April 1916
Eighty-Sixth Annual Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. (1916). Report of Discourses. Salt Lake City: The Deseret News.
FIRST DAY
PRESIDENT JOSEPH F. SMITH
The necessary Divine authority restored in this age
PRESIDENT ANTHON H. LUND
Faithful activity of workers in Church organizations
AFTERNOON SESSION
PREST. CHARLES W. PENROSE
Universal redemption through obedience
PREST. FRANCIS M. LYMAN
Temporal salvation of our people carefully considered
AUTHORITIES SUSTAINED
SECOND DAY
ELDER JOSEPH C. BENTLEY
(President Juarez Stake.)
PREST. JOSEPH F. SMITH
ELDER HEBER J. GRANT
Observance of Word of Wisdom
ELDER RUDGER CLAWSON
The Prophet Joseph Smith
ELDER GEORGE ALBERT SMITH
Selfishness, a principal cause of war
AFTERNOON SESSION
ELDER PHILIP H. HURST
(Of Juarez Stake.)
ELDER GEORGE F. RICHARDS
Meaning of immortality
ELDER ANTHONY W. IVINS
Important mission of the Church in Peace movement
PATRIARCH HYRUM G. SMITH
Celestial marriage - Word of Wisdom
THIRD DAY
ELDER ORSON F. WHITNEY
Past, present and future
ELDER JOSEPH FIELDING SMITH
The Latter-day Saints have received the words of eternal life
ELDER MELVIN J. BALLARD
(President Northwestern States Mission.)
ELDER LEVI EDGAR YOUNG
(Of First Council of Seventy.)
OVERFLOW MEETING
ELDER GERMAN E. ELLSWORTH
(President Northern States Mission.)
ELDER WALTER P. MONSON
(President Eastern States Mission.)
ELDER URIAH G. MILLER
(President Cottonwood Stake.)
ELDER JOSEPH E. CARDON
(Editor of Liahona The Elders’ Journal.)
ELDER HEBER J. GRANT
Strong condemnation of use of intoxicants and tobacco
SECOND OVERFLOW MEETING
ELDER JOSEPH E. ROBINSON
(President California Mission.)
SAMUEL O. BENNION
(President Central States Mission.)
ELDER JOHN L. HERRICK
(President Western States Mission.)
ELDER CHARLES A. CALLIS
(President Southern States Mission.)
ELDER GEORGE F. RICHARDS
Man should follow Nature’s example of obedience to law
OUTDOOR MEETING
ELDER JOHN R. YOUNG
(Of San Juan Stake.)
ELDER ANDREW KIMBALL
(President St. Joseph Stake.)
ELDER ANDREW JENSON
(Assistant Historian.)
ELDER REY L. PRATT
(Late President of Mexican Mission.)
ELDER GEO. ALBERT SMITH
Similarity of missions of Parley P. Pratt and his grandson, Rey L. Pratt
CLOSING SESSION
ELDER JAMES E. TALMAGE
A marvelous work and a wonder
BISHOP CHARLES W. NIBLEY
Loyalty, a doctrine of the L. D. S. Church
ELDER BRIGHAM H. ROBERTS
(Of the First Council of Seventy.)
FIRST DAY
PRESIDENT JOSEPH F. SMITH
The necessary Divine authority restored in this age
PRESIDENT ANTHON H. LUND
Faithful activity of workers in Church organizations
AFTERNOON SESSION
PREST. CHARLES W. PENROSE
Universal redemption through obedience
PREST. FRANCIS M. LYMAN
Temporal salvation of our people carefully considered
AUTHORITIES SUSTAINED
SECOND DAY
ELDER JOSEPH C. BENTLEY
(President Juarez Stake.)
PREST. JOSEPH F. SMITH
ELDER HEBER J. GRANT
Observance of Word of Wisdom
ELDER RUDGER CLAWSON
The Prophet Joseph Smith
ELDER GEORGE ALBERT SMITH
Selfishness, a principal cause of war
AFTERNOON SESSION
ELDER PHILIP H. HURST
(Of Juarez Stake.)
ELDER GEORGE F. RICHARDS
Meaning of immortality
ELDER ANTHONY W. IVINS
Important mission of the Church in Peace movement
PATRIARCH HYRUM G. SMITH
Celestial marriage - Word of Wisdom
THIRD DAY
ELDER ORSON F. WHITNEY
Past, present and future
ELDER JOSEPH FIELDING SMITH
The Latter-day Saints have received the words of eternal life
ELDER MELVIN J. BALLARD
(President Northwestern States Mission.)
