Part 19

“Wall,” says I, still clingin’ to my simely, as great oriters always do, “It is my religion to scald you, if you don’t stop your insultin’ talk instantly and to once! You can’t talk no such stuff in the house of her who was once Smith,” says I, glancin’ agin at the teakettle, and steppin’ up a little nearer to it.

“Be composed, mum,” says he, a hitchin’ up his chair a little nearer the door; “Be composed! I was speakin’ in a strictly religious sense.”

Says I, “You can’t never make me think a crime can be committed religiously.” And agin I looked longin’ly at that teakettle.

“Compose yourself down, mum, and let us argue for a brief spell,” says he.

His tone was sort o’ implorin’ and beseechin’. And he took a plug of tobacco out of his coat-pocket, and bit a great chew off’en it, and put it into his mouth, I s’pose to try to show off and make himself attractive. But good land! how foolish it was in him. He didn’t look half so well to me as he did before, and that hain’t sayin’ but a very little, a very little indeed.

He wadded the tobacco all up on one side of his mouth, till his cheek stood out some like a wen, and the tobacco-juice started and run down on each side of his chin. And so, havin’ fixed himself, I s’pose, so his looks suited him, he says agin:

“Less argue the subject.”

I see that here was the chance I had wanted to convince him of his iniquity. I see that Duty was leadin’ a war-horse up in front of me all saddled and bridled, ready for me to mount and career onward nobly on the path of Right.

I see that Duty was holdin’ in this charger by the martingills with one hand, and with the other she was holdin’ out a pair of spurs to me. And though never, never, did a war-horse look so prancin’ and dangerous to me, and never did spurs look so heavy and sharp and tejus to my achin’ heels, yet Josiah Allen’s wife is not one to turn her back to Duty’s call—no, my desire to battle with the wrong, my martyrous spirit curbed me in and let me hear him talk.

And he went on to tell me that in the first place he wanted to lay before me the rise, progress, and glory of the Mormon Church. Says he, “In the first place, you know, mum, that God made a distinct revelation to us. Our bible was found written on plates of gold. Them plates”—

I am naturally very well-bread. And thinkin’ mebby it would influence him towards the right, I didn’t lay out to interrupt him, or disturb his arguments, till he had got through presentin’ of ’em. But the idee of such imposture—imposture in the name of God—so worked on me, that I spoke right out, in a firm, dignified tone, but very solemn:

“Elder Judas Wart, you jest pass them plates.”

Says he: “Why should I pass ’em? The revelation of God is written on ’em.”

“Revelation!” says I. “I should jest as soon go into my buttery, and read my meat plates and platters, as to read ’em. I should find jest as much of a revelation on ’em.” And agin I says, with dignity: “You pass them plates.”

Says he: “I wont pass ’em.” And he begun agin, in a sort of a boastin’ way: “September 22, 1827, the angel Moroni placed in Joseph Smith’s hand our Mormon bible, or that is, the plates, that”—

Says I: “Hain’t I told you to pass them plates? Your bible is a romance writ by Solomon Spaulding jest for fun, jest to see how near he could write like the bible. And it is a powerful lesson to me, and should be to everybody, of the terrible harvest that may spring up from one careless, thoughtless deed. The awful consequences, the sin, and the woe that followed that one irreverent, thoughtless act might well make us all more thoughtful, more mindful of the terrible responsibility that follows all our acts, the smallest as well as the greatest. We can’t shake off that personal responsibility. It follers us tight as our shadders even into our hours of recreation, showin’ us that we should not only work nobly, but recreate nobly and innocently and reverently.”

“But,” says he “them plates”—

But I was so rousted up with my emotions, that I waved out my right hand with awful dignity, and says I:

“You _shall_ pass them plates.”

And I held firm, and made him pass ’em. And he went to bringin’ up the miracles that had been done by the early church—curing the lame and deaf, healing the sick, and et cetery, and so forth. Says he: “I have heard that you are a woman that loves reason and fair play,” and says he, “you can’t get over those miracles, can you?”

