTABLISH TRUTH VOLUME XV NUMBER 37 LEXINGTON KY SUNDAY DECEMBER 16 1906 PUBLISHED WEEKLY trse A YEAR IN ADVANCE THE REIC F KING HBUC When People Submit To Being Duped TOb= struct Progress nlights Law Should Be Based on Hum and Not Upon Alleged Divine Remedy Lies With the People For All Wrongs The Experience i lI ADDRESS DELIVERED IN E r CONCRECATIONALCHUROHJt NCINNATIY a tfA disappointed painter once sold Well as I cant sell any good pic tures Im going to paint daubs and see how they go He carried out his purpose let his hair and beard grow talked stagy act ed eccentrically and was soon a cess All the public wants Is to fooled and amused then It will give you Its patronage join your church or follow you oft Ono night last spring down on my corner a man was stationed with a telescope Hu charged ten der- structive a view lecture and a small phl- et Excepting myself he did not get a patron Presently an Italian came along wltii an organ and monkey He soon attracted a crowd whfch freer contributed pennies and larger sums I made a contract with the ostrono mer for ten minutes use of his telescope and when tho organ grlnder andmonk moved on I addressed the crowd thusly Wonderful views of Mars the only Inhabited planet besides the earth Take a view of the great planet with Whoso inhabitants we may soon be talking Price for looking only one cent reduced from ten cents Pamph let describing Mars given free Walk up Walk This I repeated over and over again To bo brief there was not a person in the crowd would give a penny to see Mars and they were intelligent appearing people too What is to be done with a man to get him to think who will give five cents to see a trick monkey an animal he has seen a thousand times and who wont give a penny to see the planet Mars which he has never seen give this illustration to show the- up hill work ot the reformer and edu cator and how very hard it is to In I disco people of all classes to think study and reason along progressive public apparently like to be fooled They enjoy being fleeced and simply revel In belug humbugged Right there is tho great stumblln block to all reform Mankind Is so gullible in co many small ways and In so many largo ways that his thoughts interests and energies are diverted from tho channels of pro gross With light amusement and a full stomach tho average man Is sat- Isfied There Is a reason fov this and why Is It s01 The natural bent of the mind of man is toward reason and progression Why then Is It so hard to get him to think and reason even when he has a good education for a foundationI why His young presslonnblo brain is humbugged Wight at tho start It Is Inoculated with faith and prayer and filled with signs wonders prejudices and fears All the fatastlcal fallacies and mud dleheaded mysticisms of the church are engraven on the clean white page of the childs mind there to remain forever and obstruct its reasoning poi r It grows up In the habit of ytrustluK in prayer and doubtllng Its 2 nses Tho love of nature truth and rf jIPi i i irofi f reason Is misguided by the rhapsodies of rollglon and nothing Is harder than to take a long established belief from the mind and rierl an entirely different one Ninetenthsof all tho humbuggery in theyworld begins with the preacher and fho priest whoso oflluess it Is to erect great corporations organized for the purpose of misdirecting deceiving and cheating mankind In or4T0bat they themsel ves may be retie tftlried In positions of honor ijMMJaHMjIp fashion style call 1 There are au an exp e e iiumery In tho world that I will pot upve time to notice the smaller and mon ones I may as well begin byltldng note of The Humbug of the Law Lawyers mako most of the laws Their business is supposed to consist defending the laws they make In stead their success depends upon beating the laws that they make Law is the most uncertain of all things There is absolutely nothing certain about it except the expense Lawyers rarely go to law on the same principle I guess that doctors rarely tako their own medicine and that preachers rarely practice what they preach Some great lawyer It was who left all his money to the support of an asylum for fools and luntatics saying that from such he got It and to such he would bequeath it It would be unfair both to the law and lawyers to condemn them alto gether for the humbuggery that is in them As long as people want to be humbugged thero will be lawyers and some others as well to do It The fault is right in the start Credulity is a human attribute The preacher and priest take advantage of the ignorance and credulity of the child and set him swimming In the stream of lirea sucker to become tile prey of every book Law Is a human necessity There can be no government without it Many lawyers are the noblest of men and truest of patriots The glory ot this country Is best reflected I lIeve in the brlllancy of Its great legal minds But all this notwithstanding the law Is full of humbuggery and the profession full of humbugs It Is a subject so great that It should bo a lecture within Itself In the first place the laws of all civilized governments aro based not upon human but upon divine rights not upon common justice but upon superstition not upon choice of the governed but upon the choice of kIng priest and monopolist We by the Grace of Gqd starts off each proclamation from thin throne In the name of God Amen starts off our wills A witness takes the oath not upon his honor but with So help mo God The Supremo Court of tho United States has declared this to ben Christian natoon notwithstanding the presence of millions of Jews Freethinkers and Secularists and not withstanding less than onethird of tho population are enrolled church r j iitt members Thus you see the government and law as well as medicine art and tho drama are veneered all over with the mysticism of clerical bum foozlcdom Creedmakers and lawmakers always understand each others winks To day the rich make the laws and they are only madp to be broken There is little cr no law for a moneyless man So outrageously corrupt and delin quent are courts of justice that com munities made desperate by their re mission take the law la their own hands For a long number of years it has been safer in this city to tell a Ho than to tell the truth An honest statement about courts and politicians was more apt to get a man into trou ble than If he lied outright The great wonder Is not that there is an occasional court house riot and lynching and anarchistic outbreaks and Drake committees but that there is not more of them We are taught that we should have a sacred regard for law and order This Is the great hue and cry of hum bug politicians humbug preachers and humbug editors Order Is always law but law Is not always order Thero mayo be no greater tyrant than the law There can be nothing more anarchistic than the law Mankind has advanced just as It has been able to repeal twothirds of all the laws that have ever been made Courts of justice or rather Injustice all over the land are simply rotten They have even the lawyers cowed Honest attorneys If they be poor fear to say anything knowing that If they should have a case come before a certain court tho decisions would go against him More and more the powers of gov sovereigntyIs Inslduously using the law to fortify and strengthen Itself Big armories are being erected In every city The standing army Is being Increased In a few months every male citizen tween the ages of 21 and 45 will be a soldier of tho U S army He will a ldte oWnYtf with tjannysayof- Ihat u he Is a soldier or tHat such a law exists in tills land of thogull and the home of the gulled A book the size of the Bible Is large enough to contain all the laws necesa sary for the government of men all over the world but each state of this union alone has enough laws to fill a freight car Owing to the selfishness greed and cruelty In human nature we must have law and government but we should have as little as possible The chief humbugger In law is that mankind is being burdened with as much law as possible When one stops to think of all the complexity bias trickery juggling injustice and humbuggery of the law he is compelled to cry out with Burns A fig for those by law protected Libertys a glorious feast Courts for cowards were erected Churches built to please the priest The Humbug of the Press The Press should be the exclusive literature of tho million To them it should not only be news but science literature history church and college for In all these the people are as much interested ns in news In a way It does assume to repre sent all these but unfortunately its cast of thought is slckllpd oer with the same pale coat of mythical moonshine with which the law Is veneered Unfortunately tho press Is not free All tho great papers of both parties with a few grand exceptions are the slaves of capitalism and co co I mean clericalism without which capitalism could not long survive The church Is one of the greatest of class privileged Institutions but you seldom find the press either opposing or ex peeing it Tho press generally speaking has become a cold blootied moneymaking Institution Today Its managing elI and correspondtors editorial writers ents are more mouth pelces of their masters tho veriest slaves crawling llcksplttlers of capitalism clericalism and bossism Nino out of ten of these employed editors are broad minded liberal men They know human nature they know the Ins and outs they know what Is going on they know the humbug gery better than anyone else exist- Ing In all the departments of government and society nut they too are victims of capitalism Their nobler natures are stilled by the pressure of economic conditions If tho progressive young men who dtJ t now furiilsh the brains for our great newspapers were free to use them as their conscience dictates there would be a big leap forward in municipal and all other reform But the toadying to money office fashion and power rather than to honesty achievement merit and brains rind its disposition to adver tise crinio and scatter scandal and spread moral mildew places the press In the first row of the ranks of hum buggery Recently the whole country was surfeited with the gush of the press over approaching marriage of the Presidents daughter Princess Alice No queen In all the world was ever given such public flattery The liter ary genius of the whole world for the last Jive years has not received equal mention European snobbery was out Miss Rbosevelt was a good girl no doubt and It is not her fault that the press matte a monkey of Itself Its humbuggery consisted In giving at least 100000000 advertising space to this ordinary girl who has achieved nothing nnd never said one word that would distinguish her while other girls of tier age with the disadvantage of poverty and family obscurity have won reputations on the stage or with pen and brush and have gone almost unnoticed When Mr Roosevelt no longer has any public patron age at his disposal he will take his place among the ordinary and his daughter among the obscurities The