ELDER LEVI EDGAR YOUNG
(Of First Council of Seventy.)
OVERFLOW MEETING
ELDER GERMAN E. ELLSWORTH
(President Northern States Mission.)
ELDER WALTER P. MONSON
(President Eastern States Mission.)
ELDER URIAH G. MILLER
(President Cottonwood Stake.)
ELDER JOSEPH E. CARDON
(Editor of Liahona The Elders’ Journal.)
ELDER HEBER J. GRANT
Strong condemnation of use of intoxicants and tobacco
SECOND OVERFLOW MEETING
ELDER JOSEPH E. ROBINSON
(President California Mission.)
SAMUEL O. BENNION
(President Central States Mission.)
ELDER JOHN L. HERRICK
(President Western States Mission.)
ELDER CHARLES A. CALLIS
(President Southern States Mission.)
ELDER GEORGE F. RICHARDS
Man should follow Nature’s example of obedience to law
OUTDOOR MEETING
ELDER JOHN R. YOUNG
(Of San Juan Stake.)
ELDER ANDREW KIMBALL
(President St. Joseph Stake.)
ELDER ANDREW JENSON
(Assistant Historian.)
ELDER REY L. PRATT
(Late President of Mexican Mission.)
ELDER GEO. ALBERT SMITH
Similarity of missions of Parley P. Pratt and his grandson, Rey L. Pratt
CLOSING SESSION
ELDER JAMES E. TALMAGE
A marvelous work and a wonder
BISHOP CHARLES W. NIBLEY
Loyalty, a doctrine of the L. D. S. Church
ELDER BRIGHAM H. ROBERTS
(Of the First Council of Seventy.)
Eighty-Sixth Annual Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
FIRST DAY
The Eighty-sixth Annual Conference of the Churchy of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints convened in the Tabernacle, Salt Lake City, at 10 a. m., Thursday, April 6, 1916, President Joseph F. Smith presiding.
AUTHORITIES PRESENT.
There were present of the First Presidency, Joseph F. Smith, Anthon H. Lund,-and Charles W. Penrose; of the Council of the Twelve Apostles, Francis M. Lyman, Heber
J. Grant, Rudger Clawson, George Albert Smith, George F. Richards, Anthony W. Ivins, Joseph F. Smith, Jr., and James E. Talmage;[1] Presiding Patriarch Hyrum G. Smith; of the First Council of Seventy, Seymour B. Young, Brigham H. Roberts, J. Golden Kimball, Rulon S. Wells, Joseph W. McMurrin, and Charles H. Hart;[1] of the Presiding Bishopric, Charles W. Nibley, Orrin P. Miller, and David A. Smith; Assistant Historians Andrew Jenson and A. Wm. Lund. There were also a large number of Presidents of Stakes, Presidents of Missions, Patriarchs, Bishops of Wards, and numerous other prominent men and women representing various quorums and organizations of the Church.
[1] Orson F. Whitney and Levi Edgar Young were present at subsequent meetings.
President Joseph F. Smith called the assembly to order, and the Conference services were commenced by the choir and congregation singing the hymn, “Come, let us anew our journey pursue.” (The Tabernacle Choir was augmented by members of other choirs from various stakes and wards of Zion.)
The opening prayer was offered by Elder Junius F. Wells.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “Guide us, O Thou great Jehovah.”
FIRST DAY
The Eighty-sixth Annual Conference of the Churchy of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints convened in the Tabernacle, Salt Lake City, at 10 a. m., Thursday, April 6, 1916, President Joseph F. Smith presiding.
AUTHORITIES PRESENT.
There were present of the First Presidency, Joseph F. Smith, Anthon H. Lund,-and Charles W. Penrose; of the Council of the Twelve Apostles, Francis M. Lyman, Heber
J. Grant, Rudger Clawson, George Albert Smith, George F. Richards, Anthony W. Ivins, Joseph F. Smith, Jr., and James E. Talmage;[1] Presiding Patriarch Hyrum G. Smith; of the First Council of Seventy, Seymour B. Young, Brigham H. Roberts, J. Golden Kimball, Rulon S. Wells, Joseph W. McMurrin, and Charles H. Hart;[1] of the Presiding Bishopric, Charles W. Nibley, Orrin P. Miller, and David A. Smith; Assistant Historians Andrew Jenson and A. Wm. Lund. There were also a large number of Presidents of Stakes, Presidents of Missions, Patriarchs, Bishops of Wards, and numerous other prominent men and women representing various quorums and organizations of the Church.
