Discourse by President Geo. Q. Cannon, delivered in the Meetinghouse, Provo, Sunday Morning, September 2nd, 1883.

I feel as though I would much rather sit still and listen to somebody else, than to attempt to speak myself.

For a number of weeks past the First Presidency of the Church have been traveling through the various settlements, and such counsels and instructions have been given to the people—mingled with kindly reproofs and warnings as the Spirit has seemed to dictate—and in the meetings we have held there has been a goodly outpouring of the Spirit of God; the people have rejoiced in their meetings and in that which they have heard.

There is a constant necessity for the visits of those whom God has called to preside over the affairs of His Church, and to hold the Apos– tleship of the Church, in the midst of the various Stakes of Zion. It is true that God our Eternal Father—in accordance with the promise which He has made unto those who would receive the Gospel in humility and with sincerity of heart—has poured out His Holy Spirit upon the people, and they are led by it in the most of instances, and the gifts of the Spirit are manifested. At the same time there are other agencies which God calls into requisition to teach and instruct His people. He has placed in His Church Apostles, Prophets, Pastors, Teachers, etc. He has given unto them certain specified duties. He requires them to discharge those duties in His fear, and holds them accountable for the condition of the people—that is, to a very great extent. He has placed certain men whom He has chosen as watchmen upon the walls of Zion; He has placed them as shepherds of the flock of Christ; and in their capacity as watchmen and as shepherds He expects them to exercise that vigilance and care which are necessary for the protection and preservation of the people. The Lord has promised unto His servants that He will give them the necessary qualifications for, and that He will sustain them in the discharge of the duties that devolve upon them; and through the varied experience of the past 53 years this has been the case. The Lord has not left His people without proper care, and He has not left His servants destitute of his word and of a knowledge of His will, but has given these to them at the very time when they have been needed. No evil or difficulty has ever occurred in the Church or outside of the Church affecting us that we have not been warned of by the servants of God, and prepared for by their teachings, their counsels and their warnings. This constitutes the great difference between the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the other churches that are organized among the children of men, and called by various names. God has made promises unto this people; He has provided for them; He has revealed himself unto them, and has extended His power for their preservation and safety all the day long.

Now, this is a new thing, it may be said in the earth—that is, comparatively new. Previous to the organization of this Church there was no claim made by any of the churches of the day to hold direct communication with Deity. Preachers, and those who lead in these various sects, base their claims for authority upon that which was given in former days to the ancient servants of God. They are honest enough to make no pretense of having received communication from heaven, or direct revelation from God, calling them to the ministry or designating them to occupy the places they fill; but, as I have said, claiming the commission that was given to the ancient Apostles as the basis for their labor, they proceeded to teach the people such doctrines as they considered essential to salvation. God’s voice was not heard. The silence that existed between heaven and earth—and which had existed after the slaying of those who had received authority from God, and unto whom He gave communications—was still unbroken—there were no heavenly messengers descending from heaven to earth and making manifest the mind and will of God unto the inhabitants of the earth, but it was as though the heavens were as brass over the heads of the people, and as though—so far as the voice of God was concerned—He took no interest in the affairs of the children of men. And this was the conclusion to which the whole religious world had come—that God had withdrawn Himself from communicating with his children, that He had revealed his mind and will as it is recorded in the Bible, and that therefore the canon of Scriptures was full, and there was no longer any necessity for further light or knowledge from Him. This was produced as an argument against the Elders of this Church, when they commenced to teach the doctrine of new revelation, when they went forth proclaiming unto the inhabitants of the earth that God had spoken; that the silence between heaven and earth had been broken; that angels had descended from heaven once more and communicated God’s will unto man; that the Holy Ghost had been poured out according to the ancient promise; that the Church had been organized according to the ancient pattern, and that the gifts had been restored as they existed in former times. The argument that was used against these testimonies was this: that for nearly 1,800 years or thereabouts, there had been no communication of this character, there had been no heavenly visitations; prophets had not been known among men since the days of the Apostles, and, therefore, this being the case, it was an evidence, they contended, that it was not God’s design that there should be any of those gifts and blessings, and that that condition of affairs which existed—or which they declared existed—was the condition that God designed should exist and should continue to exist until the end of time.

Now, the world in this way took advantage of its own wrong, and sought to justify itself by that which had been brought to pass by its own actions, attributing to God that which was traceable to man, and which was the result of man’s conduct; for the unbroken silence which reigned between heaven and earth was not because God preferred to have that condition of affairs exist, but was the result of man’s own actions. God had sent messengers; He had sent His only Begotten Son, and had given unto Him His Gospel to declare unto the inhabitants of the earth, and after a short residence among them they slew Him. They would not have Him or His teachings, and they were determined that He should have no place among them. Not content with slaying Him, they continued the warfare against the organization that He established upon the earth at that time, until they slew every man whom He had chosen—that is, they either slew them or drove them from their midst. The result was that the earth was stained with the blood of the Son of God, and of His chosen Apostles and Prophets. No one could live among the inhabitants of the earth at that time who professed to have any revelation from God, or to be a divine messenger; for if he made such a proclamation, and it was in truth, the whole power of Satan, manifested through the inhabitants of the earth, was hurled against him, and he was either slain or compelled to flee.

This being the case, is it any wonder that there should be no voice of revelation—that God should leave His children to themselves? I will tell you how I feel about my family. If I had children that were determined not to listen to my counsel, nor to obey that which I said to them, but should treat my instructions with contempt, I would say to them: “You can go your own way. You and I have chosen different paths. You have chosen one path and I have chosen another. Now, if you and I go together, you will have to go with me, and not I with you, and if you don’t do that we separate; you take your path and I take mine.” And it seems as though the Almighty had taken that course with His children. They had slain all His chosen people and had left none of them upon the earth. They had hunted them, persecuted them and slain them until there was none left; and the authority which God had bestowed upon men through His Only Begotten Son had fled—that is, the men who held it had been exterminated. What then? “Why,” said He, seemingly—that is, we may judge so by the result—“ you have chosen this course, you have slain my chosen Apostles and servants, and now I will withdraw myself from you, and leave you to yourselves;” and for 1,800 years, or nearly that—probably 1,600 or 1,700 at least, so far as that continent was concerned—there had been no man left upon the earth who held the Priesthood, that we know anything about. If there are any among the children of men who held it, they are in some retired place, inaccessible to the wicked. When the set time had come for God to reestablish His Church and to bring to pass the fulfillment of that which had been spoken by the mouths of the Prophets, He came himself.

The first account we have of the visitation of divine beings in this dispensation, is the account that is given to us by the Prophet Joseph Smith himself, concerning the visit of the Father and the Son. There had been men, doubtless many men in the various ages of the world, who had light and who had a degree of the Spirit of God. I believe myself that Mahomed, whom the Christians deride and call a false prophet and stigmatize with a great many epithets—I believe that he was a man raised up by the Almighty, and inspired to a certain extent by Him to effect the reforms which he did in his land, and in the nations surrounding. He attacked idolatry, and restored the great and crowning idea that there is but one God. He taught that idea to his people, and reclaimed them from polytheism and from the heathenish practices into which they had fallen. I believe many men were inspired who lived after him and before him, who, nevertheless, did not have the Holy Priesthood, but were led by the Spirit of God to strive for a better con– dition of affairs and to live a purer and higher life than those by whom they were surrounded were living. But while this was the case it was the Spirit of God that did it. We have no account—no authenticated account at least—of angels coming from heaven, or of the Father manifesting Himself unto the children of men. And we have no account of the Priesthood being restored; in fact, there is every reason to believe it never was restored after it was withdrawn. The first that we knew concerning God was through the testimony of the Prophet Joseph. Even the personality of God was doubted. The traditions of men were so false respecting God that the idea of a personal Deity had faded from the so-called Christian mind. Though Jesus had appeared on the earth as a personage having a body, parts and passions, and declared Himself to be the Son of God, and the Apostles declared Him to be in the express image of His Father—notwithstanding that fact and that the record bore ample testimony to it, so long had been the silence that had existed between God and man, that the very conception of the nature of God—that is, of His characteristics—had entirely faded from the human mind, and He was deemed to be something other than He is. The common sectarian idea was that His center was nowhere, and His circumference was everywhere. There was no man scarcely upon the earth that had a true conception of God; the densest ignorance prevailed; and even ministers of religion could not conceive of the true idea, and there was mystery associated with what is called the Trinity—that is, with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. But all this was swept away in one moment by the appearance of the Almighty Himself—by the appearance of God, the Father, and His Son Jesus Christ, to the boy Joseph, as he kneeled in the forest beseeching God for knowledge concerning Him, and concerning the Gospel of salvation. In one moment all the darkness disappeared, and once more there was a man found on the earth, embodied in the flesh, who had seen God, who had seen Jesus, and who could describe the personality of both. Faith was again restored to the earth, the true faith and the true knowledge concerning our Creator, our Father, the Being from whence we derive our origin. This revelation dissipated all misconceptions and all false ideas, and removed the uncertainty that had existed respecting these matters. The Father came accompanied by the Son, thus showing that there were two personages of the Godhead, two presiding personages whom we worship and to whom we look, the one the Father, and the other the Son. Joseph saw that the Father had a form; that He had a head; that He had arms; that He had limbs; that He had feet; that He had a face and a tongue with which to express His thoughts; for He said unto Joseph: “This is My Beloved Son”—pointing to the Son—“Hear Him!”

Now, it was meant that this knowledge should be restored first of all. It seems so, at least, from the fact that God Himself came; it seems that this knowledge had to be restored as the basis for all true faith to be built upon. There can be no faith that is not built upon a true conception of God our Father. Therefore, before even angels came, He came Himself, accompanied by His Son, and revealed Himself once more to man upon the earth.

As I have said, the set time had come, the instrument had been born—the instrument that had been selected doubtless as much as the Son of God had been selected to accomplish His mission—that is, He had also been selected from before the foundation of the world, to come and to be the instrument in the hands of God to again lay the foundation of His Church upon the earth—that instrument had been born and the set time had come for the establishment of the work of the Lord. Joseph Smith had the necessary gifts and qualifications by which he was enabled to seek unto God with such irresistible faith that God heard his prayer and granted unto him the desire of his heart by revealing Himself unto him and giving unto him the instructions which He did. This was followed by other ministrations—the ministrations of angels. In the sectarian world you can scarcely see a picture of an angel without having a pair of wings attached, and every angel looks like a woman. Such ideas have come down through ages. And who knew differently? Who could tell anything about it? As with the being of God Himself, so there were false conceptions concerning the character of angels, and there was no man who could correct them, because all were alike in ignorance, and all were alike a prey to the traditions that had been handed down. But when Joseph received the ministration of an angel—or angels, for he was visited by more than one—he saw that they were men, and that they had not feathered after death, that they did not have wings, but that they were glorified men, or men who had received glory from God; they were personages like they were on the earth. Thus a true conception began to dawn upon the minds of at least a few individuals, who believed Joseph’s testimony concerning these beings. When I see our sisters and our brethren buying pictures of the sort to which I have alluded—pictures in which are angels having wings—a sort of hermaphrodite beings, or worse—I wonder that they would hang such things on their walls, and then allow this false conception to be perpetuated in the minds of little children concerning the character of these heavenly beings. I think it is just as wrong to represent an idea falsely by a picture, as it is to teach it falsely by words, because an impression is made on the mind by either means. Pictures of that kind should not be patronized by our people. Our children should not be allowed to come to conclusions upon such false representations.

Is it to be wondered at, my brethren and sisters, that after so many ages of darkness and unbelief, so many ages of ignorance concerning God, concerning his true character, concerning heavenly beings, that the whole world should have gone astray concerning the Gospel of Christ and the gifts of that Gospel and the nature of heaven and the future state of existence? Is it to be wondered at that the whole world should have gone astray concerning all these things, when they were so much astray concerning God Himself, concerning angels, and concerning other heavenly things? Is it any wonder that we have difficulty in preaching the Gospel, and in reaching the hearts of the people, when we consider that they are the inheritors of those false traditions that have come down intensified and strengthened by the ages of transmission, coming through one age to another, until they have reached the present time? It is not to be wondered at that the Latter-day Saints themselves have so little faith concerning these things, when we recollect the pit from whence they have been dug, and the rock whence they have been hewn. Well might the Savior ask, if He should find faith on earth, when He should come again? In looking down through the ages that would succeed His own, He saw the terrible condition of ignorance that would prevail upon the earth. Why, this so-called Christian world is as far from God, as any heathens that ever lived upon the face of the earth. Yea, they are worse than the heathen, because they think that they are in the full light of the Gospel, and that heavenly rays are shining upon them, when in reality they are sitting in the deepest darkness and are surrounded by clouds of ignorance that are impenetrable to them. How can men know anything about God, when He never speaks to them? How can men find out whether there is any revelation from heaven, when no revelation comes from that source? How can men find out about the future, if no one comes to tell them what the future is? It would be impossible for them to do it. It requires knowledge from God, concerning Himself; it requires knowledge concerning angels, it requires knowledge concerning eternity, to give men proper conceptions about these things. Hence it was that Joseph Smith, having had these visions opened to his mind, moved like a being from another sphere, among the children of men. God had opened his mind and revealed to him heavenly things. He saw them in their true light; he knew about them; and when he talked to men he was in their midst like a being from another world. That which he told them appeared, in some instances, to be false, to be nonsense. They could not comprehend it, because they had none of the Spirit of God about them, none of the knowledge of God, and they refused to accept him as an exponent of divine truth. So it is with the Elders who go out at the present day, to talk to the inhabitants of the earth. They are looked upon in the same light; though there is this to be said: that which has been taught by the Elders has had effect in the earth, and much misconception has gradually disappeared. There are men even now, for instance, who are ready to believe a doctrine which, when it was first preached, they rejected—the doctrine that there is a space between death and the resurrection in which a man can repent of his sins. Now, when that doctrine was first taught, some 42 years ago, it was looked upon by many as an absurd doctrine. They said it was contrary to the divine will. If man, they contended, did not receive the Gospel or the truth here in this life, he lost his opportunity, and would be damned throughout all the endless ages of eternity. That was the popular idea, and many believed it. Many believed that this would be the case with pagans, and with these Indians that we know something about, and with other heathen peoples, who had never heard the name of the Son of God—the only name under heaven by which man can be saved; many believed those people were to be consigned to hell by millions, never to be delivered therefrom, and yet they called God just, the God they worshiped.

Joseph Smith taught a different doctrine even before the Church was organized. He taught the doctrine, in a revelation given to Martin Harris—it had to be given with great care, because it was entirely different to what was generally believed—that “eternal punishment is God’s punishment;” but it does not follow that those who come under God’s punishment are to be punished throughout the endless ages of eternity. He taught that grand truth in the year 1829. Then it was followed up by the Vision, which explained in the most wonderful manner the goodness of our God, and showed Him to be the being that He is described to be by all the holy Prophets—a being just and merciful, a being who labored to save His children, and had their salvation at heart continually.

But Joseph taught in later years, this doctrine: that there was a space between death and the resurrection, and during that space the children of men who had not had an opportunity of hearing the Gospel in this life, could hear it proclaimed by men who had authority in the spirit world; and he explained that the Savior himself, during the time that His body was in the tomb, “went and preached to the spirits in prison. Which sometime were disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah.”

It was a doctrine that was new to the sectarian world; new to everyone; no one had ever thought of such a doctrine. But now I see by allusions in the newspapers occasionally, that popular ministers are taking hold of this idea and ventilating it and speaking about it. How wonderful! Is it not? It shows that when knowledge is upon the earth, there are some at least who profit by it, though they may not accept it as coming from God. In this way the preaching of this Gospel has had its effect upon the inhabitants of the earth. I have seen of late, and doubtless you have, many arguments in favor of God being a personal being, of there being a personal God—that is, a God with a form like a man, or that man, rather, had a form like God. The world has profited by the ideas which the Prophet Joseph received from heaven. Until these truths were revealed all was vagueness, doubt, uncertainty. Satan reigned over the earth. He swayed, it might be said, almost an undisturbed scepter. There was no one, scarcely, upon the face of the earth to dispute his reign. A few that did so, even though they did not have the Priesthood, were speedily crushed. For instance, the Huguenots, and others, who, in mountains and recesses and distant places, sought for a purer worship, were speedily extirpated. Satan was determined to reign with undisputed sway. During this reign he had slain the Son of God, and every man who testified of Him. He was determined to control this earth, and that has been his determination all the time. When the Prophet Joseph received those revelations from God, he leveled at him all his artillery; he made him the target for all his attacks; he hounded him from morning to night; he concocted every plot that could be conceived of, to destroy him from the face of the earth. Joseph’s great anxiety all the time was to bestow the keys and authority of the Holy Priesthood, so that at his death they would not be taken from the earth. His aim from the beginning was to this end. He urged the Saints forward to build the Temple in Kirtland, so that he might bestow upon some that knowledge and authority which God had given to him. And then afterwards in Nauvoo, the burden of his thoughts and talk was to urge the Saints to push forward the Temple there, so that he could bestow upon them the keys and authority which God had restored from heaven. He feared lest he should die until these were bestowed upon men. But God preserved his life until every key, every authority, every power and every gift that he had received from the eternal worlds, through the ministration of angels, from the days of Adam down to the days of Moroni, was again restored to the earth and sealed upon the heads of men, and then it proved more difficult for Satan to accomplish his purpose. He slew Joseph; but it was too late to prevent him communicating that authority which he had received; and the Church organization was preserved on the earth. Joseph lived long enough, as did our Elder Brother Jesus, to accomplish the work God sent him to do. He laid the foundation of the Church. He laid it so deep that it will never be overthrown. He bestowed upon man the everlasting Priesthood, with all its authority, from the Apostleship down to the authority of a Deacon, with every key, every endowment and every ordinance necessary to accomplish the work of God upon the earth. Then Satan raged, and he has raged ever since. You wonder many times, doubtless, at the hatred exhibited to this Church and people. If you could see the eternal worlds; if the vision of your mind could be opened to the scene; if you could have the veil withdrawn, you would not wonder at it when you understood the real character of the stake that is being fought for. It is the supremacy of this earth that is being contended for. Satan is determined that God shall not have this earth, and that He shall not reign here; he is determined in this, and if he could he would shed the blood of every man and woman on the face of the earth, rather than it should go into the hands of God. All those who are connected with him would, if they could, slay every man that stands in their pathway. The more faithful a man is in the cause of God, the more the hatred of the wicked is manifested against him, illustrating the truth of that statement made by the Apostle Paul, that “all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution”—not may suffer it, but they shall suffer it. Hence a people who seek to establish the cause of righteousness, to build temples, to restore the authority of God, will be hated to the death, and thus the prophecy will be fulfilled concerning them. We were told in the beginning of this work that we should be hated by a township, then by a County, then by a State; but after a while it would not be the opposition of a State, of a County, or of a township against this work, but that it should be the united power of the nation itself, against this work. We live and behold a fulfillment of that prediction; we are living witnesses of it; and this nation is fulfilling just as fast as it can do, the predictions of the Prophet Joseph Smith. They are making him a Prophet by their conduct, and fulfilling everything that he has spoken concerning this work. And it will not be confined to this nation. After a while it will gain such a foothold in the earth, and excite such fear, that the nations of the earth will band themselves against it. You need not expect any other result. This warfare will not cease. “But,” says one, “when this present excitement passes over, will we not have a time of peace?” God forbid that there should be peace on such terms as our enemies would have us make; for peace means surrendering the Kingdom of God; surrendering and giving up by the servants of God, that which they have undertaken to do, namely, to restore the reign of righteousness and truth upon the earth, the reign of God and of heaven. Such peace as our enemies have in view, means the surrender of this upon our part. When we are ready to surrender these things, then there will be peace, but it will be the peace of death, it will be the peace of hell, it will be the triumph of Satan, and the destruction of everything that is pure and holy, and godlike, upon the face of the earth. Men say, “Let us compromise.” This means, the giving up of this principle and that principle for the sake of the world’s favor. And when we commence giving up, where shall we stop? I want peace on no such terms as these. We have engaged in this warfare to build up the Kingdom of God upon the earth, let the consequences be what they may. They can only kill this body of ours; but let us fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. God has said that He will bear this Kingdom off triumphantly, and that it shall not be given into the hands of another people, and as sure as He has spoken, His word will be fulfilled. It may seem sometimes as though there was no ray of light, as though all was darkness, and as though our destruction was inevitable; but there is a God in heaven who, under these circumstances knows our condition, and remembers the promises that He has made concerning Zion. His arm will be stretched out to save, and He will deliver us from the greatest perils that may environ us. This is true—true as God lives, and we shall realize it in the future just as we have in the past.

(CONCLUDED IN NEXT VOLUME)

Discourse by President Geo. Q. Cannon, delivered in Paris, Bear Lake County, Idaho, Sunday Morning, August 19, 1883.

In arising to address you this morning, my brethren and sisters, I trust we shall have the presence and assistance of the Spirit of God, to lead our minds to those subjects that may be most appropriate to you and to your circumstances. It is very desirable that we should have that Spirit to be with us, desirable both for the speaker and for the hearers, that our meeting may be mutually profitable. Our condition as a people is such that we cannot make the progress that is designed by God for us, unless we have His Spirit given unto us. We are assailed from many quarters. We have so much to contend with, that it requires the wisdom of God to direct us, and it requires His Holy Spirit constantly to be with us to enable us to perform our part in this great work. Others may get along after their fashion without direct revelation from God, but we cannot do so. It would be impossible to build up this work, and to guard ourselves against the attacks of our enemies and perform the labors that devolve upon us, unless God should be with us and manifest His power and make known His mind and His will unto us. This far we have been thus guided through all the difficulties that have arisen. Through the aid which God has rendered we have been prepared for them, and we have been extricated from them, and so it will be from this time forth, if we live as we should do and avail ourselves of the promises which He has made. I am always filled with amazement when I contemplate the wonderful deliverances which God has wrought out for us. To see us as we are today, dwelling in peace, and free from molestation, enjoying liberty, notwithstanding all that has been done against us with a design to disturb and break us up, is to me marvelous. I think that our whole career, in fact, is marvelous; but if there be anything connected with our present position that calls forth more wonder than any other, it is the fact that we are today surrounded by such peaceful circumstances.

Our enemies have felt serenely confident that the measures they had adopted against us would result in the overthrow of this system called “Mormonism.” In a conversation which I had with Senator Edmunds, of about two hours duration, we went over this whole subject—I arguing from my standpoint and he from his—and he seemed to be very confident that the bill which he had introduced, which afterwards became law, would be effective in accomplishing the desired end. It was, as he told me, to be one of a series of measures looking to the final overthrow of our system. It was supposed by him and by others that if they could succeed in having a law enacted which would disfranchise men who were living in plural marriage, and exclude them from office, the effect would be such as to make them so unpopular that they would lose their influence and be degraded in the eyes of the most of the “Mormon” people. It was anticipated that there were a great many “Mormons” who were secretly opposed to the domination of the polygamists, as they were called, and who would breathe more freely if their power should be taken away from them, and who would vote, as they would say, more independently, and probably unite with the apostates and the Gentiles, and by that means overthrow the existing rule in the Territory. Now, I am satisfied beyond any doubt that it was anticipated that by the combination of these elements—the disaffected “Mormons,” the apostates and the gen– tiles—the supremacy of this country—that is, of Utah particularly, and of course the influence would extend into your Territory—that by the combination of these elements the supremacy of the Territory would be wrested from the control of those who had had it in their hands, and that “Mormonism” would be dealt a deadly blow, and the beginning of the great work of destroying this organization would be effected. Now, you can imagine how great the disappointment has been at the results. It was plain to me—and I guess it was to most of our brethren who reflected upon this subject—that the measure would be ineffectual. I took the liberty of telling the advocates of the Edmunds Bill so, but they did not believe what I said. They felt that they understood it better than I did, and today, the men who were the most in favor—that is, in Salt Lake City—of the enactment of the Edmunds law, are the men who are the most dissatisfied with the results which have been achieved by its passage; illustrating most perfectly the oft-repeated statement on our part, that our enemies can do nothing against the work of God, but that everything they do will contribute to its advancement and success. We have said this repeatedly. The experience of 53 years has proved to us that this is the universal result of measures concocted for the destruction or overthrow of this work. God has stated it, and has made promises concerning it, and this incident is but another illustration of the perfect truth of the promises of God concerning His work. Instead of being today in bondage, we are as free as we ever have been. Instead of our enemies having control of our country, we still retain control of it. Now, what new measures will be adopted remains to be seen. Our enemies are tireless in their efforts. They will not give up this contest, they will not vacate the field, they will not consent to our living in peace, but they will continue their efforts, they will continue their attacks upon us. There is this advantage, however, that we always have—we have always had it in the past, we shall have it doubtless in the future—that the lies that are told concerning us are believed by our enemies, and accepting these as true, they frame their measures against us upon that basis; and that being the fact they always fail, because they do not have a true conception of the actual condition of affairs. Hence, if there were no other cause, that of itself is sufficient to foil them in their expectations. They are deceived concerning us by the many falsehoods that are told; but, as I say, they accept these as true and frame their measures upon these misconceptions and the result is always disappointment, and it always will be.

