Recapitulation to Third Edition.

Aggregate of crime charged against the clergy of the United States in seven years:

Crimes Charged.	From 1876 to 1881.	From 1881 to 1883.	From 1882 to 1888.	Tot'l
Abortion,	4	3		7
Adultery,	206	86	43	335
Assault, intent to murder,	8	3	3	14
Assault, intent to do great harm,	1	1		2
Assault, intent to rape,	1	4		5
Assault, and battery,	10	10	8	28
Attemp'd elopement with women,	1			1
Abusive language,	2		4	6
Attempted bigamy,	5	3		8
Arson,	4	2	1	7
Bastardy,	23	7	8	38
Beating wife,	10	3	5	18
Bigamy,	28	8	5	41
Breach of promise of marriage,	2	1	4	7
Buggery,	3		4	7
Breach of hospitality,	5			5
Breach of trust,	2			2
Burglary,			1	1
Bribery,			1	1
"Beecherism,"			1	1
Beggary,			2	2
Beating women,		2	4	6
Compounding felony,	3			3
Compelling to marry,	1			1page 89
Cruelty to animals,	1			1
Cheating,	25	13	12	50
Counterfeiting,			2	2
Criminal carelessness,			1	1
Deserting wife and children,	26	18	15	59
Dishonesty,		4		5
Deceit,		5	9	15
Debauchery,			41	43
Died in a brothel,				1
Drunkenness,	29	23	25	77
Dueling,	1			1
Drowning his son,	1			1
Disturbing school,			1	1
Elopement with women,	17	8	9	34
Embezzlement,	26	13	11	50
Escape from prison,	2	1	5	8
Egotism,			1	1
False personation.	7	2	4	13
Falsehood,	3	17		20
Fighting,	7	6	7	20
Forgery,	22	8	6	36
Fornication,	7		2	9
Fraudulent divorce,	1		2	3
Fraudulent bankruptcy	1			1
Getting child drunk,	1			1
Gambling,	2	1	2	5
Gross fraud,	4	1	9	14
Gross immorality,	3	2	7	12
"His tenets were those of last female he met,"	1			1
Horse racing,	1		1	2
Indecent exposure of person,			2	2
Illicit distilling,	2		1	3
Illegal marrying,	2	1		3
Immoral conduct,	5	1	20	page 90
Improper conduct,	1		24	25
Immoralities,	1	10	11	28
Indecent famil'ties with women	2	1	14	17
Insulting personalities,	2		12	14
Inhuman cruelty to wife and children,	17	9	7	33
Immoral assault on women,	29	19	20	68
Insulting ladies,	26	22	22	70
Incest,	8	4	2	14
Kissing servant girl for spiritual welfare,	2			2
Keeping gambling house	1			1
Lascivious conduct,	1		10	11
Larceny,	31	21	17	69
Literary piracy,	1	4	3	8
Lewdness,	1		9	10
Lechery,	1		11	12
Lying,	12	30	26	68
Libel,		1	4	5
Malicious mischief,	1			1
Malicious trespass,	1			1
Miscegenation with col'd women,	1	1		2
Murder generally,	8	5	4	17
Murder of his wife,	4			4
Murder of his child,	2			2
Malicious threats to extort,			1	1
Nuisance,	1		1	2
Obscene literature, sending by mail,	1	3		4
Obscene literature, publishing,	1			1
Obtaining money under false pretense,	10	13	5	28
Prayed for man's death; man died,			1	1
erjury,	7		2	9page 91
Poisoning starving children,	1			1
Profanity,	3	2	2	7
Quack doctor,			2	2
Quarreling,	7	7	2	16
Robbery,	2	3	2	7
Rape in general,	5		3	8
Rape on girls under 15 years,	6	1	1	8
Rape on girls under 12 years,	7	1	3	11
Riot,	4	2	2	8
Robbing mails,	1		2	3
Recklessness,	1			1
Resigned under charges,	1	1		2
Swindling,	24	20	22	66
Seduction in general,	91	58	20	175
Seduction of girls under 15 y'rs,	12	2	2	16
Slaveholder—a missionary,	1			1
Starving children,	2			2
Subornation of perjury,	1			1
Suicide,	11	3	4	18
Slander,	7	7	20	34
Sodomy,	4	2	4	10
Scandalous conduct,	1		25	26
Selling liquor without license,			1	1
"Too susceptible,"	1			1
Too free with "sisters,"	1			1
Unchaste conduct,	1			1
Unministerial conduct,	2			2
Unbecoming conduct,	11			11
Unnamed crime,	3	1	4	8
Unjust confinement of wife in insane asylum,	1	1		2
Very uncourteous conduct,	1			1
Vulgarity,	2	1		3
Vile and indecent language,	1	1		2
Wanton conduct,	1			1page 92
Whipping his five-year-old boy to death for not correctly saying the Lord's Prayer,	1			1
Total crimes charged,	912	513	628	2053
Against women in a sexual way,	456	220	173	849
Against women in other ways,	81	41	142	264
Total against women,	537	261	315	1113
Other crimes charged,	375	252	313	940

The third edition of "Crimes of Preachers" is thus before the public, with its mass of statistics for the thoughtful to ponder upon. Some attempts have been made to show the author that certain names should be dropped from the list, but careful inquiry has not warranted doing so.

