Anti-Syllabus and Tom Strang Killed/Anti-Syllabus
ANTI-SYLLABUS.
ADAPTED FROM DR. HERMANN KRASSER,
BY
LILY CURRY.
Mortals dwelt in earthly precincts ere a Paradise was known,
Ere the Bible was imagined, ere the Maker's mighty hand—
In the legendary fashion—heaven and earth and humans planned.
If the story be authentic, as each circumstance relates,
Man's terrestrial existence his creation antedates,
And the earth in cloudy orbit many thousand years had rolled
Ere the Lord, perceiving needful, manufactured and controlled.
Ere from off the tree o£ knowledge Adam rashly plucked and ate,
Ne'er had whisper of Jehovah pierced humanity's estate;
Were there princes then or clergy, not as now were such attired
In the image of Jehovah, or at His decree inspired.
Though perchance 'twere needless wholly—never bee-hive but must own
'Mongst its complement of toilers many an estimable drone—
Human numbers pray consider, where one soul in bondage sore
Turns to pack-horse for the service of a lazy, lumpish score.
Think of artisan and farmer forced to slave like merest tools
To contribute to the glory of aristocratic fools!
Think how standing armies flourish, horse and foot an idle crew,
Which society must nourish and maintain with honors due;
Think of monks with cross and sackcloth, who to God's eternal praise
Barter bloody sweat for manna to the limit of their days;
Think of speculating schemers, greedy capital in mass,
Think of wife and helpless children, and of serving folks, alas!
For whose keeping strives the toiler, though his lot be anguish-fraught,
Plodding on in Christian silence till to verge of madness brought,
Forced beside to fatten loafers, cheats and ne'er-do-well recruits,
Beggars, vagabonds and swindlers, highway robbers, murderous brutes;
Since the honest man's endeavor builds for every slothful wight
Prison, hospital and refuge—most humane and goodly sight!—
Whilst his own forlorn condition unbefriended still may go
Till himself has sunk to thieving, overpowered by want and woe.
Human Nature's conformation, back as far as Olaf's days:
Some to strive and strain forever, knowing naught of brighter ways,
Others shirking, arrant sluggards, save when sheerly hunger driven,
Then upon the toilers' earnings graceless-hearted these have thriven.
If perchance these airy loafers, brutal force the mastery gave,
High they soared as sovereign rulers, made the laborer but a slave;
Or, if haply they were weaker, strove through cunning and deceit—
In a fashion also modern—industry to gull and cheat,
Planting in the human bosom, sophist-wise with oily word
Seeds of supernatural folly, fabrications most absurd,
Bearing witness to the value of a mystic rigmarole,
Pap of phrases mixed and seasoned for the welfare of the soul.
Thus arrayed, the dual forces, like a mighty regiment,
Charged upon the weak opposers, careless of divine assent,
Potentates and hierarchies, unsustained by heavenly grace,
At their pleasure domineering o'er the feebler of the race.
And the darkness of the ages, ere the embryotic time
Of the old mosaic legend, swept and shadowed every clime.
Never any season fouler than the days of shameful mirth
When in Biblical tradition—came the deluge on the earth.
Where the heaven-chosen leaders sinned so grievously and long
That the Lord in righteous anger drowned them with the rabble throng.
Lo, the years by thousands vanished, till the past becomes the now,
And, as ever groans the farmer in the furrows of his plow,
And the toiler of the city, striving madly as he may,
Sees his famished wife and children growing gaunter day by day!
Shunned and driven forth forever by the haughty "upper class,"
Stung with insult and derision, hooted by the vulgar mass,
So the suffering one must wander through the paradise of earth,
Hopeless-hearted and despairing of his manhood's real worth;
Though for others life be laughter, freedom-buoyant, fortune-sweet,
Unbefriended on his journey he must plod with weary feet,
Blind to feasting or rejoicing, deaf to merriment or song,
E'en denied the birthright blessings which to all alike belong.
Speak the measure of his sinning, since like plague-corrupting sheep
Sorely stricken from the presence of his brethren he must creep.
Brethren who, in sluggard folly propped on pedigree, deduce
That the best of earth was fashioned for aristocratic use,
Aye, who revel in the product of their fathers' thievish art,
Though it shine bedewed with blood-drops from the toiler's bursting heart;
Or attain to might and honor, held for kinship's sake in place
By some pompous dignitary bare of dignity or grace.
Speak, O rich and prosperous mortal: is the laborer's crime so grave.
That the woman he would cherish, tarnished must become your slave?
Strange abyss 'twixt man and master,—scorn the servant from your height,
Yet regard his wife and daughters none too vile for your delight!
Shining bribe and luring promise with a lavish hand bestow,—
In the dwellings of the humble to achieve an endless woe!
Priestly celibates and masses sinning early, sinning late,
Who shall wonder at the foulness of the world's debased estate?
Would you crush the wretched victim who in fear and trembling stands
Sacrificed to meet the measure of your infamous demands?
Hath he not behind his masking—weary brow and drooping glance,—
Some degree of human reason—shadow of intelligence?
'Neath his garments' soil and tatters bears he not a manly heart,
Throbbing day by day, and longing to embrace the better part?
Ah, your own long since confessed it, and perchance compassion pleads
An array of schools and churches to accommodate his needs.
Would you rescue and uplift him? Contemplate in earnest mood,
And deny him not the age's all-ennobling spirit food.
Let the blaze of truth and knowledge stream upon his joyless mind,
Till a soul awake and blossom in the garden of mankind;
Fling aside the holy legends handed down from ancient times,
Where the chosen left a history of their lollies and their crimes!