most Important matters to be found in the press today are reports of murders rapes scahdals sermons hangings and fashionable weddings The editors claim these to be justifi able because the people are mostly Interested in them and want them Well there is some truth in this It takes a certain amount of gullible to feed thk gulls If there wasnt a de mand tar humbuggery the press wouldnt Invest Still whenever the press talks about Itself it toasts of its moral and edu dative influence and of Its uplifting an a proresslve tendencies Tblfi rUo mCJd1JlLUl3UnrlJam noL condemning thb I am talking- about the mercenary capitalistic press which cringes to clericalism sells out to bossism and grafts itself to graft which will advertise any lie cure or gold brick scheme meant to fleece the ignorant and credulous thereby becoming a party to the swindle A great many newspapers would rather blacken character than to fend It If a young man should hap pen to commit some disgraceful actI they Immediately peer Into his family anti the name of his sister who mayI be n school teacher or public person age and those of the honorable father arid mother heart broken over the act must be dragged before the public gaze and seemingly there is no recourse to this heartless Invasion of the home and cruel stigmatization of the Innocent There are papers to be seen on every hand which boast of being clean sheets which wade neck deep In the recital of scandal and crime and are as big humbugs themselves- as the swindles they advertise Next In Importance to the commer cial press In influence Is the reusing press every big and little church society has Its paper They are meant to hold the grownup child true to the faith and keep it in the mould of mysticism In which Its Infant brain was shaped They too contain quack advertisements swindling schemes All one has to do to note the humbug gery in them Is to observe theweb of superstition and of ancient falsehood woven through some nice moral talk and news of the day When It comes to dealing with truth and demonstrat ed fact they are far more unreliable than the commercial press Humbug of the Drama A passion for the dramatic art Is inherent In the nature of man Be cause people naturally prefer It the church has always condemned It The Bible is the book of tho priest the drama Is tho book of the people and show me If you can wherein the priest ever approved anything that is natur al to humanity The actor like tho physician poet astronomer and in mentor was persecuted for centuries and until very recently tho drama was universally regarded as tho work of the devil It has not been so many years since it was equal to tho loss of character for a young day to attend the theater nut tho church has never been able to control tho drama like it has the other professions therefore there is less humbuggery about It At least there Is less cant and hypocrisy Whatever meanness i there is in it is public and right out in tho open theater Is not always what it should be but one thing you may ob serve you will see more tears shed there than you will ever see in a church People will pay two dollars to hear a good play who will not listen to a sermon free of charge Why Because at the theater their better being Is newly aroused with smiles and laughter and pity and tears They approve the good and scorn the bad and the noble nature in them is widely awakened Today the drama Is taking the lead as an educator and as a moral fluence The church which pas always condemned It at last Is pelled to mutate it It is in the memory of many present when an organ was considered an instrument of the devil and not allowed In the church But finally they accepted the devils music After the organ came the horn then the fiddle then the orchestra and then opera and In a recent paper observed that a New York preacher hall adopted vaudeville declaring that if he couldnt get people to come to church one way he would In another Why is the church drifting toward tile drania Because the clergy per ceive at last that it is natural and that natural people shrink from the artificial piety trained solemnity sanctified stupldltty and Intellectual prostitution that poisons the atmos phere of the church The drama has not only Its Immoral elements but some of the cheapest kind of humbugger There are peG pIe who run to it to imbibe the morbid and sensational like some others run to a distracted meeting to hear preachers like Sam Jones blackguard Perhaps the best evidence of the humbug in the dramatic art is vealed In tho class of actors who achieve fame and over whom people Is a foolish young society woman SheA the wife of a Chlcacb or a bunker wl aboutu at whereverl goes and she finds a way of doing it in playing and acting She evinces no particular talents and cannot read her lines Intelligently But she hires paragraph writers to puff her goes abroad and forces an introduction to the Prince of Wales and succeeds in getting herself talked about still keeps her hirelings at it puff puff puffing every foolish act sue commits and every foolish word she utters Finally she closes an engagement with a manager goes off to study and plny a little and the next year she flaunts her skirts in the lics face in a grand apotheosis of makes money People who love to bo gulled will go to seo her because she Is a society woman and has passed through one or more scan dals while actresses of real merit will be without an engagement Hero Is a commonplace burlesque actress who makes a conquest of a leprous young lord He promises to marry her and jilts her In the end She sues him and after a trial mixed with much scandal receives heavy damages She is immediately a star actress She employs a lecherous and blackguard nobleman for a manager and behold them crossing the Atlantic to make a fortune In dear America where all the snobs and fools are hun gry for humbug Thus como the Langtrys the Camerons and Brown Potters by the scores All the details of their scandals are Industriously ex ploded on their arrival and they draw crowds like empty molasses barrels draw flies If there wasnt a market for such and if the drama was not a fertile soil for this sprouting of hum- bugger they wouldnt como Three fourths of the fame of all mushroon actors and evangelists is duo to tho humbuggcry and tricks of the advertiser My object Is not to expose these but to show how very easily the people at large may bo humbugged Humbug In Literature By the same trick of tho advertiser millions of people are humbugged into reading inferior literature A few years ago a lubberly young Englishman came to this country wearing a big sunflower on his bosom and mys teriously babbling of the beautiful anti tho true His poetry was rubbish and his prose was mush but he woro his hair long and dressed In knee breeches and that caught tho gullible Millions of people believed in him and he carried name to London a small fortune to attest tho success ofu Oscar Wilde among tho humbug l s t f Irfi worshipping barbarians of the West A big publishing house whoso busl ness U Is to puff the books It prints launches a new and worthless piece of fiction on the market Very soon all tho gulllbles hear of It and rush right off to buy tho latest book They have heard of Emersons Essays all their lives but never could be induced to read themHumbug In Art w Art Is just beginning to escape from the depressing gloom of eccleslastl clsm For many centuries the church monopolized the genius of the great masters That they were masters in color technique and design is not to be disputed But all tho value they have today is the aid they may be to the student It Is a pity that so much f genius was expended on the glorifica tion of royal and religious brutes All the use 9r good in most of it from the subject viewpoint was to keep alive kingcraft and priestcraft The Catholic Church sleek In tho knowledge of the advertisers art has the whole world worked up to the be lief that its sacred daubs are priceless treasures And the world believes it and American suckers like Pierpont Morgan who know as much about art ns they know about Herbert Spencer and the social problems are getting fleeced right along anti this is how It is done Here comes across the Atlantic a painter with a painting as big asthe side of a barn entitled Christ Before Pilate This painter is hired by the year by a shrewd picture dealer who is skilled in trick of advertising and who knows how to gull the pub tic He sets all the papers talking about the great picture and the fame of the great painter Munkascy is brought up the bay like Prince Henry in a special steam er with a champagne lunch in the saloon His press agents boom him He hold first a reception to ministers of gospel because the picture Is on aglblical subject you know then tM rep to the press and then to actr- rns Ilea pUbllc in and In this way they makeseve il hundred thousand Not one fnfe a thousand appreciate the picture are capable of criticising It Art has nothing to do with It except the art of the advertising agent Finally somexmillionaire who made his millionssbrewing beer or selling hogs buys It at a fabulous and that is tho last you hear of iteThis is the humbuggery by which more than half of the great socalled jmasterpieces are put on the market For a woman artist to gain recogni tion In Europe whether she be paInt- er 4V singer or actress she is compelled to prostitute herself to some old roue like the King of Belgiumr t When was In Europe I saw the originals of all the great masters of tho past I estimate that I walked past fifty miles of consumptive looking Jesuses and robust virgins nearly all of them the faces of the mistressesf of the artist who painted them and myriads of angels gyrattlng In the air and big bushywhiskered Jehovahs IwIsitting in their shirt tails on a damp cloud and archangels of doom driv ing men and women into hell and r imean looking old popes and villain Jous priests and swinish monks and and beautiful flag = Yewellatlonpriceless art The facts are that If the same artists lived here today In ih F America and painted same sub jects equally well or better they fcouldnt find a patron among all porkpackers beerbrewers s toc Irgamblers and pulpit pounders In Una tfcle Sams dominions But being ns 1 these paintings are old and the tintt41of superstition Is worked In them and l they were painted In Europe the suck era bite right alongt t- An American artist cant paint nny thing In this climate you know He must go to Europe paint it over there and bring it here then maybe it will attract some notice common trick is that of auc tioneer lIe advertises for sale tho paintings of a well known French artistso well known that no body knows anything about him The artist himself Is on handa dark complect ed dapper fellow with a love of a mustache and a foreign accent amt who talks just lovely to tho dear women His pictures are all set In J rich gaudy frames They are worth about five dollars each and sell from fone to five hundred The suckers snap them right up On the walls of u tho rich all over this country