[1] Orson F. Whitney and Levi Edgar Young were present at subsequent meetings.
President Joseph F. Smith called the assembly to order, and the Conference services were commenced by the choir and congregation singing the hymn, “Come, let us anew our journey pursue.” (The Tabernacle Choir was augmented by members of other choirs from various stakes and wards of Zion.)
The opening prayer was offered by Elder Junius F. Wells.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “Guide us, O Thou great Jehovah.”
PRESIDENT JOSEPH F. SMITH.
OPENING ADDRESS.
Former Church leaders, now in. spirit world, still deeply interested in our welfare.—Their presence and influence, and that of other heavenly beings, felt here.—God an individual, not personally omnipresent—His power and knowledge embraces all creation—Obedience to the Gospel imparts a knowledge of God, which insures eternal life—The necessary Divine authority restored in this age—Special ministry of the Twelve Apostles—The Saints should be exponents and exemplars of righteousness—Fourteen years summary of Church finances.
I shall need the assistance of the Good Spirit and the good feeling and faith and sympathy of my brethren and sisters this morning in an endeavor to speak to you for a short time. I hope it will be a short time, too, for at present I do not feel nor design to occupy very much of the time. I could not express my gratitude with language in my possession, which I feel this morning in being permitted, under the mercies of the Father of us all, to be present with you and behold the sight that I see in the assembled multitudes gathered here' in the opening session of this conference, on the Eighty-sixth anniversary of the organization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I feel sure that the Prophet Joseph Smith and his associates, who, under the guidance and inspiration of the Almighty, and by His power, began this latter-day work, would rejoice and do rejoice.—I was going to say if they were permitted to look down upon the scene that I behold in this tabernacle, but I believe they do have the privilege of looking down upon us just as the all-seeing eye of God beholds every part of His handiwork. For I believe that those who have been chosen in this dispensation and in former dispensations, to lay the foundation of God’s work in the midst of the children of men, for their salvation and exaltation, will not be deprived in the spirit world from looking down upon the results of their own labors, efforts and mission assigned them by the wisdom and purpose of God, to help to redeem and to reclaim the children of the Father from their sins. So I feel quite confident that the eye of Joseph, the Prophet, and of the martyrs of this dispensation, and of Brigham and John and Wilford, and those faithful men who were associated with them in their ministry upon the earth, are carefully guarding the interests of the Kingdom of God in which they labored and for which they strove during their mortal lives. I believe they are as deeply interested in our welfare today, if not with greater capacity, with far more interest behind the veil, than they were in the flesh. I believe they know more; I believe their minds have expanded beyond their comprehension in mortal life, and their interests are enlarged and expanded in the work of the Lord to which they gave their lives and their best service. Although some may feel and think that it is a little extreme to take this view, yet I believe that it is true; and I have a feeling in my heart that I stand in the presence not only of the Father and of the Son, but in the presence of those whom God commissioned, raised up and inspired to lay the foundations of the work in which we are engaged. Accompanying that sense or feeling, I am impressed with the thought that I would not this moment say or do one thing that would be taken as unwise or imprudent, or that would give offense to any of my former associates and co-laborers in the work of the Lord.