Says I candidly: “I don’t want to get over no miracles, and hain’t tried to. But I can say with the poet, that so far as believin’ of ’em is concerned, miracles is sunthin’ I had rather see done myself than to hear of ’em. Howsumever, I hain’t a goin’ to say that you hain’t done ’em. As to healin’ the sick, the wonderful power and magnetism one strong mind can exert over a weaker one, when the weaker one has perfect faith in it, has a great many times performed deeds that looked miracilas, out of the Mormon church, and most probable in it. But even if you have raised the dead, which I don’t think you claim you have done, it would make me no more a believer in mormonism; for we read of a woman not religious, who did that. And I never hankered after keepin’ company with Miss Endor, or wanted to neighbor with her, or appear like her.”

“You are unreasonable, mum,” says he.

“I don’t mean to be,” says I. “I have allowed all you want me to, and more too. What more can you want?”

“You deride our holy church. Our church foundered on the Commandments of God.”

“Which one?” says I enquirin’ly.

“Which one?” says he haughtily. “Every one of ’em; every one of ’em.”

“Wall,” says I calmly and reasonably, but with quite a lot of dignity, “we’ll see.” And I was risin’ up to go and get the Bible offen the stand, for I was determined he should see ’em in black and white, when he spoke out haughtily and proudly:

“Keep your seat, mum; keep your seat. I have the Bible here in my breast pocket. Our church bein’ foundered on the Commandments, leanin’ up aginst ’em as we do for all our strength and safety, I don’t depend on Bibles layin’ round loose on stands, and so forth. I carry a copy all the time right over my heart, or pretty near over it—on the left side of my vest, anyway.”

Says I: “There is different ways of carryin’ things in the heart. But that is a deep subject, and I will not begin to episode upon it, for if I should begin, no knowin’ how fur I should episode to, but will merely say that there is other ways of carryin’ things in your heart besides carryin’ ’em in your vest pocket. But howsumever, read off the first one.” And he read it:

“Thou shalt have no other Gods before me.”

He read it off jest like a text. And the minute he stopped I begun to talk on it a good deal like preachin’, only shorter; but with jest about the same dignity and mean that preachers have.

Says I, in that firm, preachin’ tone: “You have made Brigham Young a God. Your preacher, whom you call a ‘model saint,’ openly avowed that he was God. You have pretended to believe, and have taught to the people his blasphemus doctrine that he had power to save souls in the heavenly kingdom, or to shut ’em out of it.” Says I: “I could spread out this awful idee, and cover hours with it, and then not make it very thin, either; there is so much that could be said on the awfulness of it. But I have got nine more jobs jest like it ahead on me to tackle, so enough, and suffice it to say, fetch on your next one.

He was goin’ to branch out and say sunthin’, but I held to my first idee, and wouldn’t let him. I told him if I argued with him at all, he had got to read those Commandments off jest like texts, and let me preach on ’em. I told him after I had got through with ’em, then he could rise up and explain his mind, and talk; but jest at present it was the commands of God I wanted to hear—not the words of Elder Judas Wart. And I held firm, and made him. And when he would begin to argue I would call for another one, and kep’ him at it.

“Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image * * * * thou shalt not bow down to them, nor serve them”—

Says I: “You have done that and worse. You have worshipped and revered an image of clay—rather weak clay, too, though held up by a mighty will and ambition. Why, most anybody would say that a graven image would be sounder than he was—more sort o’ solid and substantial. Anyway, it wouldn’t wobble round as he wobbled, preachin’ one thing to-day, and denyin’ it to-morrow, jest as his own interests dictated. And the graven image wouldn’t have been so selfish and graspin’ and unscrupulus. It would have been fur honester, and wouldn’t have wanted more’n a hundred wives. But that image of clay, such as it was, you sot up and worshipped, and you needn’t deny it.”

He didn’t try to. He knew it wouldn’t be no use to, and says he:

“Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.”

Says I, in a firm, awful axent, “You have taken it in vain, the weakest kind of vanity, and you have taken it wickedly, the wickedest kind of wickedness, in darin’ to commit this sin in the name of God.”

Says he, “Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.”

Says I, “You have kept it holy, by teachin’ this unholy sin. By assemblin’ at the tabernacle to listen to words so low, and vulgar, and weak that they would be contemptible, if they were not so wicked and blasphemous.”

