“After years of close observation of the operations of this sect, its police would beg to express to the Committee their unqualified admiration of the results obtained. The increase of the number of suicides has been gratifying. The number of young men and girls rendered worthless for life; the number of elderly men plundered and cajoled out of their means and driven into dotage, is only equalled by the surprising rapidity with which the fanaticism has spread; indeed, it would seem as if the first step towards all the popular forms of fanaticism, is through Platonic Sentimentalism.
“It seems, that it is through the teachings of this school, of which Eusedora Polypheme is now the acknowledged priestess, that the hollowness and unsatisfactory character of all our natural sentiments and passions is first perceived. This illumination achieved, it becomes necessary that their place be supplied by what the world would call morbid sentimentality and unnatural passions, but which Eusedora Polypheme aptly terms, ‘spherical illuminations’ and ‘divine ecstacies.’ But since we know, as well as Eusedora, that flesh is flesh, and blood is blood, we can therefore calculate, with great precision, whither such mystifications must lead.
“Hardened and sharpened in mind and temper, by a graduation in this school, its disciples pass, not from it, but through it, into other, and, to us, not less important fields of activity. Hence come the fiercest and most unscrupulous partisans of Infidelity, Abolitionism, and Woman’s Rights. Having learned both theoretically and practically to disbelieve in themselves, by the most natural transition in the world, they become infidel of all other truths, and scorn all other sacrednesses alike. They are then prepared to be of use to us in a variety of ways. The spirit of antagonism, the love of strife and notoriety, have assumed in them the sense of duty, justice, and modesty; a spiritual diablerie has possessed itself of the emasculated remains of womanhood left in them. Only give them a chance for martyrdom—only give them an excuse for the cry of persecution, and upon whatever theme or theory, ology or ism, that may promise to afford them such healthful and natural excitements, they will at once seize, and, hugging the dear abstraction to their bosoms, do battle for the same, with a cunning and unscrupulous ferocity that has no parallel.
“But for their thorough training under the teaching of Eusedora Polypheme, they might, perhaps, be sometimes disposed to pause, and inquire if there might not be two sides to every question; whether they might not have made some slight mistake in crying out ‘Eureka’ so soon. But, fortunately, they are never troubled with this weakness; and, as their capacity for mischief is not, therefore, liable to be impaired by any maudlin conscientiousness, or feeble questioning of their own infallibility, or that of their teachers, they are from the beginning as valuable as trained veterans.
“The jargon of the sect, which they acquire with wonderful facility, constitutes their logic; and their efficiency in the use of this weapon, consists in the savage, waspish, and persevering iteration of its phrases, at all times and on all occasions.
“It is astonishing, the ease with which the majority of mankind can be bullied, especially from within the bulwark of petticoats. But when at once the terrible aspect is hid behind the mask of Circe, as the followers of Polypheme know so well to accomplish, the power becomes resistless indeed.
“The principal weapons of offence used by the followers of Polypheme, in all their subsequent metamorphoses, are, first and foremost, what is technically termed the ‘electrical eye.’ This is the most brilliant and effective of their weapons. It is not by any means necessary that the spiritual Amazon should have been gifted by Nature, in this respect; for the arts of Polypheme were clearly inspired from
‘Some other deity than Nature,
That shapes man better.’
“After long practice, the power is acquired of dilating or straining the eyes wide open, and suffusing them at the same time. The moisture gives them a marvellous effect of electrical splendor. As this habitual tension can only be sustained for a few seconds at a time, Polypheme happily offsets it by the modest habit of dropping her eyes towards the floor, or a flower or book in her hand; then up go the