Page:Dr Stiggins, His Views and Principles.pdf/44

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His Views and Principles

in our tea, we wish for beer with our dinner, not chemical reactions, we are anhungered for pork which is not green with gangrene—in a word, for the fleshpots of Egypt. And at last they may declare that if Chicago and its products are the results of Liberalism and Protestantism then they would rather not be Protestants or Liberals!

Ah! that old writer who could not have been Moses knew the human heart; knew the terrible appeal of fleshly lusts. Before the eyes of the wandering tribesmen the tempter dangled the Egyptian feasts: can we be sure that he will not repeat his infernal artifice in our day? There are prophets of Baal who are only too ready to insinuate their praise of old English beef and beer, home-grown and home-brewed (the vile Protectionists!); who dispute the well-known fact that in the Dark Ages the people were cowed, half-starved slaves by their stories of yeomen who fought at Crécy, Poitiers, and Agincourt (trust me, the Devil never lacks an argument); who fill foolish ears with mis-

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