ELDORADO 83 



dians, living upon roots and insects, and made it a 

 modern state, blessed with all the institutions of civili- 

 zation. 



President Eliot, of Harvard College, speaking in 

 the Mormon tabernacle, likened the INIormon migra- 

 tions to those of the Pilgrim Fathers. For this he was 

 i^rcatly abused by those of other sects. But it would 

 seem that the comparison was not unjust to either 

 Mormons or Pilgrims. The Puritans carried civiliza- 

 tion to the ''rock-bound coast" of Massachusetts. The 

 Mormons carried civilization across an unknown 

 wilderness to a barren, sage-brush desert, and estab- 

 lished it there. Granted that the Mormons were cruel 

 and unjust in many instances ; the Puritans burned and 

 hung witches, and beat and otherwise cruelly treated 

 innocent women, to satisfy a brutal superstition. Both 

 Puritan and Mormon only followed the example and 

 teaching of religious fanaticism of all ages, a travestv 

 on the pure and loving precepts of Jesus, that brought 

 to earth the new commandment that "ye love one 

 another." The world for a thousand years was ruled 

 by the cruel, iron hand of ecclesiastical despotism 

 more destructive than war or pestilence. The Mor- 

 mons, as was done in the dark ages, attempted to es- 

 tablish a theocratic government where the church 

 should dominate the civil power, and this has always 

 resulted in the destruction of human rights and free- 

 dom of conscience. 



Tt was the purpose of the president of the Mormon 

 church to be absolved from all allegiance to the United 

 States, and to establish a religious oligarchy inde- 

 j^endent of any civil government, to be known as the 

 state of "Deseret." It was at that time Mexican terri- 