I would not like to say one thing, or express a thought that would grieve the heart of Joseph, or of Brigham, or of John, or of Wilford, or Lorenzo, or any of their faithful associates in the ministry. Sometimes the Lord expands our vision from this point of view and this side of the veil, that we feel and seem to realize that we can look beyond the thin veil which separates us from that other sphere. If we can see by the enlightening influence of the Spirit of God and through the words that have been spoken by the holy prophets of God, beyond the veil that separates us from the spirit world, surely those who have passed beyond, can see more clearly through the veil back here to us than it is possible for us to see to them from our sphere of action. I believe we move and have our being in the presence of heavenly messengers and of heavenly beings. We are not separate from them. We begin to realize more and more fully, as we become acquainted with the principles of the Gospel, as they have been revealed anew in this dispensation, that we are closely related to our kindred, to our ancestors, to our friends and associates and co-laborers who have preceded us into the spirit world. We can not forget them; we do not cease to love them; we always hold them in our hearts, in memory, and thus we are associated and united to them by ties that we can not break, that we can not dissolve or free ourselves from. If this is the case with us in our finite condition, surrounded by our mortal weaknesses, short-sightedness, lack of inspiration and wisdom from time to time, how much more certain it is and reasonable and consistent to believe that those who have been faithful, who have gone beyond and are still engaged in the work for the salvation of the souls of men, the opening of the prison doors to them that are bound and proclaiming liberty to the captives who can see us better than we can see them; that they know us better than we know them. They have advanced; we are advancing; we are growing as they have grown; we are reaching the goal that they have attained unto; and therefore, I claim that we live in their presence, they see us, they are solicitous for our welfare, they love us now more than ever. For now they see the dangers that beset us; they can comprehend better than ever before, the weaknesses that are liable to mislead us into dark and forbidden paths. They see the temptations and the evils that beset us in life and the proneness of mortal beings to yield to temptation and to wrong doing; hence their solicitude for us and their love for us and their desire for our well being must be greater than that which we feel for ourselves. I thank God for the feeling that I possess and enjoy and for the realization that I have, that I stand, not only in the presence of Almighty ‘God, my Maker and Father, but in the presence of His Only Begotten Son in the flesh, the Savior of the world; and I stand in the presence of Peter and James, (and perhaps the eyes of John are also upon us and we know it not); and that I stand also in the presence of Joseph and Hyrum and Brigham and John, and those who have been valiant in the testimony of Jesus Christ and faithful to their mission in the world, who have gone before. When I go I want to have the privilege of meeting them with the consciousness that I have followed their example, that I have carried out the mission in which they were engaged as they would have it carried out; that I have been as faithful in the discharge of duty committed to me and required at my hand as they were faithful in their time, and that when I meet them I shall meet them as I met them here, in love, in harmony, in unison and in perfect confidence that I have done my duty as they have done theirs.
I hope you will forgive me for my emotion. You would have peculiar emotions, would you not, if you felt that you .stood in the presence of your Father, in the very presence of Almighty God, in the very presence of the Son of God and of holy angels? You would feel rather emotional, rather sensitive. I feel it to the very depths of my soul this moment. So I hope you will forgive me, if I exhibit some of my real feelings. I am only a child, I am only learning, and I hope I shall not be ever learning and never come to the knowledge of the truth. I sincerely hope that as I learn little by little, line upon line and precept upon precept, here a little and there a little, day by day, and month by month, and year by year, that there will come a time when I shall have learned indeed the truth and shall know it as God knows it and be saved and exalted in His presence. Now, my mission, my duty, from the days of my childhood, has been to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ as the power of God unto salvation, unto all who will receive and obey it. It is my duty to proclaim to my brethren, to the household of faith, as well as to the world, when opportunity presents, that I believe in the living God, the Father of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who begot His Son, his only begotten in the flesh, and that Son grew from His birth unto His manhood and developed into the very image and likeness of His Father, insomuch that He declared on one occasion that “he that hath seen me, hath seen the Father.” I do not believe in the doctrines held by some that God is only a spirit and that He is of such a nature that He fills the immensity of space, and is everywhere present in person or without person, for I can not conceive it possible that God could be a person if He filled the immensity of space and was 'everywhere present at the same time. It is a physical, a theological, an unreasonable, inconsistency to imagine that even God the Eternal Father would be in two places, as an individual, at the same moment. It is impossible. But His power extends throughout the immensity of space, His power extends to all His creations, and His knowledge comprehends them all, and He governs them all and He knows all. It is a scriptural truth, that this is life eternal to know the only true and living God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. I believe that the Latter-day Saints, through the teachings of the scriptures and through the revelations that have come to them by the voice of the Prophet Joseph Smith, are able to learn the true and living God and know Him and also His Son whom He has sent into the world, whom to know is life eternal. Not simply the knowledge of it but having that knowledge we are inclined and