Ever since the formation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, calumny, reproach and persecution have flown plentifully into their lap--detraction, slander, falsehood, and misrepresentation have been gratuitously heaped upon them; they have been assailed by vexatious law suits, organized mobs, and illegally treated by militia; they have been imprisoned, whipped, tarred and feathered, and driven from {99} their homes; they have had their property confiscated, and have suffered banishment, exile and death for their religion. Missouri has been one of the principal actors in the scene; she has made many a wife a widow, and many a child an orphan. The tears of the oppressed have plentifully watered her soil; the cries of her robbed and spoiled have rung through her valleys, and been re-echoed from hill to hill; many a weary pilgrim borne down with oppression and weary of life has laid himself down to sleep in the arms of death, while the blood of the innocent has drenched her soil. And never till the trump of God shall sound, the sleeping dead shall arise, the books be opened and the secret history of peoples and nations be unfolded, will the amount of their sufferings be fully known. That day will unfold scenes of wickedness, misery and oppression, and deeds of inhumanity and blood that the most eloquent cannot portray, the pencil of the limner depict; and that is beyond the power of language to unfold--scenes of misery, of woe, and human suffering. Dipped in the malice of the most fiendish hate, the cup of misery has been wrung out, and they have drunk it to the very dregs. Missouri, frantic with rage, and not yet filled with blood, wishes now to follow her bleeding victims to their exile, and satiate herself with blood. And not satisfied with staining her own escutcheon, she wishes to decoy the noble, generous and patriotic sons of Illinois--to deceive them with appearances--to draw them into her snare, that they may be sharer in her crimes, and participate in her guilt and stamp with eternal infamy their character. We have already to blush for the gullibility of many of her [Illinois] editors who feel desirous to fan the deadly flame, and stain their hands with her [Missouri's] foul deeds. We would advise such to halt, to pause for a moment--to reflect upon what they are doing. Have they not witnessed Missouri's wanton persecution; her cruel oppression; her deadly hate? Have they not loudly exclaimed against such proceedings; stood forth in defense of republicanism--and as true patriots defended the rights of man? And can they now advocate a cause that would attempt to make an innocent, virtuous people "tremble at the sight of gathering hosts!" or even moot the question.