Show THE PRESS AND PROFESSOR ELIOT THE press comments on prof eliote address in the salt lake tabernacle prove to be very interesting reading so BO we calp a few more of them today the boston home journal has a number of curt paragraphs among which are these what better example la in wanted of the intolerance of today than the reception which has been given to president eliote remarks before the abe mormons cormons at salt lake city a few days ago what he be said in effect was that the mormons cormons had a right to worship god after their own belief and that lie honored honorea them for maintaining their opinions in the face of opposition and starting out as the pilgrim fathers did to make a home for themselves where they could live in their own belief what does the press do today the press which is supposed to be the representation sen tation of the most advanced thought it scores president eliot because he sanctions religious freedom for a 1 persecuted sect it in ia not a question whether they are right or not it is a question as to whether they shall have a right to believe what tufey think arti ink and the question of polygamy is entirely another matter J the albany N Y express thus endorses prof eliot aliota ls speech the mormons cormons have fully and sincerely abandoned polygamy that was all in their religion which violates the law and since they have abandoned it they should be placed upon the same footing as other faiths polygamy is no more an issue in utah today than is the bloody shirt in national politics president eliote views are sound 11 07 this ift an extract from an editorial in the lwell mass citizen aren 49 f the salt lake tribune and the small army of quid nunce which it has raised up will bardl hardly be able to convince the country that president president eliot of harvard college is by nature a mormon or that any sudden conversion has led him to adopt the faith of the latter day saints it at it cannot be accepted as an authentic on any evidence at hand that mr eliot has commended mormonism to any greater degree than that called for by the exercise of that liberality of religious views for which he and his institution of learning have always stood and it cannot be held credible that he has chosen a time to embrace the mormon faith when mrs eliot Elio was sitting before him in theau the audience dien ceas as she sat during the meeting at the tabernacle in salt lake city there are some things that are absurd upon their faces that president eliot has bas done the thing of which he is accused is one of them star sayings a popular paper pub dished in kat louis thus closes an editorial 1 on the question president eliot bases his bis views on what he conceives to be the honest intentions of the mormons cormons in this thin direction with fine optimism he brushes aside the possibility of a lapse into former practices once the mormons cormons have all their political olit leal disabilities removed he believes dieves there can be no religious liberty in the fie united states in the complete sense of me term so long as the reformed status of the mormons cormons is singled out for special legislative correction from these conclusions there are no reasonable grounds of appeal the time has come when that remarkable comma community who with a zeal for a partly mis taken faith caused the desert to bloom and whose labors to a large extent made western territorial development possible shall be taken into full social political and religious companionship and there is no doubt that the special plea made by the president of the foremost institution of learning in the new world will go far toward realizing that great object the boston has bag these courageous editorial sentence however much the masses manses of people who think in grooves cry out against simcha such a wrench to their pre prepossession possessions however indiscreet mr elious language really was waa from the worldly standpoint such an act of a courageous m man an is lost 1081 it ic brings things forward to their issue bemuse because president eliot has spoken out oat the truth as he sees it about the good there is in mormonism niam else they were monsters and not men everybody is in bound to read and think about these people and their relations to the rest of our country in a very different way mr eliot believes that polygamy is no longer to be reckoned with as formerly and he dares say so of course there will be do doubters pate rs to declare that the mormons cormons are fo foxy Y and if they once get a star for utah on the flag of the union we shall find that we have admitted a state that intends to permit polygamy after all that is certainly j judging human nature by its lowest qualities qualifies rather than by its power of rising to cope with responsibility it is not likely that educated young mor mons are going to belittle their own future in any such way and the leaven of education is making itself felt in the territories ri its power was never better shown than when a man like president eliot exemplifying the toleration and the foresight and the wisdom of broad cul opre said that the mormons cormons have the same right to freedom of thought that is accorded the roman catholics and the jews and the methodists he might have added and the quakers and the giai aai ta tariana rians freedom of thought is not licence of action the recognition of the good is by no means praise of the evil mr eliote action will prove to be its own best defense in its educational result upon the young men of utah this to is an excerpt from an editorial in the brooklyn N Y times the mormons cormons Mor mons like all other sects which claim to be actuated by religious inspiration have been entitled to the benefit of a certain element of doubt an a to the validity of their claims to religious justification and at the present da his sect professes and is generally belled bel iWed to have wholly abandoned polygamy meanwhile the sect has founded one of the most admirable communities in the united states salt lake city has been repeatedly called a model city in its civlo civic uon its municipal management its cleanliness order and respect for those elements of the social code which every other large city in the united states more or lose less flagrantly violates president eliot comes among these modern mormons cormons Mor mons recalls their struggles in the face of the most bitter opposition ever directed against a religious sect in this countr country y and tacitly assuming that polygamy is as at an end encourages the continuance of the batile battle for the ideal of absolute civil and religious equality if president eliot committed an error it was in too great a candor this is not yet a world in which a man may speak the whole truth aruth the free statement of certain truths is likely to bring about revolutions and revolutions are uncomfortable for table this is because truths do not always appear for what they actually are and until a truth can be understood it should not be stated to ears that cannot understand president eliot is at the head bead of a conservative institution and he him haa unquestionably committed a radical error error of saying things that are seriously open to diverse interpretation the assumption contained in the things he did not say to his mormon audience will not save him from dangerous misinterpretation in the popular mind he will not be forgiven for seeming to justify all that I 1 is implied in the odious word mormonism the cambridge maw mase post port after the matter length arrives arrive at this conclusion one can respect a peoples devotion to an idea without approving the idea there la Is a good deal of humbug about this pother over eliote speech it comes with an ill grace from a people forever prating about freo free speech it A smacks of the days when phillips and garrison were mobbed in boston in the cause of slavery the boston commonwealth thus briefly dismisses the controversy re reports al orts ofa of a recent address by president eliot biot in the mormon taber tabernacle naele at salt lake city have just reached boston and the sensational press is engaged in an attempt to make it appear that mr eliote praise of religious toleration was intended to imply approval of polygamy it to is not a very dull season for news but the suggestion that the president of harvard college has embraced mormonism I 1 is perhaps the liveliest absurdity yet brought forth |