THE TORCH OF REASON, SILVERTON, OREGON, JANUARY 18, 1900. 4 Torch of Reason The Only Paper of Its Kind. P u b lish ed W eekly by th e Liberal U n i versity C om pany, in the In tere sts of C onstructive, Moral Secularism . J. E. H osm er,........................Editor P. W . Geer......................... Manager E n tered a t th e poetoffice at Silverton, O regon, as second-class m ail m atter. SUBSCRIPTION RATES. One year, in a d v an c e ..........................$1 90 Six m o n th s, in a d v a n c e .................... T hree m onths, in a d v an c e ................ 25 In clubs of five or m ore, one year, in ad vance.......................... - .............. "5 Money should he sent by registered le tte r or m oney order. Notice! A h a n d pointing to th is notice denotes th a t your su b scrip tio n h as ex p ired . You are earn estly requested to re new so th a t you m ay receive th e p a per w ith o u t in te rru p tio n . We have de cided th a t it is best for all concerned th a t we do n o t send p ap ers longer th a n tlie tim e paid for unless so ordered. T his will p rev en t any loss and we will know ju st w here we sta n d . We request you to send us th e nam es of Secularists who m ight becom e su b scribers and we will m ail sam ple copies. THURSDAY, JAN. 18, E. M. 300. EPITO M E OF T H E W E E K ’S E V E N T S A T T H E L. U . O. Perhaps we write so much about the Liberal University, its doings, its hopes and its prospects, that some of our friends may weary of the “old, old story,” but all of our former false hopes of a future life have vanished, and we are so filled with the “holy ghost” and love of the new religion of Science and Hu manity that we can not refrain from “bearing testimony” to our newer and higher salvation when ever there is “a ghost of a chance” to do so. Secularists are the only people who have a religion that is worthy of the name, and no false modesty should keep us from being witness es to the truth and from keeping each other informed as to the spread of this new gospel. Six new’ students entered the University this week. One of these was Master John Scott, who was with us last year, and whose par ents are now living in Washington. Three others, Thomas Garter, Mar- gueritte Carter, and Sidney Rogers, are from Utah, and the other two are Miss Georgia Davenport, sister of the cartoonist, and Mr. M. G. Cooley, one of Silverton’s most noted musicians. Our telephone connection with the rest of the world was finally completed this week; much work was done in getting our large and growing library into shape; a little workshop was fitted up for the “youngier,” as Prof. Wakeman calls the little folks; the important society work of the Y. P. S. 8. C., the W. 8. 8. C., and the Thought Exchange, have all been a decided success. Miss Mary Childers, a graduate of the Oregon 8tate Nor mal School, has been added to the corps of teachers; and much needed improvements have been made in the printing office. All this, with the regular school work, which has indeed been a decided advance, and victory all along the line from kin dergarten to Greek, makes our week’s work a great success, and places another carefully laid rock in the great foundation of the future triumph of Science over supersti tion, ignorance and crime. Another tower of Babel is being built right under the Christian God’s nose, and this time he will be obliged to think of some better scheme than the confusion oi tongues, for we have people here who can talk anything from pig- Latiu and Chinook jargon to the hardest of the dead languages. Our tower is being built, as Prof. Wakeman has been explaining in his opening-exercise speeches this week, to heaven just as the old fable tells about; but the heaven we are trying to reach is the heaven here, one that we know we can reach if we only wish and will to build aright. Ho there, workers! Do vou see that rope? Put a timber-hitch on to some of that material and send it up here! Our young and active artizans will put it in place. It may seem strange to some that there are people in the world who really and truly love their fellow men, those who are willing to un selfishly labor for future genera tions, but there are, and there is no confounding of the language of love. We build! D EV E L O PM E N T V S. C R E A T IO N . The cause of so much orthodoxy in the world is a very simple thing. It is ignorance! To be sure many smart men belong to Christ’s army, but they would not belong very long if the masses were once filled with the “holy ghost’’ of Science. It seems that the laws governing the origin and multiplication of the various forms of life and the forma tion of species, families, genera, orders and kingdoms are so little understood by the average ortho dox man or woman, that there is but little satisfaction in trying to convert them excepting by giving them a full course in Science. This is impossible to any great extent exceptiug with the young people, and therefore we turn our attention to them. Through the young we will be able to fill the world with the great ideas of Science, and although some may despair at this slow process let us whisper to you that this is the only way, and the sooner we are at it the better. A highly