There is this that I am thankful for, connected with this whole affair. There was a time when the efforts of those who were arrayed against the work of God, were confined to a limited circle or sphere. In the beginning it was a neighborhood, and gradually extended until townships took the matter in hand, and from townships it extended to counties, and from counties to States, and we were told as long ago as I can recollect, and it has been declared from the beginning that it would be the case, that as this work grew, so opposition should grow against it, enlarging its circle, extending its influence in proportion to the work of God, until, we were told, States would array themselves against this work. We have seen that fulfilled. We came here, not because the United States had taken steps against us, but because Illinois and Missouri had expelled us from their borders, and we could secure no redress for the wrongs that had been inflicted upon us. But we were told that after a while the United States itself should oppose the work of God, and in a national capacity enact measures against it, and that then it would not be confined to that alone, but that all the nations of the earth, sooner or later, would array themselves against the work of God. I am thankful that there is this testimony given unto us concerning the growth of this work. It is no longer a county, it is no longer a State, but it assumes now national proportions. The nation itself, under the influence of bad men, of unwise legislators, under the pressure of priestcraft which is brought to bear from all quarters of the land upon the Congress of the United States—in consequence of this influence we have now the Edmunds law following the Poland law, and it following the law of 1862, and probably to be followed by other measures of an equally proscriptive character, if the majority in Congress can be secured to pass such laws. God, however, will hold our enemies in check, and will restrain them, and will not suffer them to go beyond certain limits; so that we shall not be overwhelmed, but that we shall have the strength necessary to withstand the assaults that are made upon us or shall be made upon us. It is a wise dispensation of His providence that this should be the case, because if it were not so, with the power that is arrayed against us, we should be overwhelmed. God, however, tempers these matters according to our strength and ability to bear them or to withstand them, and as we grow, so grows the opposition; as we gain strength, so the opposition to us gains strength; as we gain experience and knowledge, we become more capable and achieve a higher position, and we will continue to do so until Zion will be the head, just as the prophets have predicted. But it is necessary that we should pass through this school of experience to test us, to try us, to give unto us the necessary confidence in ourselves as well as in our God and in His unfailing promises. Had we been called in the beginning to pass through such ordeals as we have had of late, it is doubtful if we could have endured them, unless God had endowed us with an extraordinary amount of His power. But they have come upon us gradually. We have met one difficulty after another, one assault after another, until we have gradually acquired confidence in our ability to withstand these assaults and to meet them, as well as confidence in our God. Our faith has been increased, and through the increase of faith we have been enabled to overcome, and thus it will be unto the end. There will be times, as there have been, when it will seem as though there is no possible way of escape, when it will seem as though everything is blocked up before us, and as though we are about to be swallowed up or destroyed; and the faith of the people will be tested in this manner, doubtless, many times in the future, as it has been many times in the past; but when it will seem the darkest, when the clouds will seem the most impenetrable, when there will be not a ray to illumine the pathway of the Saints of God, then God will be near to us to deliver us, and at the very darkest hour He will dispel the clouds and provide a way of escape that will excite our wonder, our admiration and our praise. It was so last year—I mean 1882, before the passage of the Edmunds law and afterwards. It seemed as though the spirits of evil had poured out of hell and they had come upon the earth and were operating against the work of God. In all my experience I had never met a stronger feeling than prevailed. It seemed as though the whole nation was aroused from the center to the extremities. Almost every church in the land, every priest and every religious organization, was stirred up, banded together and their influence combined against the work of God to destroy it. Congress was being pushed forward by a power which the Members could not resist, and it seemed as though there would be no stopping place short of our destruction. I expect you felt it here as the Saints felt it in Utah, and as I felt it in Washington. The papers, as you will remember, were full of threats against us. It seemed as though a crisis had arrived in our affairs. It seemed as though there was no way of escape. But God still reigned. He comforted the hearts of His servants, and I was filled with thanksgiving to see the spirit which rested upon President Taylor and the brethren at home. When I received their letters I saw that, notwithstanding the darkness of the hour and the threats of our enemies, their hearts were undismayed, and their confidence in God as unfaltering as ever. God was with His people. He had not forgotten His promises. And it seemed as though by one blow or one move, the whole of this opposition was dissipated. It fell to the ground, the whole fabric of it, and, like a baseless vision of the night, it melted away and the sunshine came out; the sun, as glorious as ever, shone down upon us, and every cloud was removed, apparently, from the heavens above, and our pathway was bright and clear without obstruction, and it has been so until the present time.

Will there be times again of this character? Yes, undoubtedly. It is necessary in the providences of our God, concerning this work, that this should be the case, in order that the faith of the Latter-day Saints may be tested, and that they may be led to put their trust in God, who alone can save us in such hours of extremity and trial. We need not expect that it will always be sunshine; we need not expect that the heavens will always be free from clouds, or that our pathway will never be obstructed or darkened. On the contrary, we shall have these things to contend with, in order that we may, by contending with them in the faith and power of God, obtain knowledge concerning His work and His providences.

In the meantime the knowledge of this work is being disseminated. With it, however, there goes forth a spirit of falsehood. It would seem as though, with the means of advertising we now have, and with the opportunities that are presented to men to visit us, a better understanding concerning us would be reached by thinking men. Undoubtedly this is the case to a certain extent. But my observation tells me that with the increase of information there is also a proportionate increase of misrepresentation and falsehood. The adversary is more industrious, if possible, in beclouding the minds of the children of men concerning us and concerning this work and the objects we have in view than he ever was. We become more advertised, it is true; but while we are advertised it is not always in the direction of removing error and giving correct ideas concerning us. It is a strange fact that many people who visit Salt Lake City, and visit our Territory, notwithstanding that which they see, notwithstanding all that is before them, are deceived respecting us; they do not get a correct idea concerning our motives nor the objects we have in view, nor the character of our organization. They look at us through spectacles that distort us. You have seen, probably, glasses that change the appearance of things. It is so with their views. They cannot look at these things as we look at them. From such individuals the power of correct observation seems to be taken away by the power of darkness and the effect of falsehood upon their minds. This is a remarkable fact. I have been struck with it very much of late. Many intelligent men and women visit us, and they mingle among us; but at the same time they have ideas in their minds concerning us which seem to deprive them of the power of judging of us correctly, and they go away convinced on some points, but still retain many of the old ideas that have been implanted in their minds by falsehood concerning us. Of course, there are many from whose minds prejudice is removed and whose feelings become friendly.

We need not expect, however, that we can escape the power of prejudice; for the reason that there are two influences at work—the power of God and the power of Satan. Satan is as busy darkening the minds and beclouding the understandings of the children of men as he ever was, and the inhabitants of the earth having rejected the truth, being unwilling to receive the Gospel of the Son of God when it is presented to them, are left a prey to other influences and to the spirit of darkness; therefore, they are incapable of judging concerning the work of God. Will this continue to be the case? Undoubtedly it will. There will be no change in this respect. The work of God will be accomplished on the earth, it will roll forth, the predictions of the prophets will be fulfilled, and men will see their fulfillment. Yet, notwithstanding this, they will reject the testimony of the servants of God. It is very remarkable that this should be the case with the evidences there are, which are so plain and palpable and indisputable to us.

It was only a few days before I left home that some Members of Congress, with whom I was acquainted, came to the city. One very intelligent man and his wife were among them. I took them around, showed them our public buildings and other places of interest, and in conversation concerning the Temple, when I was showing them that structure, I explained to them to some extent its character and the objects for which it was being erected. I called their attention to the fact that while we had believed for forty years and upwards that there was a space between death and the resurrection, and that in that space there were opportunities for men and women to hear the Gospel of the Son of God, and to accept it, not, however, the purgatory of the Catholics—that while we had believed that for forty years and upwards, God having revealed it unto His servant Joseph Smith, the world was just beginning to entertain the same belief, and popular preachers were beginning to advocate the correctness of the idea or of the doctrine that there was a chance for repent– ance beyond the grave. These people with whom I conversed were intelligent, and they were of a religious turn of mind and familiar with religious affairs. They stated that they had heard such doctrines lately advocated. I then explained to them about the millions of the dead, of the pagans and others who had died in ignorance of the Gospel. “Now,” said I, “how can you understand, upon any other principle than this, the justice of our God towards them? They have been dead for hundreds of years in entire ignorance of the name of Jesus, the only name given under heaven whereby man can be saved. Shall they be consigned to endless torment, because of their lack of opportunity? Would that,” I asked, “be consistent with our ideas of justice?”

They admitted that it would not.

“Well,” said I, “upwards of forty years ago, the Prophet Joseph Smith had revealed to him from God, this principle, that there were opportunities beyond the grave for men and women to learn the plan of salvation, and we are building temples for the benefit of these dead, as well as the living.” I then explained to them the doctrine of the baptism for the dead—what Paul had said concerning it. To them it opened a new field of thought and reflection; and it is a remarkable fact that at the present time the religious world, the orthodox religious world, are beginning to entertain, some of the views that Joseph Smith preached and advocated upwards of forty years ago, concerning these matters. There are popular ministers who do advocate the idea contained in the epistle of Peter, where he speaks about Jesus going and preaching to the spirits in prison, and they see nothing unreasonable in this doctrine; on the contrary, it comports with their ideas, and with the justice and mercy of our God. The world are gradually adopting many of the views that the Latter-day Saints have entertained. There are many doctrines that we have taught that were very unpopular in the beginning that they now receive. Why, there are Elders in this congregation who can well remember that it was a common belief, when they preached the Gospel to religious people, that the world was created out of nothing. That was a commonly received idea. Joseph Smith taught the eternal duration of matter. He taught the doctrine that matter was indestructible; that it never had a beginning; that it never could have an end; that it might undergo chemical changes, but that it was indestructible, and that the elements of which the earth is composed were eternal—never had a beginning and never would have an end. The whole religious world were shocked at such an idea, and so in regard to the time occupied in the creation of the earth. But Joseph taught the true principle connected with this. He said the days mentioned as occupied in the creation were not our days of twenty-four hours’ length, but were periods of time. Now, that is a commonly received doctrine, although it was sneered at and rejected by religious men at the time it was taught by the Elders of this Church. And so it has gone on. I might enumerate a great many doctrines that God revealed, that the world has gradually adopted, which at sometime they rejected, rejecting entirely the source whence they came, rejecting God as the author, and rejecting His Prophet as the medium through which these doctrines have been received and taught. It is only a day or two ago that I saw a book published by Josiah Quincy, a relative of John Quincy Adams, in which he relates an interview he had with the Prophet Joseph, at Nauvoo. He relates in that interview, that the Prophet Joseph stated to him his proposition for the emancipation of the slaves, and he (Quincy) declares that it was worthy the consideration of all Christian statesmen. Ralph Waldo Emerson—the philosopher of Concord—eleven years after this, not acknowledging that Joseph had made a similar proposition, threw out the same idea, but that was at a time, as Quincy says, when men’s minds were stirred up on this question of slavery. “But,” says he, “what shall be thought of the man who, eleven years previous, when no one was disturbed about the question, made such a proposition; and which he made not only to me verbally, but which he published and advocated?”

To my mind this is strong testimony concerning the wisdom that God had given to the Prophet Joseph, which was so far ahead of that generation that they could not comprehend nor receive it.

Thus the world are gradually acknowledging the wisdom that God has given to His servants. Thus they are adopting the truths that are revealed. Thus the influence of this work is being felt throughout Christendom, and its effect is more marked than many of us imagine. We cannot comprehend to the full extent the effect that the work is having upon the world, and what God is doing through us, although we are but a feeble people. The influence of this work is spreading. Why, it is now a very common thing for people to believe in the sick being healed by the prayer of faith. You see allusions to it in the public newspapers of the day, and there are other evidences which go to show the influence that this work and the teachings of the Elders of this Church is having upon the nations of the earth. And so it will be in all matters pertaining to government. Every day we are growing in strength, every day we are growing in influence, every day our influence is becoming more potent and wide reaching in its effects, and the people of the nation of which we form a part are becoming cognizant of it. Leading men admit it. They are conscious of it. They will not admit it in words to the fullest extent. But their movements against this work bear testimony that they, in their secret souls, feel that there is a power, an influence, and a might connected with this work that are sooner or later to make themselves felt. A people such as we are, men can readily see, must have a great influence in the affairs of the nation. We are possessed of every qualification that makes a people great. We are destitute of no single qualification that contributes to true greatness in an individual or in a nation; and a people possessing these qualifications will make themselves felt in the struggle for existence with other powers.

Another thing. While there are people belonging to our nation and to other nations who are fading away because they destroy the fecundity of their females and take no delight in posterity, in the midst of these mountains every married woman deems it an honor to be a mother, and feels it to be a deprivation not to bear the souls of the children of men.

I pray God to fill you with His Holy Spirit, and fill those who speak unto you with His power, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Discourse by President Joseph F. Smith, delivered in Paris, Idaho, Sunday Morning, August 19, 1883.

I have been extremely interested this morning in listening to the very excellent remarks of Brother Cannon. I feel that in answer to the desires and prayers of the congregation the Lord has blessed Brother Cannon in his remarks, and that through him He has made plain many very important truths and principles, upon which it will be well for the congregation to reflect and to treasure up in their hearts.

My mind was led to reflect, while Brother Cannon was speaking, upon the inconsistency, harshness and unreasonableness of the world in their attitude towards us as a people, and upon the manner in which they have sought to deal with what they term “the Mormon Question.” The words of the Savior in relation to the hatred of the world towards the people of God flashed through my mind: “If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.” Jesus and His disciples were everywhere spoken against. Everybody, almost, reviled them. When Jesus cast out devils, it was said to have been done by the power of Beelzebub, the prince of devils; that He healed the sick by the same power; that He restored the sight of the blind by the same power; and all the works of mercy and charity which He performed were attributed to the power of Satan. It is very much the same in this dispensation. No matter how good you may be—you who profess to be Latter-day Saints—no matter how virtuous you may be, you are set down by the world as adulterers. No matter how honest you may be, you are called dishonest. No matter how innocent you may be of all the crimes that are known, the sectarian world declare you are unfit to live because of your corruptions and abominations. No matter how charitable you may be, they claim that you lack the elements of charity and of mercy. Consequently they think it behooves them, and “the powers that be,” to move against you for your destruction. It was for this reason that the Congress of the United States, a little while ago, was compelled, by an influence and a power that it could not, or dare not resist, to pass a most unconstitutional, a most unjust and wicked act for the purpose of depriving an innocent and unoffending people of their legitimate rights—rights that belong to them under the constitution of our country.

Have we sought to injure anybody? Have we sought to deprive any people of their rights? Have we sought to tear down or to destroy any part of the earth? Are the vile charges that are made against us true? No, they are not. You know they are not. There is not a man or a woman under the sound of my voice this morning but know as they know they live, that the charges that are made against the Latter-day Saints are false. They say that we have been, in years past, in the habit of committing murder! We are charged with having murdered strangers that came amongst us! We are charged with having murdered apostate Mormons because they had apostatized from us! We are charged with oppressing the people, and with keeping them under tyranny! And those who make these charges claim that it is because of their influence in Utah—the influence of the world—of the public press—the presence in our midst of officers of the law who have been sent by the President of the United States to rule over us; that this murderous propensity, and this power for evil that has here– tofore been exhibited by the Latter-day Saints, have been checked!

Now, who is there that is acquainted with the history of Utah, or with the history of this people, but know that all these things that have been villainously charged against this people are libelous and as false as hell. Who does not know that such a reign of terror never did exist in Utah or among this people anywhere? I came to Utah in 1848; I have been a resident among this people from my childhood; I have been cognizant of nearly everything that has transpired of a public character among the Latter-day Saints for the last 30 years, and I am a witness and can and do bear my testimony that all these charges are false, and that the people today are a fair example of what they have always been from the beginning. Who of you are murderers? Who of you, professing to be Latter-day Saints, are thieves and robbers? Who of you, professing the same thing, are adulterers and whoremongers? Who of you, professing to be Latter-day Saints, curse and swear and blaspheme the name of God? Who of you would oppress your neighbor or would rob him of his rights? Who of you, professing to be Latter-day Saints, would not be ready to protect the rights and to maintain the liberties of the stranger within our gates as you would to protect your own rights or those of your neighbor? Is not this the case today? Yes. Was it ever different to this? Was there ever a different condition of things existed in the midst of this people? You very well know that there never was. Men who have done wrong in times past have been held accountable for their acts to the law by the officers of the law. Men who today are ungovernable and commit crimes are amenable to the law and must answer for their crimes. This has always been the case. The Gospel net has gathered of every kind. But is a whole community to be held responsible for individuals whose propensities lead them to commit crimes? If we are to be judged upon that principle, who will be exempt from the same judgment? If God should judge the world in this manner He would execute the whole world—none would be exempt. I think as a community or as communities, we will compare favorably with any on the face of the earth. I think there will be found far less crime among the Latter-day Saints than may be found in other communities of like numbers anywhere else. I believe there is less crime, less wickedness, less drunkenness, and fewer offenses of any kind among the Latter-day Saints than can be found among any other people of equal numbers in the world. And in saying this I am not boasting of the Latter-day Saints; for, surely, if we are Latter-day Saints, crime and wickedness should have no part in us. No man professing to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints should be guilty of anything that would cause the blush of shame to appear in the face. On the contrary we ought to live above suspicion; we ought to live free from crime, free from wickedness and sin of every description. Therefore, to say that the Latter-day Saints are the best people I know of in the world is not saying anything more than should be said and can be said honestly and truthfully. We ought not to be guilty of sin. The teachings of the servants of God have been toward righteousness, honesty and virtue, and towards everything that is calculated to elevate and ennoble mankind. This has been the burden of the teaching of the servants of God from the day that the Church was organized until the present time; and if the Latter-day Saints are not the best people upon the earth, it is because they have not hearkened to the counsel that has been given them.

Why, then, should we be proscribed? Why, then, should the people of the world malign us and seek to blacken our names and our characters? Why should they seek to bring persecution and evil upon us? The answer is to be found in the words of the Savior. “I have chosen you out of the world, and therefore the world hate you.” So long as you maintain the principles of the Gospel; so long as you defend and practice the principles of virtue, of truth and of righteousness; so long as you stand by the doctrines of Christ, which have been revealed through Joseph the Prophet, through Brigham Young, the Prophet, and through President Taylor and the oracles of God; so long the world will be arrayed against you, so long they will hate you and will seek to bring evil upon you unless they repent. There is no question about it. Many people will not be convinced. Brother Cannon has alluded to people who visit us. They may be favorably impressed upon some points; but still they retain in their hearts a prejudice they have received concerning us, and they carry it away with them notwithstanding what they see. This is according to what Jesus said. They have eyes, but they see not; they have ears, but they hear not; they have hearts but they do not understand. It is also said that “there are none so deaf as those who will not hear, and none so blind as those who will not see.” Many of those who visit Utah, come filled with such an amount of prejudice that they will not allow their senses to be convinced of the truth. Hence they go away as prejudiced as when they came. Nevertheless, when men come with their minds divested of prejudice, who can see and are disposed to see, and are liberal-minded enough to look at things in their true light, they do in a measure get correct views and ideas in relation to us. A few such men have come to Utah, and gone away enlightened, and have told the truth to the world. But notwithstanding they tell the truth they are generally disbelieved as we are when we tell it. We would naturally suppose that a man like Judge Black, who on legal matters was an authority in the world, would be believed; but the moment that man, with all his talent and prestige, stood up in the halls of Congress and undertook to reason upon the constitutional rights of the people called Latter-day Saints, he was denounced and the soundness of his conclusions questioned by judges, lawyers and statesmen. He was held up to ridicule because he dared to discourse upon the constitutional rights of the people called Latter-day Saints. And it has been so with everybody else that has dared to speak a word in favor of the people of God having their rights. It was so with those who dared to speak in favor of the Son of God and His disciples. Those who dared to do so were considered unworthy of being believed on oath; their testimony could not be received; they were partial. And it has become so in relation to this people. Let any man lift up his voice in the defense of the people of God, and he will at once be denounced by a certain influential class and his influence among that class of people who seem bent upon persecuting the Latter-day Saints will wane, no matter how much they may have honored his counsels prior to that.

Will this continue to be the case? Yes, more and more; for as we increase in union, in faith, intelligence, and in political and religious influence, the hatred of the wicked will increase against us. Then will the heathen rage and the wicked imagine a vain thing; and their efforts to destroy us will proportionately increase. But will they succeed? Will they accomplish their desires? Just in proportion as they have done it hitherto, and no more. When they drove the Latter-day Saints out of Missouri, and had the Prophet and his companions confined in Liberty Jail, the world rejoiced in the belief that the backbone of “Mormonism” was broken. But they had reckoned without their host. They had not based their calculations upon the facts. The sequel proves that they had committed a grand mistake. Notwithstanding that General Clark, on the square in Far West, said to Joseph and his companions, that their doom was sealed and their die was cast, they were reckoning without their host. They had not calculated upon the power of God in these matters. They simply thought they had Joseph Smith in their power, and that by destroying him they would destroy “Mormonism.” But the Lord delivered him from his enemies. And from Missouri he came to Illinois. “Mormonism”—as it is called in the world—from being a village grew into a city—the City of Nauvoo, one of the most beautiful cities in the west of America. We became possessed of chartered rights, and wielded an influence which controlled the county of Hancock, in the State of Illinois, and which materially affected the political status of other counties surrounding. We grew from a handful to an armful, and then the rage of the enemy was again stirred up until they finally succeeded in taking the lives of the servants of God, Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum. At this they rejoiced and congratulated each other, and concluded that they had done a good thing. “Mormonism” would now cease to trouble the world? But again they had reckoned without their host. Again they had based their calculations upon false premises. They had not considered the power connected with this work. They had not contemplated the nature of the power of God. From Nauvoo we were thrust out into the wilderness, but we sought out and located in Utah by the guidance of the Almighty. As Brother George A. Smith used to say, “We came willingly because we were obliged to.” We had no other place to go to. But so far as accomplishing the object they had in view—the destruction of “Mormonism”—we know that they failed. From a city we have grown to a Territory in the United States, and we have been able to honestly control the Territorial government despite the desires, the cunning, the craftiness, and all the fraudulent efforts of our enemies.

