--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Dean, Joseph H. collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 26 number: 6 published: 1923-04 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Joseph H. Dean, "Freedom or Bondage?", *Improvement Era* 26, no. 6 (April 1923): 511–519.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2606unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera2606unse start_page: 511 end_page: 519 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1923-04) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2606unse publication_year: 1923 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1923, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Freedom or Bondage? Freedom or Bondage? By Joseph H. Dean "Well, say, I'm all balled up over freedom and bondage! What is freedom, anyway?" The family of Amos Taylor was spending the long winter evening in their comfortable homes, each occupied in what suited him best. The father, forty -four, was over at the bishop's on some ward business. The mother, forty-two, was mending stockings. Henry Amos, just returned from a mission to Samoa, was twenty-three. He was writing a letter to a missionary friend on the islands. Alice, nineteen, looking cross and nervous, be- cause she had not been allowed to go to a dance in a nearby town with Richard Lamont, was trying to forget her troubles in a novel. Dorothy, fourteen, was working on her eighth grade examination problems. Then there were Jedediah ten, Harold seven, Mamie four, and baby Gordan asleep in the cradle. Jed. — "Freedom, that's easy. Freedom is to be able to do as you please." Dorothy. — "O sure, Jed. If you want some of daddy Hen- derson's melons, just go and steal them. If you want a piece of pie, just wait till) mother steps outside, and then go and take it." Jed gave Dorothy a black look, but said no more. Lawrence. — "Henry, you are a wise guy, tell us what free- dom is." Henry. — "Don't call me wise, Lawrence. When I was your age I thought I was wise, but I am learning that I am pretty foolish." Lawrence. — "Well, you can surely tell us what freedom is." Alice. — "There isn't any freedom. Just look at father, out nearly every night in the week. Gone into bondage to his church. When the bishop pulls the string, he jumps like he was shot, and drops his own work, and goes off on ward business. And you know, Henry, that you didn't want a mission, but you had to go, or be called a piker. I can't go to a dance tonight, because Dick doesn't measure up to father's standard." Harold. — "Dick Lamont smokes." Jed. — "And he swears, for I heard him." Dorothy. — "And he stinks up the whole house with his to- 512 IMPROVEMENT ERA bacco when he comes here. Alice has, sure, got a funny taste." Henry. — "Or maybe she has lost her smeller." Alice.— 0 yes, Henry Amos Taylor, I'd talk about smok- ing, if I were in your place. You know you smoked before you went on your mission, and like as not you'll take it up again. I'll wager the smell was all right in those days. And I believe Lawrence is smoking, too, for I have noticed lately, that his breath is always scented up with peppermint, or something." Henry. — "Well, Lawrence, if you are taking up cigaret smoking, you will soon know what freedom 'ain't.' When I tried to quit, I found I was in the most terrible bondage. On my way to the Islands, I was tempted to sneak away from my companions in San Francisco, and smoke on the sly. And when we reached Honolulu, after a severe spell of sea-sickness, the craving was simply awful. One of my companions was in the same bondage that I was, and he said he would smoke if I would. And, O, Lawrence, and Jed, and Harold, I was so afraid that I would give way to the temptation, I rushed back on to the ship, and locked myself in my room, and cried and prayed, and prayed and cried, until I felt I had gained. the mastery, and it was only with the help of the Lord, that I was enabled to gain the victory. And O, my dear brothers, I have been so worried, for fear that my bad example, before I went away, might lead you to take up the same filthy habit, and get into the same terrible bondage ; and I have prayed to the Lord, many and many a time, for you, that you might not do as I had done." Henry's eyes filled with tears, and his voice trembled with emotion in his earnestness. Alice was sorry she had spoken so unkindly; and Dorothy went over and put her cheek, lovingly against her big brother's, and ran her fingers through his curly hair. Harold went and took his hand and said, "I'll never smoke, Henry;" and Jed said neither