are Continued on pnif h l4syr x i tf t Ihi1 ay THE BLUE GRASS BLADE Published at Lexington Kentucky Every Sunday Founded 18i and edited by Charles Chilton Moore up to his death February JAMES E HUGHES Editor and Publisher SUBSCRIPTION RATES By mail postpaid 150 per in advance Trial subscription cents month All foreign subscription postpaid 200 per year Five new subscribers one remittance at 100 per year each ADVERTISING RATES ALL ADVERTISEMENTS of whatsoever character accepted will be published at the rate of 100 per Inch per month unless by special contract when other and bet ter rates will be quoted upon application The pnb ushers have the right to reject any advertise ments offered GENERAL BUSINESS RULES ALL SUBSCRIPTIOINS to the Blade will be discontinued at the expiration of the term for which the subscription has been paid up in advance The address slip on the paper will show subscribers the date of expiration o subscription Back numbers or numbers omitted wi be sent if asked for upon renewal In case of discontin uance MAKE ALL money orders drafts checks oete payable to JAMES E HUGHES Lexington Ky as this will facilitate collection SHOULD ANY SUBSCRIBER change his or her address siville this olliue giving both old and new and the Blade Jr be sent to the new address as desired THE OFFICE of publication of the Blade is at 55 West Short Street Lexington Kentucky to which all Free thinkers will be given a hearty welcome jrfE BLADE is entered at the Postoffice at Lexington Kentucky as second class mailing matter ADDRESS ALL COMMUNICATIONS to THE BLUE GRASS BLADE I Box Lexington Ky Be happy Fretting doesnt pay Cultivate cheerfulness All things are conquerable by man There is nothing that is impossible Improvement is the eternal order of the universe Twos only an apple but it busted our earthly paradise a Although the Blade is still forging onward the work is slow LIfe one the one could then help the man- a Iarac er When you think failure Itonfrouts you just change your viewpoint and success is bound to follow The curtain has been too tightly drawn over the future that no peephole can be found at any price Some people are born fools while others acquire it in college and others have gold bricks thrust upon them i We can best enjoy today because we cannot see i7 into the morrow and find out for a certainty where thin man with the scythe is hidden Did you ever stop to think that the worlds great history would have been written in an altogether different vein had Adam married into a different family Raising wages will never settle the labor ques tion Bathrooms button hole bouquets reading rooms and rag time dont touch the right spot i Humanity demands something more Avarice is one of the most dangerous of human qualities because it is so subtle in its development It grows as wealth and power increase until it ally dominates its victims completely Father bolts the stable door at night to keep his horse from harm but allows his minor son to prowl where he pleases and for the same reason mother tics up a ten cent poodle dog but permits her daughter to flutter at random Why is itf The Rome Book for Christmas and New Year in the Orient would make a suitable giftYounr friends would appreciate a years sub sciption to the Blade a It is only the truly orthodox believer who strives to build a heaven for himself and a hell for other people Time works inany changes however and it does sometimes happen that the plans of men miscarry Who knows but what the Christian may fall into the very pit which he hath dug for his neighbor and the latter be exalted f Only when men have made personal enemies are they anxious to delegate the pleasant duty of inflicting punish ment upon a socalled superior power Such is the benevolence of orthodox religion The Rome Book for Christmas and New Year presents it Dog Fennel in the Orient would make a suitable gift Younr friends would appreciate a years sub sciption to the Blade I11 i 4 That the latest spiritualistic communication from Col Robert G Ingersoll must stand condemned as- a man fantasy a screaming farce may be seen from this fact that it makes the dead Freethinker declare that in the II world he luis seen the work of anII almighty hand Thi is but another name for Jehovah and we know that he is not fanatic and the branding iron from the loving grasp of the benevolent bigot while Superstition that once did rule the world with autocratic sway can only shriek her important curses forth and flourish her foolish boycott at the giant Reasons growing expanding flame The night of intellectual slavery has not completely vanished however but on the higher hills already flame the harbing ers of a more glorious morn The Christian religion is either true or it is false If it is true it will stand the severest test If it is true it is indestructible as the law of gravitaton Then why do it ordained defenders take refuge be hind long forgotten laws born of brutish ignorance and strife with policemans club to close th mouth of honest criticism Thrice armed is he who hath his quarrel JustI but the leaders of the nrmies of the Lord still skulk in the cowards cas tle and refuse to fight in the open even on compul Sion enjoyIwe sit secure in some celestial citiadel holdin heaven thunderbolts in our hands it would not be safe to assert that we had been guilty of those un paralleled atrocities recorded in the Bible as hav ing been committed by the emancipated Israelites in Palestine None of that in ours The freedom some would give is a glorious thin andentitles them to the eternal gratitude of th- race As with a gift horse we are supposed not t question it no matter how much it hurts It is case of taking the good the gods provide and then get to holding your peace Look what happened to Jesus for questioning the supernal wisdom of money changers of Jerusalem The Rome Book for Christmas and New Year in the Orient would make a suitable giftYounr friends would appreciate a years sub sciption to the Blade One of the saddest sights on earth Is a person with nothing to do lIe has no joyand he has no mirth Dont let that person be you r Js will you not help the Blade in the fulfill r ksion to break the foolish idols of re htc ioditshvirs undertaking is not a ptpulnrmove uad the work of improvement has invariably fallen upon a few It is our great aim to hurl the unclean gods of orthodoxy from their pedestals in the public patheon to enable men to dig for wisdom on their own behoof to light the pathway of the worlds high destiny with the flame from the torch ofreason to play ohn the Baptist to a greater to come after Every triumph wrought in science has been the work of men who were dissatisfied with the worlds condition who had set deliberately to work to better them This is our mission our hope and our work Will you not help usY You can do it by increasing our circulation CHRISTMAS GIFTS Good reading always cultivates the mind and such cultivation is always conducive to intellectual selectinglpersonal companions Good books make excellen companions They never tire of your company and they have useful information to bestow Now readers the holiday season is at hand and while we as Freethinkers care nothing for the religious barnacles that have grown around and about the decadence of the old year and the birth of the new yet we have more or less conformed to custom of making and giving presents to our Wends at this season of the year If you are think ing of what to send or give away as a token of the season we beg to call your attention to the several books we have on hand which could be used to a splendid advantage for such a purpose First there is the Rome Book by Dr J B Wil son descriptive of his trip to the Rome Congress of freethinkers and the doings of that distinguished body For a book of travel and personal experiences abroad to say nothing of its real historic value pertaining to religion and its growth on the European continent is without a peer This book will be sent to any address for 115 Besides the Rome Book we have several copies of the book written by our late editor C C Moore namely Dog Fennel in the Orient being an count of his experiences abroad while on a voyage to the Holy Lands and tells what he saw and experienced en route This book is interesting and instructive and can be had sent to any address for 115 If you would like to have one of these books sent to a friend as a seasonable present send in your orders now and we will mail them out in ample time for a seasonable delivery While all this talk is going on about expanding the currency too many of us are apt to complain- of a contraction Compared with prices years ago is amazing how little a dollar will buy Compared with wages years ago the laborer is not get ting much more while everything is ascending to a point far beyond his reach The next thin1he will need is an economic Jacobs ladderS t f1 tiJt WHY WE MUST REFORM MEN Our admired editor of the Blade surprises us by saying men may preach reform and teach reform until nightmare plows corn and United States Sen ators earn their salaries but we must have a re form of men before we can have any other reform True a stream cannot be purer than the fountains from it flows or is itpossible for the common chap to get an even exchange of happiness for their misery so long as ignorance enough exists to taler ate the perpetuation of the cancerous parasites of orthodox mythology national decay and class distinction will inevitably govern conditions Political reform cannot exist handicap and checkmated by ignorant credulity perpetually paralizing the intellect with mental intoxication o faith zeal liquor intoxicants and zealous faith produces like results only the former deprives th brain of reason temporarily while the latter i perpetualWe Mr Hughes one of our ablest re formers and want to know why he opens such a question and leaves it without a remedy thus fooleishly we have been trying to a for 2000 years without first reforming men Mr Hughes virtually admits failure thus far which we also admit but his new remedy we want to Up to 1858 parents took care of their ehildre- taught them noble precepts at home while nov schoolYs tanmborenga With all these long standing inherited customs the frivolity of woman the increasing crimes o men the giddiness of the youths what will his answer be GEO LEESON cammunigone s thhootian statement as being true sup we have given utterance thereto but naively asks us nomeplain Nor mean ing Could a satisfactory answer be found the worlds troubles would be at an end and the mil cnnium would be upon us in all its force power and glory For centuries men have devled into science and philosophy digging to hitherto un known depths to unearth the precious gem but it has eluded their grasp or they have failed to reach it To properly answer the question we would be compelled to overhaul our entire political and re ligious systems and from out the debris evolve new systems that would be acceptable to all men encourage them to labor for their realization Fro the days of Martin Luther down to