determined to observe -His precepts, obey His laws, be submissive to His requirements in every particular and accept every ordinance of the house of God and of the Gospel of Jesus Christ that has been devised by the will of the Father for the qualification of His children in the earth to return into His presence. And he that knoweth God and Jesus Christ, whom to know is life eternal, will verify that knowledge by ample and continuous and faithful obedience to every requirement that God makes of His children, and therein consists the salvation and the gift of eternal life. The devil knows the Father much better than we. Lucifer, the son of the morning, knows Jesus Christ, the Son of God, much better than we, but in him it is not and will not redound to eternal life; for knowing, he yet rebels; knowing he yet is disobedient; he will not receive the truth; he will not abide in the truth; hence he is Perdition and there is no salvation for him. The same doctrine applies to me and to you and to all the sons and daughters of God who have judgment and knowledge and are able to reason between cause and effect, and determine the right from the wrong and the good from the evil and who are capable of seeing the light and distinguishing it from the darkness. Then this is the Gospel of Jesus Christ, to know the only true and living God and His Son whom He has sent into the world, which knowledge comes through obedience to all His commandments, faith, repentance of sin, baptism by immersion for the remission of sins, the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands by divine authority, and not by the will of man. This then is the Gospel of Jesus Christ which is the power of God unto salvation; obedience to the truth, submission to the order that God has established in His house, for the house of God is a house of order and not a house of confusion. God has set in His Church apostles and prophets and evangelists and pastors and teachers whose duty is to administer to the people, to teach, instruct, expound, exhort, admonish and lead in the path of righteousness. The people who are associated in this organization, must harken to the voice of him who has divine authority to guide and direct and counsel in the midst of Israel. All these are necessary in the Gospel of Jesus Christ and many things, too many for me to mention here, are necessary, including the ordinances of the house of God, revealed in greater plainness in this dispensation than perhaps in any former dispensation since the world was formed. All these ordinances are essential, in their place and in their time, and none of us are big enough or good enough or possess sufficient independence in ourselves to ignore these things that God has revealed and required of us. No man is too big, too great or knows so much, that he is independent of God. We are here on His earth, we breathe His air, we behold His sunlight, we eat His food and we wear His clothing; He has provided all the elements by which we are clothed and fed and live and move and have our being in the world. We are not independent of God, not for one moment. Not only do we believe in the Father and in the Son and in their words and counsel and divine authority which they brought and gave to men in the flesh, but we believe also in the divinity of the mission of Joseph the Prophet. We accept him as the one authorized, empowered, clothed with wisdom and knowledge in our day and time, to lay the foundations of the Church of Jesus Christ and to restore the fullness of the Gospel of salvation to the world ;to revive and renew in the hearts of the children of men the doctrines of Christ, the ordinances of His Gospel which He taught, which He administered anil which He authorized His disciples to administer to all that would, calling upon all men to repent and believe in the name of the Father and of the Son. We believe that God has restored the divine priesthood, which holds the keys of ministration of the ordinances of life, to the children of men. Without that divine priesthood no man could receive or would receive a remission of sins by being buried in the water. It has to be by divine authority and without that divine authority our works would not be acceptable to the Lord, for He will not accept at the hands of the children of men that which He has not authorized them to do, which He has not qualified them to do, and called and appointed them to do; but when God calls men and ordains, and appoints, and gives them authority to administer in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, what they do can not fail to be sanctioned and approved by the author and giver of the authority. When we receive the priesthood of God, and we do according to His word, then is He bound, and otherwise there is no promise. Now I can’t tell you all that I would like to. Time will not permit, and there are others to speak and all these, your brethren, that are called to the apostleship and to minister in the midst of the house of Israel are endowed, or ought to be endowed, richly with the spirit of their calling. For instance these twelve disciples of Christ are supposed to be eye and ear witnesses of the divine mission of Jesus Christ. It is not permissible for them to say, I believe, simply; I have accepted it simply because I believe it. Read the revelation, the Lord informs us they must know, they must get the knowledge for themselves, it must be with them as though they had seen with their eyes and heard with their ears and they know the truth. That is their mission, to testify of Jesus Christ and Him crucified and risen from the dead and clothed now with almighty power at the right hand of God, the Savior of the world. That is their mission, and their duty, and that is the doctrine and the truth that it is their duty to preach to the world and see that it is preached to the world. Where they can not go themselves they are to have the help of others called to their assistance, the Seventies first, also the elders and the high priests. Those who hold the Melchizedek priesthood who are not otherwise appointed are under their direction to preach the Gospel to the world and to declare the truth—that Jesus is the Christ and that Joseph is a prophet of God and was authorized and qualified to lay the foundation of the Kingdom of God. And when I say Kingdom of God I mean what I say. Christ is the King—not man. No man is king of the Kingdom of God; God is the King of it and we acknowledge Him and Him only as Sovereign of His Kingdom.