would he. Lawrence looked miserable, but said nothing. The mother had turned her rocker around, so her face could not be seen, and was silently weeping, for she had a battle to fight, that she hadn't won yet, so she said nothing. At this point they heard the husband and father, stamp- ing the snow off his feet on the porch, and Mamie clapped her hands, and went and opened the door, and the head of the family stepped inside. To look at Amos Taylor was good for sore eyes. He was fully six feet tall, and as straight as a tree. Strength and manliness and honesty, seemed to radiate from his person. He was manly, honored by all who knew him, and looked up to and loved by his wife and children. He took FREEDOM OR BONDAGE? 513 off his coat and hat; swung Mamie up astride his shoulder, and dropped a pinch of snow down Dorothy's neck. "Well," said he, "you all look excited, anything happened?" Harold. — "Alice got vexed at Henry and called him names." Father. — "And what did she call him, Harold?" Harold. — "She called him Henry Amos Taylor," at which all the family laughed. Father. — "Well, she sure called him names all right." Jed. — "Yes, and she says you ain't free, and that you jump when the hishop pulls a string." Father. — "Well, you folks have been ha\ing fun. But what's this about my not being free? If I'm not free, I'd like to know who is." Lawrence. — "I started all this racket, father. I was read- ing about conditions in Russia. The people revolted against the Czar, and overthrew his government, and butchered him and his family because of his tyrannical government; they wanted to be free, and now they are imprisoning the people so fast, their prisons are full. And then I got to thinking about the Pilgrim Fathers, how that they left the old world, and came here to a strange land to escape persecution, and so they could be free to worship God as they pleased, and then they turned Rodger Williams out of their midst because he didn't see as they did. Then our people were driven from their homes in the east, and many of them killed in this free land, and they had to come a thousand miles into the wilderness to escape religious persecution. And now the s'.riking coal miners are killing men who went to do the work they refused to do. So I said I would like to know what freedom is, anyway." Father. — "And what did mother say?" Mother. — "I didn't say anything, Amos, I didn't feel quali- fied to give an opinion." Lawrence. — "Well, I must have given you all a hard nut to crack. Henry gave us an illustration of what bondage is: and father says he is free, and that's as far as we have got, it seems." Father. — "Well, what is Henry's definition of bondage?" Henry. — I just told them,* father, of the struggle I had to quit my smoking when I went on my mission." Father. — "Some bondage, wasn't it, Henry?" Henry. — "Yes, sir, it took all the grit I had, and the help of the Lord besides, to set me free." "Yes," said the father. "And I suppose one of the argu- ments the boys used to get you to smoke was, to show yourself a man, and not be in bondage to your Church, and a sissy, tied to your mother's apron strings." Henry.- — "Yes, father, and that I was a coward, if I didn't." 514 IMPROVEMENT ERA Father. — "Yes. And so to show your 'freedom,' you went into the worst kind of bondage, and I warn you, Henry, that the same crowd will use the same arguments again. If a boy, or man either, has the manhood to obey the laws of God, and the laws of the land, he makes the smoker and the drinker, the 'bootlegger' and the gambler, the thief and the liar and all their tribe, look inferior and second best, and they resent it, and try their best to force him down to their level. It takes a man to stand their sarcasm and ridicule, and if he stands true to himself, and to his country, and to his religion, and stays a free man, he will have to walk alone in the world a good deal of his life, and one dreads to be alone." Dorothy. — "We learned this verse in school: "He's a slave, who dares not be In the right, with two or three." Father. — "Yes, and that's true. But it takes manhood and courage, of the highest order to carry it out, all the same. By the way, let me tell you what the bishop called me over to his place for this evening. Mother, Henry and Alice, you remember Helen Brim, who, some ten years ago, ran away and married Ernest Brockbank, a non-member of the Church. Some eleven years ago, I felt impressed to talk to Helen, to try and induce her not to marry that man for he was a worthless scamp. It seemed to be given me to see the bondage and degradation she would