the present various reformers have offered theories some good some bad solie indifferent but the natural per versity of the mman mind has held men aloof unr t rH i ff fooi tei itittttrmr itrauttsC ss r Once let understand that the existence of the race is but ah unimportant incident in the history1 of the universe that we are but mere infusoria born of heat and moisture perishing when the moisture is eliminated or the heat becomes greater or Let u8 admit that if man had never appeared th mountains would have reared their rugged crests to meet the glory of the unrisen sun the purple would still hover in the valleys the rivers rolled onward to the sea and the tides ebbed and flowed that not a star would have fallen from the over hanging firmament nor a planet hesitate in its course that there would not have been a drop of water or a grain of sand more or less had man never been Realising and admitting this we strike a base or a starting point and we are then forced to the conclusion that all political and religious forms arc more or less a curse as they are permit ted to dominate our social life are man made tha- is t selfinflicted Then the remedy lies in self and is t self that must assume the work ofredemption or salvation through honest effort at improvement If man created the political ystem that gives unnecessary wealth to the sleeper and not enough to the worker to sustain his strength then man can uncreate it The power to undo lies in the same medium that had the power to do If man created that religious system which dogmatizes about the deity socalled constantly pointing the way to some impossible celestial city where thecc pore mizzuble nlrmJ shall become an imperishable butterfly fitting from flower to flower doing ab solutely nothing of importance through all eternity a system that imagines deity made heaven for a few idiot harpers and hell for a host of hoodlums then man can uncreate it and the sooner the bet terTo accomplish this however what is needed Evidently a change in the character and natures ot men Then before we can obtain a reformation in systems WE MUST HAVE A REFORM OF MEN Here is the keynote the secret of it all Ha who conquers himself has conquered the universe of which he is the center He who improves himself has improved so much of that universe Before he can ever expect to reform others he must first reform himself lIe must crave useful knowledge seek it and find it and finding it assimilate and apply it He must learn that reform in religion cannot come through inactivity and prayer but by activity and labor lIe must learn that political freedom can never be won by continually marching under the II party banner and voting the same old way generation after generation but that citi zenship is above party common honesty above po litical professions humanity above god Our correspondent struck the correct vein when he said a stream cannot be purer than the fou n dations from which it flows and so believing we must work to purify the foundation and the stream manfngthe t Ft JJ ing or bringing improvement must come from him Governments are what the people under it make it When governments run counter to the will of the people revolutions follow The same ends can be reached by peaceful evolution and the result is more stable more permanent As the work of the worlds salvation rests upon those who have wrought existing conditions making that salvation necessary we repeat Men may preach reform and teach reform until nightmares plow corn and United States Senators earn their salaries but we must have a reform of men before we can have any other reform The Rome Book for Christmas and New Year- f presents Dog Fennel in the Orient would make a suitable gifts Younr friends would appreciate a years sub sciption to the Blade DENSE DARK AND IGNORANT The mendacity and muleish obstinacy of the aver withnwas never more clearly demonstrated than in the published report of the Snow Wilkinson debate as theranentsor to wrangle dogmatists oneto a timefgelsWilkinson quarrels with science because it is not perfect and damns all music because fan occa sional discord He rejects natural history because amiid a world of truth there are some silly fables invented by religious Willies who knew no betters and left the race to evolve better and nobler theories Probably he would banish the sun because of its spots and declare love a vice because hemmed in by passion It is evident that he knows untiring of the cosmic universe gazes upon the world through tinted glasses over the lens of which the spider of orthodoxy hath woven its web to darken the brightness of intellectual light It were enough that Snow slamjned his quivering diaphragm against the face of nature left him a mere mental microbe a doodlebug in the realm of theology OfIcourse Wilkinson has not been convinced neither has Snow been converted to his beliefs but the selfstyled representative of Jl C will be ready for another tourney as soon as there is enough long green in sight needmnecessary and it is so conclusive that comment upon it is unnecessary Read Geology teaches that life first appeared in its mgaftst tnsmudde wJlCJIl1Aduntujthc 8IIlets fin ct Our forefathers were not first savages All history is to the contrary There are just as savage races now as there ever was In giving utterance to such a statemlent Wilkin powerfuleknown to geology reveals the fact that the Eozoon issfound only in time tertiary strata Man does not appear in any form until the Diluvian deposits although it is inferred that he might have been extant in the earlier periods of the Paleozoic ages In any event geology has demonstrated that there was a period when even vegetable life did not exist upon this planet and the vegetable preceded the animal kingdom Nature did not bring forth animal life until conditions were such that animal life could subsist These were crude beginnings and from them have evolved the full and perfect man as we see him today Geology teaches indis putably and undeniably that the development of the animal species including mau has been one long and continual chain of constant progression There have been a few ups and downs but the gen eral tendency has been upward Wilkinson de grades the race by having it degenerate and mis represents geology in his effort to sustain a totter ing religious creed Geology and chemistry combin ed have successfully demonstrated the origin ot life and zoology aided by natural history has pointed out the successive stages of that orator of approach the method of reasoning in dulged in by Wilkinson we are prone to use a quotation from the immortal Bard of Avon and say the fool hath committed to his memory an army of good words but his use of them betrays a piteous misunderstanding thereof Let us read t again lIe ays Faith requires testimony It is a forced upon us by careful and dilligcnt convictionI tion of incontrovertible testimony lates into dogma and refuses to investigate or I accept what conflicts with it On the contrary faith becomes necessary where there is a lack of convincing testimony or in its absence altogether Of course a great deal depends upon the subject with which that faith is connected We have a boy a fine healthy fellow We have faith that he will reach maturity This faith is built upon the fact that other boys who were fine healthy fellows have reached maturity and under favorable conditions our boy ought to do the same I am told there is a god I have never seen one nor have I met any person who has I have met and conversed with people who claim to know something about him but putting them altogether I find that belief in such a being is an impossibility Then I am told that I must believe in him by faith But what fact have I to buld my faith upon Absolutelynone In the end I am compelled to guess and every physical fact in the universe being against such a belief I am compelled to guess that Sa N t I rv J1 Irhe is not Now we come to think about 6we do not care n milldam whether he exists or ntt Faith ends where knowledge begs s The moment a man KNOWS there is no room roc faith This is the strict rule in all matters of dogmhtic theology The mere coincidence that NVinkinson prefers to believe there is a god does not convince or prove else would Snow have been convinced- during his discussion with him Did god exist the his existence would not a fit subject for debate and when Wilkinson undertakes to attempt t prove his existence he admits by implication tha there are very many serious doubts about th matter It is the blind unreasoning faith tha refuses to accept or recognize a fact if that fact appears to contradict its theories anent the unknown In this lies the full force of all dogmatic theology Were it otherwise theology would have died out long ago a e e WHAT TO SEND FOR CHRISTMAS Last week we directed the attention of our read ers to Dr Wilsons Rome Book and Dog Fennel in the Orient by Charles C Moore as being suitable ipresents for the coming holiday season A few Imye acted upon our suggestion and we appreciate tiieir kindly attention Those books will be sent to address for 115 each All you have to do is to send the amount of the book desired and the address of the friend to whom it is to be sent and we will mail it direct with a small printed card showing who it is from if the donor wishes it In addtion to this we desire to suggest that a years subcripjion to the Blade for a friend would also be a useful an denjoyable present At the same time it would be a valuable present to the Blade to know that its circulation was increasing and its family of readers extending Some of you may know of a Freethinker who would like the paper and is too poor to pay for it too proud to let any one know Think of what a happy season would come to him could he know that he had been pres ented with the Blade for one year and think how much it would help us The numerous letters we arc receiving in con gratulation upon the continued improvement of the Blade is an indication that it would he anDrepintnrl by a friend especially if that friend is inclined to only a modcum of human liberty This is an appeal to all to be capable of mutual help mutual encouragement and cheer MORAL MENTORS IN HUMAN AFFAIRS Where dense ignorance prevails and supersti tion runs rist in the blood religion may be necessary as a moral restraint but in cases of an intellectual enlightenment where human knowledge reigns and prospers by the light of reasons mighty flame selfrestraint takes the place of religious restraint and improvement sets in How frequently have we as Freethinkers after amild discussion upon morality ith is tian believer had said unto us whyfif Ibelieved as you do I would rob and plunder right and left without fear of the consequences Nay Christian friend take hells terrors away and there still stands the law with its retributive punishments to keep you in the path of right doing or the laws consequences will inevitably fall upon you As a general rule the Christian believer who may be in clined to wrong doing stands in more natural dread of the