Now, if it was difficult for the world to deal with the question of “Mormonism” in 1838, it was still more difficult for them to deal with it in 1844. If it was difficult for them to deal with and handle this “Mormon Question,” as they call it, in 1846, when the people were made wandering outcasts upon the desert; I say, if it was a difficult thing for the Government of the United States and for the enemies of this people to deal with the “Mormon Question” then, is it not a far more difficult question for them to deal with today? As they turn over the wall, lo! It becomes higher and broader than it was before. As they kick the mustard plant? Lo! The seed is scattered, and it takes root and springs forth and increases on every hand. Every effort of our enemies has utterly failed. Let them continue their efforts. Let them do their worst. God Almighty is at the helm, and if they can succeed in turning over the wall again they will find that it has grown larger since they last tipped it over. But they do not want us to grow in political power. They do not want us to be, religiously or otherwise, a separate and distinct people from the rest of the world. They want us to become identified and mixed up with the rest of the world, to become like them, thereby thwarting the purposes of God. They hate our union; but they apparently do not sense that persecution has a tendency only to make us more united.

Well, it is for us to live our religion. Let us attend to our duties as Latter-day Saints. Let us continue to be humble and faithful before God. And if the time should ever come when the Lord will see fit to allow our enemies to drive us from our present homes, the result will be similar to what it was when they drove us out of Nauvoo. They will drive us from the Territory of Utah into a half a dozen of States, and we may possibly take possession of them all. They won’t believe me, and they won’t believe the Elders of the Church when they tell them these things plainly. They won’t believe us any more than they would believe Joseph Smith in his day, or Brigham Young in his day. But what these inspired men said is coming to pass. Every word that they uttered in relation to the building up of Zion, and to the progress of the kingdom of God upon the earth will be fulfilled, and not one jot or tittle will fail. You and I as individuals may fail, but the work of God cannot fail. It is His work. He hath decreed its consummation, and no power on earth or in hell can alter the decree. The work is marching forward, and if we do not keep pace with it, we must eventually be left behind. Better far for us to keep up with the rank and file, and to walk shoulder to shoulder with the authorities of the Church; with those who have the spirit of the Gospel in their hearts; with those in whose bones burn the fire of truth and the testimony of Jesus Christ, who are continually exhorting the people to be diligent in keeping the commandments of God. We should do what is right. We should be virtuous, honorable and charitable, and we should be liberal in our hearts to all mankind. We can afford to be liberal. We have received that which pertains to eternal growth, to eternal increase, to eternal happiness; we have received that which pertains to dominion, and power, and glory and to thrones and principalities. Freely we have received, and freely we can afford to give; for in giving we do not diminish our own store. We can afford, therefore, to exclaim (in relation to our enemies), “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” We can afford to have sympathy for them, to beseech God in the name of Jesus, to have mercy upon them, for they know not the consequences of their acts. It is for us to work righteousness; for, as President Young remarked in the Temple at St. George, in 1877, the more righteous we are, the more united we are; the more diligent we are in keeping the commandments of God, the less will be the power of our enemies; their power will diminish in proportion to our faithfulness. Yet our enemies will rage and their anger will increase against the work of the Lord; and I presume it is a true saying, that “whom the gods would destroy they first make mad.” The heathen—the so-called Christian nations—will become mad with rage against the Latter-day Saints; and thus the world will go on until they are ripened for destruction. We can afford to be calm and patient and await God’s deliverance; for we know that He is our friend; that He is on the side of the righteous; and that He will bring them off triumphant if they continue faithful, which may the Lord grant in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Discourse by President Geo. Q. Cannon, delivered in the Tabernacle, Logan City, Sunday Morning, August 12, 1883.

I have listened—as no doubt all have—with great interest, to the remarks which have been made by Brother Joseph F. Smith, and I can bear testimony to their truth, that they are profitable to us, and should be treasured up in our hearts and made practical in our lives.

While he was speaking, this reflection forced itself upon me: What other people upon the face of the earth aspire to the same glory and the same exaltation that the Latter-day Saints do? What other people have the same hopes respecting eternity and their condition in eternity, and the glory they are to receive if faithful in keeping the commandments of God, that the Latter-day Saints have? My acquaintance with mankind, so far as it goes, teaches me that of all people now living, either in Christendom or heathendom, the Latter-day Saints excel them all in their hopes, in their anticipations, in the character of the glory that they are to receive, and in the promises which are sealed upon them. There is not a man in this room who has a proper conception of the Gospel, and of the rewards attached to obedience to it, who does not at least hope that he will attain unto celestial glory (which means the Godhead, to be an heir of God, and a joint heir with Jesus Christ); that he will enter upon a career of exaltation that shall not terminate throughout the endless ages of eternity, and that will place him in the company of Him concerning whom it is said “of the increase of His kingdom there shall be no end.” And there is not a woman in this congregation who has a proper conception or knowledge of the promises associated with the Gospel, and with obedience thereto, who does not indulge, when she thinks upon these matters, in similar hopes, and would be very unhappy if she thought she should be deprived of that which she anticipates—I mean of being one with her husband as a wife and as a queen and as a priestess throughout eternity, and stand with him at the head of their mutual posterity.

This being the case, is it any wonder that God makes requirements of us, and expects a perfection on our part that is not looked for nor expected of the rest of the world? We were told this morning—and the truth cannot be too often repeated in our hearing—that God, our Eternal Father, has placed all these possessions and blessings—that is, the possessions of the earth and the blessings connected with the earth—that He has placed them in our hands merely as stewards, and that we hold them subject to Him, in other words, in trust for Him, and that, if He calls upon us to use them in any given direction He may indicate, it is our duty as His children, occupying the relationship that we do to Him, and with the hopes in our breasts that we have, to hold them entirely subject to Him. There is not another people upon the face of the earth that I know anything about who are taught such ideas and doctrines as these. I do not think that any other denomination of people, either religious or secular, have such doctrines as we have heard this morning taught to them respecting their duties and their obligations to God. Of course you will very frequently hear in sectarian churches, many things connected with this subject; that it is the duty of the rich to help the poor and to be benevolent and to hold all things in a way that will please God; but to bring this down to what we would call practical consecration, to practically consecrate their wealth and hold it as though they would have to practically consecrate it at any time, is a doctrine that I do not think is taught in any other church, or so-called church, nor is it believed in by any other people. There are, it is true, people who indulge in very wild vagaries about property, such as communists and others, but they have no system of religion, they do not believe in God, they do not believe in the principles that He teaches and which we accept. They would not carry them out on any such basis.

Let me ask you, my brethren and sisters, is it not appropriate that we should be required to make—I was going to say sacrifice. Well, that is a word that is so commonly used, that I suppose I could not use any other that would convey the idea to your minds clear enough. I will use it, therefore. Is it not appropriate to make sacrifices of this character, considering who we are and what we are? If we are expecting to reach a glory and an exaltation such as we think about and talk about and pray for, it seems to me that there should be something to be done on our part commensurate with the expectations and hopes and desires that we entertain, and I do not know myself any better test that can be brought to bear upon human beings than this test to which allusion has been made this morning, the test of holding ourselves—that is our individual persons, with our time and the ability that God has given unto us, our wives, our children, and the possessions that God has placed in our hands to control—to hold all these subject to His dictation and to His approval.

“Now,” says one, “I am quite willing for that; I would be quite willing to receive all that doctrine and to believe it if God himself were to come and make the requirement of me. I am quite willing that God should dictate to me about my wives and children; and if He wants me to use my talents and give up my life or to yield up my property—I am quite willing to do all these things if He will come and tell me himself, or if He will send an angel to tell me. But I look upon my brethren who preside over this Church, and I see that they are mortal men, and I see that they do many things that mortal men do, and I have not quite confidence enough in them to dispose of my property as they may dictate. They are mortal, they are like I am, and I do not know whether they will do the right thing or not. I have some doubts about that. I have not got confidence in their management as business men. I do not know but I have better business qualities myself than they have, and I can manage my own affairs to better advantage than they can. I am not willing, therefore, to do as my fellow men dictate.”

Now, let me ask is not that the secret thought of many minds? I am sure it is. And yet the same men who entertain these thoughts, and the same women, will go into this Temple when it is completed, and will ask at the hands of the servants of God blessings that are far beyond all price when measured by earthly substance, by gold or silver, or that which men consider valuable. It is a strange thing; it is a strange feature in the human character; it is exhibited everywhere; it is not confined to Latter-day Saints alone; that mankind are very willing to trust men with spiritual things, and to have confidence in them concerning spiritual things, and have little or no confidence in them when it affects their temporal interests. There are men—and there may be some in this congregation—who have been quite willing to submit to the ordinance of baptism and rely upon it as a means of salvation, as a means of remitting their sins, and have also been willing to submit to have hands laid upon them by the same individual, for the reception of the Holy Ghost, who would not listen to his counsel concerning their property. This want of confidence arises in some instances from selfishness or a lack of faith, and in others from witnessing the unwise conduct of Elders in the management of means. There have been Elders who have gone out in the world for the purpose of bringing souls to the truth who have abused their privileges among the people, and have borrowed money and never repaid it. Such occurrences inspire distrust. And such men have transcended the limits of their authority in taking this course. They were not sent out to meddle in this way, in people’s affairs, to borrow money, and do things of that character; but were sent to preach the Gospel, and so long as they confined themselves to their legitimate duties, and did those things they were authorized to do, they were blessed, the Lord was with them, and their labors resulted in salvation to the people. Every man who attends strictly to the duties assigned to him, and pertaining to his Priesthood, and confines himself to them, is sustained and upheld of the Lord. The Elders who have destroyed confidence by the methods I have alluded to, transcended their authority. That constituted the difference between their action and the action of the man whom God places to preside over His Church. Can you not see the distinction? I can see that a man that goes out as a missionary, as Elders have done in the past, often acquires great influence with the power of God resting upon him, and through the confidence that power has inspired in the midst of the Saints, I can understand that men have taken advantage of that influence, and have abused the trust of the people, and have done wrong, and have lessened their influence with God, and with man, and have caused the Spirit of God by that action to be withdrawn from them. There are many such cases to which I could point you, if it were necessary this morning. No man, however, has done that in this Church without losing that power which God gave unto him, and there are men who have apostatized from this Church who brought on that apostasy because of such conduct as I allude to. They were not warranted in doing what they did. They exceeded the bounds of their Priesthood, and in doing so they committed sin. But there is an authority in the Church to whom God has given the right to counsel in the affairs of the children of men in regard to temporal affairs. When Joseph Smith lived upon the earth it was his prerogative to do that. He stood as God’s ambassador—not clothed with the attributes of God, for He was a mortal man; but he stood as the representative of God upon the earth, holding the keys of the kingdom of God upon the earth, with the power to bind on earth and it should be bound in heaven. He occupied that position when he lived, and on his departure another took his place upon the earth and stood in precisely the same capacity to us as a people that Joseph Smith did. That was Brigham Young. When he passed away another stepped forward and took the same position, and holds the same keys and exercises the same authority and stands precisely in the same position to us that the Prophet Joseph did, or that the Prophet Brigham did, when he lived upon the earth. Now, was not Joseph Smith a mortal man? Yes. A fallible man? Yes. Had he not weaknesses? Yes, he acknowledged them himself, and did not fail to put the revelations on record in this book [the Book of Doctrine and Covenants] wherein God reproved him. His weaknesses were not concealed from the people. He was willing that people should know that he was mortal, and had failings. And so with Brigham Young. Was not he a mortal man, a man who had weaknesses? He was not a God. He was not an immortal being. He was not infallible. No, he was fallible. And yet when he spoke by the power of God, it was the word of God to this people. When he sealed a man up to eternal life, he bestowed upon him the blessings pertaining to eternity, and to the Godhead, or when he delegated others to do it in his stead, God in the eternal world recorded the act; the blessings that were sealed upon that man or that woman, they were sealed to be binding in this life, and in that life which is to come; they became part of the records of eternity, and would be fulfilled to the very letter upon the heads of those upon whom they were pronounced, provided they were faithful before God, and fulfilled their part of the covenant. There is no doubt about it. And so it is today. There is but one man (as you have often heard), at a time on the earth, who holds this authority. There maybe others who have this authority also; and I thank God there are many who hold this authority—that is the authority of the Apostleship; but they hold it subordinate to the man who holds the keys, they cannot exercise this authority only as he shall consent or delegate or authorize them to do so. There is but one man who has the power to exercise this authority, to stand, as it were, in God’s stead, to be His voice unto the people, and that is the man who stands at the head and who is President, and who holds the keys by virtue of the appointment of God. God places him there. It is not man’s act. It is God’s Providence. God knows the hearts of the children of men. By His overruling Providence He brings this man to the front, or He keeps him in the rear, just as it pleases Him. I believe that His Providence is over all of us, and He can kill or remove as He pleases, or He can preserve in life as seemeth good to Him. And he has done so. When the Prophet Joseph was slain, God, by His overruling Providence, brought the man to the front who was His choice to succeed His servant. David Patten was slain at Crooked River, who was the senior of Brigham Young. Thomas B. Marsh lost the faith, also the senior of Brigham Young; but Brigham Young was preserved in the Providence of God, and when His Prophet was slain He stepped forward clothed with the eternal Priesthood of God, full of the fire of the Holy Ghost and the power of God, and the whole people felt that they stood in the presence of the man whom God had chosen and whom God had endowed for His position. God qualified him and made him equal to every emergency from that hour until the hour of his death. God was his unfailing friend. He blessed everyone who listened to the counsel of His servant. He blessed this entire people, and He blessed this land under his (President Young’s) administration. And we know by the outpouring of the power and gifts and graces of God upon us individually as well as an entire people, that he was God’s servant, chosen by the Almighty to stand at the head of His Church. Could I not trust that man with anything I had? Why, I would have been an unworthy servant of God, if I could not have done so; I would have been recreant to every principle that I believe in, if I could not have done so.

Now, watch the Providence of God in the selection of our present President. At the time Joseph and Hyrum were slain, according to all human appearances he was as unlikely to live almost as they were who were already dead. In the hottest of summer he was shot to pieces. The men who waited upon him had no idea that he would live. But he did. God brought him through. But who thought then that he would be the senior Apostle who would preside over this Church? There were a number his seniors. In consequence of a misunderstanding and his being senior in age, Brother Woodruff’s name stood above Brother Taylor’s. Brother Woodruff recognized all the time that he and Willard Richards were not his seniors in ordination. President Taylor had been ordained to the Apostleship before them, and when this matter was brought before the President of the Church (President Young) the names were put in proper order. Brother Woodruff recognized this as being correct, and if Willard Richards had lived, doubtless he would have had the same feeling. But then there stood Orson Hyde and Orson Pratt, as seniors in the quorum. Their names preceded his. But had their names the right to stand in that position? No, they had not, for reasons I need not dwell upon here, which ought to be familiar to every Elder in this Church. Therefore, I will merely say this: that President John Taylor, Wilford Woodruff, and George A. Smith were bearers of the apostleship at a time when Orson Hyde and Orson Pratt did not hold that power. Therefore they were by right their seniors; and President Young providentially, prompted by the Spirit of God, made a ruling which the Twelve accepted—every man knowing the true state of the case—as correct, and placed the names in their order some time before his death, making John Taylor, Wilford Woodruff, and George A. Smith, seniors of Orson Hyde and of Orson Pratt. In this manner God has brought forward to the front the man whom He chose to be President of the Church. It is His privilege to chose whom He pleases. The man whom He wants preserved is preserved. When the Prophets of God were slain, Brother Taylor’s life, by the wonderful Providence of God, was preserved, and he has lived among us until this day. He now stands in his place as the President of the Church, holding the keys and the authority as such to manage all the affairs of the Church according to God’s mind and will. And shall one who knows this, who knows that God has honored him, that God has chosen him, that God has endowed him, that God has blessed him—shall such a one raise his voice against him, and say that it is not the will of God that he shall control the affairs of this Church? God forbid! God forbid that I or any other man in this Church should do anything of the kind! On the contrary, let us be obedient to the voice of God, and to the will of God. If God, through him, says unto us we must consecrate our property, we must hold everything we have subject to the will of God, if He through him dictates any course of policy, I say it is my duty as a servant of God to submit: it is my duty to carry out faithfully, according to the will of God, that which He counsels, and that which He dictates. If God has confidence in him, shall not I, who am God’s servant and God’s child, have similar confidence? I believe in God. I believe God manages all the affairs of this Church. I know if I do my duty He will save me, He will exalt me, and I know if you will do your duty, He will do the same for you. And if men whom He chooses are fallible, that is His business. He requires on our part obedience to His will, as it is made manifest through the man whom He has chosen.

Now, this is a great point. I look upon it as one of the most vital points connected with our existence in these mountains. I look upon it as a test. It may be said that it will test the Latter-day Saints as they never have been tested—this vital, doctrine of obedience to the Priesthood of the Son of God. There is no point today against which so many assaults are directed by the wicked. They make it the main object of their attacks. They would like to destroy confidence in your hearts in the Priesthood of the Son of God. If they could weaken your confidence; if they could undermine your faith; if they could by any power or means in their possession wean you from the Church, and sow the seeds of distrust and suspicion in your minds concerning the Priesthood, or those who bear it, they would attain the object that they have in view. The man who holds the keys is always the object of assault. His life is the life that is most sought after. He is the man they would strike down, if they had the power. They seek to weaken the confidence of the people in him, by all manner of slanders, and by every sort of falsification. It is the main object of our enemies to sow the seeds of distrust and suspicion in the midst of the Latter-day Saints, and to accomplish this they relate all manner of falsehoods concerning those who bear the Priesthood of the Son of God. They contort every act. They misrepresent every word and every counsel that is given. They endeavor to put everything in a false light. And those who read those things continually, begin to believe by degrees, that there is foundation for them, that there is something wrong, that this man or the other man is not to be trusted, and that they are doing wrong in yielding obedience to the counsels of the Priesthood, and in submitting to its control. You are aware these attacks are constantly directed against the Priesthood, and it is, as I say, the vital point today.

We have this Temple (Logan) nearly completed. That at Salt Lake is progressing very rapidly, that at Sanpete also. And the building of these Temples will bring about, to a certain extent, a change among this people. Blessings are to be bestowed, and power is to be manifested in these buildings in my opinion such as has never been manifested among us as a people before. The question, therefore, will press itself upon our attention—who are going to be worthy to receive these blessings? Who are going to be worthy to enter into these buildings? With my feelings today I never can consent for any man to go in and receive a fullness of the blessings of the everlasting Gospel in that building or those buildings, unless I know him to be a man who is willing to yield implicit obedience to the Priesthood of the Son of God. And further, I am not willing, with my present feelings—I do not pretend to dictate in this matter, I am merely stating my own personal feelings—for any man to go into these buildings who is not willing to hold all he has got subject to the Priesthood of the Son of God, and be willing to do with it as that Priesthood shall dictate.

Now, these are two vital points in our faith, and in the requirements of the Gospel, that I believe are obligatory upon us, and we may as well understand our position today as to postpone the understanding of this matter for months, or for years, or until it is too late. This may sound like strong doctrine to some of you; but I look upon these things as essentially necessary to make us the people that God designs we shall be. Already things are in contemplation, and are being counseled about, that may bring this matter home to us individually, outside of the Temples of the Son of God. I desire to see the time come when unworthy persons cannot get their endowments and a fullness of the blessings of the everlasting Priesthood. I desire to see some test of faithfulness, some test of growth, and some degree of reward, so that all will not be reduced to one common level, the faithful and the unfaithful, those that are willing to do all that God requires, and those that are not willing—I do not desire to see all endowed with the same blessings. I do not believe that God ever intended this. He has told us there are different degrees of glory—“one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead.” I would like to see some difference here. I believe it will come. I believe God will move upon His servant in His own due time to make the necessary regulations to effect this. There are men who have been faithful all their lives, who have done everything that it is possible for men to do, and there are others who have been indifferent, and who have had their own way, and carried out their own mind, yet all come along and get the same blessings without any distinction whatever. There is not much encouragement, it would seem, under those circumstances, for the faithful. And yet there is, for there are degrees of re– ward in heaven; but then we may as well begin to have some of them here.

Now, my brethren and sisters, I feel that it is a matter, as I have said, of vital importance that we should have this that I have spoken of—faith and confidence in the Priesthood of the Son of God, and we cannot build up Zion without we have it, and we cannot build up Zion without we are willing to do all we have been taught by the inspiration of God—I know that as well as I do that I live.

I pray God that we may have this confidence, which I ask in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Discourse by President Wilford Woodruff, delivered at the Tabernacle, Salt Lake City, Sunday Afternoon, July 20, 1883.

We meet here upon the Sabbath day for the purpose of partaking of the sacrament, the emblems of the Lord’s body and blood which were broken and shed for us, and also to give and receive instruction as we may be led by the Spirit of God.

It is well known to the Latter-day Saints—though perhaps not to strangers—that no Elder or member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who enters into this Tabernacle knows who is going to be called upon to speak to the people. Hence no man spends a week, a day, an hour, or a moment to prepare a discourse to deliver unto the people. We are all of us dependent upon the Spirit of the Lord, upon revelation, upon inspiration, upon the Holy Ghost, in order to be qualified to teach the people before whom we are called to speak, and if the Lord does not give me the Holy Spirit this afternoon, I promise you all you will not get much out of Brother Woodruff, whether they be Saints or strangers. I have never seen a day since I have been a member of this Church, that I have felt that any man was qualified to teach saint or sinner, Jew or Gentile, the inhabitants of the earth abroad or at home, only as he was moved upon by the power of God. I have never believed any man was qualified from the days of Father Adam to our day to go forth among the inhabitants of the earth with the declaration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, in a way and manner to convince them or teach them the Gospel in its truth and purity, and in the power of God, only by inspiration. I have never believed that any man was qualified in any age of the world to build up the kingdom of God, or do the will of God only upon that principle. And I have felt, both while abroad in the world, as well as at home, that when called upon to teach the Latter-day Saints or anybody else—I have felt as though my lips ought to be touched with a live coal from off the altar, and my heart filled with inspiration from Almighty God. When I think upon the day and age in when we live, when I think upon this day and dispensation in which the God of heaven has set His hand to carry out the fulfillment of the mighty prophecies contained within the lids of the Bible, the Old and New Testaments, the stick of Judah, I realize that in order to comprehend these things a man must be in possession of the Spirit of the Lord day by day. In the words of the Savior as recorded in St. John’s Gospel, “This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.”

I say many things when I am called upon to speak in the presence of strangers that I do not confine myself to when addressing the Saints, because the latter are acquainted with our principles, while the former are not.

As Latter-day Saints we respect the rights of all men. We believe that all mankind, men and women, in this and every other dispensation and generation, have certain rights; that God has created all men with an agency, I care not in what kingdom, empire, republic or place they dwell. They have a right to enjoy their religion. They have a right to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences. “But,” says one, “do you mean that in empires where an emperor holds the rights and destinies of his subjects in his hands?” Yes. I mean there is no emperor who breathes the breath of life who has the right to deprive one of his subjects of the freedom of his religion. I will tell you why. No emperor, no king, no president, no ruler of any nation under the heavens has ever given his subjects life. Their life has come from God, and God has granted them their agency and the right to worship Him according to the light and knowledge they have. This is the view entertained by the Latter-day Saints. And I have heard Joseph Smith say that if he were emperor of the whole world, holding the destinies of all men in his hands, he would defend the religious rights of every man, whether his religion was right or wrong. And especially ought this to be the case in this American nation, the Constitution of which guarantees to all people the right to worship God according to the dictates of their own conscience. This is the broad platform upon which our government has been founded. I have looked upon the Constitution of the United States as one of the best instruments ever devised by man for the government of the inhabitants of the earth. I look upon it as such today. And while we are willing to allow the Methodists, the Baptists, the Presbyterians, the Catholics, and every sect under heaven, the right to enjoy their religion undisturbed, yet we claim the same privilege as a people, as a church, as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and hence, in expressing myself here this afternoon with regard to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, or the kingdom of God, if I differ from any of this congregation, I have a right to differ; the congregation has a right to differ from me; and no man has a right to say, Why do you so? The destinies of the whole human family are in the hands of God. I shall be held accountable before the God of heaven—and so will all men—for the course I pursue in this life.

