crucified between two thieves after being condemned under due forms of law, and who attracted to him a following that could be regarded as the off-scourings of despised Galilee, and who were so vile as to steal his dead body from the tomb by night, and then put in circulation the story that he had risen bodily from the dead! From such a basis as this, all of which can be established "by the multiplied testimony" of the Savior's "acquaintances and neighbors," we could, with your correspondent exclaim, "how could the system" emanating from such a founder "be otherwise than mischievous and immoral in its tendencies and results?" It would be easy to prove that from the beginning of Mormonism until now there are many men of wide reputation, men of national repute and high character, who have testified of the purity of life and honorable conduct of Joseph Smith and the general honesty and high moral character of his following. But it is impossible to quote such testimony because of the necessary limits of this communication, and it is not necessary because the premise from which your correspondent starts is utterly untenable and foolish. Your correspondent scoffs at the idea that Mormons married their plural wives in good faith, and that it would now be a crime to abandon them, and declares that your representative could as well have talked about "committing the crime of bank robbing in good faith." The gentleman rushes a little too quickly to his conclusion. Things he puts in comparison are altogether unlike. It is a truth to begin with that the Mormon people accepted the doctrine of plural marriage as a revelation and commandment from God; and they did marry their wives under what they considered divine sanction, in good faith, believing that they were protected in the practice of a religious principle by the constitution of their country, which specifically prohibited the passage of laws "respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Furthermore, this doctrine was sanctioned by the practice of the Bible patriarchs, whom the Son of God himself upheld in his teaching as the very favorites of heaven, whom God had made his own especial witnesses of the truths he would teach mankind. It was well on to half a century before the Supreme Court of the United States had finally decided at all points the constitutionality of the several acts of Congress against the exercise of this religious doctrine of the Latter-day Saints, during which time a whole generation had lived in the practice of it, believing absolutely in its righteousness, in its divinity in fact, and it is not difficult to understand how men under such circumstances married their wives in good faith.