Editorial Notes by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Nov 13, 1893

Editorial Notes

By Editor

A REPORT from our missionary, Elder B. J. Cady, came just too late for this issue. It will appear next week.

“NOTES FROM FRANCE,” in another column, shows us somewhat of the condition of affairs in Europe. “What next?” expectantly asks the multitude.

We give in this issue another installment of Professor Magan’s paper on a “Review of Sunday Legislation in Century Nineteen.” We hope that it may be widely read.

READ the article in another column on the “Parliament of Religions” from the Herald and Presbyter. It bears fine contrast to the many fulsome laudations of that antichristian gathering.

As A man, a Roman Catholic is no more a persecutor naturally than the member of any other sect. It is his principles which make him what he is. Anyone who will adopt the principles of that church with all his heart must of necessity become a persecutor if he have the power, and there be heretics to persecute. The inexorable logic of the whole system is intolerance and persecution. And when Protestants adopt the same principles, they are inevitably led to the same conclusions. But these principles are antichristian; for the principles of the gospel of Christ know nothing of coercion, intolerance, or persecution.

AT the Massachusetts Democratic Convention a resolution was adopted favoring a plan of referendum, by which important acts of the Legislature can be voted by the people. This would be a limited feature of original democracy. But it will not succeed to any marked extent, if at all; the tendency is all the other way. Ever since the civil war centralization of governmental power has been making rapid strides. Notwithstanding that each of the dominant parties has raised the cry against the one in power, it is a fact that each succeeding administration, whether Republican or Democratic, has carried the principle a step or two farther forward. It was this centralization, and disregard of the real sentiment of the masses, that made it possible to open the doors of Congress to religious legislation in the matter of declaring Sunday to be the Sabbath, and enacting that the Columbian Exposition, a State corporation, should be closed on that day. That precedent will be enlarged upon as the principle of centralization becomes more pronounced.

IT IS thus that an esteemed contributor of the Signs writes in a private note of the refusal of the Parliament of Religions to allow the Mormon representative a hearing; and who can say that he speaks too strongly?

The elder says, “This may be good Christian treatment, but it is different from that taught by the Mormon Church.” But a man cannot have a very high ideal of Christianity who would expect “Christian treatment” at the hands of such a hodge-podge of Catholicism, degenerate Protestantism, and all the other idolatries that could be induced to join the show. How could any Christian manifestation come out of the worst medley that the world has known since the confusion of tongues at Babel? However, it is a little strange that a religion claiming 300,000 adherents could not have a chance on the platform with the universal pot-pourri,—especially as they adhere to the “American Sabbath.” It certainly was not an exhibition of true American patriotism to invite a display of all the polygamy of foreign countries—free of duty—and then rule out the home product.