There is one very peculiar feature with regard to the followers of Jesus Christ, or those that have attempted in other dispensations to obey the law of heaven, and that is, their unpopularity in the world from the days of Father Adam to the present time. Trace it through from the beginning, and you will find that men who were inspired by Almighty God to go forth and proclaim any message to the inhabitants of the earth, have been most unpopular in their day and generation. You will find it has been so in the whole history of the world. You may go back, for instance, to the days of Noah. Noah was a preacher of righteousness. He was called of God. He was warned of God, and told what to do to save himself and family. The world had become terribly corrupt, and it was necessary that the people be called upon to repent. To this end God Almighty raised up a prophet. That prophet was Noah. He went forth as he was commanded and preached the Gospel of Jesus Christ in its purity and truth. He was commanded to build an ark on dry land. The people laughed at him and would not believe his testimony. For one hundred and twenty years he warned the inhabitants of the earth of the coming flood; but all that he could save were the members of his own family, some eight souls. The flood came, and all the inhabitants of the earth, save those who had entered the ark, were drowned. Their spirits were shut up in prison in the spirit world, and they remained there until after the death of Jesus Christ; and while His body lay in the tomb three and a half days He went and preached to those spirits in prison, where they had been shut up for thousands of years.

As it was with Noah so it was with other Prophets who lived in ancient days. You may trace the history of Daniel, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Isaiah, and the rest down to the days of Jesus Christ, and you find they were all unpopular in their day and generation. In consequence of the wickedness that prevailed in the world, those Prophets were moved upon to prophesy concerning the destruction of Babylon the great, Ninevah, Tyre, and many other ancient cities; they declared the word of the Lord to the inhabitants of these cities, but their testimony was not believed; and because of their unpopularity, the Prophets were put to death. Nevertheless, not one jot or tittle of their predictions fell to the ground unfulfilled.

Then, again, you come along down to the days of Jesus Christ. You trace His life from His birth in a stable to the tomb. Was ever a man on the earth—a good man like the Savior—so persecuted, opposed, ridiculed and derided as He was by the Jews, Pharisees, Sadducees, and the different sects of that day? No matter what He did it was attributed to him for evil. If He cast out devils it was attributed to the power of Beelzebub. If He restored the blind to sight, they were ready to cry out, “You give God the glory, this man is a sinner.” And so in all His works was He opposed, persecuted and derided. And His Apostles shared the same fate. Every soul of them—with the exception of John—had to lay down their lives and seal their testimony with their blood. Some were beheaded, some were sawn asunder. Even in the case of John they sought his life, but it was decreed that he should live, and he remains on the earth to this day—although probably there has been a change in his body—and will remain until the Son of Man comes in the clouds of heaven.

I speak of these things to show that men of God in all ages of the world have been unpopular. Jesus warned His disciples with regard to this opposition. He said to them: “If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.” Why didn’t the world love the Prophets and Apostles in their day and generations. Why does the whole sectarian world rise up against Prophets and Apostles in this day and age of the world? Simply because in former ages they rebuked sin, and in this age they do the same. They have been plainspoken men. They have gone forth and declared the word of God as they were moved upon by the Holy Ghost.

Now, with regard to the day and age in which we live. The Saints are acquainted with our history as a people. They have a testimony to bear that the world knows not of. A man must become acquainted with the Lord, acquainted with the principles of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and receive them before he is qualified to understand the work of God, or the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. We read of a man named Nicodemus, who came to Jesus by night. Said he: “We know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of the water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” This is the principle that has been connected with the Gospel of Jesus Christ in every dispensation of the world.

As an organization, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been in existence now for 53 years. It was organized in the first place with six members on the 6th day of April, 1830—organized by a Prophet of God, a man raised up by commandment of God, by inspiration, by revelation, and by the administration of angels. Every step that he took was taken by commandment and revelation. He was given to understand by the angels of God who administered to him that there had been a falling away from the ancient order of things, and that now the full set time had come when the God of heaven would again establish His kingdom on the earth and call forth His Church out of the wilderness of darkness and error and establish it upon the foundation of the ancient Apostles, Jesus Christ being the chief cornerstone.

Now, any man acquainted with the Scriptures can clearly understand that there is but one true Gospel. There never was but one Gospel. Whenever that Gospel has been upon the earth it has been the same in every dispensation. The ordinances of the Gospel have never been changed from the days of Adam to the present time, and never will be to the end of time. While there were many sects and parties in existence in the early times, Jesus gave his disciples to understand that there was but one Gospel. He told them what it was. He declared unto them its ordinances. He commissioned them to preach the Gospel to every creature. In the first place they were to preach faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; next, repentance of sins; next, baptism for the remission of sins. Baptism was an ordinance taught by the Savior himself. We find, too, that He obeyed this ordinance, being baptized in the river Jordan by John the Baptist. Why? To fulfill all righteousness. It was a righteous law and it was a type of baptism to be followed by the whole human family. “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.” Such was the declaration of the Savior to the twelve Apostles. People were to be “buried with him by baptism unto death: that like as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.” What next? Men bearing the Melchizedek Priesthood—Apostles and Elders—had the authority to lay hands upon baptized believers for the reception of the Holy Ghost, which they received and which led them to prophesy of the things of the kingdom of God; and the signs followed those that believed. These were the first principles of the Gospel. And Paul the Apostle, makes this declaration: “But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.” He repeats this, and goes on to tell us what the Gospel is, and what the Church of Christ is, and what it always has been. In the Church were Apostles, Prophets, Pastors, Teachers, Evangelists, etc., and these were “for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.” The Lord never had—and never will have to the end of time—a Church on the earth without Prophets, Apostles, and inspired men. Whenever the Lord had a people on the earth that He acknowledged as such, that people were led by revelation. No man can find anything contrary to this. When the Gospel was given to the Jews, all the gifts and graces and powers thereof, accompanied it. It was accompanied by the Eternal Priesthood—which is after the order of the Son of God, without which no man can administer in the ordinances of life and salvation. The Savior was a Jew himself. He came to His own father’s house, but they rejected him and put him to death. The Gospel was then taken from the Jews and carried to the Gentiles. Paul warned the Gentiles to take heed lest they too fell into unbelief. But the Gospel was delivered to them with all its blessings and powers, and remained with them as long as there was a man upon the earth that had the power to administer in its ordinances.

Now, have the Gentiles had that church and kingdom of God in their midst since the ancient Apostles were put to death? I think not. At the present time there are some six hundred three score and six different religions—different roads to heaven and to hell—in the world; but none of these bear much resemblance to the Gospel as taught by Jesus Christ and His Apostles. The whole Christian world today rises up against these Latter-day Saints because they profess to believe in revelation, in Prophets and Apostles. This has been the case ever since the organization of this Church. Do we teach anything that is contrary to the laws of God? We do not. Do we believe anything that is contrary to the Gospel as taught in the days of the Apostles? We do not. “But,” says one, “how did you come by this Gospel?” We came by it through the administration of an angel from God. John the Revelator, in speaking of the last day—the opening of the seals—the blowing of the trumpets—and all that should transpire before the second coming of the Son of Man—said he saw (among other things) “another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come.” When the angel of God delivered this message to Joseph Smith he told him the heavens were full of judgments; that the Lord Almighty had set his hand to establish the kingdom that Daniel saw and prophesied about, as recorded in the second chapter of Daniel; and that the Gospel had to be preached to all nations under heaven as a witness to them before the end should come, and that, too, in fulfillment of the revelation of God, as given here in the Old and New Testaments. Joseph Smith never attempted to organize this Church until he received commandment so to do from God. He never attempted to baptize a man until he received the Aaronic Priesthood under the hands of John the Baptist (who was beheaded for the word of God and the testimony of Jesus). He never attempted to officiate in any of the ordinances of the Gospel until he received the Apostleship under the hands of Peter, James and John. These men appeared to him. They laid their hands upon his head and sealed the Apostleship upon him with all the power thereof. And these angels told Joseph Smith to go forth himself and to call upon other men to go forth unto the world and preach the Gospel as taught by Jesus Christ and the Apostles, and the Lord would back up their testimony; that when they laid hands upon those who had been baptized for the remission of sins, and who had received their testimony, they should receive the Holy Ghost. This was the proclamation to Joseph Smith 53 years ago.

Now, I want to ask this assembly, strangers and Latter-day Saints alike, what position the Elders of Israel would have been in when they went forth and made this promise to the inhabitants of the earth—the promise that if they would receive of our testimony, repent of their sins and be baptized for a remission of them, and have hands laid upon them, they should receive the Holy Ghost—I want to ask, gentlemen and ladies, how long those Elders would have taught this principle in the nations of the earth if God Almighty had not backed up their testimony? How long would it have been, in the absence of this backing, until they would have been found out to be deceivers? Not a great while. Is there another set of men on the face of the earth today, that dare to go forth and make that proclamation to the world? No; because, unless they were called of God to make it, He would not back up their testimony, and it would be known who they were. We have labored upon this principle for 50 years. You cast your eyes and you see a tabernacle in the desert; you see a city; and you may travel for a thousand miles and you will find this Territory filled with cities, towns and villages. By what power have these things been accomplished? I came here on the 24th of July, 1847, with a little handful of men as pioneers. What did we find? A barren desert, as barren as the desert Sahara. No mark of the white man here. No outward sign that a white man could live here. How has this desert been made to blossom as the rose? Why this body of people from almost every nation? I will tell you. We carried the Gospel to Europe, the Islands of the sea, and the different nations of the earth; we offered them the Gospel, and a class of men and women—two of a family, and sometimes a dozen of a city—received our testimony, and when we laid hands upon them they received the Holy Ghost. That Holy Ghost has remained with them: it has instructed them and inspired their hearts, and today you see Utah as it is. If the Lord Almighty had not backed up the testimony of the Elders of Israel as He has done, Utah today would have been as when we found it 36 years ago.

This is the condition of the Latter-day Saints. Joseph Smith received these keys, this Priesthood, this power, this Gospel by the administration of angels from God, and this testimony is true. He also received a record called the Book of Mormon, which is a record of the ancient inhabitants of this continent. That record is true; as also the Book of Doctrine and Covenants, a code of revelations given through the Prophet Joseph Smith. These revelations are true and faithful, and they are being fulfilled as fast as time will admit. I bear my testimony of these things to the world, for I know they are true.

I traveled thousands of miles with Joseph Smith. I knew his spirit. Many of the revelations given through him have been fulfilled. I myself wrote the revelation that was given through him concerning the war that would take place in this country between the north and south. That revelation was published to the world for twenty years before the war. It broke out just as predicted, and I refer to it because it is one of the revelations that is fulfilled. Today we are still preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The Lord Almighty has set His hand to establish His Church and kingdom on the earth, to build up Zion in the mountains of Israel.

Now with regard to the Priesthood. We have been found fault with sometimes because we profess to have the Priesthood. Let me say to this congregation that our Heavenly Father performs all His works—the creation of worlds, the redemption of worlds—by the power of the Eternal Priesthood. And no man on the earth, from the days of Father Adam to the present time, has ever had power to administer in any of the ordinances of life and salvation only by the power of the Holy Priesthood. You will find this to be the case in the whole history of the Prophets of God. When Aaron was given the Priesthood he was called by revelation. “No man taketh this honor unto himself, but he that is called of God, as was Aaron.” Jesus Christ himself had to be called of God. He was a High Priest. He left the Priesthood on the earth with his Apostles. They officiated in it until they were put to death. It is by that power that we administer in this day and generation. The Church and kingdom of God has continued to grow from its first organization. It is true we have been called to pass through many afflictions in our day and time. Nevertheless, the Lord has preserved His people, and they still live here in the valleys of the mountains.

We have an anxiety to honor God and keep His commandments, and to honor our country and the Constitution of our Government. That Constitution we believe was given by revelation, and whatever laws are passed agreeable to it we desire to honor. It guarantees to all men the right to enjoy their religion, to worship God according to the dictates of their conscience.

“But,” says one, “I would like to know how many wives you have. That is a matter you have not said anything about.” Well, now, I will tell you a little anecdote in connection with Sidney Rigdon. The circumstance took place a great many years ago, in Kirtland. A young Elder just come in met President Rigdon on the street one day in the vicinity of the Temple. Said the young man: “President Rigdon, will you please tell me the meaning of the horns of the beast John saw?” President Rigdon, drawing himself up, looked at the young man, and replied: “My dear brother, there is a great deal between you and the beast that John saw,” and walked away. Well, I sometimes think it is so with this generation. There is a great deal between the people of this generation and the plurality of wives. There are a great many principles that God has revealed in these last days that it is necessary for us to understand before we come to that principle. But as I have brought the subject up I will say a few words upon it. The Lord has revealed to us that no kingdom, no king, no prince, no president, no ordinance of marriage, no ordinance performed by any man from the days of father Adam, will have any power or force after death, except those ordinances are performed by men holding the Eternal Priesthood. Is there a king, is there a prince, is there a queen—will either when they pass the other side of the veil, find a throne there? Would the Czar of Russia, who was assassinated by the hands of the ungodly not long ago, when he went into the Spirit world find a throne there? No. Why? Because the kingdom of the Czar of Russia belonged to time. When he went into the Spirit world that was the end of his kingdom and power. His kingdom had not been sealed upon his head by any man having the power and authority of the Eternal Priesthood. So in regard to all kingdoms and thrones. You may take Her Majesty Queen Victoria—who has reigned a long time, and who is perhaps as good a sovereign as has reigned since the days of William the Conqueror. When she passes behind the veil she will find her kingdom at an end, because it was not sealed upon her head for time and eternity by any man having the authority of the Holy Priesthood. So I will say to our friends here—the strangers within our gates—that any man that marries a wife by any other authority than the authority of the Holy Priesthood is simply married for time, “or until death do you part.” When you go into the Spirit world you have no claim on your wife and children. The ordinance of having them sealed to you by one having the authority of the Holy Priest– hood must be attended to in this world. Father Abraham obeyed the law of the patriarchal order of marriage. His wives were sealed to him for time and all eternity, and so were the wives of all the Patriarchs and Prophets that obeyed that law.

I desire to testify as an individual and as a Latter-day Saint that I know that God has revealed this law unto this people. I know that if we had not obeyed that law we should have been damned; the judgments of God would have rested upon us; the kingdom of God would have stopped right where we were when God revealed that law unto us. Why have we obeyed it? I obeyed it because I want my wife or wives with me after death; I want my wives and children with me in the morning of the resurrection; I want my wives and children organized in the family organization, that I may dwell with them and they with me, throughout all eternity, as well as with Father Abraham and other men who honored and obeyed that law. This is the position we occupy. We have obeyed the law because God has commanded us, and I bear record of its truth; and so far as I am concerned, if I can have my wives and children with me in the morning of the resurrection, so that I can dwell with them and with those Patriarchs and Prophets who obeyed that law, it will amply repay me for the trials and tribulations I may have had to pass through in the course of my life here upon the earth. Many men suppose that we have obeyed that law to gratify the lusts of the flesh. Bless your soul, if that had been our object, we might have followed the example of the people of the Christian world—committed whoredom and adultery—without bringing upon ourselves the cares, pains, and penalties that we have to bear by obeying this law. But let me tell you that the Latter-day Saints look upon adultery as one of the greatest crimes any man can commit in this world. It is next to murder. No, this people have not obeyed that law because of a desire to gratify the lusts of the flesh; they have observed it in obedience to the command of God, and because it will have power and effect after death.

I pray God to pour out His Holy Spirit upon us, that our ears may be open to hear and our hearts to understand the things of the kingdom of God, which is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Discourse by President Geo. Q. Cannon, delivered in the Tabernacle, Salt Lake City, Sunday Afternoon, July 15th, 1383.

In standing up to address you this afternoon, I desire an interest in your faith and prayers, that I may be led to speak upon those subjects that will be best adapted to you and your circumstances. I believe it to be our privilege when we come together, as we have this afternoon, with our hearts united, desirous before God for His blessing, that the very things—that is, the very doctrines and instructions and counsel that are needed by us, and that are best adapted to our circumstances and condition, will be given unto us by the Holy Spirit. It is for this purpose we meet together. I never did feel satisfied in attending meetings and listening to instructions, and going away feeling unrefreshed and without being edified and strengthened in the principles of the everlasting Gospel; I do not think that it is right that we should thus meet and thus separate. God has made promises unto His people. If His people do their part He will fulfill those promises; He will give that portion of His Spirit that is necessary to impart unto them everything that their circumstances may require. I think it wrong that men should prepare themselves beforehand to speak to the people. I believe that God has given unto us the correct rule, the rule that He gave to His ancient disciples—“to take no thought beforehand what ye shall say; but treasure up in your minds continually the words of life, and it shall be given you in the very hour that portion that shall be meted unto every man.” When the time should come for His servants to address the people, He would give unto them the very things that were needed. How do I know, how does any other man in this congregation know the thoughts and the fears and the wants of you who are here today? There may be souls here hungering for the word of God, tried and tempted in many directions, annoyed and perplexed with the cares of life and with those anxieties that are connected with our earthly existence. Who shall tell these souls that which they need? Can any man out of his own wisdom, from the depths of his own thoughts, give the needed strength and comfort to those hungry souls? It is impossible. God must do it. God must pour out His Holy Spirit. God must help as he has promised to do, and we His children must put ourselves in a position to be helped so that we can claim the blessing.

These people continually need strength from the Lord. There has never been a day, nay, not an hour, from the commencement of this work upon the earth in these last days that the Latter-day Saints have been destitute of the counsel of heaven, of the word of God, and of the guidance of that Holy Spirit that God has promised to bestow upon His faithful children. Having thus been led in the past it is still essential that we be thus led in the future, that we may live by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God—not that proceeded from His mouth 1,800 years ago, but that proceeds from His mouth today, in this year of our Lord 1883. And we need it just as much today as we ever did. We need the direct interposition of God’s providence in our behalf, and we need the assistance of His Holy Spirit; we need His word, and His blessing, and His power, and His direct intervention in our behalf as much today as this Church did fifty years ago, or as the Church did 1850 years ago. It is indispensably necessary for our progress, for our advancement in the things that pertain to righteousness, in the knowledge of God, that we should be thus assisted and upheld and inspired.

This great work with which we are connected is becoming so extensive, is spreading out in so many directions, that it needs more of the manifestation of God’s power and greater faith on the part of the people to carry it forward in the earth. It needs greater faith on the part of those who bear any portion of the responsibility of the Priesthood of the Son of God, because they have now to act in capacities that heretofore they did not act in. It seems only a little while ago that we had but one Stake of Zion. We had but one High Council, and the Presidency of the Church presided over that High Council. Every matter of moment, every case of importance, came directly before the First Presidency of the Church. In fact, affairs of the most trifling importance—or at least that which we would now consider of trifling importance—had to be submitted to them. Upon their shoulders rested the responsibility of directing everything connected with the work of God in its minutest details. But this has changed. Instead of one High Council, instead of one Stake, there are at least twenty-five. Instead of the First Presidency of the Church presiding over High Councils, there are Presidencies of these various Stakes and upon them rest the responsibilities which formerly rested upon the First Presidency. There are stakes now in Zion, the number of whose members far exceeds the number of members in the Church in those early days. For years after we came to these valleys—or for some time at least—the whole Church in these mountains did not number as many souls as are now comprised within Salt Lake Stake. The responsibility, therefore, is being divided. It rests upon a great number of men, and as the people increase, this responsibility becomes more and more divided. It is an impossibility now for the First Presidency to attend to anything but general matters of business, giving general instructions, and they find themselves under the necessity more and more of dividing this, laying it upon the shoulders of other men, calling helps from various quarters, to labor in various directions, and to perform the work which in former times was deemed especially their province. The Saints themselves find themselves under the necessity of depending more upon themselves than they did formerly. They cannot, in the multiplicity of cares and labors which devolve upon leading men—they cannot expect that help, that attention to minor affairs, that they formerly received.

Hence, my brethren and sisters, it is necessary that every man and woman and child, connected with this work should learn as rapidly as possible the habit of self-dependence—to exercise faith before God for themselves, so that each one in his place or in her place, will be able to perform his or her part to the acceptance of our God, and in such a manner as to bring to pass their own salvation. This is much more easy at the present time than it was in the past, from the fact that doctrine is becoming better understood, the principles of the Gospel are more thoroughly disseminated by the aid of all the various agencies that are at work in our midst. Our children now receive in the Primary Associations—as soon as they are able to comprehend principle—such instruction as is adapted to their dawning intellects, and from that to the Sunday school, and from the Sunday school to the Young Men’s and Young Women’s Associations, and in the case of the boys to the various councils of the Priesthood, and in the case of the girls to the various Relief Societies. They are led along step by step until they become thoroughly indoctrinated in principle, and compre– hend in the broadest sense the character of the work with which they are identified. Only this morning I had an opportunity of testing this to some extent. My frequent absences from home give me but few opportunities to meet with my children. But I said to them this morning: “Instead of you going to Sunday school, I will have a Sunday school at home.” I wanted to talk to them, to inquire of my little ones concerning their knowledge of the principles of the Gospel, and I was somewhat surprised at the replies which were made to my interrogatories concerning this work, concerning its character, concerning its doctrines and the principles that are taught by the Elders. I presume that it is the case with all our children, and I have no doubt from my observation, that at the present time there are children quite small who are capable of giving replies to questions which a few years ago many of our Elders could not answer. I am pleased with this. I think it right.