policenuuii than he does of the god he pre tends to believe in The Christian will commit crime when he knows that the eye of a peace officer is not upon him although he believes that the all penetrating eye of god is constantly watching him and keeping a record of his every act In this we observe the inconsistency of the Christian form of faith and its absolute impotency to exercise any moral influences upon its devotees At the same it demonstrates its uselessness as a moral factor in the affairs of men- Freethought would impress upon the minds of all that virtue will inevitably bring its own reward and vice its proper punishment We all know and have experienced the sweet blessings that come to us with the knowledge that we have performed a good and useful act We also know and have ex perienced the remorseful pangs and tortures of the mind that comes with the knowledge that we have acted mean towards another person Can any be liever in any religious system suggest or produce a higher mental monitor than the intelligent human mind We only know good and evil as we exper ience them or perceive them Good is that which produces happiness without consequent injuryEvil- is that which produces pain without any cOns- equent good Time terms are relative and are used to designate human emotions created by any chose whatsoeverThe whose mind is evil yet avoids wrong only through the fear of hells horrors or the bribe of a fancied heaven is none the less an immoral person Time influences such a person would be bound to exercise would bo decidedly injurious False mo tives for right doing would be ascribed and a false standard of conduct inscribed upon the tablets of the ntfnd Such a system of morality il incapable of the highest ideals or the inculcation of virtueI It is impermanent and insecure It is a liable to break with the first adverse wind that blows The Freethinker should his mind incline to wrong doing yet avoids its commission because he knows the act is wrong and its perpetration would produce or cause pain and suffering either to hi- or others is moved by a higher standard of human morals than the devout Christian could pos siby be Such a person can see and realize the herent vice that lies in evil actions Hence he is imotivesof right and duty lie needs neither heaven to jole or hell to terrify Ho is fearless and independ ent and in this lies his great moral strength nud 4 1dreA 6 power This is why he can face the world through sunshine and storm Morally speaking the Christian is a coward and has no more backbone than a tub of butter or a banana The Freethinker is a perfect tower of moral strength upon whonn rests the happiness of the world lpLIBERTY VS RELIGION Before this issue of the Blade can possibly reach ontpeopltforged and the people plunged into a hopeless slavery which nothing but a revolution of blood remove The French separation law which removes the last vestige of religious authority over the political institutions of the country goes into effect Monday December 9th and the next two days are to be spent in enforcing its provisions upon the var ious religious bodies in the republic Thcre is talk o resistance and a refusal to obey the provisions o the law backed and encouraged by the Vatican which sees in the workings of this law a wholesale slipping away of its power If the law officers of the republic meet with armed resistance they must respond with like measures and the conflict is on As a means ofcneouraging the Catholic clergy of France to remain hostile to the government the Pope has addressed to them a letter in which he is reported to have said I am like the father of a family I cannot per mit an outsider to entor my house and regulate th interests of my children without consulting me The father ofa family indeed Rodents A true father works and labors for his family He gives to them and succors them He never takes from them With the Vatican it has always been never to give but to take all it can get It has im poverished every nation where it has been able to acquire the slightest power and authority It has controlled Italy for a thousand years and the work ing people of that priestridden country today are but paupers and mendicants or as Ingersoll once said reduced to a hand organ and a monkey Given the proper freedom Italians are a worthy and industrious people as shown by their industryand frugality in America under free institutions While at home they were compelled to give Peters Pence nnd widows mites from their scant earnings suffering hunger while fat lazy priests lined their stomachs with capons Time people would be hap pier and richer today had they never known such a father and could they get rid of him their present condition would speedily undergo an immense improvement- France has got the right notion and so long as the republic is able to retain intact itts fret politi cal institutions there will s reman associations midstby which even in the mental degra even in the midst of mental degradation the minds d ton rife niiucTS o Iier may calleirfo better things When people have once tasted of the sweets of freedom the intrusion and an nounced hostility of a foreign influence willat once rouse the generous imagination of a bold people To reinvest the church with political authority will be as fatal to the na tional intellect as it would be to the national lib erty It would consummate the intellectualruin of France by reducing its greatest men to complete silence and subjection to priestly dictates and de grading the population into a coterie of religious serfsBut says the Pope I cannot permit an out sider to enter my house etc Tut Has not the Pope through his church as an outsiderentered the house of others and forced upon the inmates his peculiar religious nostrums under pains and penalties Has he not directed his hordes to politi cal action in the house of another to its ruin and degradation Has not the French household been satiated with Papal influences for years Has not the Vatican exercised a supreme and irresponsible control over French political affairs curbing every tenency toward political freedom by ecclesastical laws of stringent cruelty and enforced with a ruthless barbarism Time time has come wiieu in France as elsewhere the Vatican is not to be al lowed to oppress the consciences of men and the French people have thoroughly determined to di rect their own inquiries on religion as wellus politics to permanently establish their freedom to diminish their superstitions and maintain a perfect balance of the natonal intellect Just as one cen tury ago France lost its respect for the crown so now its respect for the cowl and the mitre goes the same way Had France overthrown the church first that is before the monarchy the present possible conflict would never have confronted the re of bitter experience have taught thinkng men the world over no less in France than in other civilized nations that those who usurp an unlimited power and authority over mens conscience have no conscience themselves The leaders of the church both Catholic and Protestant have never been men of unassailable charity and virtue From this can be seen the gross impolicy of trusting ecclesiastics with political power Time increase of political power with the clergy has ever been in compatible with the interests of civilization When men are called upon to make a choice between cepting religious rule and sacrificing liberty they I will let both church and religion go Such has been the history of the world and such it will be for centuries to come The Rome Book for Christmas and New Year in the Orient would make a suitable gift Younr friends would appreciate a years sub sciption to the Blade BIRTH OF JESUS A FICTION Declares Dr Crapsey In His Letter Renouncing the Episcopal Minis tryParting of the Theo logical Ways APPEALS FROM VERDICT TO VOICE OF PEOPLE Refusing to make a cowardly retraction of his belief In religious tenets which the cccleastlcal authorities have used to terminate his ministry Rev Algernon S Crapsey former Rector of Rochesterf whichfto Bishop William D Walker of the Western diocese of New York State In his letter Dr Crapsey says Under existing conditions I deem It my duty to make a formal and final renunciation of tae ministry of the Protestant Episcopal Church and consequence i ask that you will for reasons as to time already given not theetaKe order under Canon 31 of the General Canons ot church to accomplish my deposi tion from the prlestuood I am certain that you will be glad to acknowledge that I am not com pelled to this action by anything that reflects upon my moral Integrity or calls In question my faithfulness as a pastor My solo difficulty lies In the fact that a long careful conscientious study of the Holy Scriptures has cdm polled me to come to certain conclu sions concerning the prenatal history of Jesus which are not In physical ac cord with the letter of tho creeds and since have compelled me In order to hold the creeds to give to certain articles an Interpretation that will har monize them with the truth as I find that truth In he teaching of the Holy Scriptures Yields To Court But recent judicial decisions have declared that any such harmonizing of the creed with my own conviction of too truth is not permissible in the Protestant Episcopal Church In my own case I recognize the right of tun aulha to define the limits of Interpretation and in order to hold fast to truth must let go of the creed as now interpreted by the Be Horrible I am not now and never have been conscious of any insincerity In giving slice Interpretations to the various articles of tue creed as are demanded uy present conditions of thougnt and tho present state of Knowledge any uioro than am conscious of insmcer ny wneu say the sun rises and sets itiuujiu as u walter of tact Uie sun uiea uutumg of the Kind if i am to hold tau creed at all must give to curtain u not ail of lib anlclts a spiritual rather than a liter any physical Interpretation When say of Jesus that He has ascended into Heaven do not mean and cannot mean tha with His pnysical body ot flesh and blood and bones He flowed into space and has for two thousand years been existing somewhere in the say lu tuat very puyaical body ot ijusu okiod and bonus Such an exigence would seem to me nut glorious but horrible and such a conception is to me not only unbe lievable it Is uuthtuKble What I do mean by this phrase Is that Jesus bay uccoiupilsuud His worn in the ilesu ascended Into the higher life of tho spirit Also when I say of Jesus that He was not conceived by the Holy Ghost bor not the Virgin Mary I do not wean that the great and living God in order to get into this world had to violate His wonderful law of human generation break into sanctities of mar riage and cause a son of than to be born without a human father Such a notiona notion is most repugnant m Ideal of a wise and Holy God I was not therefore alarmed was relieved when a careful study of tho Holy Scriptures convinced me that this notion of the origin of Jesus was without foundation in history