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Show Wherein Is the Difference? i The Xcils, in its issue of Saturday j evening, attempts to distinguish between j the conduct of John Taylor and that of John Sharp relative to the Edmunds law, to the disparagement of the latter. To quote: "President Tavlor, while asserting assert-ing that ho obeyed-the law as he understood under-stood it, boldly asserted in addition that he never would, rcnounco his wives, but would continue to acknowledge them in j that relation." How did Taylor understand the iaw?i How did he obey it? He sent all his j alleged wives but bno to live separate and I apart from him. He said that his under-1 standing of the law from the first required this, and ho complied witn it. inat was all the law required, as interpreted by him or by the courts. To add that "he never would renounce his wives, but would continue to acknowledge them in that relation," is sheer buncombe and ; humbug. John Taylor is at liberty to j parade the streets of Salt Lake every day carrying his banner bearing the inscription, inscrip-tion, "I have six wives but I live with only one" if he chooses, and the only court that would interfere with him for so doing is the Police Court. He knows it, and the News ought to know it, if it doesn't. If he has kept good his declarations declara-tions as to his observance of the Edmunds Law, he has no need to flee prosecution under it, and I venture to say that if his conscience was as clear of guilt under the law against polygamy as that against cohabiting co-habiting he would not be a fugitive from justice. ... ' Has Bishop Sharp said he would renounce re-nounce his wives or refuse to acknowledge acknowl-edge them or his children ? On the contrary, con-trary, having first acknowledged his amenability to the laws of the country, he explicitly and expressly avows his marital mari-tal and parental relationship. The News is dishonest in its . dealing with either John Taylor on the one hand, or Mr. Arnold and Bishop Sharp on the other. If Taylor is justified in ceasing to live with more than one woman as a wife in obedience to the law, so are Arnold and Sharp. To justify and excuse in Taylor that course of conduct which is Arnold and Sharp is condemned and reprobated, is not only unjuBt and dishonest, dis-honest, but if prompted by the apparent motive of flattering the most powerful, is sneaking hypocrisy. But this theory doesn't cover the entire case. Cannon and Mnsser, so far as matters of conscience are concerned, could just as well have pledged themselves them-selves to . live apart from all wives but one, and stand at large as not. They went to the Penitentiary from policv and not principle, to make capital for themselves them-selves and other Church leaders. They went in obedience to counsel (it. is to be presumed), to reserve- stock-in-trade to keep good the quarrel between "Mormons" "Mor-mons" and the rest of the world ; to keep intact Mormon crankiness. John Taylor having secured hiB own safety by obedience obedi-ence to the laws, was perfectly willing, by proxy, to suffer martyrdom in the persons of others however high, numerous or beloved. The Church, thereby, was persecuted, made compact nd. strong. Even the News isn't so blind as not to know that if Taylor had been genuine and true to any high principle, prin-ciple, been gold instead of tinsel, he could, by a manly avowal of a higher law, "and by a manly defense of it, in court, as well as elsewhere, have done much to redeem the creed and system sys-tem from contempt. Had he even lost life, in such a defense of a worthy cause, his fate would be enviable. . Rut the cause is unworthy the sacrifice of any man, and this man is not for sacrifice in anv cause. Doubtless, noble causes ennoble their advocates and adherents, and ignoble causes have an opposite effect. If there is in this system of Mormonism, a singlo feature that is both new and valuable, it ought to be clearly pointed out, so it can be recognized. T. |