complex compound of viduals and the inherited character carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitro istics of their progeny came about gen, phosphorus and sulphur, the difference of sex. Male and which were brought together by the female were thus developed. simple laws of nature in the same The lower forms of life have no manner in which hydrogen and eyes, but by the constant actions of oxygen were brought together in the various lengths of waves in this forming water, formed a jelly-like great ethereal ocean of space, the substance, which being in turn “most fit” developed a set of cells acted upon by the heat and light that became sensitive to these (motion) of the sun, gained the char waves. These waves have beaten acteristic of absorbing some of the upon the shores of this planet for surrounding substances, and by millions and millions of years, and contraction and expansion a sort of the result is that we see. How locomotion. By exposure the sur strange! And yet how true. A face became harder than the inner few cells, made up mostly of water, portion. The absorption became have become so sensitive to certain regular by regular action of the ele I lengths of waves that they tell us ments. A nucleus was developed by the shapes, colors and distances of this regular action and absorption, bodies which these waves beat and this nucleus, perhaps by the upon and react, entering through unequal distribution of absorbed the cells which have become trans material or the unequal walls of parent, and forming a picture on the cell, caused perhaps by unequal the wonderful cell-screen which in exposure, etc., was accompanied by turn is hurried along on a cell-wire another nucleus. Thus two centers to the group of cells that know and were formed and, naturally, the two feel and will. The waves in the sets of actions became more and ocean of air also developed another more independent, until by con separate organ, which we call the striction the cell was divided and ear. We are thus in our entirety, thus there were two. This is an epit creatures of development and not ome of the origin and multiplica creatures of creation. tion of the simplest forms of life; How wonderful and yet how sim but this can only serve the reader ple it has all come about! There as a pointer to the more exhaustive are no mysteries! Ignorance alone works of such men as Darwin, cries mystery! We may not know Huxley, Haeckel, and Spencer. all but we can learn enough to When this simplest of life forms know that all is law, order, cause above described became numerous and effect, and that gods, miracles enough and the conditions of heat and prayers are products of gross light, etc., were right, a number ignorance and fraud. grew together in a group and the energy from the sun, in the same ATOMS. simple manner as with the single cell, produced groups within the All matter is made up of atoms, group, which, by the regularity of so says the scientist, and as these their actions, became distinct or atoms are indestrctible, essential gans. Organs of locomotion and and forever acting, so are the atoms organs of digestion were already in , of the great social life and moral the cells, but by use one office be character of our people. The na came more or less given up and ture of the atoms determine the special offices emphasized. This nature of the substance and the made it possible for the develop nature of the little thoughts and ment of other organs. actions of the individuals of society In very low forms of life we find determine the nature of the society that cells separating from the itself. parent group become new crea How much comes from each little tures, and, if divided artificially, thought and deed we can never be such low forms as worms will even able to determine, but in tracing now form individuals of each part. out some of the results of seeming The organs of propagation when unimportant things we are forced developed were at first both in the into the conclusion that no thought same individual (hermaphrodite), or action is really unimportant, and many of the lower forms are but that from each thought-seed found to be thus developed today. grows a crop that will only be com And what a strange thing it is pletely harvested at the sunset of when we realize that even men and eternity, if such a sunset be possible. women have the rudimentary or Every bad thought, every unkind or gans of the opposite sex. The rudi false statement, every indulgence of mentary mammary glands of men an evil habit h: s an appalling result! and the males of all higher mam- But the greatest of reforms and the mals tell a truer story of our genesis greatest of civilizations are started than any bible that was ever writ and carried forward by the simplest ten. of thoughts aud actions that are It is a perfectly natural thing go<»d and true. This thought itself, that in hermaphrodite animals one for example, though perhaps seem of the organs of propagation should ing at first to be of little conse be used more in some individuals quence is of vast importance. If it and the other in others. Thus by be true, the “blessed are the meek’' the use and disuse iu sets of indi ideas should be sparingly enter- *