Jesus was not lessened in my worship He was ennobled by this discovery When reached the conclusion as I did some years ago that the Infancy stories were not historical I did not cease to believe in Jesus I believed in Him all the more and I gave to the words Conceived by the Holy Ghost Born of the Virgin Mary an interpretation that harmonized with my knowledge of the facts Ho was a Child of the Holy Seed sanctified from His moth ors womb A Son of God all the more- J In my estimation because He was the son of man Will Never Change Now this conception of Jesus bas ed upon a careful study of Holy Scriptures is the very warp and woof of my Intellectual and spiritual life and it is not probable that I will ever change I will carry it with me Into that spiritual world whore I shall see Jesus face to face But I am told by judicial decision that this conception is not permissible in the mind of a minister of the Pro testant Episcopal church I bow to that decision I cannot change my mind I therefore leave tho church I do not blame my judges they acted according to their light let not them blame me If I follow my light Which Is lighting me to tho everlasting day But whether they blame or not I can not do other than I do I must obey God rather than man But while I thus see that their decision is final for me I am equally certain that it Is not final for the church I have reason to know that there are hundreds of clergymen and thousands of laymen in the Protestant Episcopal church who have reached the same conclusions that I have and sir I beg to say to them in this let ter to you that their position in the church Is just as tenable as It ever was Affects Only Himself This Judgment affects no person ex cept myself Let no one be dismayed Let every man stand in his place speak his mind boldly and the truth will soon have such a multitude of wit nesses that all the church must hear bo confident am I of the truth as it is In Jesus that I appeal from those in piaces of authority in the church to the church Itself to the great body of the people secure In their wise se rene possession of the truth Again I exhort my brethren of like belief to stay where they are I am about to carry our case to tho high court of the free Intelligence of the world and If I win it there I will win for every church and every soul In Christendom If I fall before that court it will be because I am wrong In my conception of the truth and then I will bo glad to fail for my con tention is not for my conception but for the eternal truth of God Let my brethren within the church abide the Issue of this trial For whet the gr tribunal of free thought has this conic iil showing that God Is In Man and Man is In God tnat I consecrate tho rest of my life Let no one think for a moment that I do not love the Lord Jesus Christ- and would not have served Him to the last in this church wulch is to me the historic church of the great English speaking race if only its men in au thority had let me All I asked of them was tolerance But they have refused to extend tolerance to such as I and I must with a grief which only my heart knows accept my dismissal from the service of the churchj WART The Elgin and Waltham Watch Cos have Indirectly declared war on John C Dueber of the Hampden Watch Co and smaller competitors By continually reducing prices they hope to drive out competitors or force them into a Trust But John C many times a millionaire who em ployes Union Labor only will not join them In their nefarious scheme He promptly meets all reductions male by the oiler companies until now watches are actually sold far be low value Note the lastest quotations 23 jeweled Spl Ry 26 New Ry 23 jwls 20 John Hancock Jewels 1650 or Dueber W Co jewels only Above all in silver Ine screw case prepaid in 20year goldfilled case more Every watch new from factory and guaran teed to pass Ry Inspectors The 17 jeweled nampden adjusted 17 Jeweled not adjusted 15 Jeweled 7 Jeweled 450 In 20 year goldfilled case more all prepaid with guarantee Buy now When this war is over you will pay 30 per cent more WHEN IN SEARCH OF A DIAMOND Engagement Ring Diamond Button Locket or Pin dont you wish you could correctly Judge quality and value and buy them first hand from the Cutters and Importers and thus save 30 per cent or the dealers you can do if will confide In and order of me I am an expert se lect Diamonds with great care from largest stock In Chicago get lowest trade prices and best cash For my time and work you the benefit of my 40 perience as a diamond discountsrwill only charge you 5 per Jeweler or catalogue house pete with me Send for price lists f Watches not listed here CLains Jewelry Rings OpticalGoodsand My Tract Theism in the Cruel ble free OTTO WETTSEIN LaGrange Cook Co III oJMETHODS I The PoliticalBody cDAnr L tIn2 all of eooJfState uniting with and assisting and or party Justly for religious and nor belief political the corrupt reign of bytherights and Justice to in alt andlegalJut and all other IIais a and rest 1EXPERIENCE MARKS DESIGNS c lendln a descrtptlon ascertain our tree whether probably 18ten181lentlIIutratoo Loreest culatlonofanyscfenttaa Tcrma3a SoldbyaiinewdcalersMUNN F SU Wublogtou THE BEST LINE rnTOartat t scn ChicaQoi din aotisoLouis511eRailwny ONLY LINE TOTHE FAMousnElllTH OfDRD UPTODATE PAMPHLET UN t MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE J uY f w JOSEPHINE K HENRY 1hjtVERSAILLES KENTUCKY All r orders promptly filled ii Price copy 26c = 5 copies for 9100 1 GREATEST DISCOVERIES fl 1GODThe Central Kansas Business College which teaches Stenography Typowwriting Bookkeeping Commercial Arithmetic Penmanship and Spell1iJand The Truth About God In a general course of study giver by the tent porary International Instructor for the church The Church has 100 LIFE MEMBERS It wants 900 more to formsll organize and Incorporate The first thousand members will be the founders and organizers of the CHURCH OF HUMANITY If you have loved ones you wish rescued from the Idolatry of worship ing a dead man named Jesus an4 a myth named God you should Join thus Church and It will aid you in freeing them and In saving your posterity r from becoming Idolaters by teaching thorn The Truth About God applicationa rears irabscrlptlot to the TRUTH ABOUT OOK TV It sew rt Vta r tt h r t rfJ ry- ti t f t 7 t i t THE REIGN OF I KING HUMBU y Continued from page One hung these gaudy daubs The gulls wouldnt think of paying an AmerIcan artist twent five dollars for a really good i Humbuggery- In no other way is the love of hum- buggert more manifest than In the i general belief that particular persons are gifted with a knowledge of the future and are able to peer into it Look at all the millions of people r running to preachers and priests and mediums and fortune tellers In order to obtain Information of the future All classes alike are humbugged by this trinity of tricksters the onl difference between whom is that the preacher is a little more fashionable than the other two At least 100000000 are spent it yearly for advertisement In our Sun day papers by preachers psychls seers mediums Christian scientists fortuntellers and healers of man descriptions They dont advertise for nothing They expect to get aU back and as much more From whom do they get It Why from the gum blefrom the women principally mistress as well as servant The pity of it is that the poor wor ing girl should be made one of thl principle victims of this sacred char lantry These poor creatures after doing the bulk of the worlds housework and a largo part of its factory work must be swindled out of theIr meager earnings to support preachers f and priests in big churches and grand and priest get them first and over thereafter they becbn easy victims for the medium and the c faith healer It ought to be plain to I any one that the soil is prepared first by the church the Sunday School and school for all this ran t Vigrowth of superstition and humbug gery that blossoms out in Christie Science Faith Healing Spirit Me iumship Palmistry Fortune Tellini and what not When the preacher and priest fall to satisfy then the credulous dupes turn to the psychlst and sooth saye Thousands of people of all classe r believe that Anna Eva Fay possesses some mysterious occult power They cannot see that as fast as her old tricks which at the time were re b garded as bejrtgc tit are dIscovered and exposed tl lvented for her anyklnilrsifllTral occult or sleigh ofhand but is simple enough when W you know how It is played It Is the love of mystery which at tracts and which love is perpetuate t by the preacher and priest by In fstilling it in the mind of the chlld t by teaching it the mysticism of the BIblethat a snake talked to Eve that Baalams ass cussed In Hebrew that Jonah held a three days prayer meeting in a whales belly that the witch of Endor called up the spool of Samuel and a multltudlous mess of such mellow moonshine The child Is next Inocculated wltti the New Testament virus It is filled with all the legerdemain of the mysterious Jesus who was born In a mysterious way lived in a mysterious way as all men do who dont work j performed a lot of mysterious tricks none of which were as sleek as those of Eva Ann except possibly his trick l of driving the devils out of a sick man into the hogs of Gadarene and who 11dIed in a mysterious way When people can be made to believe such things they can be made to believe t t anything i Is It any wonder that there are so many gullible fools in the world where the mind of youth in Its im pressionable period Is confounded with mystery and educated and gradn ated in the school of gullibility Let me tell you right here the very beginning of all reform Is that of throwing a safe guard around the mind of the child protecting it from the mysticism of the preacher and priest and training it to reason for Itself so that It may grow up free to perform Its natural functions No child can be started right on faith prayer credulity and myst clam If he turns out alright it la due to none of these but to the good in human nature and to environment and secular Influence Snrirituallsm Christian Science anti Theosophy are all offshoots of the Chrstlan mysticism all nubbins from the same stock- Spiritualism has its Big Injuns who come and talk heap much non sense Christian Science well explains Itself in the absurdity of Its name Christianity is a superstition a mys deism Science deals only In facts that are demonstratable In nature Therefore Christianity can no more- bear a relation to science than lion esty to a horse thief There is about as much sense In the term Christian Science as In a torrid winter a riot of ous peace a cheerful agony a tem pestuouclm a soothing sorrow a r a sable blonde But iTheosophy Is the king bee of them all It Is chiefly dIstinguIshed from the others by its being just a little bit more aristocratic The r son that it Is more aristocratic is be cause Jit is more mysterious and In comprehensible Theosophy Is what call an erratic aesthetic AsIatic ailment All three are alike In this respectthey start off weaving