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VOL. 1.
SILVERTON, OREGON, THURSDAY, APRIL 15, ¡897.
Balm.
You know not w hat a h e a rt ache is
Unless you’ve had a tria l:
You cannot feel a n o th e r’s woe
W ithout a h e a rt’s denial.
You canno^know w hat sickness is,
If alw ays you’ve had h ealth :
Nor do you know a poor m a n ’s lot
If yours has been of w ealth.
You know not w hat it is to have
The wolf howl at th e door;
If you have alw ays had your m eals
And never have been poor.
You know not if a n o th e r’s shoe
A brase th e toe or heel—
U nless you’ve had a corn yourself;
I t ’s pain you do no t feel.
A cringing w retch before th e bar
W hom all th e people blam e
W ould be as nice as you ap p ear
If he were bred th e sam e.
Before a n o th e r you condem n,
Or slim e him w ith disgrace,
T h ink w hat, perhaps, you m ight have
been
H ad you been in his place.
All m en, and I th in k wom en, too,
Do ju st th e best they can ;
For brain s am i th e ir en v iro n m en ts
C ontrol th e race of m an.
T h en give a th o u g h t of sy m p ath y ,
For each lorn wail of w oe;
For you, no doubt, w ould be as lie,
W ere you surrounded so.
—G. H. W alser.
Nature.
B. F . UN D ERW O O D .
By Nature is commonly under­
stood the totallity of material
phenomena, worlds and all the
physical forms and activities that
belong to them. This view com­
prises in the natural domain the
bodily organization, the intelligence
and instincts of all the creatures
below man, and even the physical
structure, the appetites and pass­
ions of the human race. From
this classification the mind of man
is excluded. The body returns to
the dust whence it came, the spirit,
the divine spark in man, to the
God who gave it.
A larger view would recognize in
the entire animal world, especially
in the intelligence and affection of
the higher brutes, for instance, the
dog and the horse, something akin
to the mind of man, and therefore
entitled to rank above purely
material phenomena; for it would
be as difficult to show that the
preceptive power, the consciousness
and the incipient moral nature of
the dog are the result of the action
of material atoms, as that the more
developed mental powers and
ethical qualities of man are merely
the functions of physical or­
ganization.
The modern scientific conception
of evolution, according to which
the higher organic forms have l>een
evolved from lower forms, and the
higher intelligences from lower in­ the means he used to lure men to
telligences corresponding with the destruction. To forsake family and
less developed structures, is that i friends, to withdraw from society,
there is a genetic relationship, a to go into the monastery or the
primordial kinship between man desert, was the hightest duty of
and the despised brutes, and that, man. To despise the world and all
although he is immeasurably above its natural enjoyments
was
them, he and they belong to a com­ necessary to regain God’s favor,
mon order of existence and to th e1 and to escape torture beyond the
same great domain of being; and if grave as horrible as omnipotence
we recognize the instinct of the bee could inflict and as lasting as eter­
and the faithfulness of the dog as nity. “A hidious, sordid and
well as the mind and heart of man emaciated maniac’” says Lecky,
as but different manifestations and “without
knowledge,
without
products of the Universal Energy! patriotism, without natural affect­
immanent in all phenomena, ma- i ion, passing his life in a long routine
terial and mental alike, we shall of useless and atrocious self-torture,
find no difficulty in viewing man, and quailing before the ghastly
even as a spiritual being, as part phantoms of his delirious brain,
of the natural order in which a r e had become the ideal of the nations
also included brute life and all ma­ which had known the writings of
terial phenomena, from the move­ Plato and Cicero and the lives of
ment of a cloud of dust to the won­ Socrates and Cato.”
derful revolution of a planet in its
Hundreds of years later when
orbit.
Nature-hatred and asceticism and
The ancient Greek have elevated pessimism had found their foe in
views of Nature which they glorified industrial life—the
condition
and deified. They sang its praises of a porgressive civilization
and aimed to imitate its methods. philosophers arose who taught that
Natural beauty, natural symmetry, the^jjath to -perfection'led back to
natural harmony, was the object of Nature from * which man had
their strivings, and their art and departed, and that in savage life,
sculptures, their poetry and oratory unperverted by the artificialities of
and their language with its marvel­ civilization, was to be found the
ous beauty, finish and flexibility, method of living required to restore
remain to attest the success with man to his first estate. Of this
which they cultivated the study of view Rousseau was the most bril­
lant and accomplished advocate.