Some object to the estimates of "hidden" crime, as not being the most reliable way of computing; but they give no real reasons.

The basis of computation is varied in this edition, in a perfectly mathematical way, and in no way based upon conjecture.

As before, the crimes charged have been mostly from the Northern States, and from about 35,000 priests and preachers. Now, 35,000 men, after reach- page 93 ing maturity, with average health, live about twenty-seven years, on the average. Make some allowance for "parsonitis" with this class, and give an average age to preachers of twenty-five years, after they begin to preach, including "boy preachers." Then this compilation, commenced in 1876, and the 35,000 priests and preachers then "heralding glad tidings to a dying world," would live twenty-five years, or till 1901—say 1900; the recruits supplying the places of those "killed and wounded," i.e., died and "otherwise accounted for."

Now let us make a different computation to ascertain the amount of crime committed by the tribe of "sky pilots." If 35,000 preachers have committed 2,000 crimes in seven years, 35,000 clergymen will commit 7,140 in twenty-five years. If but one out of sixteen has had his offense discovered and published, then 35,000 "guides to holiness" commit one hundred and fourteen thousand crimes in twenty-five years; and this presuming that the author has collated every instance of published offenses. If half of the "gentlemen of the cloth" are innocent, the other half will be guilty of 228,000 crimes in twenty-five years. But, says one, you are computing upon the basis of the number of crimes charged, not upon the number of criminate. Well, let us compute upon the number of priests and preachers charged with crime; let us see how that would figure. We have 870 names now published in this work during seven years, the data for the first three or four years being very incomplete; that will be page 94 3,100 in twenty-five years, on the same ratio. But take the ratio of the last two years, of nearly 200 per year, and the number in twenty-five years will be five thousand—ascertained and published criminals, "wearing the livery of heaven!" Only one out of sixteen having been detected and his crime published, this 5,000 must be multiplied by 16, making 80,000 reverend criminals in twenty-five years; that is, in the lifetime of thirty-five thousand preachers there will be eighty thousand criminal preachers! And so notoriously criminal that their names and crimes will be so thoroughly published that an ordinary newspaper reader in a little city in Iowa will see it and preserve the account. Really, the Bureau of Public Justice (?) should furnish the author with a good corps of clerks to keep this good work going on, so that the people may see just what kind of gentry these are, who assume to write all of our school-books, control our system of education, teach our children at Sunday-schools, deliver the "word of God" from the pulpit, and visit our wives and daughters to see about their "spiritual welfare!"

And now, reader, we ask, in all candor, is there anything unfair in the above computation? If so, show us where it is. Facts are stubborn things; figures won't lie. The preacher has many ways to conceal his fault that the poor laborer has not, besides having the greater cunning of education, and the aid of powerful and superstitious friends, none of which is at the service of the poor criminal. And then, of the 2,053 crimes charged against these "followers of Jesus," 1,113 have been committed page 95 against women—more than one-half of the crimes! Do ladies as a rule proclaim to newspaper reporters their own shame for the sake of having the parson's crime published? How much of such crime ever really gets before the public eye?

The statistics of crime, including the preachers', show that but about three per cent of all crime committed is against women. Do the ladies always "tell on" the dominie? The philosopher who has the good of posterity at heart may even express a doubt of its having the best of parentage!

There is no denying these facts. The data are open to all. Then this expose should cause even the most bigoted and superstitious to think, and, upon thought, to act.

The assistance of many kind friends, in sending the author papers containing accounts of priestly crime, has made the work much easier and more effective. Will the friends please continue to send items? Please either send the paper entire, with article marked, or cut out item, and name and date of paper, as no names are included in this "illustrious" category except where the author preserves the original authority.

