aroundworldortra00peebiala-1

112 AROUND THE WORLD.
them. As the friend of man, he frequently said to English
societj'-, " If you want the poorer classes to become better
men, place them in better circumstances ; raise the wages
of laborers, diminish their hours of hard work, increase their
food, improve their dwellings, expand their range of thought
let science serve them, culture refine them ; and, above a??,
help them to help themselves." Though emperors and kings
had listened to Mr. Owen, and though distinguished statesmen
had been his associates, he never forgot the crowning
ideal principle of his life, — communism !
Rising from the miry plains of selfishness, to the mountaintops
of equality and " good-will to men," it may be clearly
seen that communism is the voice of God through Nature.
Light and air, rain and sunshine, are common. The prince
and the pauper child, at the hour of birth, are equal and
common. Death is common to king and subject. And the
laws of the universe are common.
A disorderly, anti-law, anti-marriage " Paris commune
"
of society
aside, Mr. Owen meant by communism that state
in which the common fruits of industry, and the common
results of science, intellect, and a sincere benevolence, should
be so diffused that poverty would be unknown, and crime
quite impossible. Though a theist, contending that "theology
was a mental disease," though loathing pious cant and
churchal superstitions, he was nevertheless a religious man
in the best sense of the term.
Non-immortality did not satisfy
the wants of his great, manly soul. Investigating the
Spiritual manifestations, in the later j'^ears of his life, he
became a believer in a future existence. He died, or, rather,
went up one step higher, a Spiritualist. Robert Dale Owen
is the worthy son of such a sire.
Many are the pleasant hours that I've whiled away listening
to Elder Frederic W. Evans's descriptions of memorable
occurrences transpiring in the life of the large-hearted Robert
Owen. It may not be generally known that Elder Frederic,
one of the prominent Shaker elders at Mount Lebanon,