Life has need of other teachings, calls for comprehension vast,
That the spirit mount forever from the darkness of the past.
If the great Creator's mandate on the second day made bright
What was hitherto but chaos,—fired the universe with light,—
If the fourth morn saw discovered sun and moon and starry way,
To make radiant earth and ether, and to sever night from day;
If Jehovah, the All-powerful, was obliged to pause and rest
From the week's severe exertion, as the chronicles attest,
If a human clod was mated with a rib from out his side,
Then, because he ate an apple, doomed to wander far and wide,—
If created in God's image—one—the first-born of the race
Turned a fratricidal monster in that fair and heavenly place,—
If the records of succession be a veritable guide,
How, like patient brutes they wandered, found their homes, begat and died;
If, with blade made keen and fearful, Abraham had nigh begun
To atone for numerous sinnings by the slaughter of his son,—
If with wine his zealous daughters plied the patriarchal Lot
To insure the perpetration of their strange, incestuous plot,—
If the ever-famous lyrics of King Solomon, the wise,
Stain the whiteness of the pages that their music glorifies:
If the wayside tree was grafted—Absalom-wise, with human fruit,—
If the Jews' amazing thievery 'twere laborious to compute,
Ere from Egypt they departed, following Moses and his staff
In the safety of the desert to adore a golden calf,—
If Jehovah, God of justice, overwhelmed relentlessly
Pharaoh's swift pursuing forces with the roaring of the sea,—
If the gay Philistines perished by the jawbone Samson held,
If Rebecca's instigations actually her son impelled
To deceive his aged father, helpless, long bereft of sight,
Thus to steal away the blessing that was patient Esau's right,—
If Jehovah to reward him for the knavery, marked him well
Future head and source prolific of his people Israel,—
If the swallow and Tobias be a credence-worthy tale,
Or if Jonah undigested roamed the stomach of the whale,—
If the virgin mild and holy in her yet unwedded state,
Having borne the infant Jesus, still remained immaculate,—
If she tinned as custom ordered, and the Bible law recites,
If the Saviour's intercession so blots out our every sin,
That the Inquisition demons highest heaven have entered in,—
If the story be a true one of the earliest wonder sign,
Where the tipsy Jews were gladdened at the "water turned to wine,—
If the touching of the eyelids with the spittle-moistened clay
Brought a being born to blindness, swift the glory of the day,—
If the devils fled in terror, subject to a will divine,
From the ever-quivering bodies of the long-tormented swine,—
If the woman who had suffered a decade of years and more,
Swift was healed at merest touching of the robe the Saviour wore,—
If the ancient Nicodemus with his subtle acumen
Turned obedient at Christ's bidding, eager to be born again,—
If our children be instructed as concerning these events,
Till they comprehend and master all stupendous incidents,—
If these adamitic methods of enlightenment conspire
To uplift them to the heavens or to sink them in the mire,—
Nay, but own it, ye believers, leaning from your high estate,
Ours a superhuman patience to endure and tolerate!
Lo, the stupid faith demanded in the shadow of the past,
From beclouding human reason needs must disappear at last!
Oh, unspeakable the havoc that the earlier teachings wrought,
Crucifying heart and spirit, blighting every bud of thought!
For the soul that groped in darkness and their monstrous tales believed
Was forever dwarfed and crippled by the lessons it received,—
Aye, beset with sore affliction, since forbidden to progress,
Life and intellect were wasted in a struggle profitless!
Would you risk the certain evil that such foldarol imparts
To pollute the pure condition of our children's minds and hearts?
E'en to-day, when knowledge, rising and rejoicing in Its might,
Bears a wealth of bloom and fruitage for continuous soul delight!
Aye, to-day, when theologians by their fettering creeds oppressed,
Through the joyous halls of culture walk unseeing and unblessed!
And the earnest man, the toiler, hidden in the blinding maze
Of the struggle for existence, sinks to proletarian ways,
Out with cabalistic fancies, nightly visions of the past:
Give us human institutions for the human family vast!
Mourn our predecessors' errors, who, enslaved and falsely taught,
To the great and glorious dawning of the future gave no thought,
Who, by nature truly noble, bowed 'neath many a grievous woe,
Or, for Truth's dear sake, if needful, gladly unto death would go.
Oh, the depth of their rejoicing, could they witness our delight!
Oh, the pity they would lavish on the Past's unhappy plight!
If but Socrates and Jesus once again should walk the earth
And perceive athwart the darkness morning's sweet and marvelous birth,
With what prescient exultation they would comprehend and wait
The fulfilled and perfect glory of the intellect's estate.
Should we cleave to ancient mummeries, or forever soar away,
Spreading wide the spirit's pinions in the sunshine of to-day?
Should we rest upon tradition and obey the old decrees,—
We, the children of the present, with its dawning excellencies?
Thrust aside the cumbering rubbish! Break from bondage and arise,
Soul of man with wings untrammeled, to the beauty of the skies!
Suffer not an hour shall vanish, ere in richly fertile ground
Golden seeds of strength and purpose for futurity abound.
Suffer not the fleeting moment from reality to fade,
Ere upon thy brow hath greatness set its seal and impress made!
Suffer not that childish wonder or the vigorous thought of youth
Be forever cramped and darkened by the shrouding of the truth!
It beset with orthodoxy—shaven priest or parson prim,
Singing psalms or chanting masses—sing thou Nature's nobler hymn,
Though with crucifix he menace—though severe the aid he calls
In the effort to convert you to the olden rituals,
Straight with telescope and spectrum overwhelm the foolish wight!
Aye! or thrust stupendous wonders, steam and lightning, on his sight.
