_August 28th._
MY DEAR MR. BONNER: Are you not a censor of all your contributors? Do
you not read cautiously all matter sent to the _Ledger_, to prevent
the entrance thereinto of any injurious sentiments? And yet you have
allowed _blasphemy_ in your columns? You have! Or else the _Christian
Intelligencer_, the Dutch Reformed religious journal of New York, by
one of its contributors, is greatly mistaken. An article appears there
signed “Puritan,” and entitled “Veiled Profanity.” It begins with an
extract from an article of one of your contributors:—
“Henry Ward Beecher says, ‘The only way to exterminate the
Canada thistle is to plant it for a crop, and propose to
make money out of it. Then worms will gnaw it, bugs will
bite it, beetles will bore it, aphides will suck it, birds
will peck it, heat will scorch it, rains will drown it, and
mildew and blight will cover it.’”
And now guess, if you can, what harm lies couched in these words. Put
on your spectacles. Nothing wrong, do you say? O, but there is! _You_,
a Scotch-Irish Presbyterian, and can’t see heresy! Fie, for shame, to
be beaten by a Dutchman! Now, let our _Intelligencer’s_ man express
himself. The italics are his, not mine:—
“These bugs, beetles, aphides, heat, rain, and mildew are
the messengers of God. If they are sent, they _are on an
errand for God_! Now, if the above extract has a point, it
is that when mankind plant a crop of any kind of grain or
seed, _God_ takes _a malicious pleasure in defeating such
schemes_.”
This is exquisite! If mildew attacks my grape-vines, _it is on an
errand for God_, and if I sprinkle it with sulphur as a remedy, I put
brimstone into the very face of God’s messenger! When it _rains_—is
not rain, too, God’s messenger?—does “Puritan” dare to open a
blasphemous umbrella, and push it up in the very face of this divine
messenger? When a child is attacked by one of “God’s messengers”—measles,
canker-rash, dysentery, scarlet-fever—would it be a very great sin to
send for a doctor on purpose that he might resist these divine
messengers? There are insects which attack men, against one of which
we set up combs, and against another sulphur. “Nay,” says Puritan. “If
they are sent, _they are on an errand for God_.”
“Puritan” goes on:—
“Such a sentiment is far deeper in its tone than a mere
_murmur_. Especially as Mr. Beecher’s farm at Fishkill is
well known to be cultivated with reference to making money.”
Yes, we confess it. A “murmur” very imperfectly expresses our feelings
as we dig at a Canada thistle, or squirt whale-oil soapsuds over a
myriad of “Puritan’s” divine messengers, called aphides. A _grumble_
would not be too strong a word to use on such occasions. Nay, the
reverend gentleman has been known to say, in a paroxysm of
horticultural impiety, “I wish every rose-bug on the place was dead!”
which must seem to “Puritan” a piece of horrible depravity.
I did not before know that I had a farm in _Fishkill_. My experience
with the farm at Peekskill, “which is well known to be cultivated with
reference to making money,” is such, that if it be true that I own
another farm at Fishkill, I shall consider myself on the straight road
to the poor-house!