Says he, “Honor thy father and thy mother.” He spoke up awful quick and some haughty. He felt what I had said, I knew it by his mean, and he seemed to read this with a air as if this was sunthin’ he could lean aginst hard, and nobody could hender its bein’ a support to him. He looked sort o’ independent and overbearin’ at me as he finished readin’ it, and he spit on the floor in a sort of a proud way.

But I went right on, in a deep and impressive axent, and says I, “You have made that commandment impossible for your children to follow. You have wickedly deprived your children of one of the holiest and most sacred things in life. A child’s right to honor the parents they love, and feel it their duty to reverence. But how can anybody, unless he is a fool or a luny, honor what hain’t honorable? How can a child honor a parent whose hands are stained with innocent blood, who is enriched by theft and rapine, who is living in open shame—in open defiance to the commonest rules of morality—who breaks all the commandments of God, and calls it religion?”

Says he, “Thou shalt not kill.”

Says I, “The teachers of your religion say, Thou _shalt_ kill, if it is for the safety and enrichment of the Mormon church. And, following their commands instead of God’s, you killed one hundred and 20 innocent men, wimmen, and children in one day. And how many other murders have been committed by orders of your church, in those lonely deserts and mountain roads and canyons, will never be known till the searchin’ light of the great day of doom reveals all secret things. Why,” says I, “Brigham Young taught that Mormons should shed each other’s blood for the remission of sins.”

He looked meachin’, very. He didn’t try to argue on this—he couldn’t, for he knew I could prove what I had said. And he looked meachiner yet, as he read the next one:

“Thou shalt not commit adultery.”

Says I, “The hull Mormon church is built up on the ruins of this broken commandment, and you know it. And you teach this doctrine, that the more pieces you break this commandment into, the higher it is goin’ to boost you up into heaven. The meaner and lower you be on earth, the higher place you will have in the heavenly kingdom—”

Says he, interruptin’ of me with a look of fearful meach restin’ on his eyebrow, and speakin’ up dretful quick:

“Thou shalt not steal.”

Says I, “Your church teaches, ‘thou _shalt_ steal.’ And you have to do it too, and you know it.”

Says he, “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighber.”

Says I, “Ask the unhappy Gentiles who have incurred the displeasure or aroused the cupidity of the Mormon church, whether the Mormon commandment, ‘Thou _shalt_ bear false witness against thy neighber,’ has not been followed, and followed, too, to the death.”

“Thou shalt not covet”—and he said over the hull on ’em—wife, property, and maidservant.

Says I, “Your church teaches thou shalt covet ’em, every one of ’em, and get ’em, too, the hull on ’em—wife, property, and maidservant, ’specially the maidservant.”

He quailed. And right there, while he was a quailin’, I spoke, and says coldly:

“Now, Elder Judas Wart, you have read off the commandments of God, one by one, and I have preached on ’em; now tell me, and tell me plain, which one do you lean on the hardest?”

Says he, “As it were—that is, you know—”

“No!” says I, with dignity, “I don’t know, nor you don’t, nuther.”

Says he, “I—that is—you—you are unreasonable, mum.” And he looked curious, and spit fiercely onto the stone hearth and the floor.

“I don’t mean to be,” says I. “I sot out in this talk with principles as hefty as I ever hefted in my life, and if I hain’t a good judge of the common heft of principles, nobody ever was. Why,” says I, “the rights and wrongs of my sect has for years been held nearer to my heart than any earthly object, exceptin’ my Josiah. And I can tell you, and tell you plain, that I have laid awake nights a thinkin’ over what my sect has endured a settin’ under that Mormon church. And daytimes I have sot a knittin’ and thought of the agonies of them female wimmen till there wuzn’t a dry eye in my head, and I couldn’t tell for my life whether I was a seamin’ or a knittin’ plain, or what I was a doin’. For of all the sufferin’s my sect has suffered from the hands of man, this doctrine of polygamy is the very crown, the crown of thorns. Other wrongs and woes have spilte earth for her time and agin, but this destroys her hope of heaven. When other sorrows and wrongs broke her heart, killed her, she could still look to the time when she could take the hand of Death, the Healer, and he would lead her into Repose, give her the peace earth had denied her. She could think that all her burdens of sorrows and wrongs would drop from her into the grave; and in that land where all tears are wiped away—that land of eternal beauty—of sweet consolation for the weary—she could find rest. But this last hope of the broken-hearted, your accursed doctrine has destroyed. Your infamous belief teaches that if a woman won’t do wrong, won’t submit to man’s tyrannical will on earth, commit sin for his sake, he won’t let her go to heaven! Good land!” says I, “it makes me sweat to think on’t.” And I wiped my forward on my apron.

