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Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VI, Issue 619, 6 February 1879, Page 2

We think nothing could have been in worse taste than that the Hon Mr Stout, one of our present Ministers, should have taken the chair at a banquet given to Mr Bright the " freethought" lecturer. Ma Bright is, no doubt, a very clever man ; so also was Tom Paine ; so was Carlisle, so have been many atheisrts and unbelievers : but what man would care to place the writings or the utterances of such men before his wife, his daughters, or his sons. It is, no doubt, right that the Truth, in all things, should be spoken, but then comes the great question what is Truth in such matters. We do not believe a man has any right to deliver all thoughts which come out of his mind, any more than he should expose to public gaze, his ulcerous sores, the consequence of a diseased body. As a man Mr Bright may be all that a man should be, but we are quite sure he has disturbed many men's minds by infusing doubts into them. We cannot express what contempt we have for any one who, because he is an unbeliever himself, raises money for his support by trying to make others as unbelieving as himself ; and this is the man Mr. Stout does honor to by presiding at his banquet. Mr. Stout, in support of Mr. Bright's opinions, told the banqueters that "he could not help remarking the difference the appearance of the first meeting they had held in Dunedin and the present. He considered there was nothing like an opportunity of letting people know what they really thought of religion, but he was sorry to say that in this community it was impossible to speak out what one's opinions really were on religious subjects. He thought if religious opinions were freely tolerated, it would simply tend to suppress the religious hypocrite. There could be no moral action if a man believed one thing and pretended to his neighbor quite another. In his opinion, the free-thinking theist was the most believing member of society. The earliest Christians in Rome, Greece, and Judsea had the advice given them by their leaders that the only f way they could give evidence of their* faith was by their conduct, and after all it was by the life one led that one could show what their faith was by their conduct, and after all it was by the life one led that one could show what their faith was worth. He concluded by trusting that, Mr. Bright would be spared to return again to Dunedin after visiting America and England, and expressing a hope that the seeds Mr. Bright had sown wotild reap a goodly harvest." Onr hope is not that of Mr. Stout. We trust Mr. Bright, when he leaves the colony, will have left it never to return ; and that he may with a contrite heart, repent him of the evil he has done to weak and silly men and women.