The West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY APRIL 19, 1911. THE MORMONS.

West Coast Times, 19 April 1911, Page 2

The West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY APRIL 19, 1911. THE MORMONS.

In the eighty years that have elapsed since the revelation of the so-called sacred tablets to its, “prophet” and “martyr,” Joseph Smith,'the sect of the Mormons, or Latter Day Saints, has increased to three quarters of a million. To, proselytise is the first duty it enjoins, and the agents of the polygamous creed have crept over the face of the most civilised and uncivilised lands like a pernicious blight. We say polygamous, because although the institution was formally abolished in 1980 by the Mormon Church, it is not yet clean of taint. Recently information was afforded by the cable of the insidious progress of the sect in the United Kingdom. It, was stated, on the authority of the Countess of Chichester, that dining last year no fewer than 555 English girls had been enlisted for Salt Lake City, and that large Mormon colonies have been established both in England and in Ireland. Later our cable news records that during the past five years the. Mormons have secured the emigration of 150 Swiss girls annually to Utah, and. that a strong ajitLMormou agitation has begun. Id was officially stated a short tim’efago that Mormonism had 33 missionaries distributed in the chief cities: of Australia. “Every mailboat that leaves Australia for Vancouver sees a contingent of girls from 16 to 20 years of age consigned to Utah. 'There are thirteen of these de T pastures a year, and in one contigent no fewer than thirty girls and youngwomen constituted the list. a Only two' men in the course of- twelve months were known to leave as converts to Mormonism.” It is known that Mormou agents have made many proselytes, of recent years, among the' Maoris of the -North Island, and according to the census five years ago there were 279 white Mormons in this country. It is the association of Mormonism with polygamy which gives a terrible significance :to these figures, and the ' evidence for that association is too strong, we fear, to be affected by contradiction, When the Mormons were first accused of polygamy at the beginning, of their movement, they denied the existence of the relation. Afterwards, at Salt Lake City, the practise was en-, couraged on the ground that the rank and dignity of the “ Saints ” was proportioned tq the number of' theirywives and children, and the systeni-ywas also defended upon, moral grounded Twenty years , ago the bead*.-of A the Mormon Church, Woodruff,’yyafffiduncecl , that through him God had commanded its

avoidance. An American writer, Mr Burton J. Hendrick, lias recently made a study of this subject, and ho states that in the last ten years the Mormon Church has several times modified its attitude towards the question. Six

years ago Joseph l‘\ Smith, in an “ ad- ' di'e§s to the world,” acknowledged that there wore a few “sporadic cases” of polygamy, but ho declared that the number was utterly insignificant. How insignificant it is so shown by the fact that a Salt Lake City newspaper, the “Tribune,” has published detailed re- •; cords of 224 polygamous marriages which have been entered into since Woodruffs manifesto. Hie Mormon Church, wo are told, has made no attempt to deiiy the substantial accuracy of the list, the official organ of the Church in Salt Lake City has made no answer to this evidence, and the men and women whose names the • “ Trirbune ” has held up to public infamy have made no attempt to secure legal redress—in fact the marriages, it is said are generally admitted. Tho calculation has been made that, allowing for secret unions, there must have been between 1500 and 2000 “new polygamous marriages since the practise was technically abolished. It is stated that leading churchmen who . notoriously practise polygamy have been promoted, and that the present head of tho sect, Preside,ut Smith, and others of its leaders are polygamists. Mr A. Rivett, writing to the “Sydney Daily Tele-

graph” of March 24th, declares:— “ Polygamy is illegal in Utah, but there fIVK+.C on n/'/»lACecfioQl Inin Inr +

cAiolo till CLLiUbtlot'K-dl ld-\\ Uj iWllvll WIG well-to-do Mormon may have as many wives as his purse will allow. Ho has hut one wife in the eyes of tbe civil law, but many have half a dozen by permission of the' Mormon Church. These Australian girls go out presumably to he married, but rarely become wives of t.lio rirs+, irlnoii Iniri.

timacy and property, but only of the second, which means, in tho last result, they become mere chattels, who till the Mormon’s' soil and otherwise

servo his pleasure. That they are treated with kindness is undeniable; but nevertheless they are deceived, the whole thing is not pleasant to Australians.”' That, certainly, is not the language of unreasonable opposition. Mormon proselytising is prohibited by

law in Austria and Prussia, and that is probably the best way to deal with Mprmonism until the “ Saints ” can prove that this foul plague spot is really purged from out their midst.