Says he: “As it were, you know.”

“No, I don’t know it,” says I warmly. “Nor I never shall know it.”

Says he: “And so forth, and so on.”

He acted embarassed and skairt, and well he might. Why, the abomination of their doctrine is so abominable, that when it is presented to ’em in a eloquent, high-toned way by a woman who talks but little, but that little earnest and deep; when she places it before ’em in the axent she always handles when talkin’ on principle, and with the soarin’, deep look of her spectacles she always uses on them occasions—why, it is enough to skair anybody to death.

But in a moment or so he sort o’ rousted up, and says he:

“If you think so much of female wimmen as you say you do, I should think you would think about what the position of these plural wives would be if polygimy were abolished. What would they be thought of? What would they be?”

Says I, in awful tones: “What be they now?”

“Wall,” says he, “if they should be divorced they wouldn’t be looked upon as they are now.”

“No,” says I, “that is very true; they wouldn’t, not at all, not by me.”

Says he: “They would be looked down upon more.”

Says I, with dignity: “Stoppin’ sinnin’ hadn’t ort to make anybody thought less on,” says I. “That hain’t accordin’ to my creed or my skripter.”

Says he: “If they was divorced their situation would be very painful and humiliatin’.”

Says I, very dryly: “It is now, in my estimation.”

Says he: “Look at the position of the childern of these unions, that would be left fatherless. What a sad scene it would be; helpless infancy made a mark for contumely and sneers; babyhood blamed, scorned.”

Says I: “They wouldn’t be scorned, not by anybody whose scorn would be worth havin’. Nobody but a fool or a luny is in the habit of blamin’ folks for doin’ what they can’t help doin’, and bein’ what they can’t help bein’. Blame the childern! Why, good land!” says I, “I should jest as soon set out and scold a mornin’-glory or a white violet for the looks of the ground they sprung from. God’s own purity is writ in the clear eyes of babyhood, and in the blue heart of them mornin’-glories. Blossoms of light, mornin’-glories, springin’, God knows how or why, out of the black mould, out of darkness and decay. Who could look scoffin’ly or irreverently on ’em, or on them other blossoms of innocence, springin’ as mysteriously from as dark a soil, and touched by the hand of God with as pure and divine a beauty.”

“Unpractical, unpractical female, led away as females ever are by sympathies and views of right and wrong. Oh! thank Heaven! thank Heaven! such dangerous qualities are not incorporated into politics. I should tremble for the nation if it were so.”

And agin he looked fiercely at the stove-hearth.

“Unpractical female, what would become of the childern left, as it were, fatherless?”

Says I: “If the parents of the childern are rich enough, let ’em support ’em; and the poor ones—I know a man who will adopt the hull lot, and be glad of the chance,” says I proudly. “It is a uncle of mine, a uncle I am proud to own. Samuel is his name, and nobility and generosity is his nater.” Says I: “Let these childern and the wimmen, if necessary, be took care of by the government, and let the evil end with this generation.”

“But what would the position of these wimmen be in society; what would they be?”

“What be they _now_?” says I agin. And I snapped out that “now” considerable snappish, for I was gettin’ a good deal wore out with him. Says I: “You seem to think it would be the death-blow to their reputation to stop sinnin’, stop livin’ in wickedness; but there is where you and I differ. I should think as much agin of ’em.”

And says I: “If a evil is a goin’ to stop, it has got to begin to stop sometime, or else it won’t never get stopped. More of these unholy unions have taken place durin’ the past year than ever before in the same length of time. Powerful efforts are bein’ made to strengthen and extend the power of the system. And it must either be stopped, or else go on widening and spreading, and destroying this beautiful new world as it destroyed so many other strong, proud nations that were glorious in the past.” Says I: “Can I set still and see it go on, and can Josiah set still, and other female pardners, and other Josiahs, and not long to lift a hand to turn back this flood of woe and desolation?”