Now we all need patience, forbearance, forgiveness, humility, charity, love unfeigned, devotion to the truth, abhorrence of sin and wickedness, rebellion and disobedience to the requirements of the Gospel. These are the qualifications requisite to Latter-day Saints and to becoming Latter-day Saints and members in good standing in the Church of Jesus Christ and heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ. No member in good standing in the Church will be drunken or riotous or profane or will take advantage of his brother or his neighbor or will violate the principles of virtue and honor and righteousness. No member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in good standing will ever be chargeable with such offenses as these because they will avoid these evils and they will live above them. Then we have a mission in the world, each man, each woman, each child, who has grown to understanding or to the years of accountability, ought to be examples to the world, ought, not only to be qualified to preach the truth, to bear testimony of the truth, but they ought to live so that the very life they live, the very words they speak, their every action in life, will be a sermon to the unwary and to the ignorant, teaching them goodness, purity, uprightness, faith in God and love for the human family.
Now I have a few figures that I want to read to you. They are only a few. They cover a space of about fourteen years. I do not wish in doing this to appear to be in any way distinguished from any of my brethren, I do not wish to claim any honor more than my brethren, but I do think that we have a record that we need not be ashamed of for the last fourteen or fifteen years or more.
The report which follows will inform you concerning some of the Church expenditures and activities from the year 1901 to December 31. 1915:
At the close of the year 1906 the One Million Dollar bonded indebtedness and interest had been paid, making a total of $1,200,000.00
There has been paid on account of Church Schools 3,714,455.00
For repairs, improvements, operation, maintenance and building of temples 1,169,499.00
For building stake and ward meeting houses and amusement halls 2,007,733.00
For real estate and buildings, for mission house and meeting house purposes in Europe 266,236.00
For real estate and buildings, for mission house and meeting house purposes in the United States 292,795.00
For Agricultural Colleges and for meeting houses in New Zealand and Samoa 78,000.00
Expended in the missions for all purposes, less amount expended for real estate and buildings 2,625,328.00
For the Joseph Smith Memorial Farm and monument, and for the Joseph Smith Farm at Palmyra; for real estate covering Adam-Ondi-Ahman; for Carthage Jail, and for real estate at Independence, Jackson County, Missouri. 161.000.00
For real estate and buildings surrounding the Temple Block at Salt Lake City, and for new buildings that have been erected thereon 1.555.000.00
For buildings and equipment for the Dr. W. H. Groves’ Latter-day Saints Hospital 600.000.00
There has been paid to the poor through all Church channels 3,279.900.00
There has been a net increase in the Church membership of 187,733 souls; and there has been organized 22 stakes of Zion, 202 wards and 6 missions. There are now 72 stakes of Zion. 797 wards and 22 missions. There have been erected and remodeled 465 meeting houses in the stakes of Zion, besides branch and mission meeting houses in the various missions of the Church.
There have been 1,468,437 baptisms performed for the dead in the temples.
The Relief Society membership has increased 34%; the Sunday School 40%; the Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Association 23%; the Young Ladies’ Mutual Improvement Association 27%; the Primary Association 39%: and the Religion Class 85%.
I scarcely need to add one remark to this report; but I want to tell you this, that the tithes and means of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have not stuck to my hands nor to the hands of any of my associates. They have gone to their legitimate purposes.
Now we are building a temple in Canada. We are building another in Hawaii, and we are building an office building for the Church, a library, and a record depository that will be safe for the records of the Church, which for many years have been exposed to danger of destruction by fire or by other means; and we hope soon to have a place that will be practically fire-proof and that will be capacious enough to hold the records of the Church for many years to come.
How has it been done? How can we continue to do such things as these? Simply by the Latter-day Saints observing the laws of God and the rules of His Church; and while you do your duty I will guarantee to you, so long as my brethren are in charge, with whom I am associated, you will never have cause to suspect that your means will be misused or misappropriated. God bless you and all the household of faith, and help us to be true and faithful to the end, realizing that the battle is not to the strong, nor the race to the swift, but to him that endures to the end. Amen.