the beautiful and the good with the moral and the true then presently they rise above the earth and soar heavenward and metaphorize in metaphysli moonshine Then all at once the get lostthey dont know where the are at They skIddoo Theosophy always reminds me of the sly rocket It springs heavenward in a golden column of words pierces the mystic either with Its meteoric lash spreads out into beau tiful scintillating stars light up the whole heavens then all at once It takes a sudden drop flickers Into nothingness and all Is as dark as me I do not mean that there is no good truth or wisdom either of these mysticisms I recog nlze them as simply an expression of the dlccatsf action with the Christian mysticism and as a groping towan1 something grander and higher The spiritual philosophy is beautiful and I wish It were true ChrIstian Science is an improvement on ChrIs tianlty While its principles widch are as old as the world tend In some cases to allay physical diseases at the same time they have a dangerous tendency to create mental and Intellectual diseases It is not good to think too much about yourself There are a thousand other things more portant Christian Science unfort nately for itself has run into Church lanity and therefore into dogmatist Theosophy has been wise enough to avoid the dog But all these people are freethln lag and superior people and I like them The great trouble with them Is that they start out with such beau ful arguments and get lost so quIck Before they know it they stumble right into a pitch darkness Illumine ed only with Jackolanterns My friends the safest thing for you to do If you wouldnt be humbugged by belief Is to stick close to old Mother Nature and not follow every new fangltMl mysticism off Shown should always be your motto Medical Humbuggery you no doubt hat b practice of would prove atexceptio t1jman nature but I maintain Is far less of It among ethical phys clans than in any other profession I admit that it is not alone found among quacks and advertisers but also in the reputable ranks Physicians are selfish and mercer iry like every one else and economl circumstances drive many of them to the tricks of the trade They are compelled to make a pure commei ilallsm of their profession in order to Ive They are compelled by law to o to school four years then the starve four years oefore they have a dollar they can call their own and all thIs time they have to compete witl faith healers who graduate In eight days and who dontt know a cough from a borborygmus They have also to compete with druggists young rug clerks just hatched nice old ladies and gentlemen everywhere who have forgotten more than the actor ever knew and they have go up against amulets charms scap- ulas holy water prayers and bless- Ings of the clorgy At Xavlers on a certain Sunday of every March the throats of all the children are blessed whIch knocks out all the doctors profits on the dlptherla trade So spe what they have to compete with and Is It any wonder sometimes that they fight the devil with his own fire A great many of you may not know that medical science is almost altogether an achievement of the last undred years Previous to that was blended with Christian humbug gerthe church permitting no one to build on the broad and solid founds tlOng laid down by Hippocrates Just as the church dictated what should be law art science drama and musIc just so it laid is proscription on medicine The church was in the prayer charm faith healing and mIra- cle business and it wouldnt stand for any truthful or scientific opposl tlon It couldnt afford It Conse quenUy the humbuggery in medicine Is chiefly the transmitted humbuggery of the church Only as medical science became freo from ecclesiastical and mystical hIndrances did it bound forward and compllsh a work which has won the respect and gratitude of every lover progress truth and health Today physicians are more open to knowledge and less susceptible Mo mysticIsm than any other professionals I dont deny that the practice medicine is faulty It has spent r too much time on minerals and too little In studying human nature suggestion and the social and mental causes of health and disease Of course it has made and mlkes many mistakes The larger part of It Is pure experimentation but this Is the only method of obtaining knowledge The man who never makes takes seldom makes anything else The difference between doctors and preachers and faith healers Isthat- the doctors have their faces turned toward science while the spook chasers have theirs turned toward superstitionAt very moment when thousands of clergymen all over the world have their faces turned upward ing Into vacancy thousands of physl clans are toiling in their labratori looking downward Into their microscopes endeavoring to gain some knowledge that will add to the health happiness and well being of human Ity They are not hunting for spIrIts or astral bodies but for microbes and facts And many of these InveliUga tors are penniless and starving and working without hope of reward here of hereafterThe comes nearest being the ideal socialist than any other man even more so than the professing so cialist himself He Is the only man In the community who is at the senIce of his fellow man night and day and without charge If the case be one of worthy charity and no one is more often unrewarded and imposed upon than he For fifteen hundred years doctors like actors poets and astronomers were regarded as moral outcasts They were denounced as heretics from all the pulpits of Europe Better die with Christ than be healed by an Infidel they said ease is a matter of belief sahtSt Thomas Aquinas just as Mrs Edt is eddyfying the world today Physicians were called sorcerer magicians and atheists and they dured all the persecutions of the heretic Why it has only been about one hundred and fifty years since tbey were permitted to dissect the human body The reason for this was that the exercise of curing by faith cles and prayer was the source of the greatest income of the church a nd therefore It blocked all approach to the truth because the truth would put an end to its graft Finally Vesallus a Ital- Ian physician and founder oflhe Science of Anatomy succeeded in ex plorlng the human body from head to too He proclaimed that there we such thinS as a Resurrect Jon bone a eau i r wtli the wo an causIng fclergy to drop these two preposterous and cardinal doctrines of the churcl And ever since that day Inch by Inch the clerg has had to yield it humbugger to the truth of the coverles of medicine Today the Insane are not treated as being possessed of devils and crueil tortured but with love and kindness The Jesuits of Vienna in 1583 boastei bat they had cast out 12652 devil This was in one city remember ThInk of the number of devils cast out by torture all over Europe Pestilences are no longer treated by prayer but with disinfection and Iso atlon which have practically abolish ed yellow fever small pox and cholera Carbolic acid and corrosive subil mate have taken the place of faith and supplication The typhoid mortality has been reduced from 75 to 15 to the hundreda iin of 60 and what conqueror In the- all tine worlds broad field of faith ever won such a victory The dread dlptherla Is almost a liing of the past thanks to horse serum instead of holy water By the use of the clinical thermomp ter test tube stethoscope and micro with new discoveries in the Oeld ol pathology and basteriology many diseases are almost mastered Under the Roentgen ray flesh be comes as glass and foreign bodies are dIscovered and removed while the hlevements of general surgery anti dentistry are astounding The discovery of choloform ushered In the happy time when under the knife there shall be no more pain If the United States had done notli- Ing else but discover chloroform said a great British scIentistilt would deserve the lasting praise and atltude of the universe Still oven In the nineteenth century chloroform anrl cocaine were declared to be works of the devil by those breeders of all imbuggery the ecclesiastics faith healers If there has ever been a set of people who as a class haven afflicted with chronic constlpa tlon of the Intellect it has certainly been thesefI have given these few of the many ilevements of medical science that the y may stand out In bold contrast the achievements of mysticism and faithIAs to advei tin rs quacks and Irrconv petents I admit them by the thousand As to advertisers I want to be fair and will say that I believe that some of them are able and conscientious men and often give the moneys worth They believe that they have just as much right to advertise as merchants evangelists or anybody else and If they are honest I have no quarrel with them I admit that medical science IJro grosses only by experimentation that it is full of humbugs who think more of the dollar than of the cure and some of whom prolongthe disease for the sake of the fee I recognize that many of such faults are caused by economic pressure still no class does as much free work as the medical fra ternlty none have done so much for numan prolongation of life none have done so much to dispel mysticisms and advance mankind none have done so much to promote science and the prog ress of the world Next we come to the greatest humbug of all The Humbug of the Church Although I have already pretty well portrayed this humbug in this lecture still it would take a volume to plete Religion based upon morals scIence truth love and progress Is not only a good thing but a necessity In fact mlracleslprayer thing but in its very nature is a hum bugNow is there anything in all the world so strange as that twothIrds of all human energy physical and tellectual has been expended In perI petuating the Christian superstition One of the principle reasons that so many people adhere to the ChrIstian church is because they are Ignorant of its inception into the government of man They know nothing of the Council of Nice and the manner In which the Bible was compiled and of how its inspiration was establishe They are Ignorant of how Constantlr and his successors forced the Chris tlan faith and the Bible on the world at the point of the sword butcherIng millions They do not understand ho It has been the most valuable aid to the kings autocrats tyrants and land monopolists of the earth and how It has been silent partner In all theIr reason mankind has been bllnd to all these Is due to the wonde faith fear and obedience practiced on the mind of the child These have been so thoroughly Instilled into the human mind that they are as beret tary as red hair or the roman nose or the complexion or any racial type There Is no other humbuggery In the world so strongly arrayed agaInst 1VbyIt Christian hey alkciLan Iked thThey say that his fahe was a ghost and here is one of the trangest phases of human credulity and intellectual inconsistency In all thIs world There is not one man among the millions who believe that this event took place In Josephs fam- Ily who could be made to believe for me moment that It happened