As I have said this work is spreading to so great an extent that responsibility must rest upon individual members. The Presidency of the Church, the Twelve Apostles, the various presiding authorities, can no longer do as they have done in years past—carry the people along. The people themselves must learn to walk, to bear their own burdens, to perform their own duties, and to take such a course as will result in their own development, and in the advancement of this great work that God has established upon the earth. I would not give much for us, nor for our work, nor for our future, if the individual intelligence of the people should not be developed. It would be an impossibility for this work to achieve the high destiny in store for it, and concerning which we have indulged in so many glowing anticipations upon any other principle than this. We are told that intelligence is the glory of God, and it certainly is the glory of man. And with the obstacles that have to be overcome, that confront us every step in our progress, there must be knowledge developed among this people; there must be the highest attainment and grade of intelligence developed among us. Upon no other principle can we stand. Upon no other principle can we progress. Upon no other principle can we accomplish the great results that we have before us. It is true we testify that God has restored the everlasting Gospel in its primitive simplicity, purity and power. We bear this testimony; but the restoration of this alone, in and of itself, will not accomplish that which we have before us, unless we avail ourselves of the advantages which its restoration affords. We must put in practice and carry out practically in our lives its principles. We must be a people who are not only hearers of the word, but doers of it also. It will not do for us to have a form of godliness without the power thereof. We must have the power of the work that God has founded. We must put ourselves in a position to receive the blessings and advantages connected with this work, and to have these we must be a pure people—pure in thought, pure in word, and pure in action. God through us is founding a new order of things in the earth. The axe is laid at the root of the old tree, and sooner or later it will be hewn down. The restoration of the everlasting Gospel, the restoration of the powers connected therewith, of the gifts, of the blessings, and especially of the union and the peace that characterized it in ancient days, is bound eventually to produce wonderful results in the earth. Already it is conceded that it is a marvelous work and a wonder, just as the Prophet Isaiah said would be the case. This must spread. From the nature of things it must spread. It must continue to grow, to increase. The more obstacles it has to contend with the better its power is developed, the better its strength is exhibited. I am thankful myself for the difficulties we have had to contend with. I am thankful that we have a hard pathway to tread. I am thankful that we have opposition of so serious a character. Without this we could not be developed. Without this we could not be thoroughly tested, nor our principles be proved. It is by such ordeals as these that man exhibits his divine origin, and the qualities that he inherits from his divine Father. It is by such ordeals as these that systems are tried, and that principles exhibit their force and power to mankind. We are being tested as no other people upon the face of the earth are being tested. The principles that we have espoused and that we advocate are passing through such an ordeal as the principles advocated by no other people are subjected to. Every form of opposition is brought to bear; every kind of influence is set in motion, not even stopping at violence itself. If our principles withstand all these shocks and assaults upon them and endure, they will prove to the world far better than our verbal testimony will that they are of divine origin. If the organization of this Church cannot be broken up by the attacks of mobs, by the uprooting of the people, by the driving of them forth into the wilderness, by the attacks of townships, of cities, of counties, of States, or by the adverse legislation of the United States itself, then the world will be more likely to believe that which we solemnly assert, that God is its author, that God laid its foundation, that God has preserved it thus far, and that He will preserve it to the very end. These are proofs of that which we testify. That it has thus withstood all these assaults, we are living witnesses. That we exist today in our present organized capacity in these mountains is due to the capacity of the organization to adapt itself to every change of circumstances. Men may sneer, men may deride, men may publish false statements, men may attribute all this to various causes which are untrue; but the fact still remains uncontrovertible and unassailable, that there is a power and a strength and an elasticity about the organization of this Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that all that is brought against it fails to unsettle or to shiver. Now we have been testifying—that is, some of the Elders have—for these 53 years that this work had this capacity. Joseph Smith stated it in the outset before the Church itself was organized. The first Elders of this Church bore similar testimony when but six members comprised the entire Church of Jesus Christ. They predicted its future. They stated that it possessed these divine qualities. They solemnly declared that God had restored it from the heavens; that it was the old organization brought back again; that it was the old Gospel restored once more to the earth, and that it would win its way in every land and among every people, and that it would accomplish all that God had predicted by the mouths of His holy prophets that it should accomplish. But who believed it? No more believed it then than can be found now to believe our testimony, that which we bear this day, that this work, notwithstanding all the opposition it may have to contend with—notwithstanding it may have every power on earth to oppose it, that it will win its way until it will fill the whole earth. There were probably no more who believed the testimony of the early Elders respecting the growth of the work than are to be found to believe our testimony now concerning its future. But fifty-three years have passed, and in their passage it has been demonstrated that it possesses the qualities and powers that were claimed for it by those who declared the testimony in the beginning. Wonderful it must have seemed in the early days when they all could meet together within a log schoolhouse—wonderful it must have seemed to them when their minds were enlightened by the Spirit of God, and they looked down and saw the future of this work—its growth, development and advancement, and the mighty results it would accomplish—it must have seemed wonderful, I say, to them at that time with their surroundings. But if there is anything that shows clearly how God dealt with this people and how plainly He could reveal His mind and will to them, it is the fact that those who lived in those days, and whose writings have been left, whose testimonies are on record—saw with extraordinary clearness that which we now behold and the far greater results that are yet to be reached in the future. They saw it with plainness, they saw it with wonderful clearness and predicted concerning it as though they were writing contemporaneous history; and that which they testified to, as I have said, has been proved so far as we have gone.

There has been no lack about this work. Its principles have withstood all that has been brought against them. They stand unshaken because they are founded on eternal truth. The whole clergy of the world may array themselves against them, as they have to a certain extent; they may endeavor to controvert these principles, but they are founded on truth and they cannot be overturned. Not a single principle that has been declared or been testified to by the Elders of this Church from the beginning up to the present time can be assailed successfully by any religionist, nor by scientific men, because they are impregnable, having had their origin in God. And so it is with everything connected with this work. It has never taken a step backward. It never will take a step backward. There are no mistakes to be corrected connected with it, either with its doctrine, with its organization, or, with its movement. Who is there—I speak to you, my brethren and sisters, who have been connected with this Church from the beginning—who is there that can recall a single instance of recantation of any of its principles? Has there ever been a doctrine declared by the authorities of this Church, as a part of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, that they have had to take back or modify? Not one. Has there been anything in the organization that has had to be perfected? No. The organization was as perfect in theory—being revealed of God—50 years ago as it is today in practice, after years of experience, practically carrying it out in these mountains. That constitutes the strength of this work. It is its infallibility. Not that man connected with it is infallible, for he is fallible; but the work itself, its principles, and everything connected with it, is infallible, having a divine origin, being revealed of God. It was a wonderful thing to state, as was stated right at the outset of this work, that it should be preached in every land, that its doctrine should be proclaimed in every tongue throughout the world, and that it should gather from every nation under heaven, men and women who should be numbered as its converts. A remarkable feature, something unheard of, that the principles of this religion when preached should have the effect to gather out from every nation, kindred, tongue and people those who espoused them. Yet every word has been fulfilled. Wherever the Elders of this Church have gone they have gone accompanied by that wonderful power, the power of gathering the people together; not of one race, not of one language, but people of every race and of every language, showing the adaptability of its principles to the people of the frozen north as well as to those of the torrid south. Wherever these principles have been proclaimed they have gathered out from the nations unto whom they were proclaimed those who have espoused them, and as I have remarked here before, there is no power short of violence that can prevent these people from thus coming together. It has not been the inducement of the Elder; it has not been by persuasion; it has not been any influence of this character that they have sought to wield over the people that has gathered them together. They have come of their own accord. They have forsaken home, friends, old associations, ancestral tombs, and everything of this character that is calculated to bind men to their native land; they have severed all these and have gathered out and cast their lots with the people of their faith in these mountains. And this has been a peculiar feature of this work from the very commencement, and it will continue to be as long as the Gospel is preached. And it is this wonderful union, this Godlike union, that bears testimony that it is from God.

I do not wish to say anything in relation to other forms of religion; I do not know that it is necessary that I should do so; but no thinking man can admit that Christianity so-called—I call it a false Christianity, untrue to its name—satisfies the wants of humanity at the present time. It is not a religion that satisfies. It comes short in almost every particular. It is devoid of all the powers that characterized it and gave it force in the early days. You look in vain for those features that distinguished it, and that gave it power in the earth and that made it the foe of Paganism and false religions existing in those days, and which gave it the wonderful success it achieved. It is destitute of these features. It is divided, split into hundreds of sects, without power, having a form of godliness, but lacking the power thereof. It cannot stand; it cannot prevail. Monstrous as its power is, great as its growth is, co-extensive with the world it may be said, it nevertheless is destined to tumble with Babylon the great. It must go down. It has not the elements of strength. And the great cause of its weakness is, that God is not with it. God’s power does not accompany it. Men in too many instances are Christian because it is popular to be so. But where is the power of Christianity? Where are the revelations of God? The idea of God having a church on the earth, and never speaking His mind and will unto that church! Why, I will not worship a God who will not speak. He is as Baal of old. I want nothing to do with him. I want the God of heaven, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, a God who can speak and who can manifest His mind and His will, who can guide His people, who can bestow gifts and blessings upon His people, who can hear and answer their prayers when they call upon him. I want a God of that kind if I can find Him, and I thank God that I have found Him, and that He has revealed Himself in these last days, and has established His Church as He did in ancient days, and has endowed it with the same powers that the ancient church possessed, and it has to undergo the same trials and temptations and the same persecution that the ancient church did. The blood of its members has flown. They have been slain for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God, for claiming to be Prophets, for claiming to be apostles, for claiming to be servants of God, just the same as the ancient servants of God did. We, today in these mountains are here because we have been driven out, not permitted to enjoy those blessings that as free men and free women, born free, we were justly entitled to—that is, the right to worship our God according to the dictates of our own consciences. We are therefore a standing protest against religious tyranny, and while God gives us breath, we shall always be found defending the right of every human being to worship his God or her God according to his or her conscience, without anything to molest or to make afraid, as long as in that worship they do not trespass upon the rights of their neighbors.

Now, my brethren and sisters, as I said in the beginning, there is a great responsibility resting upon us individually. Our children must grow up understanding these principles, willing to endure everything for them, strong in the Lord to bear them off, and to maintain purity in the earth. The devil has raised every sort of cry against these Latter-day Saints, throwing dust in the eyes of the people concerning us, making the world believe that we are unfit to live, that it would be doing God service to kill us off, making them believe that we are the most impure and the most corrupt people on the face of the earth. Why, who has done these things? Men who are steeped in corruption, up to their lips in it, and who cannot comprehend purity. And this has been the cry: “Kill them off, they are unworthy to live; it will be doing God service to destroy them.” And yet in these mountains the virtue of woman is held sacred. There was a time when a woman was as safe in our streets, or in our remote byways, as she would be in a strongly guarded house or castle. A woman could travel from the northern boundary of our Territory to the southern, without hearing a word of disrespect or seeing a gesture or anything of that character that would annoy her. But how has it been of late years? Why, women are unsafe in the streets. There was a time when drunkenness was unknown in this land. How is it now? In spite of our protest, in spite of everything we can do—because we have not the power, being a Territory, to carry out our laws or to maintain them—drunkenness runs riot, and it is the constant effort on the part of every man who has a family, and every leading man, to guard our youth against these devilish influences that are growing on every hand. We say to our boys: it is the worst crime you can commit short of murder, to be guilty of illicit intercourse with the other sex. I would rather carry my son to the grave than that he should be guilty of such a thing. We say: “Marry the sisters, marry the daughters of Eve, take to yourselves lawful wives, but you shall not commit adultery, you shall not commit seduction, you shall not commit fornication; if you do, God will curse you, and we will sever you from the Church.” We say to our daughters that it is one of the worst crimes they can commit to be guilty of unchastity. We want to raise up a righteous seed in these mountains, pure and virtuous, so that a man will be so virtuous that he may be in the company of an unprotected woman alone for any length of time, and she would be as safe as if she were in heaven, or under the guardianship of an angel, safe from pollution, safe from everything that is vile. We want to teach our children to be sober, to be industrious, to be truthful, to be honest, to love God, and to love their neighbor; for they can best show their love for God by exhibiting their love for their neighbor. If they cannot love him whom they see, how can they love Him whom they have not seen? Let us take these things to heart, and let us be watchful and use all our influence to protect the rising generation against those sins that are sweeping over the earth, and God will bless us in our efforts in so doing. I pray God that He will bless you, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Discourse by Apostle Erastus Snow, delivered at the Quarterly Conference, Parowan, Sunday Afternoon, June 24th, 1883.

I want to say to the young men and the young ladies and to all the people—but especially our children, the youths in Israel—that the leaders of this people do not speak of themselves. That which they are striving to impress upon the people is of the Lord and not of man. The Latter-day Saints have not been gathered from the different nations of the earth, and brought together in these mountains to worship man, nor to serve man, to be their slaves, nor to be obedient unto man, and if anybody has such an idea or intention they have got hold of the wrong people. The people who are gathered here are not the people calculated to do such a thing. The faith we teach throws everybody upon their own responsibility; they are at liberty to act and choose for themselves, and all will be held responsible before God for their faith and conduct. The free agency of man is and always has been a prominent doctrine in this Church, and no one advocated it more strongly than the Prophet Joseph Smith. The free agency of man is inseparably connected with intelligence, as the revelations of God in the Doc– trine and Covenants plainly and explicitly declare, that all intelligence is independent. Without this agency there would be no self-existence. And because of this agency, which existed in eternity before the worlds were, with intelligent beings, with our spirits when they existed in the spirit world—through the exercise of this agency Satan fell, and all those who clung to him and rebelled against our Heavenly Father. Brother Cannon has impressed us with the idea that obedience to correct principle, believing in the truth and living it and obeying it, is as good an evidence of independent thought and character—and perhaps a little more so—than to be disobedient; that no man, woman or child will be more independent by rejecting the truth, by disobeying correct laws and correct principles, than those who receive and obey the truth with contrite hearts. Now, what say you, you must all judge for yourselves, and choose what you will be. My experience and observation of the Latter-day Saints is that they are the hardest people I know anything about to either drive or lead in a wrong direc– tion. Brother Cannon speaks of President Young and President Taylor, and other good men, our leaders, being led, as it were, by a hair in obedience to the Priesthood, which implies simply obedience to truth and to correct doctrine, and to righteousness. This is the explanation the Prophet Joseph Smith gave to a certain lawyer in his time who came to see him and his people and expressed astonishment and surprise at the ease with which he controlled the people, and said it was something that was not to be found among the learned men of the world. Said he: “We cannot do it. What is the secret of your success?” “Why,” said the Prophet, “I do not govern the people. I teach them correct principles and they govern themselves.” I have been young, now I am getting old and expect to pass away soon, as well as all those who have been for many years before the people serving the Lord, and laboring to promote the welfare of the people; but from my youth up I have observed the dealings of God with the Latter-day Saints. I am pretty well acquainted with them. They are pretty well acquainted with their leaders. They are pretty well acquainted with the voice of truth, and they know it when they hear it as a rule—that is, all those who are humble and prayerful and who love the truth and the voice of the good Shepherd, they know it when they hear it, and when principles are taught that are good, that come from God, they comprehend them and receive them. But as Paul said in one of his epistles to the ancient Saints: “There is a law in our members, warring against the law of the spirit and bringing our bodies into bondage to the law of sin and death.” That is, the lusts and desires of the flesh and the pride of life which we have to war against. And this warfare commences as soon as we begin to grow up to maturity. It is this that lays the foundation for rebellion. As soon as this begins to manifest itself in us, in our youth, so soon we need to begin to curb it. And here comes in the duty of parents in their Priesthood and calling, to watch over those children that are given them of the Lord, which are lent to them for a season. It is required of them to teach those children the law of the Lord and the ways of the righteous, and to restrain them from passions, from anger, from strife, from contention, from envy, from jealousy, from disobedience; to impress them with the necessity of doing right and repenting of wrong whenever they do it, that they may hold in check the passions that are common to our nature; and to show them how to enjoy all that the Lord has designed for our happiness in this world and our exaltation in the next without excess, without allowing our tabernacles to be used as instruments of sin and wickedness.

We have heard during this conference—and especially this forenoon from President Taylor—some very important principles advanced for our government, as individuals and as communities, principles which we are to observe and which are essential to our purity and progress as a people, and as individuals, and our exaltation in the eternal world. For the law of the Lord is strict unto those who are instructed and have opportunities to observe it, and far more so with us as Latter-day Saints than with the Gentile world. The Lord will make greater allowance for the Gentile world than He will for us, and He has had compassion upon us and made greater allowance for us in the days of our ignorance than He will do for us in the future; for He expects us as a people to profit by our experience and our instruction and the opportunities afforded us, and to improve our condition, to purify our persons, our families, and our communities, and to purge evil from our midst. And touching moral purity and the intercourse of the sexes and the objects and purposes of this intercourse, God has revealed to the Latter-day Saints, as He also revealed unto our fathers, that He has a great and glorious and grand object in view in placing us here upon the earth, male and female, and commanding us to multiply and replenish the earth. His purposes in these things are from eternity to eternity. They reach back into our first or former existence, and consequently will reach forward through this our second, and into our next estate, and through all eternity. And we need a correct understanding of the proper use of the privileges and blessings that are given unto us. On this depends the glory and exaltation of ourselves and our children for evermore. The Lord is striving to educate a people that will properly understand these things and appreciate them, and that will not trifle with the fountains of life and with those choice blessings that are placed within their reach. When we look abroad into the Gentile nations at the present time, those who are acquainted with their condition are constrained to acknowledge that we live in a wicked and adulterous generation. Adultery, whoredom and lust have cursed the Gentile nations, and the wicked portion of all mankind, we may say, from time immemorable. But with the seed of Abraham, the children of Israel—who were called an holy nation, a peculiar people—God has sought to regulate, by His laws, those things, and to teach the people so that they may raise up unto Him a holy nation, a peculiar people, a royal priesthood. He chose Abraham from among the nations and blessed him. He promised to multiply his seed like the stars in the heaven or the sands of the seashore for number. He tried and proved him well as we heard this morning. He blessed him and blessed his seed after him, likewise his son Isaac and his grandson, Jacob, and promised that the oracles should remain with him and his seed. Nevertheless, the promises made were general; they were not promises to individuals alone. Yet the promises were conditional. They were given on condition that their posterity should abide in the truth, follow the teachings and examples of their fathers, and prove themselves worthy; for Nephi has said concerning these things in the Book of Mormon that God covenants with none except those that repent and believe in His Son and keep His commandments. But there are special promises to the children of Israel, the seed of Abraham, as a people; for as a people they are the elect of God. But as individuals every one is held responsible for his own sins. No promise of the father can save any individual. Nevertheless, according to the promise made unto the fathers, God makes manifest among the children of Israel the Priesthood and reveals unto them the Gospel, and gives them an opportunity to receive it and obey it and obtain exaltation through it, if they will, and in this respect they are more favored than the Gentile nations throughout the whole world, though He has said that whoever fears God and works righteousness is accepted of Him among all nations and all peoples, Jew or Gentile. But the Lord has set His hand to gather His people, and He is selecting them by the preaching of the Gospel to the world by the Elders of Israel. The spirit which accompanies the preaching of the Gospel feels after and searches out and gathers together the seed of Abraham that are worthy to be saved. It gathers together those whom God has called to have part in the latter-day work, in the “dispensation of the fulness of times”—the ten thousands of Ephraim and the thousands of Manasseh, spoken of by Moses when he blessed the tribes of Israel.

Well, now, because the Lord has set His hand to gather out from the nations of the earth the humble and the honest in heart and those that will be obedient and will submit themselves to the truth and to the law of the Lord, therefore He reveals unto them a new and everlasting covenant, the holy covenant of marriage for time and for all eternity, the union of the sexes, the sealing of wives to husbands and husbands to wives, children to parents, etc., the uniting and sealing us in the holy Priesthood unto the fathers and even unto our Lord Jesus Christ, who stands at the head of the kingdom of righteousness, the Chief Apostle and High Priest of our profession; and unto this new and everlasting covenant has the Lord purposed and designed His people to be united and bound together with the Son, our Savior, and through Him unto His Father; for He has said, “Whosoever receiveth me receiveth my Father, and all that my Father hath shall be given unto him.”

This new and everlasting covenant reveals unto us the keys of the Holy Priesthood and ordinances thereof. It is the grand keystone of the arch which the Lord is building in the earth. In other words, it is that which completes the exaltation and glory of the righteous who receive the everlasting Gospel, and without it they could not attain unto the eternal power and Godhead and the fullness of celestial glory. Now, many may enter into the glory of God, and become servants in the house of God and in the celestial kingdom of God, who are not able to abide this new and everlasting covenant; but as we are told in the Doctrine and Covenants, with them there is an end to their exaltation. They may remain in their saved condition without exaltation, but they enter not into the order of the Gods. They cannot progress through the ceaseless rounds of eternity except they abide in the covenant, and abide the law that governs it, and the Lord will not be mocked in these things.

We heard this morning how strict was the law pertaining to these matters. Now we say unto all Israel, old and young, these things are revealed unto us for our good. The strictness of the law may not in times past have been taught us and enforced upon us as we may look for it being taught and enforced in the future. But it behooveth us to reflect upon these things, and while it is our privilege to go forward, earnestly desiring and seeking after all that the Lord has to bestow upon us, yet we must remember that the more we receive and the greater privileges we are permitted to enjoy, the more strict accountability will be required of us, and the more dreadful will be the consequences of transgression or violation of the holy covenants and obligations which we assume.

Now, I wish to say that I realize that there are some in our midst—whether they are in your midst in this Stake of Zion or not, I am not prepared to say with any certainty, for I can only judge of the condition and feeling of the people as I am informed from time to time—I say, there are some whom Satan would stir to disobedience and try to make an impression upon their minds that the system of plural marriage, and those things that pertain to the sealing of men and women for time and for eternity, and the revelation which has been read in our hearing, given through the Prophet Joseph pertaining to this subject—that it was the work of man and not the work of God. We have recently had published in some of the Utah papers some letters on this subject, and one from Joseph Smith, the eldest son of the Prophet, in which a great deal of sophistry is made use of, special pleading, such as the lawyer that he is, seems only capable of using. And the object of this special pleading and the sophistry is to try to leave an impression upon the ignorant, those who know no better, that plural marriage was not introduced and sanctioned and practiced by his father, but that it has been an innovation of man, and does not belong to the system of religion which he believed and practiced and taught the people. And there are some among us who would fain take this view of the subject; not that there are many who believe it, but there are some who would like to believe it. And so there are in the world many people who fear that “Mormonism” as a whole is true and of God; they are very much afraid that it is, but they hope that it is not. They do not want to receive it; they do not want to live it, but they are afraid it is true, and multitudes of people have been convinced of its truth, but have not the honesty to acknowledge it; and many who would acknowledge it for a little season, would afterwards, because of the love of the world, fall away, and thus condemnation has fallen upon the world because they will not obey the truth when they hear it. And so it is with some among the Latter-day Saints. They are pretty well satisfied that this doctrine of plural marriage is true, and that it was revealed through the Prophet Joseph Smith, but they would like an excuse for disavowing and rejecting it. And why so? Mainly because their minds are closed up and have not been able to comprehend the principles that are embraced in this doctrine and connected with it. Their minds are contracted and limited. They think more of this present life than they do of the future. They want to lay up riches; they want to gather personal comforts around them; they want to gratify the pride of life and the lusts of the flesh. They do not understand that which is for their real good, their real happiness. But I testify that there is more real happiness in serving God and abiding in His law, and submitting to all its conditions and requirements than there can be in taking an opposite course. This is the testimony of all who receive and abide in the truth, and there is abundant evidence in their lives and conduct to prove that they, in receiving the truth, enjoy more comfort and happiness than those who reject it. And touching our plural families, I will say that, with all the weaknesses that are common to frail humanity, and that manifest themselves in our midst— the men who enter into this order in the sincerity of their hearts and with devotion to God, and the women who also enter into it in the love of the truth and in the earnestness of their souls, fearing God and desiring to do His will—that with all the weaknesses that manifest themselves, I say there is treble the genuine comfort and happiness in those families who enter into this order and abide in it, than is to be found in the same number of families in monogamy in this Church, to say nothing of the Gentile world. And then we will take the Latter-day Saints as a whole, whether in plural marriage or single marriage, and we will say that there is ten times more genuine happiness and comfort in believing and obeying the Gospel—whether in plural or single wedlock—than is to be found among the same number of people in any part of the world outside of this Church. Now, in this you are all my witnesses. Many of you have been in the world. You know what you were, and how you felt, and how your neighbors felt, and what kind of enjoyment you had before you heard the fullness of the Gospel. You know pretty well the condition of the world now—the condition of those who have not received the Gospel—and you know what your condition is and has been since you received the Gospel. And who among you, Latter-day Saints, would exchange your present condition for the condition of the outside world? Are we not prepared to testify that our happiness is trebled, through having believed and obeyed the Gospel?

Now, as I said to the Priesthood last night, we are arriving at a political crisis in our affairs. The priests and bigots of Christendom—and of America especially—are driving our lawmakers into trying to hedge up our way and to oppress us politically as well as religiously. They are endeavoring not only to deprive us of religious freedom, but to deprive us of political freedom, and to bring us into bondage. Well, now, they will do it as far as the Lord will allow them and no further. He will block their wheels. He will throw obstacles in their way. He will stay their onward progress. But He allows His people to be tried to see whether they will trust Him and have faith in Him, or whether they will deny Him, whether they will deny their covenants and their principles through fear of the power of the wicked, through fear of oppression, through fear of prisons or of death. For we have among us those who will falter, those who will halt between two opinions, those who wish to serve the world and who, at the same time, would like to serve the Lord a little. Well, can such people always continue in this doubtful and divided condition? No, they cannot. They will be tried and proven, and by and by they must take sides one way or another; they must either turn their backs upon the wicked and cleave unto God and His people with full purpose of soul, or they will turn their backs upon God and His people and go down to perdition with the ungodly of the world.