be running into, and the disappointment and heartache, and sorrow she would have to endure if she married him. I succeeded in thoroughly frightening Helen, and she declared she would have no more to do with Brockbank. But in less than six months, she ran away with him, and got married. They have one child, a lovely daughter, now ten years old. When she was an infant, Helen wanted to have her named and blessed in our Church, but her husband refused. And when she was eight, he refused to let her be baptized. Now she is dying, seemingly of typhoid-pneumonia, and the doctor says she won't live till morning. Poor Helen says she knows if the bishop and I went and adminisatered to her, that the Lord would heal her. But her husband says if we come near his house, he will kick us into the street. Helen says her child is the only thing that has made life endurable now for years, and that if she dies, she doesn't want to live. The poor soul wrung her hands in her agony, and it melted our hearts to learn of her sufferings, but we couldn't see how we could help her." Amos Taylor, big strong man though he was, choked up with emotion, and the family was profoundly moved in sym- pathy. Alice had gone over to the window, and taken a seat behind the curtains so she could cry without being seen, for FREEDOM OR BONDAGE? 515 Richard Lamont, had suggested the night before, that as she was denied her "rights" and deprived of her "freedom," that she run away with him, and get married/ She had listened to him, and promised to give him an answer the following evening. Lawrence. — "Well, Jed, it's plain to see that your idea of freedom, to do as we please, won't do." Dorothy. — "Well, daddy, don't let us go to bed without a true definition of what freedom is." Father. — "Well, now, after all we have said, let's try and see if we can't make up a definition ourselves. Suppose we start with the youngest, and take our turns. Jed, we will begin with you." Jed. — "Well, this is mine, 'I am free to do as I please, if I don't do anything wrong.' " Father. — "That's pretty good, Jed, for a ten year old boy." Dorothy. — "Freedom is to do right, and not to do wrong." Father. — "Pretty hard to beat, Dorothy." Lawrence. — "Well, I suppose freedom is to do as I am told by those who have the right to direct me." Father. — "Alice, your turn next, what is true freedom?" Alice. — " 'There hain't no such animal,' " at which quota- tion they all laughed. Father. — "Now, Henry, we'll hear from you." Henry. — "I was just looking in my Bible concordance, father, to see what I could find there on the subject. The Sa- vior says, 'And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.' And again, 'If the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.' And Paul says, 'Stand firm therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ has made you free.' I think there- fore, that the gospel is the perfect law of liberty." Father. — "Mother, we haven't heard a word from you all evening, will you give us your idea of freedom?" Mother. — "Well, after listening to all that has been said, I am about convinced that freedom is obedience to law; and that any one that will do as he pleases, unless he pleases to do right, will go into bondage." Dorothy. — "Now it's daddy's turn." Father. — "Well, you haven't left much ground for me to plow. All your definitions are good. I can't conceive of free- dom without obedience to law. Everything we see around us, in the animal, vegetable and mineral kingdoms, is governed and controlled by law, and are all filling the measure of their creation. Man is the only exception, not necessarily so, nor rightly so, but because of his free agency, he often chooses to be so. But every time man disobeys law, he must pay the pen- alty. We often hear the expression, *As free as the air we 516 IMPROVEMENT ERA breathe;' but air is only free to obey law, and that law is, that it shall accompany the earth in its flight through space; and that it shall be composed of certain elements in certain fixed proportions, and if those proportions are disturbed, as when crowded halls are not properly ventilated, death and destruc- tion begin their work. Our beautiful mountain streams are free, but they are governed by the law of gravitation. They can- not turn round and run up hill. The earth is free. No other planet, except its moon, within millions of miles of it. It is whirling through space seventy times faster than a cannon-ball can go, and yet, so fixed is the law governing its motions, that astronomers can tell just where it will be any number of years ahead; just when it