CHAP. XXIII.] STEPHANISTS AND MORMONS. 51 



emigrants, she had engaged herself as stewardess in several ves 

 sels, and at length in the Amaranth. &quot; But what became of 

 Stephan ?&quot; asked my wife. &quot; He escaped entirely,&quot; she said, 

 &quot; for you know, madam, there is no law in this country as there 

 i-s in Saxony ; but for all that, this is the land for the poor to 

 thrive in. They pay me twenty dollars a month, and I am sav 

 ing money fast ; for, though home-sick, I can not, after all my 

 follies, return and throw myself penniless on my relations.&quot; Here 

 she began to shed tears and to be much affected, wondering 

 whether her mother was still alive. She had written to ask her 

 forgiveness, as she had been her darling, and in spite of her pray 

 ers and entreaties had left her almost heart-broken. &quot; I thought 

 it my duty to go ; for how should we poor peasants not be de 

 ceived when so many of our clergy were led astray by the cun 

 ning of that artful man ? I have written to my two sisters to 

 tell them how bitterly I repent, and to ask them to pardon me.&quot; 



When I afterward talked of this adventure in a steamer on 

 the Mississippi, a fellow traveler exclaimed, &quot; But would you be 

 lieve it, there are still many Stephanists ?&quot; &quot; Why not,&quot; said I, 

 &quot; are there not also many thousand Mormons ? The fraud of 

 Stephan was not more transparent than that of Joseph Smith or 

 his vision, and the story he related so circumstantially of records 

 engraven on metallic plates, shining like gold, which were deliv 

 ered to him by the angel of the Lord on the 22d day of Septem 

 ber, 1827.&quot; 



Are we then to despair of the progress of the human mind in 

 inquiries in which it must ever take the deepest interest, because 

 in a land where there are so many schools, and so many millions 

 of readers, a free press, and religious toleration, it is so hard to 

 extinguish a belief in the grossest impostures ? By no means 

 in the doctrines taught by Stephan and Smith there was a mix 

 ture of some fiction with much truth; they adopted nearly all 

 the highest truths of theology common to the prevailing religions 

 of the world, with the addition of nearly all which Christians be 

 lieve. In each sect the difficulty consists in clearing away a 

 greater or less amount of human error and invention from the di 

 vine truths which they obscure or conceal. The multitude are 