Well, now, in regard to those who are seeking for an excuse to reject plural marriage and are inclined to receive the statement of young Joseph Smith, I wish to say that I know that Joseph Smith is entirely ignorant of what he says, or he is a liar; for I know that he does not speak the truth. How far his mind has been blinded or how he has been influenced to look upon these things as correct, or to think that he speaks the truth, I do not know. But he is woefully in the dark if he thinks he does speak the truth in regard to this matter. I do not wish to accuse him of lying knowingly and intentionally. But there are multitudes of witnesses who know better, and know that when his father was murdered this son Joseph was in his eleventh year, and like other children of that age knew little either of his father’s life or his teachings and the principles that governed his life. He knew but little of what was being taught among the people. But there are multitudes of witnesses that were older than he, and that were intimate with the Prophet Joseph, that know better. Now, those who take this other view, and are trying to convince themselves that this is an institution of man and not of God, bring forth the law that was given to the Nephites of old upon the American continent, which was given them by Jacob, the brother of Nephi, and which you can read, as doubtless you have often read, in the Book of Mormon. Jacob arraigned some of the people because the men were giving way to the lusts of the flesh and the pride of life, and whoredoms, and they attempted to justify themselves in their whoredoms by referring to what is written in the Jewish Scriptures concerning David and Solomon and other men having many wives and concubines, which Jacob informed the Nephites was an abomination in the sight of the Lord, and gave unto them a commandment that not any man among them should have save it be one wife, and concubines they should have none, saying that the Lord “delighteth in the chastity of woman.” And in the same connection the Lord said: “For if I will, saith the Lord of Hosts, raise up seed unto me, I will command my people; otherwise they shall hearken unto these things.” Now, there was a reason why the Lord gave this commandment to the Nephites. But this reason did not exist when the Lord called Abraham and promised that his seed should be like the sand upon the seashore for number. He recognized the righteousness of a plurality of wives, and never at any time did he restrict them from the days of Abraham until Christ, so far as we have any record in the Jewish Scriptures. But there were reasons, as I said before, why he restricted the Nephites, but in this restriction He intimated that when the time should come that He should raise up seed unto himself, He would command His people.

Now, when the Lord raised up the Prophet Joseph to lay the foundation of this Church, He found monogamy instead of polygamy to be the rule of Christendom, and He enjoined, in the early revelations to this Church, that every woman cleave unto her husband, and that every man cleave unto his wife and none else, saying that he that looketh upon a woman to lust after her who is not his wife hath committed adultery already with her in his heart. This was the law governing Christendom which had been inherited by the Gentiles for ages past, and introduced among the Roman Empire and perpetuated by the Roman church and the Protestant churches that had sprung out of her, and the Lord in the early history of this people continued this order of things, but revealed unto the Prophet Joseph, nevertheless, that the time would come when He would require His people to enter into plural marriage as He did Abraham and the prophets of old, to bring about His purposes in the latter days. Joseph revealed this unto some of the first Elders of the Church, taking care to enjoin them that they must preserve these things in their own hearts; that the time had not yet come when the Lord required His people to enter into this order, but the time would come when He would require them to do so. This was made manifest in the early stages of this Church, but not until 1843 was this law committed to writing and given to the people. This revelation we find in the Book of Doctrine and Covenants.

Now, Joseph—I refer now to the young man that is alive and who was a mere boy at his father’s death, and who with his mother and her children remained behind, though his mother did know for herself that her husband did teach and practice this order of marriage, yet she was not willing to own or acknowledge it to her children, and her children, the oldest of which, as I have said, was only eleven years old when his father was murdered—were studiously kept ignorant of the facts of the case as far as she was concerned, and therefore we can make allowance and excuse in part for what they assert. But there are great numbers that I can call to mind who know for themselves that the Prophet Joseph did receive from the Lord and teach this order to the first Elders of this Church, and did receive and commit to writing this revelation on the subject of plural marriage which is contained in the Doctrine and Covenants, and did teach it and did practice it, and I am one of those witnesses. I know that he taught to me as early as in the spring of 1842 what God had revealed to him on the subject; I know that he gave to me my second wife and assigned his brother, Hyrum, to seal her to me; and I know that he taught this doctrine to quite a good few others—the Twelve Apostles and others of the faithful Elders of Israel—and that very many of the faithful and good women of Israel know and understand and are witnesses of these things for themselves. And we testify of these things, that God has reserved to Himself this right to command His people when it seemeth to Him good and to accomplish the object He has in view—that is, to raise up a righteous seed, a seed that will pay respect to His law and will build up Zion in the earth. And while the wicked are hardening their hearts in sin and giving themselves up to whoredoms and lust, and seeking to prevent the increase of offspring among them, God is impressing upon us the heinousness of these crimes and showing us the beauty and glory of multiplying the families of Israel. When we visit the settlements of the Saints and attend the Quarterly Conferences throughout the land, what do we hear in the reports? We hear that an average of about thirty percent of the entire population are children under eight years of age, and another one-third between that and twenty, and scarcely one-third of the population are yet old enough to enter into the marriage relation. And what do we hear? Reports from the Relief Societies and the Improvement Associations and the Sunday school teachers and superintendents that are engaged in instructing them—and what do we hear? Why, we hear that the spirit of the Gospel is in them, that faith is in them, and that they possess bright, intelligent minds that are reaching out after knowledge, and hearts that are grasping the things of God. It is this that causes the world to fear and tremble and this is the cause of the opposition waged against us.

Brethren and sisters, let us put our trust in God, who will give us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Discourse by President John Taylor, delivered at Parowan, Sunday Morning, June 24th, 1883.

Elder George Reynolds, at the request of President Taylor, read Christ’s “Sermon on the Mount,” after which,

President Taylor spoke as follows: I have had a long discourse read over in your hearing. I do not know that we can listen to anything better than to instructions given by the Savior; and in that discourse is a great amount of intelligence, wisdom, thought, reflection, principle and doctrine presented to our minds. It is full of thought, full of intelligence, and presents to us principles that connect earth with heaven, man with God, and with which are interwoven all our best interests in time and throughout eternity. It is well, therefore, to reflect upon these things—upon the doctrines, teachings and instructions given by our Savior and by ancient men of God, who were under the inspiration of the Almighty, and who spake as they were moved upon by the Holy Ghost. For if the principles which were enunciated by our Savior in His day, were correct, they are just as true and correct today as they were then, and they are quite as applicable to us as they were to the people to whom He addressed Himself; for they are general principles, and some of them refer to things that are personal, that are associated with our everyday life, and with the spirit and feeling that we ought, as Saints of the Most High God, to be in possession of. Indeed I very much question whether we could find in the same space as comprehensive an exposition of ideas or principles enunciated by any person that ever spake, as are found in this sermon which was delivered by Jesus upon the Mount. We should have esteemed it a great privilege to have listened to the Son of God, yet we can read His words today, and the principles He taught, as I have said, are just as true and im– portant now as they were then.

I desire to speak a little this morning upon some of the duties and responsibilities which devolve upon us as Latter-day Saints, and I feel that—as I often hear the Elders say—I would like to have an interest in your faith and prayers. I like to have the prayers, the faith and confidence of good men and good women, and I feel this morning that I am among good men and good women who are desirous to do the will and keep the commandments of God our heavenly Father—that is, this is the general feeling.

I will say I have been pleased to meet here and greet some of our Presidents of Stakes and other brethren from a distance. Here is Brother McAllister from St. George, and some others who have accompanied him from that region. They have traveled over a hot, sandy desert, quite a long distance to meet with us and to meet with you. Again, here is another President of Stake—Brother Crosby—who has come over these big mountains from Panguitch, and I think some of his folks have come with him from that Stake. Then again, here is Brother Murdock, who has come 35 miles with us, and then you might double that distance by two or three times, for he was at Milford to meet us, and some of his folks are also with us. Then we had the President of Millard Stake—Brother Hinckley—who was with us for several days. It gives me great pleasure to meet with these my brethren of the Priesthood, especially with the Presidents of Stakes and their Counselors, because they hold important positions in the Church and kingdom of God, and I greet you and bless you in the name of the Lord. There is a spirit exhibited which shows that the brethren feel inter– ested in the things pertaining to the kingdom of God, and that of all others is the thing in which we ought all of us to be interested. [President Cannon: We have also with us Brother Erastus Snow and Brother Jacob Gates.] President Taylor: Oh, yes. We expect them to be everywhere, as we are. We have specially dedicated ourselves to God, as active servants in His vineyard; we have dedicated ourselves to do the will of God, and to assist in carrying out His purposes, and we feel quite happy in the labor. And I should have been very much pleased, and so would Brother Cannon—and I do not know but what he wants me to say something about him being here—(laughter). [Brother Cannon: Oh, no.]—we should have been pleased to have stayed in the country a few days longer, but we cannot do so; that is, we have other duties devolving upon us, and we ought to be in Salt Lake City on Tuesday next. At one time we could not very easily have done this, but we have found out the way—at least, there is a way provided. The Lord has blessed us with many blessings. He has caused us to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. He has granted unto us His Holy Spirit to enlighten our minds, and to teach us the principles of righteousness. He has called us to do a great work. How great, could I tell you? No. Could you understand if I did? No, you could not. But He has called us to do a great work—a work in which God our heavenly Father is interested, a work in which Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant is interested, a work in which Adam is interested, a work in which Seth, Methuselah, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses and the Prophets are interested, a work in which the Apostles that officiated on the continent of Asia are interested, a work in which the Apostles that officiated on this continent are interested, as well as Lehi, Nephi, Moroni, and others, who operated here in the cause of God, and who sought to carry out His purposes in this land. It is a work in which all men that have ever lived upon the face of the earth are interested. It is a work in which the Gods in the eternal worlds are interested. It is a work that has been spoken of by all the holy Prophets since the world was. It is called the “dispensation of the fulness of times,” wherein God will gather together all things in one, whether they be things in the heavens or things in the earth. It is a dispensation in which all the holy Prophets that ever lived upon the face of the earth are interested. They prophesied about it as the grand and great consummation in the accomplishment of the purposes of God; purposes which He designed before the morning stars sang together, or the sons of God shouted for joy, or this world itself rolled into existence. It is a work in which we, our progenitors and our posterity are especially interested. And we are gathered together from among the nations of the earth in order that we may be taught of God, that we may understand the law of God, and the principles of life and salvation; a salvation that extends not only to ourselves, but to all mankind. We are gathered together here that we may be placed especially under the tuition and guidance of the Lord, that we may feel and realize that which the ancient Israelites expressed when they said, “The Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king”—and He shall rule over us, and we will be his people; and we His latter-day Israel, will acknowl– edge Him in all things; for we are a chosen people, a royal Priesthood, selected by the God of Israel for the accomplishment of His purposes, for the organization and purification of His Church, for the establishment of His Kingdom, and for the building up of His Zion on the earth. We are indebted to God for the revelation of all those principles that we today possess, whether they relate to the Church of God, to the Zion of God, or to the kingdom of God; so far as any principles thereof have been made manifest and developed unto us they are truly, positively and unequivocally the gift of God our heavenly Father. They did not originate with us. They did not originate with any man that lived on the earth, for no man knew them. They did not originate with Joseph Smith, or with Brigham Young, or with myself, or with the Apostles, or with any class of men in this Church. They are the gift of God to His people, to His children who dwell upon the earth. He has offered these principles freely to the nations of the earth. Thousands and millions of people who have heard them have not received nor obeyed them; but you have—that is, I speak generally, not individually, for some have not obeyed them. Many Latter-day Saints do not comprehend their position. They do not understand the relationship that exists between God and themselves. They do not understand the responsibility of the position that they occupy; some such hold the Holy Priesthood, and others are not in the Holy Priesthood. After so many years of teaching and instruction, and the many opportunities that we have had, we come far short of comprehending the principles of life, truth and intelligence which God has seen fit to make manifest to us, and the world do not comprehend them at all. And why cannot they? Because Jesus said very positively in His day, that except a man was born again he could not see the kingdom of God, and unless he was born of the water and of the Spirit, he could not enter into the kingdom of God, and they do not understand it. We cannot help that. But if we could comprehend our own positions and realize the blessings that we have enjoyed, and do now enjoy, and the prospect that lies before us in consequence of God having inclined our hearts to yield obedience to the Gospel of the Son of God, we should call upon our souls and all that is within us, to bless His holy name. We should thank God from morning till evening, that we have the privilege of being Latter-day Saints. We should thank Him for the light and intelligence that we have already received, and we should seek for a closer communion with Him that we might comprehend more fully the duties that devolve upon us, and feel in our hearts to do the will of God on earth, as angels do it in heaven. We should do this if we could comprehend our true position, and some of us do comprehend it in part. We see in part, we understand in part, we prophesy in part, etc., but when that which is perfect is come, that which is in part will be done away with. The Lord has gathered us together, and is seeking to introduce among this people the principles of Zion, that we may be pure in heart, pure in spirit, pure in our actions, and that we may all of us feel like saying: “O God, search my heart, and try my reins, search me and prove me, and if there is any way of wickedness within me, bid it depart; show it to me that I may overcome it, that I may gain the vic– tory, that I may be worthy to be thy son, that I may be worthy to have Thy blessing and Thy Spirit, and the intelligence that dwells with Thee imparted to me; that I may walk according to Thy laws and fulfill the various duties and responsibilities that devolve upon me.” That is the kind of feeling we should have if we could realize and comprehend our position. We would seek after the Lord.

In the discourse read by Brother Reynolds, this morning, it says, among other things: “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.” I also read with regard to Abraham: He was a man of God, and he tells us in his history that he was a follower after righteousness; that he desired to obtain more righteousness, and that upon examining into the history of his fathers, he found that he had a right to the Priesthood and sought ordination, and he received that ordination. He was ordained by Melchizedek, who was prince of Salem, and a servant of the Most High God, and held the Priesthood called after his name. It is the Priesthood which is after the order of the Son of God, a Priesthood which possesses the power of an endless life. Abraham received a knowledge of these things; and when he obtained the Priesthood what did he do? Did he, after the manner of some religionists, “sing himself away to everlasting bliss?” No, he did not. What then did he do? He kept seeking after more righteousness. Jesus recognized that principle in his sermon—“Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.” Abraham sought the Lord diligently, and finally he had given unto him a Urim and Thummim, in which he was enabled to obtain a knowledge of many things that others were ignorant of. I think the meaning of the name of this instrument is Light and Perfection, in other terms, communicating light perfectly, and intelligence perfectly, through a principle that God has ordained for that purpose. Did Abraham stop there? No; he did not rest until he could communicate with God Himself. Jesus says: “Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.” The Lord appeared to Abraham, and told him many things. And in proportion to the blessings which He conferred upon him, the Lord exacted from Abraham strict obedience to His law, to His word, and to His will, and He tried him to the uttermost. He gave unto him a son. Sarah laughed at the idea when the Lord told her she would have a son. At her time of life—she was 90 years old—it did look a little odd. The Lord asked her what she laughed at. She denied that she had laughed, but He said, “Nay, but thou did’st laugh.” There were to be certain blessings associated with this son. The Lord also told Abraham that He would bless him exceedingly, and make him a great man upon the earth. Finally, this son was born. But there came, after a time, a time of trial of Abraham’s faith. In substance the Lord said to him: “Now, Abraham, take thy son Isaac. You received him from me,” the same as we all do, if we could understand it, but we do not—he was a son of promise—a great many people are not sons of promise, but still are no less the children of God, for God is the God and father of the spirits of all flesh—“Take thy son and offer him up as a sacrifice.” “What!” said Abraham. No; I do not believe that He said that; but I will suppose what He might have said: “Why, Lord, did you not tell me that you would establish your covenant with Isaac, for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him, and that I should become a great and mighty nation, and that all the nations of the earth would be blessed in me?” “Yes.” “And now you tell me to offer my promised son as a sacrifice? What are you going to do about it?” “You have got to obey me, that is all.” Abraham did not begin to question the Lord if He could find a precedent for such a thing in the Scriptures, or whether such a thing had ever taken place anywhere else. No; he proceeded to carry out the commandment of the Lord. I fancy I can see Abraham undergoing this trial. I wonder what his feelings were. What would your feelings be if you were commanded to sacrifice your promised son? Well, Abraham took his son into the mountain. They built an altar. And finally Isaac said to his father: “Behold the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” What would you have thought if you had been in Abraham’s place? Yet Abraham was a righteous man and sought after righteousness, sought after God, and God had talked with him, and blessed him in a very remarkable manner, and given him a son where there was no prospect naturally of his wife Sarah having one. How would you have felt, you fathers here, if you had been placed in the same position? But Abraham nerved himself up and said: “My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering—thou thyself art that lamb!” He thereupon bound Isaac, and laid him on the altar. He lifted the knife, and was about to strike the fatal blow, when the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven and said, “Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me. And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son.” And the Lord said, “Because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son: That in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the seashore; And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.”

I speak of these things to show how men are to be tried. I heard Joseph Smith say—and I presume Brother Snow heard him also—in preaching to the Twelve in Nauvoo, that the Lord would get hold of their heart strings and wrench them, and that they would have to be tried as Abraham was tried. Well, some of the Twelve could not stand it. They faltered and fell by the way. It was not everybody that could stand what Abraham stood. And Joseph said that if God had known any other way whereby he could have touched Abraham’s feelings more acutely and more keenly he would have done so. It was not only his parental feelings that were touched. There was something else besides. He had the promise that in him and in his seed all the nations of the earth should be blessed; that his seed should be multiplied as the stars of the heaven and as the sand upon the seashore. He had looked forward through the vista of future ages and seen, by the spirit of revelation, myriads of his people rise up through whom God would convey intelligence, light and salvation to a world. But in being called upon to sacrifice his son it seemed as though all his prospects pertaining to posterity were to come to naught. But he had faith in God, and he fulfilled the thing that was required of him. Yet we cannot conceive of anything that could be more trying and more perplexing than the position in which he was placed.

Now, although I have said considerable in regard to Abraham, yet I will say a word or two more. God said that in his seed should all the nations of the earth be blessed. Who was Isaac, and who was Jacob? Heirs with him to the same promise. Who was Moses? A man that was raised up to lead the children of Israel out of Egypt. Who was he? A descendant of Abraham. Who were the Prophets from whom we receive the Bible? The seed of Abraham. Who were the prophets from whom we received this Book of Mormon? They were the seed of Abraham. Who was Jesus, the Mediator of the new covenant? Of the seed of Abraham. Who were the Apostles? Of the seed of Abraham. Who were the people that came to this continent? The seed of Abraham. Who were the Apostles that were raised up here? They were the seed of Abraham. Who was Joseph Smith, the Prophet of God, raised up in these last days? He was a descendant of Joseph, the son of Jacob, and his father’s name was Joseph, as had been anciently prophesied should be the case, when the work he should perform was being referred to. Who are this people? A great many are of the seed of Abraham. And what is God doing with us? Has He raised us up to injure mankind? No. For what are the Twelve Apostles appointed? To preach the Gospel to all mankind. What are these 76 Quorums of Seventies for? Here is one of their Presidents. What are those quorums for, Brother Gates? [Brother Jacob Gates: To preach the Gospel to all the world.] Yes; to preach the Gospel to the nations of the earth—messengers of Jehovah, to communicate the glad tidings of salvation to a fallen world, to declare that the heavens have been opened, that God has spoken, that the eternal principles of life have been revealed, and that we are commissioned to make known unto the nations of the earth the glad tidings of salvation which God has ordained. Again, what are the Elders for? The same thing. Then come other principles. We are gathered together here that we might be taught of God, that we might be placed under His tuition, under His guidance and under His direction. As it is written: “They shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest of them.” We are here to learn of His ways and to walk in His paths.

We are living, as I said, in “the dispensation of the fulness of times,” when God will gather together all things in one, whether they be things on the earth or things in the heavens, whether they appertain to Adam, or Seth, or Enos, or Mahalaleel, or Methuselah, or Noah, or Abraham, or Isaac, or Jacob, or the Prophets, or Jesus, or the people that have lived in the different ages who have possessed the Gospel of the Son of God; people on this continent or any other continent. They are all interested in this work. All heaven is engaged in carrying out the work that we are engaged in to– day. They are looking upon us and watching our acts, and are interested in this great work. And God will say, today, as he did in former times: “Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm.” And I say woe to them that lift their hands against the anointed of God, for God will be after them. We have a work to perform. We have to build up the Church and kingdom of God, and to see that the principles of purity and the law of God are enforced. Let me speak upon this. The Scriptures say: “And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.” Again, the Scriptures say: “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.” Being gathered together as we are, and having our organization of the First Presidency, of the Twelve Apostles, of the Presidents of Stakes and their counselors, of the Bishops and their counselors, of High Councils, of Priests, Teachers and Deacons, and of all the associations and organizations of the Holy Priesthood, according to the pattern that exists in the heavens—God having placed us in this position, He expects that every one of us will fulfill the duties devolving upon us. If the Presidents of Stakes do not do their duty aright, it becomes the duty of the First Presidency to call them to an account, and if the First Presidency do not do their duty, it becomes God our heavenly Father, or Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, to call them to an account, and it is woe to those men if they do not perform their duties aright. Then it becomes the duty of the Twelve to fulfill the callings and responsibilities devolving upon them, and to carry out and fulfill the word, the will and law of God. And who has a right to depart from that? God has introduced laws into His Church for the purification of His people. How was it formerly? God placed in His Church Apostles, Prophets, Pastors, Teachers, Evangelists, etc. What for? To be so many dummies? No. But for the perfecting of the Saints. What else? For the work of the ministry. What else? For the edifying of the body of Christ. How long? “Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things.” In other words, that we may be one with Christ as He is one with the Father, and operate together every man in his place, and then God for us all. Hence it is for us to purify ourselves as God is pure.

I have heard sometimes that you have hard struggling in some of these southern countries, especially a little further south. I presume you have. I presume you have difficulty sometimes in making both ends meet. But we won’t cry about it after all. We might be a great deal worse off, and I have seen the time when we were a great deal worse off than we are today. Have not you? [Several voices: “Yes.”]

You are all well clad. You do not look as if you were starved to death, or anything of that kind. We want to cultivate the principles of life, to train up our children in the right way, and to place ourselves in a proper position to fear God and to carry out His laws. And about our riches or about our poverty it will not make much difference not a great while hence. It will not make very much difference whether we are poor or whether we are rich. But it will make a great difference whether we are honorable or not; whether we are men and women of virtue or not; whether we are free from covetousness or not; and whether we keep the commandments of God and live our religion or not; it will make a very great difference whether we do these things or whether we do not. And did you ever think that it became necessary in times past, so we read in the Bible—for the Lord to allow the Philistines and the Midianites and others to become thorns, as it were, in the side of the children of Israel, in order to bring them to righteousness? Did you ever read of such things? I have in my Bible. And if the Lord suffers us to be tried we will be tried; and we will say, “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” We will pray as Jesus taught His disciples to pray. We will say: “Our Father who art in heaven; O, God, my Father, O Thou that art the Father of my spirit and of my flesh, and that watchest over me and art interested in my welfare, let me reverence Thy holy name. If Thou conferest upon me the good things of life, I will thank Thee for them. Give me my daily bread. Forgive me my sins as I forgive those that sin against me.” I see people sometimes full of wrath and indignation against their neighbors, and they sometimes say, “I will never forgive them as long as I live.” Then you will never be a Saint as long as you live. I have heard our sisters say such things. You would not think it of them, but it is true. God teaches us to pray for a forgiveness of our sins, as we forgive those that trespass against us. Is not that the principle laid down? Yes. “How oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?” enquired Peter of the Savior. “Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, until seven times; but until seventy times seven”—that is if he repent. Well, I have seen such folks. They are all the time sinning and all the time repenting. We look upon them as “weak sisters.” But we can perform our part with them. For if we forgive not men their trespasses, how shall God forgive us our trespasses? “Lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil; for thine is the kingdom.” What? “For thine is the kingdom.” What, God’s? Yes. What kingdom? In Him pertains all the powers, and kingdoms, and authority over the whole earth. But who acknowledges His authority? We see kingdom against kingdom, nation against nation, power against power; confusion, disunion and anarchy everywhere prevailing. Jesus taught His disciples to pray, “Thy kingdom come.” What is implied in this expression? What is meant by a kingdom? It signifies power, rule, authority, dominion. Whose kingdom was it to be? God’s kingdom. What! God to bear rule and have dominion over the earth? So it is said:

“There was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations and languages should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.”