A soprano solo, “The Plains of Peace,” was sung by Sister Magdaline Anderson.
OPENING ADDRESS.
Former Church leaders, now in. spirit world, still deeply interested in our welfare.—Their presence and influence, and that of other heavenly beings, felt here.—God an individual, not personally omnipresent—His power and knowledge embraces all creation—Obedience to the Gospel imparts a knowledge of God, which insures eternal life—The necessary Divine authority restored in this age—Special ministry of the Twelve Apostles—The Saints should be exponents and exemplars of righteousness—Fourteen years summary of Church finances.
I shall need the assistance of the Good Spirit and the good feeling and faith and sympathy of my brethren and sisters this morning in an endeavor to speak to you for a short time. I hope it will be a short time, too, for at present I do not feel nor design to occupy very much of the time. I could not express my gratitude with language in my possession, which I feel this morning in being permitted, under the mercies of the Father of us all, to be present with you and behold the sight that I see in the assembled multitudes gathered here' in the opening session of this conference, on the Eighty-sixth anniversary of the organization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I feel sure that the Prophet Joseph Smith and his associates, who, under the guidance and inspiration of the Almighty, and by His power, began this latter-day work, would rejoice and do rejoice.—I was going to say if they were permitted to look down upon the scene that I behold in this tabernacle, but I believe they do have the privilege of looking down upon us just as the all-seeing eye of God beholds every part of His handiwork. For I believe that those who have been chosen in this dispensation and in former dispensations, to lay the foundation of God’s work in the midst of the children of men, for their salvation and exaltation, will not be deprived in the spirit world from looking down upon the results of their own labors, efforts and mission assigned them by the wisdom and purpose of God, to help to redeem and to reclaim the children of the Father from their sins. So I feel quite confident that the eye of Joseph, the Prophet, and of the martyrs of this dispensation, and of Brigham and John and Wilford, and those faithful men who were associated with them in their ministry upon the earth, are carefully guarding the interests of the Kingdom of God in which they labored and for which they strove during their mortal lives. I believe they are as deeply interested in our welfare today, if not with greater capacity, with far more interest behind the veil, than they were in the flesh. I believe they know more; I believe their minds have expanded beyond their comprehension in mortal life, and their interests are enlarged and expanded in the work of the Lord to which they gave their lives and their best service. Although some may feel and think that it is a little extreme to take this view, yet I believe that it is true; and I have a feeling in my heart that I stand in the presence not only of the Father and of the Son, but in the presence of those whom God commissioned, raised up and inspired to lay the foundations of the work in which we are engaged. Accompanying that sense or feeling, I am impressed with the thought that I would not this moment say or do one thing that would be taken as unwise or imprudent, or that would give offense to any of my former associates and co-laborers in the work of the Lord.
I would not like to say one thing, or express a thought that would grieve the heart of Joseph, or of Brigham, or of John, or of Wilford, or Lorenzo, or any of their faithful associates in the ministry. Sometimes the Lord expands our vision from this point of view and this side of the veil, that we feel and seem to realize that we can look beyond the thin veil which separates us from that other sphere. If we can see by the enlightening influence of the Spirit of God and through the words that have been spoken by the holy prophets of God, beyond the veil that separates us from the spirit world, surely those who have passed beyond, can see more clearly through the veil back here to us than it is possible for us to see to them from our sphere of action. I believe we move and have our being in the presence of heavenly messengers and of heavenly beings. We are not separate from them. We begin to realize more and more fully, as we become acquainted with the principles of the Gospel, as they have been revealed anew in this dispensation, that we are closely related to our kindred, to our ancestors, to our friends and associates and co-laborers who have preceded us into the spirit world. We can not forget them; we do not cease to love them; we always hold them in our hearts, in memory, and thus we are associated and united to them by ties that we can not break, that we can not dissolve or free ourselves from. If this is the case with us in our finite condition, surrounded by our mortal weaknesses, short-sightedness, lack of inspiration and wisdom from time to time, how much more certain it is and reasonable and consistent to believe that those who have been faithful, who have gone beyond and are still engaged in the work for the salvation of the souls of men, the opening of the prison doors to them that are bound and proclaiming liberty to the captives who can see us better than we can see them; that they know us better than we know them. They have advanced; we are advancing; we are growing as they have grown; we are reaching the goal that they have attained unto; and therefore, I claim that we live in