THE LATEST IMPOSTURE.

Westport Times, Volume V, Issue 840, 22 July 1871, Page 2

THE LATEST IMPOSTURE.

Recent Victorian intelligence states that Fisher, who claims to"' be the Messiah, has been acquitted on a charge of obtaining money by fate pretences. The saintly personage is thus graphically described bv a Melbourne correspondent:—

" Wo have had a new Messiah tura tip here within a few miles of Mel* bourne. It seems that in the neigh" bourhood of Nunewading, about eight, miles from town, a man named Fisher, who condescends for ' the time &' follow the humble but useful occupation of a charcoal burner, has p] ceeded in persuading a lot of ignom'j people that he is the Messiah. Sit has made a lot of prophecies, ifl'® ] have been fulfilled as his belie««

say, have been lucky as sceptics jjjj it, and he has also shown a good itg of power in cures and other thingsHowever, he has done it, he had convinced them that he will never die, ail those who believe in him will shared immortality. The millenium has already begun, Fisher the Messiah is on earth among his saints, and he and they are to remain here in a blessed condition till they are translated. Saints are hound by no human law ß , and still less are Messiahs so bound. Accordingly, Mr Fisher has three sisters as his spiritual nurses, and although a fourth sister is marned,ne means to kill her husband by -his 1 m and appropriate her The fattg of these young women is one of tna ataunchest believers, and himself g aV | his daughters to the charcoaUburninS incarnation of Divinity.. Ta tbs'l brother, Fisher promises twelve nrgij wives, who are to become the motnei

of twelve sons—the future twelve apostbjs. Somehow religious fauatici&i£m these days .seems always associated with an immoderate number of wives. Fisher killed his mothor-iu-law lately by an act of power, and has saved some people at the point of death. Kecently, by way of aiding one of his-devotees who engaged in a law case, he entered into the body of the judge to compel him to deliver a favorable judgment. He has established a Church of the Firstborn, and is surrounded by apostles. He wants his male followers to believe in him, and his female followers to love him, and so far seems to have succeeded in both respects. One of the former showed his belief to such an extent as to' give Fisher sums of money from time to time, but at length came to doubt him on finding that Fisher was attempting to tamper with the virtue of his wife. He then fell off from the Messiah, and aftewards took the extreme step of denouncing him as an impostor. Messiahs in these times have to put np with circumstances as they find them. In addition to all, the recreant friend summoned the Messiah before the local police court for obtaining money under false pretences. To such a pitch have we come in this nineteenth century!"