And it is elsewhere said:

“And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.”

And what else? The gold and the silver are God’s, and the cattle upon a thousand hills. All that we possess is the gift of God. We should acknowledge Him in all things. We sometimes talk about men having this right and the other right. We have no rights only such as God gives us. And I will tell you what He will show to the Latter-day Saints. He will yet prove to them that the gold and the silver are His, and the cattle upon a thousand hills, and that He gives to whom He will, and withholds from whom he pleases. He will yet show you this is a matter of fact. Our safety and happiness, and our wealth depend upon our obedience to God and His laws, and our exaltation in time and eternity, depends upon the same thing. If we have means placed in our hands, we will ask our Father to enable us to do what is right with it, and, as I have said, we will ask Him for our daily bread, and thank Him for it; just the same as the children of Israel did. They had manna brought to them from time to time by the angels. I do not know what kind of mills they had or who were their bakers; but they brought the manna. “He that gathered much had nothing over, and he that gathered little had no lack.” I think that is the case sometimes with us. The angels do not feed us exactly with manna, but God does take care of us, and I feel all the day long like blessing the name of the God of Israel: and if we fear God and work righteousness, as I told you yester– day, we, the people of Zion, will be the richest of all people.

What then shall we do? We will fear God, keep His commandments, and observe His laws. We will not seek to do our own will, but the will of God our Heavenly Father, and if we do the will of God our Heavenly Father, we have to be taught what that will is. And then we have to be taught it, too, through the proper channels. You may everyone of you, ask God to guide and direct you, and He will show you the right path. But we have to be obedient to the authorities of His Church. You have a President of Stake here, and ought to be obedient to him. You have Bishops, and you ought to listen to their counsel. You have teachers, and they ought to perform their duties faithfully and diligently, and you ought to be subject to their counsels. And we ought all of us to seek to fear God, keep His commandments, and obey His laws, and God will bless us.

There is another principle I desire to speak about. We have no right to condone the sins of men and pervert the order of God in His Church. Now, I want you Presidents of Stakes and you Bishops to listen to this. If men transgress the law of God, it is your duty to see after it, and to call upon them to repent, and if they do not repent, they ought to be removed out of the Church. For it is only he that doeth righteousness that is righteous, and God has instituted laws and expects us to be governed by them. We are not to be harsh masters. I will have read something on this subject from the Book of Doctrine and Covenants.

“Behold, there are many called, but few are chosen.

“And why are they not chosen?

“Because their hearts are set so much upon the things of this world, and aspire to the honors of men, that they do not learn this one lesson—

“That the rights of the priesthood are inseparably connected with the powers of heaven, and that the powers of heaven cannot be controlled nor handled only upon the principles of righteousness. * *

“No power or influence can or ought to be maintained by virtue of the priesthood, only by persuasion, by long-suffering, by gentleness and meekness, and by love unfeigned,” etc., etc.

There is no authority associated with the Holy Priesthood except on the principle of persuasion, and no man has a right to plume himself upon any position he occupies in this Church, for he is simply a servant of God, and a servant of the people, and if any man attempts to use any kind of arbitrary authority, and act with any degree of unrighteousness, God will hold that man to an account for it, and we all of us have to be judged according to the deeds done in the body. We are here as saviors of men, and not as tyrants and oppressors. But at the same time if men do not and will not yield obedience to the laws of God, then it becomes the duty of those who preside over them to see that the law of God is carried out, and that these unrighteous men are severed from the Church. We have had adulterers among us, and wherever I have heard of them I have directed that they be severed from the Church. Why? Because I cannot permit it, and God will not permit it. Who is it that will be outside of the Eternal City by and by? The liar, the hypocrite, the whoremonger, the sorcerer, and the adulterer—they shall be with the dogs outside of the city. Now, I do not want to try to drag such men in. We have no right to tamper with these things. God expects us to begin to walk up to the line, and to perform the several duties that devolve upon us. We must honor our God, and purge the Church from unrighteousness. I have had cases come before me in regard to adultery. There is a law in relation to that—that is, when they have not entered into the new and everlasting covenant, and taken upon themselves obligations associated with the celestial law—that if a man commits adultery he shall make an acknowledgement of it before the Church—that is, if it is his first offense, and he has not sinned in this wise before. If it is his first offense, and he repents, he shall be forgiven, but if he does it a second time he shall be cast out. But when we come to other things—things that are more serious—when men have entered into covenants associated with the celestial law and taken upon themselves obligations pertaining thereto, it is a different matter. I will read a little from the revelation:

“And as ye have asked concerning adultery, verily, verily, I say unto you, if a man receive a wife in the new and everlasting covenant, and if she be with another man, and I have not appointed unto her by the holy anointing, she hath committed adultery and shall be destroyed.

“If she be not in the new and everlasting covenant, and she be with another man, she has committed adultery.

“And again, as pertaining to the law of the priesthood—if any man espouse a virgin, and desire to espouse another, and the first give her consent, and if he espouse the second, and they are virgins, and have vowed to no other man, then is he justified; he cannot commit adultery for they are given unto him; for he cannot commit adultery with that that belongeth unto him and to no one else.

“And if he have ten virgins given unto him by this law, he cannot commit adultery, for they belong to him, and they are given unto him; therefore is he justified.

“But if one or either of the ten virgins, after she is espoused, shall be with another man, she has committed adultery, and shall be destroyed.”

Here is a principle—and the same principle applies to the man—that if a man commits adultery, he also shall be destroyed. Can I change that? I did not make the law. Have I the right to change it? “But,” says one, “does it not say that what you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and what you shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven?” Yes; but I have to know if it is the mind and will of God that it shall be so. The law says, “they shall be destroyed.” What else? “And shall be delivered unto the buffetings of Satan unto the day of redemption.” That is the law. Can I change it? Can you? I speak now to Presidents of Stakes and Bishops. We are told that we are not to be partakers of other men’s sins. Now, you send men with recommends to me to have me pass upon them. I trust to you. I suppose you are acquainted with these things. I suppose you act intelligently and understandingly. But if people do not fulfill the requirements of the Gospel, you have no right to recommend them to the house of the Lord. They do not belong there. People who do not observe the laws of the Gospel and live their religion, should not receive recommends, and if you do recommend such you will be held responsible, for I will not. I receive them upon your authority, and trust to your judgment. I have known cases where wicked and corrupt men have gone into the house of God. The parties administering did not know it, but nevertheless it was a fact. And what has become of them? They have come to me feeling as though they were in hell. They wanted to know what they could do. I tell them I did not know; perhaps the Lord would indicate by and by. I say to all, you had better, unless you determine to fear God and keep His laws, quit at once, for God expects us to do right, and will hold us to an account for our acts. And I say to the Bishops, purge your Wards from all iniquity, and have no fellowship with adulterers and adulteresses. Adultery is the curse of the nations today, and it is corrupting, corroding, and eating out the very vitals of the people among the nations. They are overrun with it. God has set us apart to do His will and to build up His Kingdom and His Zion. Zion means the pure in heart, and we have to be pure in heart and pure in life. We have to be honest. We must not steal. What, do Saints steal? I hope you have no thieves among you here. And then there are covetous men, men who conceive all kinds of plans to get possession of other people’s property. Such are not going to get into the Kingdom of God, unless they repent and do right. Who will inherit the earth? Those who despoil their neighbors? No. Who will they be? Jesus said in His sermon, “Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth;” not the covetous, sorcerers, adulterers, liars, hypocrites, and those who bear false witness against their neighbors; all such characters will not have a place there. It is for us who hold the Holy Priesthood to be pure. “Be ye pure that bear the vessels of the Lord.” It is for each of us to be pure, and then say to others, “follow me, as I follow Jesus.” It is for us to live our religion and obey the laws of God, and perform the duties that devolve upon us, and I tell you, if we do this, I will risk all that the nations of the earth, or that this nation can do. If we will only fear God, build up Zion, and work righteousness, God will put a hook in the jaws of our oppressors. We may have to suffer for a little while, but we will overcome. This kingdom will not be given into the hands of another people, for God is with Israel, and Israel will triumph. And if we will continue to do right—and whether some of us do right or not; those that do not do right will be cast out of their place; but if we continue to do right Zion will increase and grow until the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdoms of our God and His Christ, and until every creature in heaven, on the earth, and under the earth will be heard to say, blessing and honor and might and power and majesty and dominion be ascribed to Him that sitteth on the throne and unto the Lamb forever.

God bless you, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Discourse by President Joseph F. Smith, delivered at Ogden, Sunday Morning, June 21st, 1883.

There has, perhaps, never been a period in the history of the Church when the delusive spirits that are abroad in the world, deceiving the children of men, were more active than they are and have been for the last few years. I have never in my recollection heard of so many pretended prophets and revelations, special messages, missions and manifestations to various individuals, as have come to my notice within the last few months or perhaps years. Some claim that they are in constant communication with angels, others that they have received a direct command from God to accomplish a certain mission, others claim to be Christ, and therefore assume the right to dictate and direct the labors of the Presidency and Twelve, and undertake to correct and set them right and to show them wherein they lack inspiration, etc., and wherein it is necessary that a strong arm should be raised up in order to steady the ark of Zion. There has been a great deal of this kind of spirit manifested of late among men who are and have been in the Church for years; and not only such, but by men who never have been members and who have no knowledge of the character of this latter-day work. Messages from the spirit world, communications from the departed through mediums, people that permit themselves to be used for this purpose by lying and delusive spirits.

It has sometimes been sorrowful to see respected members of the Church, men who should know better, allow themselves to become the tools of seductive spirits. Such men seem, for the time at least, to lose sight of the fact that the Lord has established on earth the Priesthood in its fullness; and that by direct revelation and commandment from heaven; that He has instituted an order or government that is beyond the capacity, and that is superior to the wisdom and learning and understanding of man, so far, indeed, that it seems impossible for the human mind, unaided by the Spirit of God, to comprehend the beauties, powers, and character of the Holy Priesthood. It seems difficult for men to comprehend the workings of the Priesthood; its legitimate authority, its scope and power; and yet by the light of the spirit it is easily comprehended, but not understanding it men are easily deceived by seductive spirits that are abroad in the world. They are led to believe that something is wrong, and the next thing that transpires, they find themselves believing that they are chosen specially to set things right. It is very unfortunate for a man to be taken in this snare; for be it understood by the Latter-day Saints that as long as the servants of God are living pure lives, are honoring the Priesthood conferred upon them, and endeavoring to the best of their knowledge to magnify their offices and callings, to which they have been duly chosen by the voice of the people and the Priesthood, and sanctioned by the approval of God, so long as the Lord has any communication to make to the children of men, or any instructions to impart to His Church, He will make such communication through the legally appointed channel of the Priesthood. He will never go outside of it, as long, at least, as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints exists in its present form on the earth.

The Church of God has been organized, the kingdom of God has been established, and the Gospel has been restored to the earth for the last time; and this work which has fairly began will never cease, but will continue to spread abroad and increase in the earth, and gather to its fold the righteous, the honest, the pure, the meek and the poor of the earth, until “the kingdom” shall be exalted to power and glory in the midst of the world; and it will reign triumphant when Babylon will be broken to pieces, and will fall to rise no more. These are the promises that have been made to us. This fact is indicated by the revelations of God to man through ancient and modern prophets, and through angels that have visited the earth in this dispensation of the fullness of times.

It is not my business nor that of any other individual to rise up as a revelator, as a prophet, as a seer, as an inspired man, to give revelation for the guidance of the Church, or to assume to dictate to the presiding authorities of the Church in any part of the world, much less in the midst of Zion, where the organizations of the Priesthood are about perfect, where everything is complete even to the organization of a branch. It is the right of individuals to be inspired and to receive manifestations of the Holy Spirit for their personal guidance, to strengthen their faith, and to encourage them in works of righteousness, in being faithful and observing and keeping the commandments which God has given unto them; it is the privilege of every man and woman to receive revelation to this end, but not further. The moment an individual rises up assuming the right to control and to dictate or to sit in judgment on his brethren, especially upon those who preside, he should be promptly checked, or discord, division and confusion would be the result. Every man and woman in this Church should know better than to yield to such a spirit; the moment that such a feeling presents itself to them they should rebuke it, as it is in direct antagonism to the order of the Priesthood, and to the spirit and genius of this work. We can accept nothing as authoritative but that which comes directly through the appointed channel, the constituted organizations of the Priesthood, which is the channel that God has appointed through which to make known His mind and will to the world. It was necessary prior to the organization of this Church, that God should select from the inhabitants of the earth some person through whom to reveal His will to mankind; and it pleased Him to select for this purpose the youthful and untutored boy Joseph Smith, as David of old was His choice, but as there was no Priesthood on the earth when Joseph was called, legally constituted by the authority of heaven to officiate in the name of the Lord, it was necessary therefore that someone should be selected as the first Elder for the beginning of this work, for there has to be a beginning, and he was the one foreordained for the position which he occupied and filled. After calling and setting him apart for the work of introducing and establishing this Gospel of the kingdom, the Lord of course recognized him as His mouthpiece, as His authorized agent, if you please, and it would be absolutely inconsistent, unreasonable and absurd to suppose that after God had called one man and appointed him to this work, that He should pass him by and go to somebody else to accomplish the same purpose. No sensible person would accept for one moment such a proposition. To seriously contemplate any such idea would be charging the Almighty with inconsistency, and with being the author of confusion, discord and schism. The kingdom of God never could be established on earth in any such way.

Through Joseph then, the Lord revealed Himself to the world and through him He chose the first Elders of the Church—men who were honest in their hearts; men whom He knew would receive the word and labor in connection with Joseph in this great and important undertaking; and all that have been ordained to the Priesthood, and all that have been appointed to any position whatever in this Church, have received their authority and commission through this channel, appointed of God, with Joseph at the head. This is the order, and it could not be otherwise. God will not raise up another prophet, and another people to do the work that we have been appointed to do. He will never ignore those who have stood firm and true from the commencement, as it were, of this work, and who are still firm and faithful, inasmuch as they continue faithful to their trust. There is no question in my mind of their ever proving themselves unfaithful, as a body; for if any of them were to become unworthy in His sight, He would remove them out of their place and call others from the ranks to fill their positions. And thus His Priesthood will ever be found to be composed of the right men for the place, of men whose backs will be fitted for the burden, men through whom He can work and regulate the affairs of His Church according to the counsels of His own will. And the moment that individuals look to any other source, that moment they throw themselves open to the seductive influences of Satan, and render themselves liable to become servants of the devil; they lose sight of the true order through which the blessings of the Priesthood are to be enjoyed; they step outside of the pale of the kingdom of God, and are on dangerous ground. Whenever you see a man rise up claiming to have received direct revelation from the Lord to the Church, independent of the order and channel of the Priesthood, you may set him down as an impostor. God has not called you to go out to the world to be taught, or to receive revelations through apostates or strangers; but He has called and ordained you and sent you forth to teach and lead people in the paths of righteousness and salvation.

It is the duty, therefore, of every Latter-day Saint to seek for the spirit of truth, and to desire with full purposes of heart, and seek diligently for the gifts of wisdom and understanding that will lead and guide into all truth, that will enable us to comprehend the purposes of God, and this most perfect, most harmonious organization which God has instituted by His own wisdom in these last days for the gathering of Israel, and for the communication of all His purposes as made known through His servants the Prophets. Men may become dissatisfied one with another, they may become dissatisfied towards the Presidency, the Quorum of the Twelve, or others, and may say in their hearts, “I do not like such an one; I do not believe he is as good as he should be, he has too many faults and weaknesses and, therefore, I cannot and will not acknowledge his authority, as I have not faith in the man.” Doubtless there are those, too many perhaps, who feel that way, but the trouble is, and that is the worst of it, just because they have become dissatisfied with the individual and harbored feelings of bitterness in their hearts against their brethren, they lose sight of the designs of the Almighty; they turn against the authority of the Holy Priesthood; and through their blindness, allow themselves to be led astray, and at last turn away from the Church.

Now, how should it be? I will tell you. In the first place every person should know that the Gospel is true, as this is everyone’s privilege who is baptized and receives the Holy Ghost. A man may be grieved in his feelings because of some difficulty between him and President Taylor, or Cannon or myself; he may have feelings in his heart which lead him to think that he could not sustain us in his faith and prayers; but if this should be the case, what is the course for him to pursue? He should say in his heart, “God has established His kingdom, and His Priesthood is upon the earth; and notwithstanding my dislike for certain men, I know that the Gospel is true, and that God is with His people; and that if I will do my duty and keep His commandments, the clouds will roll by and the mists will disappear, the spirit of the Lord will come more fully to my relief, and by and by I will be able to see—if I am in error, wherein I erred, and then I will repent of it, for I know that every wrong thing will yet be made right.” I think all men should feel that way. A man may not have confidence in his Bishop, or in one or both of his Counselors; circumstances might be such that according to his judgment the Bishop or his Counselors might be in the wrong, and his confidence in them, whether right or wrong, would therefore be destroyed; but because he may feel so, would it be right or consistent in him as an Elder in Israel, to set himself up as the judge of the Bishop or his Counselors and the whole Church? If one were to get in a position of this kind he would be like some others I have heard of, John and David Whitmer, for instance, two of the witnesses to the Book of Mormon, and Wm. E. McClellan, and William Smith, two of the Twelve Apostles, some of whom are still living, and many others, both living and dead. Do you think you could convince those of this class that they had apostatized from the Church? No; these men are firmly convinced in their own minds that they never apostatized. They stoutly and indignantly deny that they ever apostatized or turned away from the Church, but say that Joseph Smith and the Twelve Apostles apostatized, and all the Church had apostatized and become very wicked, and that God has cut the Church off, but that Brother David Whitmer and Brother Wm. E. McClellan, William Smith, and others are the only members of the Church in good standing, and they are all at variance with each other. If I were to raise my hand against my Bishop, against the Twelve or the First Presidency, because I did not like them, that moment I should place myself in the position that these men now occupy, and that scores of others who have passed away have occupied, and say: “The Church has apostatized, Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, and John Taylor, have apostatized, but I am firm in the faith; all the people have gone astray because they will not acknowledge me.” There is where the man is who rebels against the authority of the Priesthood, and at the same time endeavors to hold on to the faith. Never is there but one appointed at a time to hold the keys of the kingdom of God pertaining to the earth. While Christ remained on the earth He held them; but when He departed He committed them to Peter, he being the President or Chief of the Apostles; and it was his right to direct and to receive revelation for the Church, and to give counsel to all the breth– ren. After Satan and wicked men had prevailed against the Church, crucified the Savior and killed the Apostles, the keys of the kingdom were taken from the earth. John the Revelator describes it most clearly. And from that time until Joseph Smith was called by the voice of the Almighty, and ordained to hold those keys, no man held them upon the earth that we know of. It is true the Lord did appoint other Twelve upon this continent, and His Church flourished and prospered in this land for many years, but the Lord declared that Peter, James and John, and the Twelve that walked with Him at Jerusalem, held the Presidency over them. God may reveal himself to different nations, and establish among them the same Gospel and ordinances as He did anciently, if necessity require, but if these nations should be joined together there would be one head, and all the rest would be subordinate. So that from the time that the keys of this Priesthood were taken from the earth until they were received by Joseph Smith, no man ever possessed that Priesthood, nor the keys thereof, with authority to build up the Zion of God, and prepare a church or people for the second coming of Christ, “as a bride is adorned for the bridegroom;” unless it may have been among the lost tribes, yet of this we have no knowledge, but if so they would receive those keys necessary to administer in the ordinances of the Gospel for their salvation. We know not of their existence or the condition in which they are placed. The Gospel that is given to them is suited to their needs and condition, and is for their salvation, not ours, and yet it will be the same Gospel. And God will not call one from them to give to us the Priesthood, or to give to us keys and blessings, or to point out the organization of the kingdom of God, because He has established that Priesthood here, and we have it. If He has any communication to make to us He will send His messengers to us. And in this way He will deliver His law and give His mind and will to the people. He will do it through the ordained channels of the Priesthood which He acknowledges and which He has established in the earth. He will go nowhere else to do it, neither will He send us to them unless they should be without the Priesthood and it becomes necessary to take the blessings of the Gospel to them, and I presume that will be the case.

When Joseph received the keys of the Priesthood he alone on the earth held them; that is, he was the first, he stood at the head. It was promised that he should not lose them or be removed out of his place, so long as he was faithful. And when he died, President Young was chosen by the voice of the people, and sanctioned by the voice of God. He held the Priesthood which was after the order of the Son of God, with the keys which pertain to the presidency of that Priesthood upon earth. He received it from the hands of Joseph, directly from him or by his authority; and he held it until his death. When he died that mantle fell upon John Taylor, and while he lives he will hold that authority inasmuch as he is faithful. So it was with President Brigham Young, he held it on condition of his faithfulness. If any man in that position should become unfaithful, God would remove him out of his place. I testify in the name of Israel’s God that He will not suffer the head of the Church, him whom He has chosen to stand at the head, to transgress His laws and apostatize; the moment he should take a course that would in time lead to it, God would take him away. Why? Because to suffer a wicked man to occupy that position, would be to allow, as it were, the fountain to become corrupted, which is something He will never permit. And why will he not suffer it? Because it is not the work of Joseph Smith; it is not the work of Brigham Young or of John Taylor. It is not the work of man but of God Almighty; and it is His business to see that the men who occupy this position are men after His own heart, men that will receive instructions from Him, and that will carry out the same according to the counsels of His will. You may depend that he will see to it, and risk nothing upon this head. Hence you will have no reason to find fault or to rise up in judgment upon President Taylor or upon President Young, or upon the Prophet Joseph Smith, or upon the Twelve Apostles. We have no right to rise up in judgment upon the President of the Stake, or upon our Bishop, or upon the Priesthood in any shape or form, unless we can do so agreeably to the laws of the Church. If they decide against us inasmuch as God has conferred the keys of this Priesthood upon them, and the kingdom is here, and its authority is here, and the Priesthood is here, and the organization of the kingdom of God is here—and inasmuch as the decision is reached and rendered agreeably to the laws and commandments of God, then it would be our bounden duty to humbly submit, and bow to it and acknowledge it. You or I might think it hard, and possibly feel that it was unjust, but as it would be impossible to make it otherwise, we must submit. “What,” says one, “submit to an unjust decision? No, sir!” Who says it is unjust? You or I say it is; but twelve High Councilors and the Presidency of the Stake say it is just, and in holding to our idea of the unjustness of the decision, we put our judgment against that of fifteen disinterested men. Who then is to decide on the justice of the case? They, not me; and it is my business to acknowledge it and yield to it. There is, however, a supervisory authority in the First Presidency; and they may exercise in some degree the pardoning power, for unto them is given power under the laws of God to forgive. “Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them, and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained.” President Taylor holds the keys of that authority in this Church. You may appeal then to the Presidency of the Church, and they may inquire into the justice or injustice of the decision and see if the case is entitled to a rehearing. But if the decision of the High Council should be confirmed, then you have no other appeal on earth. And yet God has given to us the broadest latitude peacefully to defend our individual rights, agreeably to just and righteous laws. He permits us first to be tried by the Bishop and his Counselors; and even before that we have the opportunity to settle our difficulties amicably without going to a trial; or if we cannot settle them amicably among ourselves we are permitted to call in our Teacher to assist us if possible to be reconciled to one another; and if that cannot be done we can then bring the matter before the Bishop to be formally tried. If we have reason to believe the decision to be unjust, we have the right then to appeal our case to the High Council, and then, if the First Presidency so decide, there may be a rehearing. So that the Lord has given unto us every possible chance to vindicate our rights, defend our causes, and maintain our standing in the Church. No man is asked to bow to unrighteousness; but to say that the decision rendered by the Bishop’s Court or High Council is an unjust decision is to say one of two things, namely, that these men, from three to fifteen of them, every one of whom should possess the spirit of the Gospel, and the inspiration of the Almighty, and is quite as likely to understand such circumstances as the litigants are all in error and lack judgment, or that they are willfully wicked and unjust, while one individual, and he a party to strife, alone is right.

