C11A^GE OF SEASONS AND OF THE TIMES. 289 



comes on, or as crime increases with learning among 

 the lower orders of the present clay, or schism 

 and dissent from orthodox doctrine increase pre- 

 cisely with the increase of the churches erected for 

 the so-called established religion. 



If false doctrine, heresy, and schism cannot ^^ 

 be gagged or prevented, — if we are to support 

 self-styled Liberal Governments, who lust for dis- 

 ruption and office, and care not for the Consti- 

 tution, who court the murderer, as in Ireland, 

 and set tlie Fenian and traitor free, with punish- 

 ment cravenly commuted, — why, then, if such a . 

 course of communism were permitted to continue, 

 there would be ^' a political aspect in the times" 

 both marked in its changes and in its ruinous 

 results too terrible for calm contemjjlation. ^^ . 



In all the action of the visible world, from the 

 lightning above to the increase of crimes below, 

 there is a change going on. Every thunder-storm 

 has become more or less fatal to living things, and 

 trees are oftener struck by tlie electric fluid than 

 they used to be. So rare were the accidents at 

 one time, that they were alluded to as facts for 

 wonder ; now, we only wonder if a tlnmder- 

 storm lias burst without a consequent loss of life. 



VOL. II. U 