Nature.
The view of today is, among
In later times, under the influ­
ence of theological pessimism, men progressive thinkers, that the earth
came to look upon Nature as essen­ and man are in a process of growth,
tially evil, something corrupt and of evolution, and that Nature is
vile, because accursed of God. Al­ neither depraved nor perfect, but
though the Creator had originally modifiable and improvable. Man
pronounced the works of his hand is the highest product of the
good, the devil had thwarted his universal energy that lias appeared
plans by successfully tempting the j upon this mundane sphere, and
first human being to sin and there­ having arrived at a condition in
by introducing evil into the world, which he can discern the general
all Nature became corrupt and de­ trend of evolution he is able to co­
praved; the earth was made to operate with the forces of the
bring forth thorns and thistles universe, and in some degree, to ac­
where before bloomed roses of rar­ celerate progress. Recognizing his
est beauty and sweetest perfume; own race as the highest form upon
the frown of God was upon all the planet, yet imperfect, he can
things and ‘‘Nature, from her seat, aim at higher conditions, help the
sighing through all her works, gave least perfect, and make the con­
ditions for general advancement
signs of woe that all was lost.”
It is still believed that in man more favorable than would be
there was something of the divinity possible without his intervention.
Thus Nature makes her highest
which should war against Nature,
crush and overcome it even though product instrumental in accomplish­
the struggle involved a life of pain, ing her ends. Man sees the imper­
wretchedness and horrible death. fection in the undeveloped con­
To follow the promptings of Nature ditions about him, and these he
was a sin to be mourned over, to can change in adaptation to his
l»e expiated only by prayer and requirements. He can drain the
fastings and self-inflicted pain. swamps, ami improve the natural
The natural instincts and passions products of the ground, converting
were regarded as the promptings of wild and almost worthless fruits
Satan, and all pleasures of life were and plants into nutritious and
NO. 24.
delicious food. Himself a part of
Nature, he can assist in improving
it and making the world better for
his having lived. His own volition
and co-operative methods replace,
in the action of his own race, the
process of natural selection which
played so important a part in the
early history of man and which
prevails now generally throughout
the animal and vegetable world.
Man’s wisest efforts are but Na­
ture’s methods, for in the light of
the highest science Nature includes
the entire universe, pervaded and
permeated with the universal energy
which embraces the life and heart
of all humanity. In a large
sense Nature comprises all the
heights and depths o f being. And
as Emerson wrote:
“ O ut from th e h e art of N atu re rolled
The burden o f th e Bible old,
The litan ies of nations cam e
Like th e volcano’s tongue of tlam e,
U p from th e b u rn in g core lielow,
T he can ticles of love and woe.
T he tem ples grew as grow th e grass ;
A rt m ig h t obey, b u t not su rp a ss.”
Oh, Death, W here Is Thy S tin g?
Manifestly, annihilation of one’s
personality can, by no possibility,
be any worse than would have been
a failure 4>f his parents to have
made the acquaintence of each
other; and surely such a failure
would have been nothing of which
any one could have reasonably
complained. If one’s next sleep
should be dreamless, what would
it matter if it lasted nine hours
instead of eight, or ten instead of
nine, or twenty instead of ten, or
or twenty days, or months, or
years, or centuries? Or what if,
after he had remained asleep,
unconscious and inexistent for a
million centuries, or years, would
one be harmed by continuing this
through all of the succeeding
eternity any more than by having
been non-existent through all of
the eternity that preceded his advent
into existence?
If a dreamless sleep is good for
the sleeper for any length of time,
why should it be bad for him for
any other length of time, or for
time without end? If dream­
less, endless sleep—that is to say,
death as conceived of by rational­
ists—deprives us of all of the
enjoyments of life, it likewise de­
prives us of all memory thereof and
of all regret in respect thereto, and
protects us from every pain, saves
us from every sorrow and defends
us against every danger and dread.
So t h a t it is the rationalist and not
the religionist (and especially the
religionist who believes in a hell of
a hereafter) that can apostrophize:
“Oh, death, where is thy sting?”—
Independent Pulpit.