The moment a man says he will not submit to legally constituted authority of the Church, whether it be the Teachers, the Bishopric, the High Council, his Quorum or the First Presidency, and in his heart confirms it and carries it out, that moment he cuts himself off from the privileges and blessings of the Priesthood and Church, and severs himself from the people of God, for he ignores the authority that He has instituted in His Church. These are the men that generally get crochets in their heads, that get inspiration (from beneath) and that are often so desirous to guide the Church, and to sit in judgment upon the Priesthood. The only safe way for us to do, as individuals, is to live so humbly, so righteously and so faithfully before God, that we may possess His Spirit to that extent that we will be able to judge righteously, and discern between truth and error, between right and wrong; and then we will know when a decision is rendered against us that in 99 cases out of a hundred we are in error, and that the decision is right; and although we may at the time not be fully able to see and feel its justness, yet will be constrained to say that inasmuch as there are sixteen chances against one for me to be wrong, “I will gracefully and humbly submit.” The pith of the matter is, the Lord has established His Church, organized His Priesthood, and conferred au– thority upon certain individuals, councils and quorums, and it is the duty of the people of God to live so that they shall know that these are acceptable unto Him. If we begin to cut off this one and that one, and set their authority aside, we may just as well at once set God himself aside, and say he has no right to dictate. Amen.

Discourse by President Geo. Q. Cannon, delivered in the Meetinghouse, Beaver, Wednesday Afternoon, June 20, 1883.

I am greatly pleased at having the opportunity of meeting with the Latter-day Saints in this place, and I trust that our meeting will be profitable to all. It is a most excellent thing to come together as we have done today, and as we shall do tomorrow, and have an interchange of views and partake of that spirit which is accessible to all of us—that is, to all those who have placed themselves in a position to receive it, by keeping the commandments of God.

We have had from Brother Lyman much good instruction, and if it is remembered and carried out practically in our lives it will be of great profit to us. There is one thing that suggested itself to me in listening to his closing remarks, and that is, that if there are any strangers here—I suppose there may be—I am not so well acquainted with your people as I might be—they will imagine that we are dwelling considerably on this idea of listening to the counsels of the Priesthood. If there is anything more objectionable than another in the eyes of those who are opposed to this work called “Mormonism,” it is that feature of it. I do not think there is any feature that is so much disliked and so much found fault with as that peculiar feature of our religion which requires us to listen to the counsels of the Priesthood. In this respect we differ from every other people upon the face of the earth. It may be said that the Catholics take the same view that we do about listening to the Priesthood. But then the Catholics are not gathered together as we are, and are not combined as we are, and are not, therefore, in the opinion of those who are opposed to us, so much a menace to others as we are because of that feature of their religion. Nevertheless, though this doctrine is so distasteful, we have to preach it. It is the burden of the Lord upon us, and it would be woe to us unless we did preach this very doctrine, with all our zeal and all our power. I can readily understand why this doctrine is so much disliked, and why men find so much fault with it; because if that peculiarity were to disappear from among us, and we ceased to listen to the voice of God, as we believe it to be manifested, through those whom He has chosen to be His servants, this great latter-day work would amount to nothing in the earth; it would soon melt away and be like the sectarian systems from whence these Latter-day Saints have been gathered out.

God had a purpose in revealing the Gospel in these days and in restoring the everlasting Priesthood, and that was to prepare the earth for the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is an important work, to prepare the earth and the inhabitants thereof for the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, I think that everyone who ever believed in Him, or that ever believed in God, will admit that when Jesus comes, everybody will listen to Him, and will do as He requires; for it is written that every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that He is the Lord. He will be accepted as the King of kings and Lord of lords, and the ruler over the whole earth; and it is the constant prayer of those who are most devoted upon the subject of religion that the Lord Jesus may come and reign king over the whole earth as He does in heaven; and, of course, if He does that it will be expected that He will sway a scepter that will not be disputed, and will exercise a dominion that will not be questioned.

Now, the first announcement that was made concerning this work of our God in these last days was, that the object in its restoration was for the purpose of preparing the way for the coming of the Son of Man. That was the announcement that was made. And when the Priesthood was restored it was told to those to whom it was restored that it should not be taken away from the earth again until the sons of Levi should offer an acceptable sacrifice unto the Lord; and they were also assured that it never would be taken away from the earth again, but that it should continue until it accomplished all that God designed for it. In the organization of this people, in the settlement of these valleys, in the framing of our first provisional form of government, in the enactment of our laws, in the building of our settlements, and in the polity that has distinguished this people from their first settlement until now, the wisdom of God manifested through the Priesthood which He has restored to the earth, has been plainly discernible. Though these are civil matters, its influence, through the knowledge and power which it possessed, has been most beneficent. I think that if there is any people upon the face of the earth who should listen to the Priesthood and to the counsel of God’s servants, it is the Latter-day Saints; and I think if there are any men upon the face of the earth that can claim loyalty from the people and allegiance to the Priesthood, it is the men who have borne it and who have exercised its authority from the time we settled these valleys until now. I think they can do so with the best possible grace, for the best of possible reasons; for when ever their counsel has been listened to it has always been attended with unquestioned success, and when it has been disobeyed it has always been followed by disaster. The Latter-day Saints are the witnesses of this themselves. We can appeal to them with the utmost confidence upon this point, because they know, they have had experience; they have tested these things for themselves, and they know that these are not idle statements; they know they are true and well-founded; and that God has, in His mercy and kindness, confirmed the labors of His servants and the counsels they have given by bestowing prosperity and blessing upon all those who have accepted their counsels and have carried them out in the spirit in which they have been given. The Latter-day Saints themselves are living witnesses to this.

The men who followed President Brigham Young and the Twelve Apostles over whom he presided when they left Nauvoo and came across to Iowa and followed the Indian trails to the Missouri River and built Winter Quarters, and then in the spring of 1847, traversed the plains, the untrodden—that is, to them they were—wilds, of which they knew nothing—people who followed him and them to Salt Lake Valley, and laid the foundation of Salt Lake City, they have been the people who have been the most blessed of God and most prospered; they have prospered in their religion, they have prospered in temporal things, and they have been blessed with peace all the day long; while the men who disobeyed that counsel and concluded that they had had enough of this work and of following the counsels of the leading men of this Church, have had sorrow and difficulty and have not prospered. God confirmed the leadership of these men by bestowing His blessing upon them and upon those who followed their counsels. He delivered them from perils, He delivered them from Indians, He delivered them from famine, He delivered them from pestilence, and prosperity attended their labors, and every settlement that has been formed in these mountains from the day Salt Lake Valley was reached has been attended with similar prosperity. The men who have gone forward and listened to the counsels of God’s servants have been the men who have been blessed; they have been the men who have had influence, while the men who have taken a different course are the men who have not. Where is there any apostates from this work that have influence in the earth? A few have had temporal prosperity. But is that all prosperity consists of? Is that all success consists of? To have a little of this world’s goods—and there are very few of them that even have that. There is something else. There is the blessing of God; there is the peace of heaven; there is the joy of the Holy Ghost; there are the gifts and blessings that attend the faithful servants and handmaidens of Jesus Christ, in addition to temporal prosperity, before which temporal prosperity fades. I am speaking now of money and that which perishes with money. I have seen the richest people living in the lowliest homes. Why? Because they were rich in their feelings. I have seen the richest men who were poorer than the poorest of earth’s sons. Why? Because they did not have that rich feeling. Such a feeling does not belong to riches and earthly prosperity. It comes from the blessing of God. In this respect the Latter-day Saints may be said to be the richest people on the face of the earth. They are rich in that glorious feeling that God gives. You may strip them, as I have seen them stripped, of earthly possessions, and turned loose in a wilderness without a place of security and not knowing where they would find a resting place, and yet they were as happy a people as I ever saw in my life. Destitute of many things that men and women consider essential to earthly comfort, yet they had that which is above price, and which riches cannot bestow, namely, the peace of heaven, the peace of God resting down upon them. And they have been a rich people from that day to the present. If they have not glad hearts and cheerful countenances it is their own fault. But this is one of their characteristics. They do have glad hearts and cheerful countenances. Wherever you go you see them. They may not have rich surroundings, an abundance of this world’s goods, elegant houses, nor elegant furniture for their houses; but when they have this spirit they are happy and they are full of peace and joy.

Those who have listened to the counsels of God’s servants have had this blessing. But, as I have said, where is the apostate, the man that has denied his God, broken his covenants, dissolved his connection with the Church, turned his back upon the people with whom he was for– merly associated, that can lay claim to this? It may be said that this is all delusion; but if delusion brings happiness, then delusion is a blessing. And is it not better to know and feel as we do respecting a future, to feel that there is a future before us that is bright and glorious, than it is to have our mind a blank in regard to a future, to be without hope, looking as it were into a horizon that is darkened by the densest clouds, which are impenetrable to our gaze and beyond which we cannot see? Certainly it is. Certainly it is better to have this hope that God has given us. We know that it is of God. But our enemies say it is a delusion; but if this delusion brings peace and joy and happiness and certainty, and all those feelings that fill our soul with inexpressible delight, why, then we are in a better condition than those who are not thus deluded. But we know that we are not deluded. We know that when a wife is sealed to us by the authority of the holy Priesthood, that that ordinance is binding as eternity if we are faithful. We know that when we have children born to us in the everlasting covenant and death takes them away, we are comforted with the assurance that though they be consigned to the silent tomb, we shall yet have them in eternity. Thus the sting of death is taken away, and the grave has no victory. Death does not fill us with gloom and apprehension and doubt and uncertainty. We know as well as we can know anything of that character that when time ends we shall be united with our children and dwell with them eternally. We know also that when a man buries his wife, the faithful partner of his life, if she were married to him by the holy Priesthood, he knows when he lays her away in the grave that that is not an eternal separation, but that they will again be united. And so with the wife when she lays away her faithful husband, she knows as well as she knows she lives that they will be united, and that they will dwell together throughout eternity, if she continues faithful to the truth.

It is the Priesthood that has brought unto us these blessings. There is not a thing connected with our existence in these valleys that I do not in my feelings give credit for, under God, to the Priesthood. Do we have peace in our hearts? Do we have order in our settlements? Do we have good order throughout these mountains? Yes, we have, and it is due to those men whom God has inspired to lead the people. This good order is due to the Priesthood. We cannot give any credit to anybody else, however much we might be inclined to do so. We have had Judges here; we have had Governors here, some of them men of ability; but we cannot in honesty and truth give them credit for any of the blessings we enjoy. On the contrary many of them have been our worst enemies, and if they could have had the power they would have destroyed our peace and introduced strife and disorder and confusion and war and bloodshed in our midst; and that these things do not exist is due to the Priesthood, and to the people also, who have listened to their counsels and been guided by them.

Now, it is our duty to honor our God, and in honoring God we do not show dishonor to others. Because I feel in my heart to honor the Priesthood that God has restored to the earth, I do not therefore mean nor do I feel any sentiment of dishonor towards anybody else. It does not make me any the less a loyal citizen or a true man because I do this; not in the least. On the contrary, I am a better citizen for this, because I am more peaceful, I am more easily controlled, I maintain good order, or endeavor to do so. The influence, therefore, of the Priesthood upon me, as upon all the rest of the community, has not the effect to make us disloyal to our trust, nor to make us any worse citizens of the government of which we form a part. On the contrary, there is no more loyal men to be found within the confines of the Republic than are to be found in this Territory; no men more true to the Constitution, or who love it with more devotion, or who are willing to make greater sacrifices for it, than are to be found in this Territory, and I think I am in a position to speak understandingly.

I say there are no people who will do more to maintain true republican government than the people who form the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I would shoulder my gun to defend an Episcopalian against a mob, and I would do the same to defend a Methodist, or an infidel. I would do as much to maintain the rights of all men and all women under this form of government as I would those of my own faith. I would consider myself unworthy of my position if I did not have that feeling, and this is the feeling, I am sure, of this entire people called Latter-day Saints. They hate oppression, they hate it in every form, and they will fight it as long as it exists upon the face of the earth, until it is stricken down, and until it ceases to exist. They are bound to do that. The principles of their religion compel them to do it. To resist tyranny in a governor who may be sent here? Yes, if he comes here and exercises unjust rule. And the same with a Judge. Because a man is sent here as a Governor or a Judge does that make him a king, or give him the authority to trample upon the rights of his fellow citizens, or upon the Constitution, and the laws of the land? Not by any means. And are we disloyal because we reject his claim to that authority, and the claim of others who band themselves together and say, “Oh, you poor Mormons, you poor, miserable wretches—you have no rights here?” No, we are not. They may try to usurp this authority, but they will always find us in their path under the Constitution, and under the laws; not by force of arms, not by violence, not by lynch law, not by mobocracy; but contending in the right place and under the right circumstances for those liberties that God has given to every human being and especially guaranteed to us as free men who were born free and who live under a free form of government. Mobocracy, from the bottom of our hearts, we hate every form of it, and every form of violence. Where men take the law in their own hands and seek to redress their own wrongs, it is abominable, and should be frowned upon everywhere. Better for us to suffer any number of wrongs than that we should resort to violence. It would not be right for us to do so, however just our cause may be. We must maintain law and good order, and we must frown down and put down every form of mobocracy and lynch law, and this disposition to execute vengeance outside the pale of the law. It is just as wrong for us to indulge in that spirit as it was for the mobbers of Missouri when they drove us from our homes there, or those in Illinois when they drove us from there. We should learn a lesson from these things; we should profit by this experience and stand up steadily and maintain constantly the rights of man, no matter who that man might be. He may be our enemy; he may be opposed to our principles; but that should make no difference in our determination to execute justice and right.

Now, God has blessed us wonderfully in this land since he led us here. I can see a great improvement here in your place. In fact I see this in all the settlements. God is blessing this people. He is causing them to increase, and He is giving us a firmer foothold. I am glad of it. I want to see this work increase, because I love it, and because I love everything connected with it. It is not a partisan feeling. It is not a selfish feeling that a certain portion of people may be blessed more than other people. I do not believe that Latter-day Saints entertain any such feeling. But I take delight in this work. I consider everything connected with the future growth of the human family is connected with the growth and development of this people. I know this is saying a great deal, but nevertheless it is true. And as God lives the day will come that constitutional government and the rights of man will have to be maintained by the Latter-day Saints, and that at a time when there will be no other power upon this land that will be able to make headway against the tide of evil that will flood the country. And it will be due to our organization that we shall be able to stem it. God has given us an organization that is magnificent, as our enemies freely admit. We are a consolidated power. And when anarchy reigns, as it will do, for it is coming, and every man that opens his eyes to see the evils that abound—if he does not persistently resist the truth—must have a secret dread of it in his heart; when that comes, there will be no power upon this continent that will be able to stem it, except the organization which God has given to us. We have shown our capacity for self-government ever since we came here, from the very fact that we had no government except that which we framed. We had to form our own government and make our own laws. We have had Governors who have fought our laws even when our Legislature has enacted them unanimously. So that that which we have today in the shape of good government is due to ourselves, under God. It is due in Beaver to the Latter-day Saints under God. If we have maintained order and resisted anarchy in Salt Lake City, it is because of this man [President Taylor] and the man that preceded him in his office, controlling and guiding the people all the day long; to them, under God, the credit is due. So it may be said with reference to our entire Territory. We have shown our capacity in the midst of all the obstacles that have been thrown in our way, and in the face of all the attacks that have been made upon us in various forms and from various quarters—we have been able to withstand these and maintain good government. That power we still retain. We are gaining experience day by day. God is training us in this way. We are receiving a training such as no other people receive. Men are being made statesmen in spite of themselves. Such men as John R. Murdock, and others around him, have been compelled to learn these things. So with others. They have had to acquire a knowledge of practical statesmanship, that they might preserve the liberties of this people. And God has given us the necessary wisdom to do it. I thank Him for it. He has given us this wisdom, and he will continue to bless us in this way. And the day will come when we will exercise this authority in a far wider sphere than in this limited Territory. The same wisdom that has maintained the organization of this people, and that enables us to withstand attacks that would swamp any other people, will enable us to act in a far more extended sphere.

We have had conspiracies against our liberties from every quarter; we have had conspiracies of every conceivable character; you cannot conceive of anything scarcely in the shape of conspiracy that has not been formed against us, and yet we live and are a free people today. In many respects there are no freer people in the United States than we are. But our enemies do not deserve any credit for it. To God the credit is due, and He gets it, I believe, from all the Saints. But He has given the men whom He has chosen the wisdom to govern and control this people, and to point out the path of safety. And I predict that we will be just as prosperous in the future as we have been in the past, and more so. God will always prepare a way of escape for His people. Even if everything should be as dark as it was fourteen or fifteen months ago, when it seemed as though the whole heavens were covered with the blackest clouds, with no ray of light to break the darkness, and when it seemed as though overwhelming destruction was about to come upon us—even under those circumstances God will prepare a way of escape, He will open out the path and make it plain, and we will emerge from the difficulty stronger than we were before, and be full of additional thanksgiving unto God our heavenly Father, for His goodness and kindness to us. This will be the result in the future just as it has been in the past, and it will continue to be the result. For I tell you there is a great future before this people. We have all the elements which are necessary to make us a great people, and we cannot be deprived of them. We are a united people to begin with. And then we are a temperate people, we are a frugal people, we are a loving people, we are a virtuous people, we are a brave people. Yes, we are a brave people; for it takes courage to be a Latter-day Saint. A man that is a coward cannot be a Latter-day Saint. A woman who is not a heroine cannot be a Latter-day Saint. It requires just that kind of courage which is so rare in the world to be a Latter-day Saint—the courage to maintain one’s convictions. This famous young lady—Belle Harris—has given us an exhibition of it. She preferred to go to the Penitentiary rather than answer the questions propounded to her. Such an exhibition of courage must have a wonderful influence. There is something about it, even if the cause were a bad one, that is admirable. Men admire that quality wherever they see it. There is nothing so admirable as courage of that description. It impresses even our enemies. “Why,” they say, “if this girl can do such a thing, what shall we do with a people of that kind?”

Well, courage is a quality that this people have always manifested. They have submitted to wrongs, it is true; but their having done so is not an indication of a want of courage. On the contrary, it is sometimes an evidence of the highest and the purest and the best courage, to be willing to suffer wrong rather than take a course that could not be approved of to resist it, and these qualities in the struggle that lies before us will tell. You find a people who are frugal, who are temperate, who are industrious, who are united, who are loving, and who increase as we do, and they will make their mark on the earth. Such qualities always did tell in the struggle for existence among men from the earliest days. The nations that have possessed the qualities which our people possess have always been the honored nations. They have been the nations that have won their way to power and have compelled admiration even from their enemies. These qualities we possess, and we mean to cultivate them. We mean to train our children in these virtues. We mean to make them a virtuous people above everything else. That is the most desirable quality in this age of sin and corruption, when women, in many instances, are unsafe in the society of men. I want to see it in our country that our young ladies in the company of our young men, in any place and under any circumstances, in the darkest hours and in the most unprotected situations, will feel as safe as if they were in their mothers’ bed chambers so far as anything wrong from the opposite sex is concerned. I would rather see men punished with death—which we believe is a law that should be put in force against any man who ruins woman—than that there ever should be a time in our country when corruption and wrongs of this character should run riot and be unchecked. Virtue lies at the foundation of individual and national greatness. No man can amount to much who is not a virtuous man, who is not strong in his virtue; I do not care who he is. He may be as talented as Lucifer; but if he is not a virtuous man his greatness will not amount to much. Virtue lies at the foundation of greatness. We mean to promote it and encourage it in the rising generation. In order that the rising generation should have it, the mothers must have it, and feel its importance, and the fathers also. And then we must teach all those other virtues that belong to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Our religion is admirably adapted to every circumstance of life. We can carry it with us every day. It is not like our Sunday clothes—to be worn on the Sunday and laid away on Monday. It is an eminently practical religion, and is adapted to every day alike and not for special occasions alone. I like it on that account. I am very much pleased with it, always have been, and with those virtues that it instills, the everyday virtues of life.

If I am a Latter-day Saint, as I should be, I am an honest man. If I were to trade I would trade honestly, or else I am not worthy of the name of Latter-day Saint. If I had a wagon to sell I would tell what sort of a wagon it was and not cheat the party to whom I was selling, or say that he must judge of the article by his own eyes, that his own eyes must tell him if there is anything wrong. I do not consider that good Latter-day Saint doctrine. If I have a horse to sell to my neighbor and he asks me if the animal has any defect, I ought to be willing to tell what it is. And so with everything else. We must be an honest people; for I tell you those who are not honest cannot retain the Spirit of God. God wants an honest people, a truthful people, a people whose word can be relied upon, a people whose word is as good as their bond. I do not know whether you all do or not, but if not, you ought to cultivate this quality of honesty. It is always profitable for a man to be honest. Let him get a credit of that kind and it will bring him profit; but if he deceives then confidence is gone and people will shun him. I never trade with a man that tricks me more than once. I do not say much. I suppose everybody has the same kind of feeling. I never quarrel nor find fault, but then I think a great deal, and I suppose most of the people have a good memory for these sort of things.

As Latter-day Saints, we should be honest, truthful, frugal and economical, and do everything we can to improve our condition. Every man that has a poor house should seek to get a better. When I started out in life I attached little importance to the matter of a house. For many years I was in the missionary field. Fifteen years of my early experience in life was spent in the missionary field. I was only some nine months at home during that period, and I attached little importance to a house. But I soon found out that my folks did not take the same view that I did about it. I have learned this, that a woman looks upon a house as a matter of much more importance than a man does. It is her home. And when I see wives in houses of a poor class when their husbands might build better, I think their husbands do not understand woman’s nature as they should do. Women with families should have good houses, and husbands should labor to get them, and then leave them to adorn them and make them comfortable and desirable. Children like to have a nice house, because they can invite their companions to it. Men should strive to make their families comfortable in this way. It is their duty to do so. I was very much delighted with some remarks President Taylor made on this subject. He told the husbands to court their wives over again, to cultivate the feeling they had when they started out in life, when they were everything to each other, and when they could not do enough for each other. That is a feeling that should be cultivated. Men should never treat their wives with disrespect. They should manifest a feeling of love for them, and more especially when they become advanced in years. There is nothing that will excite love in a man’s heart so much as to see a wife as willing, even in her advanced years, to sacrifice her own comfort for his sake as she was when they were first married; and I am sure it must have the same effect upon a woman—to have the husband, when her charms are fading and she is growing old, and perhaps not so attractive as she was—to have the husband tender and kind and loving, not forgetting her good qualities, nor what she has done. When a woman sees a husband manifest that feeling towards her, she in return will manifest her kindness and love for his thoughtful attentions.

These are little things, but how much they contribute to our happiness and to our peace! We should therefore cultivate these qualities ourselves and teach them to our children. Our children should be made to feel that we love them and that we are disposed to treat them with proper respect. When we ask a child to do a favor, we should ask it as though he were a gentleman, or if a girl, as though she were a lady. A man should never talk to his children as though he were a tyrant. He should address them in kindness, and as though they were gentlemen and ladies, and they will grow up with that feeling and treat others with the same respect. Why, I would not ask my children to do me a favor without thanking them, any more than I would ask any grown person. Neither would I ask a favor of a hired hand without doing the same thing. I have been in such positions myself and know the feelings that such people have. I know that their feelings are tender and that in their position they appreciate kindness. And people who are young are more sensitive than older persons of more experience in life, and we cannot be too careful about their feelings. We should treat one another with the utmost respect and the utmost kindness. Women should talk to their children in kindness; not harshly, and not in a spirit of scolding. It is a dreadful habit this habit of scolding. A man or a woman who is always scolding, loses influence with children and with everybody else.

I pray God to bless you and fill you with the Holy Ghost, in the name of Jesus, Amen.