will pass between the sun and the moon, causing an eclipse of the moon; or when the moon will pass between us and the sun, causing an eclipse of the sun. The earth is never early nor late, but just on time, and it has al- ways been so ever since it was created. If it should be a law unto itself, like some people are, and should leave its orbit, and go off its course, the whole universe would be thrown out of harmony, and the end no doubt would be, that it would crash into some other planet, and be destroyed. "The inmates of our prisons, reform schools and asylums, are made up, mostly, of those who would not obey law. Their idea of freedom was, that they had a right to do as they pleased, instead of doing as they should. The result is, that they have to be locked up where they can do no harm. "Poor Helen Brim wouldn't obey the law of her parents, nor the laws of her Church. She was determined to be 'free;' and now she would willingly give her right arm to be cut off, if she could go back eleven years and be free again, as Alice here, and Dorothy are free. "Everything that is clean, virtuous, praiseworthy, God-fear, ing and law-abiding, leads to health, happiness, respect of our fellows, freedom, and the blessing and approbation of our heav- enly Father; while all that is unclean, unruly, disobedient, and law defying, leads down to bondage, degradation and death." Amos Taylor was not blind to what was going on in his own family. His wife was a splendid woman. She had borne him eight lovely, intelligent children. She had worked uncom- plainingly by his side from a state of poverty, when they were first married, to their present well-to-do condition. But she had come of a family that made no pretentions to keeping the Word of Wisdom, and had acquired the tea-drinking habit in her girlhood. Since her marriage, she had tried several times to quit, but had invariably taken it up again. This had been a great trial to her husband, especially since the children had FREEDOM OR BONDAGE? 517 grown old enough to take notice. He knew that they would justify themselves in breaking the same law because mother was breaking it. As we have seen, their oldest son had taken to smoking, which was a sore trial to his father. He was so thank- ful for the mission that had cured him, and sent him home clean and full of faith. He had been afraid for Alice, in keeping company with Richard Lamont. And when his recital of the case of poor Helen Brim had driven her into the window seat, his suspicions increased. He also suspected Lawrence of smoking. He knew why his wife was taking no part in the discussions of the eve- ning, and why she had turned her back to the family. He felt that she should be by his side, and by word and look and ex- ample, be helping him to save their children. A sudden determination seized him. He felt that he had a right to know where his wife and children stood. He arose, and with a trembling, but kindly voice said: "My wife and chil- dren, we have discovered in our discussions here tonight, what freedom is and what bondage is. All my hopes for time and eternity are bound up in you. With your support and co-opera- tion, I am strong. Without it, I am weak. 'A house divided against itself cannot stand.' Shall we walk together, hand in hand, and keep the commandments of God, and be free, or shall we each go his own way and maybe some go into bondage, and be lost? I feel that a critical time has arrived in the life of this family, and that I have a right to know where each of you stands. You also have a right to know where I stand. We all have our free agency. You have your salvation to work out as I have mine. 'Who's on the Lord's side?' Like Joshua of old, I feel to say, 'Choose ye this day whom ye will serve, but as for me, and my house, we will serve the Lord.' Now if you feel this way, and are willing to go with me and keep the Lord's commandments, I want you to manifest it by rising to your feet." It was a dramatic moment. If his wife, or any of his chil- dren should keep their seats, what should he do? What could he do? Henry and Dorothy, Jed and little Harold promptly rose to their feet. Lawrence and his mother looked into each other's eyes for a moment, and the mother could see that her son was going to do as she did, and she dared not hesitate a moment longer. She arose and took her rightful place by her husband's side, and Amos Taylor, his heart singing with joy, put his arm around her and pressed her to him. Then Lawrence stood up. Alice now was the only one left. What would Alice do? Amos Taylor and his wife trembled with anxiety. But the