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    880 THE LE AD E B. [No ^ 390, September ...

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    THE MORMONS. The Mormon delusion ia a wo...

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  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

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    The Civil Government Of India. The East ...

    Court of Directors . What , then , is the Court of Directors ? It is a body formed of qualified holders of stock , partially elected by the proprietary , and partially nominated by the Crown . The Manchester party , or any other set of sincere politicians , might , if so disposed , obtain a powerful voice in the government of India by purchasing East India stock and returning their own nominees to the Court . The Directors exert a large influence over the patronage of the

    Three Presidencies ; but , acting with them , is that peculiar institution , the Board of Control , composed of a President and two Secretaries sitting in parliament , in addition to the Secret Committee , consisting of the Chairman , Deputy Chairman , and Senior Members of the Court ; and with this triple machinery is carried on the administration of our vast Asiatic territories . ! N ~ , such a system , if ably worked , might not be superseded for another hundred years ; it might be

    perpetuated on the plea that its pi'actical results have been good ; but , unhappily , the tendency of institutions is to decay , and we have at the head of the East India Company Mr . Boss DoNEiiiiT Maggies , and at the head of the Board of Control Mr . Vernoit Smith . "When matters go wrong , Mr . Matt-Gxes passes the reproach to Mr . Smith ; Mr . Smith would be glad to make a scapegoat of Mr . Maisgxes ; but , as that is out of the question , they confabulate and strike out

    small schemes which , they assure tlie country , cannot fail to remedy existing defects . It is said that to Lord Ijausdowne we owe Mr . Vjbsbkon Smith , who , as his friends say , could govern India 'if he were able . ' We wonder what his Secretary , Sir Geokqe Cla-ek , thinks on tbat point . All we can tell is , that wherever the name of the yellow-gloved satrap is mentioned , you hear at once of ' the most incapable man who ever sat at the head of the Board of Control '

    The Court of Directors is distributed into judicial , financial , political , and military committees . These little conclaves deliberate and make known their decisions to the chairmen . The chairmen ruminate tliem and make a communication to the President of the Board of Control . But how are the discussions of tlie Directors carried on ? Not in debates , bub by means of papers and minutes , penned by each , and copied by clerics ; for at the weekly and extraordinary courts , the votes given are almost invariably silent . The matter is then referred to Mr . Vernon

    Smith , and that gentleman is expected to pronounce judgments affecting the destinies of our splendid Eastern empire . Perhaps it is not his fault that he is feebly ; hut if he were only modest , the Government of India might be considerably improved . Mr . Veunon Smith however , ia not a diffident man . He has a thiriat for distinguishing himself , and has generally imagined that to treat with contempt the opinions of the Court of Directors is to " behave like a statesman . This , however , lias

    been the habitual policy of presidents of the Board of Control . They have almost always set themselves xip in opposition to the East India Company . The Earl of Rijon was wiser , but it is well known to many persons that , when a gentleman once called on him for an opinion , ho confessed he was incapable of giving it . He made LordEoxENBonovan his oracle , and Lord EiiLENBOitouGH was the very

    Governor-General who was recalled by the Court of Directors on account of his insolent and overbearing despatches to their chairman . That such squabbles have gone on for years unnoticed by the public , is a Bignal illustration of the radical defect underl ying our Indian system—irresponsible authority . Civil and politinl errors aro committed—the Court of Directors offer to j ) rovo that their counsels

    "have been set aside by the Board of Control ; the Board of Control retorts upon the Company , and indefinite responsibility becomes no responsibility at all .- Especially , we repeat , when the Court is headed by Mr . Mangles , notoriously unfit as he is for any public position , and the Board by Mr . Smith , whowhatever may be his other capacities , is un ,

    fitted to govern India . Both these gentlemen have had pressed upon them , repeatedly , the necessity of an improved administration of jus tice , in Bengal especially , of "better securities for life and property , of establishing a plan for protecting all classes of the population , and of exempting the proprietors and labourers from excessive taxation . What have

    they done ? How have they met these claims ? They have talked , and evaded , and wasted time , and they have done nothing more . They were told , upon entering their respective offices , that more magistrates were wanted in Bengal , that there was but one European magistrate to half a million of the population . They did nothing—they did not even inquire .

    The truth is , India has been governed by apathy . The gentlemen in power have not realized the sense of their responsibilities . When tlie young Englishman arrives in Calcutta , what are his earliest cares ? To wipe out the marks of griffinage . He avoids the sunshine ; he travels in a palk ; he ia punkaed and tattied : he has his

    sirdarbearer , hitmutgar and khansaman ; one servant to carry his pipe , a second for his bottle , a third for his umbrella ; he is like a young cavalry soldier , whose aim it is to ride well , not to study the art of war . "Wear off your griffinage and you are fit for Anglo-Indian society—which is the whole duty of th » civilian- So with a President of the Board

    of Control ; he is ' the Bight Honourable ;' he must talk in Parliament of ' two hundred millions of souls ; ' but , if he should happen to be Mr . Verstok Smith , he will stand stupidly gazing , while a tempest gathers , and while the system of which he is the head sinks into dust and destruction . The incompetency of our public men is the key to the lute disasters ; but there are innumerable details connected with the civil government of India which it will be necessary to examine . We have preferred , at the outset , to deal only with the initials of the subject .