Here Josiah groaned aloud. He had his thoughts there on that lounge, though he lay middlin’ still. His thoughts goared him worse than that stitch did, ten times over. And I felt sorry for him, my feelin’s for him are such; and I brought his name in in a friendly way, just because my love for him was so strong, and I forgive him so.

Says I: “Elder Judas Wart, I won’t take you back to the old Jewish nations, round by Italy, Spain, and other roundabout ways, as I might do, and as some wimmen who are more talkative than I be probable would, and show you all the way the ruins of the nations ruined by this crime of polygimy. But I am a woman who says but little, but that little I mean, and I will merely hold up Turkey before you. And while I am holdin’ up that Turkey, I will merely mention the fact to you, that you and everybody else knows, and that Turkey knows it well, and if it should speak up and own the truth it would say that it was the effects of this system that made it so weak and impotent. Weaker as a nation than our old turkey-gobbler; fur weaker than a hen-turkey. (I make use of the gobbler as a poetical metafor, and would wish to be so understood.)

“Will not America and Josiahs heed these warnin’s?” says I, lookin’ right up at the ceilin’, in a rapped way. “Will they not listen to the voice of doom that rises from the ruins of other nations, glorious and proud and strong in the past, that has crumbled into ashes from the effects of this sin? Will they not,” I went on in a still more rapped, eloquent way, “will they not bend down their ears and hear the wail of warnin’ that seems to float along over the dust of the desert from old Babylon herself, warnin’ to this new, fresh, western world to escape this enervatin’, destroyin’ sin, and escape her doom? Will not America and Josiahs take warnin’ by the fate of these nations? or will they go on in careless merriment and feastin’, unheedin’ those terrible words ‘_mean! mean!_’ writ up in the blue vault above, till it is too late; till the land is given to the enimy; till weakness, ruin, and decay take the septer from Columbia’s tremblin’, shakin’ grasp, and rain over this once strong, lovely land.”

I sithed, I almost wept—I was so fearfully agitated—and says I: “If this threat’nin’ doom that threatens our beloved land is to be averted, if this evil is to be stopped, when is there a better time than the present to stop it in, now,” says I, wipin’ my eyes on my apron, “now, while America has got me to help her?” And agin I sithed, and agin I almost shed tears, and wept.

He see my agitation, and took advantage of it. Says he: “You seem to be tender-hearted, Josiah Allen’s wife, and to have a great affection for the female sect, and yet you don’t seem to think of the hearts that would be wrung by the agony of seperation. Why,” says he, “if they should part with their companions, they would be unhappy.”

Says I, lookin’ out of the open window, fur away over the tree-tops, over the blue lake beyond—and beyond—

My spectacles seemed to look very fur off. They had a very deep and sort o’ soarin’ look to ’em, somewhat happy, and somewhat sorrowful and solemn. And says I:

“I don’t know as there has any law ever been made, in Heaven or on earth, that we had got to be happy. There is a law made that we should do right, should not do evil, but not that we must be happy. Why, some paths we have to foller lead right away from happiness.” And says I, still lookin’ fur off, in that same sort of a solemn, deep way:

“That path always leads to something better, more beautiful, more divine.”

“What can be better than happiness?” says he, in a enquirin’ way.

“Blessedness!” says I. “The two hain’t to be compared no more than a flower growin’ out of earthly soil is to be compared to one springin’ up in the valleys of God. One is lit with earth’s sun, and the other is shinin’ with Heaven’s own light. One is mortal, the other immortal.”

Says he, still follerin’ up his old theme, still tryin’ to head me off in some way:

“Wouldn’t you be sorry for these females, Josiah Allen’s wife?”

Says I firmly: “If they suffered from the wrenchin’ away of old ties, I should be sorry for ’em to that extent that there wouldn’t be a sithe left in my breast, nor a dry eye in my head. At the same time, if they made the sacrifice willin’ly, from a sense of duty, for the ransom of their people, for the deliverance of the land from peril, my very soul would kneel in reverence to them, and they should be honored by all as those who come out of great tribulations.