In hIs own They believe all the miracles tha Jesus is said to have performed The Believe that he raised the dead even after peutrefactlon had set In The above he fed a multitude on two loaves and three fishes that he cure Insanity by driving out devils that he took some dust from the road mixed It with a little divine saliva rubbed It on a mans eyes and cured him of blindness and all this holy humbug gery Is the foundation of the spiritual chrIstianity and faith healing of today not only of these but it Is largely the cause of the hypocrisy and servll Ity and prostitution of the intelligence of of this holy humbug geryare all around us We observe governors of states appointing days prayer to persuade God to end drouth and also a day of thanks the author and creator of all omitting of course the storms earthquakes fires famines pestilences sorrows grIefs headaches and losses which hIs kind Providence he so graciously sends us We observe the church encroaching upon the state in every way It can- and in defiance of the constitution has its salaried chaplains In legislative bodIes and in the army and navy evades taxation and is the greatest class privileged institution In the country yet it poses as the exponent of justice truth honor and good cltl years ago the ground whIch the First Presbyterian church stands down on Fourth street worth about 2000 A fifty thousand buildIng was erected on it It has- done nothing to enhance Its value SurroundIng Improvements have made- thIs ground worth today a half million Not one cent of taxes have ever been- paId on it Over three billion dollars worth of such property in this country Is untaxed and still somehow the- church manages to keep the majority people humbugged into the belief that it is the soul of justice and sin cerlt and the only good to tha con scIences of men the very first step toward honesty is to pay your own wayto be square with your fellow man =One of the greatest humbugs the church Is Ifs missionary propor nda In which Protestant and Catho c talk bad about each other to the oath each telling tat the oth ls false which is as near tho truth perhaps as they ever get There are twice as many heathens now as there was 100 years ago At the present rate of heathen increase and Christian conV6 slon when will every tongue conflss and every knee bow The chief hum buggery however consists In trying to fit the heathen for a social equal lu Paradise and refusing to mix with him here Missionaries just now are causIng nearly all the devilment and revolu tlonary outbreaks among heathen na tlons The only good thing about mls slonary work so far as I can see Is teat It Is the means of getting a lot of cranks and fanatics uut of thIs countryI time to go Into the hum- bugger of salvation damnation the atonement an a lot more of tae dog mas dreams fictions and fallacies b which the church has succeeded In bamboozling the whole world I will only notice further the humbugger of have all heard of waves of religion sweeping over the country That is one of its peculiarities It goes In waves You never heard of a wave of intelligence or common sense sweeping the country did you The country could not be happy with out these humbugs of religion A mG dlocre preacher falls to make any hIt In the pulpit by doing badly wlmt others do well He turns to sensationalism for reo lief He preaches blood and fire hurls damnation around him in solid chunks like brick bats He shrlel silly lies perverts facts to suit hIs own ends prances froths howls stamps and whacks his pulpit till the top splits Nothing is too extravagant or dishonest for utterance It all rant noise nonsense but It stuns the gulls and they swear by It as heaven born eloquence The country Is speckled all ovc with theso baboons of bigotry who turn their tabernacles Into monkey dens Call them Talmage Sam Jone Commander Booth Dowie Voliva whatever else you will but remember always that theJr name is Humbug The Political Humbug Lincoln declared that Politics a trade finds most and leaves all dli honest Some one else has sale Party Is the madness of many for the gain of a few Since parties seem to a necessity is long as we have them wo will have ftQlltics therefore evry monougl- ot bea politician If ne wouldnt b humbugged It must be plain to nll hat there Is as much human deceit bIgotry and credulity in politics as In religIon Millions likewise boast boy never change They cant bE hanged Politics as well as religion demen itrate that people general dont wan to know the truth If a man is a staunch Republican he wont believe nor does he want to hear anything reo looting on his partythe same with the Democrat no matter if his party be as rotten as Denmark The Catholic Is offended at once If you tell him the truth about his church and religion but it is pleasant sough to hear other religions nounced The Methodist and Presby 3rlan dont want the truth told about theIr churches but It is alright tc gIve the Catholic and the Jew hell Why Is this phase of bigotry and prejudIce so universal in mankind for certaInly men naturally incline to in estlgatlon end trutti It is chiefly due say to the misdirection of the mIni of the child in the start There is this difference between a politicIan and a statesman tho poll tlclan thinks of the next election the atesman thinks of the next genera tlon If there Is a country in the world at the present time that has a jverty of statesmen It Is the United one great aim seems to be to control elections and perpetuate plutocrats In power The popular vote determInes nothing It is all a hum ig Money makes masters Every election Is bought The vote of the Ignorant vicious and corrupt deter- mInes majorities We see both parties going after the Goetto uid the Negro We see parties buyIng up the Catholic church and the MethodIst church and wo see great corporations buying up both parties Still the gulls are proud of their parties Still they remain dyed In the wool Democrats and uncompromising unswervIng Republicans At the last election in New York Hearst was defeated by a proclama tlon from Dick CrocKer the ex boss and Tammany thief The mere Ion of this public plunderer turned the heads of thousands Crocker in accounting for Hearsts defeat said God did it which If true shows it even God Almighty can bp gullI Pr for he defeated the best man Could there be any better evidence than this to show tow e oily men can be numbuggcd and hpw thick the guns roost rI0 f r 0 i Labor parties are among the worst of the humbugged They howl about not having any representation In Con gress then when the opportunity come to them to vote for a labor candidate they wont do it Theres plenty of humbug of Ue same kind in all the reform parties Two out of three ormers need reforming Theres plenty of humbug too In all shades of Liberalism Liberals are not always liberal The humbuggery In munici pal government has been so thorough ly discussed of late that I will not attempt It here Suffice it to say that the professors of religion and morals and the arbiters of respectability in society for years have sustained and supported In office in this city a gang cf public plunderers whom they would not Invite Into their own homes or be seen with up a dark alley- Summary Let It bo understood that in present- Ing this subject my object has not been to denounce and condemn but to show by strong contrast and in plain speech a phase of human nature which Is universal and which Is not taken Into account as much as It should bo I see the good In the law press art drama medicine religion and in nil beliefs and creeds seldom make them good Men are good be cause of the good In human nature and because of breeding climate and environment What have aimed to show Is that credulity and humbug gery have such a dominating influence even in tile great affairs of life that they obstruct right reasoning and make the march of progress painful and slow The question we are all up against now Is What Is the remedy The clergy say Just be guided by us and wait for the second comIngof the Lord which may occur the next year or In 10000 years The same time between drinks would create a beautiful thirst Even Stanley Bow die the distinguished young gentleman who spoke at your last meeting has written a pamphlet In which he proves to his own satisfaction that the only solution to all these human dIm tildes is the second coming of the Lord Oh Lord Tie statesman says Respect the E4 law and maintain order The social ist single taxer prohibitionist and titer small party folks have theirfveil known views My opinion Is that there is no remedy Credulity is a fixed principle human nature and nature is not In the habit of changing herprlnciplcsC to accommodate any creedsocetyor person vf 1 The best that can be done is only toi mollify conditions Wo can ou yal y 1i vance along any line little by little Each step forward makes tae next more easy Evoluto and revoluto is natures way and there is no other r The world advances only by Intellectual 5 fighting and physical fighting Educationally I would propose Intro acing In the school curriculum the istudy of economics and politics If fhe boy is not trained in politics he is not qualified to enter politics A rea son for it should accompany every mans vote Nearly every boy joins tbe churcn his father belongs to and votes ns his father votes and most mengo on all through a long life with no Letter reason for casting their lots Tills Is why the gulls are so ilck Introduce the study of political methods in the scaools and qualify a youth for the ballot Every voter my opinion should be a politician then politician not being able to humbug politician would find more profit In honesty Each being on to the tiers tricks they couldnt fool each other I propose also the Initiative and referendum which If universally opted will transform the world nut above all I propose that the state shaU take charge of the minds of the- phlldthat it shall be taken out tho 1 hands of the preacher and priest that Its education shall be based on nature and science that It shall be traIned In right reasoning right from- the start and that the indelible seal ot wonder fear falsehood myth mtraclo and moonshine shall not he tamped Ullon the Infant brain I would also propose a reformation of tine clergy and true humanizing of irlstlanlty The clergy as a rule- aro good abe and conscientious men- and they are worth saving All thatrIs the matter with them is the twist that Is In their brains and they canl- help that If every church was like this church open and free to all discussion and If every preacher were as the preacher of this church hospitable to all thought the greatest step forward the world that I can Imagine would bn taken Not because the people thIs church are better morally than- the people of other churches not causa its pastor is better than other clergymonbut bopause the church is e and its pastor is free and Freedom is Everything eiul voter friend n Clirlitdiinnnf New eRrs present in the A Trip to Rowe SruAFE n4c a 3 y j

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