    880 The Le Ad E B. [No ^ 390, September ...

    880 THE LE AD E B . [ No ^ 390 , September 12 , 1857 .

    The Mormons. The Mormon Delusion Ia A Wo...

    THE MORMONS . The Mormon delusion ia a wonder only to those who do not see how many parallels it has had , and still has ; it is a mystery only to those who are too idle to look into the most obvious and common causes . It might be a profitable lesson to us , if we could acquire the capacity of reading it . No doubt it is ridiculous enough , save to those who suffer from it , aud are about to suffer worse ; but we have had close counterparts in different

    places and times ; some not far from our own . Johanna Sou j ? ii cote waa followed by many believers , and , notwithstanding the failure of her announcements , and her own disappearance from the scene , she still has believers . Jojo Smith was a very uneducated man , but so was Thom of Canterbury , who , as Sir William Covhtenay , became a prophet to tho peasants of Kent . The cloaest parallel , perhaps , ia that furnished by tho mission oi

    Miwomet , which wub , and ia , so eminently successful . The poor camel-driver struck out a new faith suited to those who became liia followers , aud met a decided ' want of the day ' by tho appropriate * supply . ' Ho baaed his now invention upon a religion already existing ; for tlio Mahometans , like tlie Mormons , nro professedly a sect of C hristians , who , in common with the followers of

    Johanna Sottthcote , believe in Christianity and something more . Mahomet , an . uneducated man , produced the Koran , which i 8 considered to be his one miracle ; the miracle of the mountain being a failure . In like manner Job Smith has produced the Booh of Mormon , and by the help of his followers he has also produced a variety of miracle s , though strangely enough ., he could not work a miracle in his own behalf , and pass scathless amid the bullets of his pursuers .

    That which constitutes the wonder for us is , thatMormonism is a religion manufactured in the presence of civilization ; as the French say , we ' assist' at its manufacture , and perfectly understand its history while it is developing itself . Born at the very headquarters of Yankee-land , Joe Smith has all the ingenuity and energy of a Northern man . He did not , as some are still doing , go into any branch of ordinary commerce ; he did not set up an Ohio Trust Company , or a bubble railway company ; but he struck oat another joint-stock enterprise , which has

    proved to be quite as successful , and much more enduring , than many other schemes in New York . There was no great originality in his plan of action . He ' saw visions ; ' he heard a voice call him into a wood ; a great light came upon him ; and he had the honour of an interview with two persons , one sitting on the right hand of the other , who gave him direct and specific instructions as to his mode of action . He found a cyst , or box , containing metal plates , inscribed with hieroglyphieal characters ; he copied or burlesqued these in some more voluminous form on paper or parchment ; and an original of the book of Mormon was exhibited to a learned

    gentleman . It proved to consist of some ancient characters more or less closely copied , with Ifcoman characters laid down on their backs or sides , as may be seen sometimes in bad printing ; with other fanciful marks . The characters were ranged like those of some Oriental languages , in lines from top to bottom . Subsequently Smith produced his own translation' of this mystic book , wliereof a few brazen or paper leaves only liare been seen by others . In the meanwhile he had procured ' witnesses' of these various stages—persons who attested to the accuracy of his statements on oath . This is certainly

    stronger evidence than some religions can boast . Many a prophet has neglected to procure for us an affidavit duly attested before competent magistrates by respectable people . Besides the brazen leaves , visions , and other waifs . and strays , Job Smith seems to have found an unknown fiction , by a Mr . Solomon Spaui / ding , a person who once lived ia an obscure part of the State of New York , had alternated commerce and literature , and had

    amused the ] eisure moments of what seems to have been an unsuccessful life in composing rather a dull romance which represented the origin of the indigenous inhabitants ot the United States . This book we have not seen ; it appears in some degree to resemble the original machinery which introduces the Peruvian Tales . It waa , however , only the basis upon which Smith constructed his volume—only the coarse canvaa upon which hia embroidery waa worked ; for the sacred volume beara the most manifest traoes ot Smith's own writing , in ludicroua faults ot grammar . The first conference of tho sect waa hold at Fayette in 1830— about ten years after Smith had begun hia mission . Ho then looked out for the site of a ' Now Jerusalem , ' and , with considerable following , arrived at a p l »« e m Jackson county , Missouri , which became tho land of 7 Aon . Ho returned and preached in the United States , beating up recruits exactly aa hia followers aro doing now . *

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 12, 1857, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_12091857/page/16/