curtains slowly parted, and a tall, beautiful girl with a white- 518 IMPROVEMENT ERA drawn face, showing that she had heen fighting a hard battle, came slowly forward and stood by her father's side and took his hand, and\the parents knew that their beautiful Alice was safe. With a voice shaking with feeling, the father said, "God bless you all, my loved ones. And now I suggest that in place of our usual evening's devotions, we stand as we are, and bow our heads in silent prayer for one minute, then you are all at lib- erty to go to your rooms." When the minute was up, Alice drew her father's face down and fervently kissed him, and then embraced her mother, and without speaking went to her room. The mother went into the kitchen, and called Lawrence to her, and when he was in, she quietly locked the door behind him. She had a half package of tea in her hand. "My son," said she, "this innocent looking thing has been my master all my life. For this tea I have sorely hurt your father, and set you, and all my children, the example of disobedience. On ac- count of this tea, my conscience has hurt me for twenty years, and I have felt myself a hypocrite, and have felt cheap, and second class. When any of our leaders have preached on the Word of Wisdom, I have felt that they meant me, and I have been uncomfortable, and unhappy. And during that minute of silent devotion, I solemnly promised the Lord that I would never touch it again. What a coward I have been, to let such a trifling thing get such a tremendous power over me. Lawrence, I am going to pass from bondage to freedom, even though it kill me. The very fact that I know I am going to conquer this time, makes me feel a different woman already. And now, my son, you see this package is only half full. There is just room for your sack of tobacco and cigaret papers. Come, my son, let's be free. Let's be able to look your father and all the world in the face, and say, 'I'm free! I'm free!' " And Lawrence fished out his tobacco, and stuffed it in with the tea, and his mother led him over to the stove, and they threw their enemy on the coals and watched it reduced to ashes. Then the mother said, "Now, my son, kiss me and go to bed." The next evening, just at dark, an auto stopped at the Taylor gate. A cigaret glowed in the darkness. The driver tooted his horn, and a tall, stately girl went down to the gate. "Good evening, Dick." "Why, hello, Allie, hop in. "No Dick, you see I haven't my wraps." "Well, why haven't you? Hurry and get them." "No, Dick, since I saw you last, I have had a change of heart, or maybe I should say, I have seen a light. I have been able to see that the proposal you made me, that we run away and get married, was both unwise and unmanly. For me at least, it would mean a disgraceful and dishonorable bond- FREEDOM OR BONDAGE? 519 age, and I refuse to do it. I have decided to honor rny father and my mother, and my Church, and not do a a foolish thing that could only bring sorrow and disgrace to all concerned. And furthermore, Dick, if I ever get married, I shall choose a good, clean man of my own faith, and in place of going into a dis- honorable bondage, I shall have a clear conscience, and be free!" Dick. — "This is the work of your pious, hypocritical, mis- sionary brother, I suppose." Alice. — "You must excuse me, Dick, I refuse to quarrel with you. And as it is chilly, and I haven't any wraps, I will wish you goodnight." And with a light heart, and shining eyes, Alice Taylor walked up the path and into the house. Shelley, Idaho Meditations I was sitting in the shadow Of a cedar, old and grand ; I was gazing at the beauties To be seen on every hand, At the pines so tall and stately, At the oaks so gnarled and strong, Listening to the breezes sighing, Listening to the bird's sweet song. I was thinking how the mountains, With their rugged cliffs so steep. There had stood through countless ages. Worn with canyons, wide and deep; How the ferns and wild flowers growing By the hand of man untamed, Far surpassed in real grandeur Man's productions e'er so famed. And I felt by chance they came not But were planned by One Divine, And my soul was turned with reverence To the Lord our God sublime Who has made the mighty mountains, Made the flowers and birds and bees, Made the rocks and trees and bushes And the boundless, restless seas. So all nature sings the praises Of the God who gave us life; Man alone of all creation Causes misery and strife. Everything by God created Has a mission to fulfil, Then let us as God's own children Honor him and do his will. Mesa, Arizona Ethel R. Lillyuhile