The church to which the "pious sinner" belongs is given much more accurately in this edition than before. That "much persecuted," pure-hearted, poor sect, the Methodist, still holds pre-eminence in priestly villainy. Of the 191 reverend scoundrels in this third edition who have been accredited to churches, the list stands: page 96

Methodists,	39	Lutherans,	5
Baptists,	27	Adventists,	2
Catholics,	27	Free Methodists,	1
Congregationalists,	12	United Brethren,	1
Presbyterians,	11	French Reformed,	1
Episcopalians,	5	Jewish,	0
Campbellites,	5	Universalists,	0
Tunkers,	0	Unitarians,	0

Again the showing is bad for orthodoxy and vice versa.

The following table shows the aggregate of reverend villainy, according to sect, in all three editions of "Crimes of Preachers:"

One thing becomes very evident: that in the criminal records orthodoxy stands a very unfavorable comparison with heterodoxy. Compared with Agnostics, Spiritualists, Infidels, and Atheists, Methodism—at least among the reverends—has a very dark and unseemly appearance. Can it be possible that teaching and pretending a belief in the "immaculate conception," that three times one is one, that a person is his own father, that a ghost proceeded from the father and son both, and was at the same time both that father and son, make men villians per se? Do teaching and pretending belief in an impossibility make men wicked? Do teaching and pretending to believe that to be true which is manifestly false, that to be historical fact which is not even a respectable mythological fable, make men into coarse and degraded criminals? It would seem so.

The facts are that a class of men who demand support, confidence, esteem, love, and homage, simply because of some pretended influence they have with the unseen and unknown powers in the skies, will of necessity come to look upon their dupes as their legitimate prey, and to feel agrieved if all, their unjust demands are not at once complied with.

Another thought. A preacher is entirely incapacitated for any other occupation. Accustomed to asserting that to be true of which they know nothing, and of which they at least have much doubt, or believe to be wholly false, when compelled in other employments to meet competition, even flat contradiction, they are thrown completely off their base. Why, they never knew but one side to a question before, and are completely nonplussed when disputed or called upon to show facts. So, too, a preacher's sons are mostly worthless, and for the same reason. Beggary—call it by what name you will—renders the beggar worthless. Priestcraft is beggary. Priests are the most insolent of mendicants! No beggar is so despicable as he who is clothed in shining vestments, the fruit of his trade.

There are honest preachers, but they are also ignorant, No really educated man can remain a priestly drone, unless he does so as a hypocrit. The educated clergymen all well know that the story of Jesus and his apostles is a myth—a fable common to the whole Aryan race for thousands of years. There is no excuse for any minister remaining ignorant on this subject. Slight investigation is all that is necessary. If he will not investigate he is a bigot, and just as unworthy as his hypocritical colleague.

Many honest preachers are investigating, many are leaving their mendicant's position and boldly announcing to the world their disbelief in the dogmas of Christian mythology. Bright stand forth the names of Chainey, Miln, Weaver, Newton, Thom- page 99 as, Swing, and scores of others, who have braved the impotent scorn of the church and assumed the garb and mien of freemen. Take the cowardly incentive of popularity away—and it is fast going—and none will remain priests except the groveling ignoramus and the crafty mountebank. All hail the day when men and women shall live in the live present, not in a dead and rotten past!—live to build up the cause of king-and-priest ridden humanity, instead of building costly churches and cathedrals, supporting in indolence and crime a horde of priestly drones, while the wail of the orphan and the moan of the crushed woman are heard on every hand!

Down with the system that reduces a land to the condition of master and slave, palaces and paupers' huts! Down with the privileged, untaxed class, who have no more manhood than to extort, through superstitious fear, easy living and gorgeous attire from the hardy but ignorant poor! May the day soon come when any man will feel ashamed to hold out a soft, delicate, bejeweled hand in beggary, to receive alms from a poor woman dressed in rags, elbow-deep in the washtub, and a horde of pinchedfaced starvelings clinging to her tattered skirts, crying for a crust.

Archbishop Purcell, hiding away six million dollars of the hard earnings of the wretched poor, receiving the commiseration of a truculent press because of his misfortune—in the mean while his confiding dupes perishing for food—is a picture which page 100 cannot long be painted upon the broad canvas of our free republic.

This work will be issued every year as long as the author can labor. Lovers of their kind will aid in circulating it. The author will be pleased to receive letters from friends in the future as in the past concerning the work. Thousands have written to me, from Maine to the Pacific shore, and from the source of the great Father of Waters to the tropical Everglades. The writers will excuse the author for not answering their good letters; it would require all his time. Receive his hearty thanks, and continue to aid him in the good work.

Many respected friends have requested the author to issue a work on Religious Insanity. He has much data now on hand and is collecting. Please send clippings from the papers of items of "religious craze," and in a short time a work will issue thereon. He is also collecting the same kind of data concerning murderers who are swung from the rope's end into the arms of Jesus. Send him all such accounts.

And now, for another year, goodbye.