PUERILE PARSON PALMER.

NZ Truth, Issue 170, 19 September 1908, Page 4

PUERILE PARSON PALMER.

Prohibition Parson Palmer is still earning a frantic crust m Christchurch, where the sedate residents regard him as a species of unusual animal like the Okarito whale— and more noisome. Palmer has a pernicious habit of rubbing his audience the wrong way ; he fathers malignant statements without discretion, and the -angry protests of the crowd turn nis openair meetings into howling scenes of cursing and invective. This impartial paper thoroughly believes that New South Wales was so heartily sick of Palmer that it would have ..paid, his passage to Shackleton's base at the South Pole, if transit were practicable, and "spared", him to New Zealand for a' space with the joy of a Chow getting irid of a bad shilling. Palmer is as ifull of venom as a porcupine is of quills and is just as disastrous to everything he touches. "Truth has already mentioned particulars of the mesis he" has made of things- m connection with sundry matters, and further > evidence has been received that, as the saying is, , he is unable to open his mouth without putting his foot m it. It is related of a wellknown commercial traveller that he .was mistaken for the boss of an establishment into which the gloomy shepherd had poked his nose for a hearfcto-liver talk with the men..' This, didn't prevent an exchange of views arid winking violently past the parson s ear at the crowd, the traveller told a, simple story of Ashburton's holiness. Yes, he had seen a drunken , man m the main, street of the droughtstricken town, But the spectacle was so unheard of and astounding that almost the entire population turned 1 out to view it, arid the squiffy one was . shown to the little children as x an unique and unbeliever able wonder, and also as an object lesson of the brutalising effects of the cursed der-ijik. Palmer was m ecstasies. Enquiring the name of the yarn-spinner, which happened -to be a very . prbminent one rri Christchurch, : he repeated it on every pos-\ sible occasion and everywhere he went,' mentioning the author of it and his prominence and respectability as a guarantee of veracity ; so that the traveller was 'beseiged by people, on the telephone" asking for particulars, also by letter and postcard, and his friends poked, 'boirak at him, arid his life was. made an interminable misery by people who met him in ' t;he street. The traveller set out m search of Palmer, who proved as elusive as a no-liccnsc rat m a\ vat of beer. , Falmer 'jr>^tinnf>(} selling the story to the public, fwnai emsclMbments,. and attributing authorship to the bagman, who rang up Isi'tt and other prominent prphlbs. asking them to muzzle or .gag the, brute, but the worried cold-tea hustlers already had their hands full of Palmer's other iriUis-r cretions anti were trying to suppress the black-garbed bounder Is sordid snapshots of Auckland's drunk during Fleet Week, ancf were quelling i the riot caused, m Anglican circles by the waster, andhacl I*almer's disgraceful,, street, scenes under review, and they •' promised to do what they couldi m pure weariness of spirit. Meanwhile Palmer. spouted :the same old yarn from day to day, and one afternoon a frantic commercial . traveller went round to the Square and personally heard ifc and reproached Palmer with inaccuracy and breach of confidence and other things, and Palmer replied with heat arid the language of the gutter, a , hostile crowd joined issue, and a riot seemed imminent. Strangely enough, the police tackled the traveller, and not ■ Palmer-, for creating a disturbance, but the distressed bagman did get a hearing ultimately and furnished an explanation of the stoiy. This is mentioned by the way, as an example of Palmer's piggish ignorance and want of tact, arid his street scenes are always like that. On the following day tho crowd ( took exception to- many of his statements, a proinincat lawyer directing, the screecher's attention to inconsisten/ cies ia the statements, but Palmer, who is a vulgar type of pious slanderer, aired his knowledge of Surry Hills Push repartee and told the law person to stick to his six-and-eight, and leave , Palmer alone. The collection cadger was quoting some alleged Balclutha ! statistics, when | a man m the crowd asked the unholy hypocrite if he had read .John Norton's "Truth" on the' same subject. Mention 0,1 this delectable .journal m Palmer's hearing is like unto a red rag to a bull or a long beer to a '< prohibitionist. "That r-r-rag !'" said the bible-puncher, spluttering on the verge of apoplexy. "I wouldn't touch it with • a rake ! I wouldn't touch it with >a forty-foot pole !"' "Truth" feels gratified. IE ever by any conspiracy of disastrous circumstances this paper should earn the goodwill of a parasitical parsonic pirnp 1 like Palmer then "Truth." would feel disgraced for evermore, and denunciation by/ the clerical cad is /accepted as the sincerest flattery. No one' is astonished ithat ' a person like Palmer, ' who preys upon the superstition, credulity, and fanaticism of weak-headed people, women and children, should shrink from "Truth" and truthfulness whenever they approach, arid would place even a forty-foot pole between him ami those virtues.. This -paper publishes the truth ; it is sometimes brutal and naked, but truth is always brutal and naked, and this paper takes to itself the just boast that it is the } only publication m Mew Zealand wherein the people, no matter how poor, no matter how uninfluential, are permitted to have a just cause championed with fearlessness, force and impartiality. Can Palmer claim anything like that for his cause? >His Anglicanvreligion bolsters up the man of wealth and preaches to the poor and lowly to be satisfied with the humble lot m which the Maker has placed them, a gross species of blasphemy when Palmer's rich patrons are keeping useless people like Palmer m luxury out of the" blood and sweat and curses of tine poor, who are enjoined to look above for solace and resignation and prepare themselves for something better m the next world. Meantime Palmer and his rich bosses, for whom he pimps, are enjoying heaven here below, whatever they • will get when they pass" m their check, and they are it at the efipense of the common people, who are drugged with hymns and prayer and spiritual exhortation into 'the hypnotic belief that the monopolist is entitled to , his illgotten gains and that parasites like Palmer serve a iuseful purpose on this earth. If Palmer were to preach the gospel of the Man he, says he serves, and espouse the cause of the lowly and down-trodden, "Tnuth" would lend him all the support, guaiantteed by its gigantic circulation ; but even this anti-beer crusade is grounded on selfishness, and the desire for prohibition is baased upon the basic principle that if the toiler doesn't bury his misery m beer he will be able to contribute more to the monopolist and waste [ economic prowlers like Palmer and Co., and he will be able to work harder for , the brutes who control the avenues of wealth. Palmer betrays the people daily, even as Judas did his Master, and iE the ■ neurotic, looncy-headed clerical slanderer • were to touch this respectable paper, i even with a forty-foot pole, "Truth" would shudder with such violence as to , disarrange the cathedral steeple and - cause an ■ earth tremor to rumble through the interior ol the two islands-