their presence, they see us, they are solicitous for our welfare, they love us now more than ever. For now they see the dangers that beset us; they can comprehend better than ever before, the weaknesses that are liable to mislead us into dark and forbidden paths. They see the temptations and the evils that beset us in life and the proneness of mortal beings to yield to temptation and to wrong doing; hence their solicitude for us and their love for us and their desire for our well being must be greater than that which we feel for ourselves. I thank God for the feeling that I possess and enjoy and for the realization that I have, that I stand, not only in the presence of Almighty ‘God, my Maker and Father, but in the presence of His Only Begotten Son in the flesh, the Savior of the world; and I stand in the presence of Peter and James, (and perhaps the eyes of John are also upon us and we know it not); and that I stand also in the presence of Joseph and Hyrum and Brigham and John, and those who have been valiant in the testimony of Jesus Christ and faithful to their mission in the world, who have gone before. When I go I want to have the privilege of meeting them with the consciousness that I have followed their example, that I have carried out the mission in which they were engaged as they would have it carried out; that I have been as faithful in the discharge of duty committed to me and required at my hand as they were faithful in their time, and that when I meet them I shall meet them as I met them here, in love, in harmony, in unison and in perfect confidence that I have done my duty as they have done theirs.
I hope you will forgive me for my emotion. You would have peculiar emotions, would you not, if you felt that you .stood in the presence of your Father, in the very presence of Almighty God, in the very presence of the Son of God and of holy angels? You would feel rather emotional, rather sensitive. I feel it to the very depths of my soul this moment. So I hope you will forgive me, if I exhibit some of my real feelings. I am only a child, I am only learning, and I hope I shall not be ever learning and never come to the knowledge of the truth. I sincerely hope that as I learn little by little, line upon line and precept upon precept, here a little and there a little, day by day, and month by month, and year by year, that there will come a time when I shall have learned indeed the truth and shall know it as God knows it and be saved and exalted in His presence. Now, my mission, my duty, from the days of my childhood, has been to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ as the power of God unto salvation, unto all who will receive and obey it. It is my duty to proclaim to my brethren, to the household of faith, as well as to the world, when opportunity presents, that I believe in the living God, the Father of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who begot His Son, his only begotten in the flesh, and that Son grew from His birth unto His manhood and developed into the very image and likeness of His Father, insomuch that He declared on one occasion that “he that hath seen me, hath seen the Father.” I do not believe in the doctrines held by some that God is only a spirit and that He is of such a nature that He fills the immensity of space, and is everywhere present in person or without person, for I can not conceive it possible that God could be a person if He filled the immensity of space and was 'everywhere present at the same time. It is a physical, a theological, an unreasonable, inconsistency to imagine that even God the Eternal Father would be in two places, as an individual, at the same moment. It is impossible. But His power extends throughout the immensity of space, His power extends to all His creations, and His knowledge comprehends them all, and He governs them all and He knows all. It is a scriptural truth, that this is life eternal to know the only true and living God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. I believe that the Latter-day Saints, through the teachings of the scriptures and through the revelations that have come to them by the voice of the Prophet Joseph Smith, are able to learn the true and living God and know Him and also His Son whom He has sent into the world, whom to know is life eternal. Not simply the knowledge of it but having that knowledge we are inclined and determined to observe -His precepts, obey His laws, be submissive to His requirements in every particular and accept every ordinance of the house of God and of the Gospel of Jesus Christ that has been devised by the will of the Father for the qualification of His children in the earth to return into His presence. And he that knoweth God and Jesus Christ, whom to know is life eternal, will verify that knowledge by ample and continuous and faithful obedience to every requirement that God makes of His children, and therein consists the salvation and the gift of eternal life. The devil knows the Father much better than we. Lucifer, the son of the morning, knows Jesus Christ, the Son of God, much better than we, but in him it is not and will not redound to eternal life; for knowing, he yet rebels; knowing he yet is disobedient; he will not receive the truth; he will not abide in the truth; hence he is Perdition and there is no salvation for him. The same doctrine applies to me and to you and to all the sons and daughters of God who have judgment and knowledge and are able to reason between cause and effect, and determine the right from the wrong and the good from the evil and who are capable of seeing the light and distinguishing it from the darkness. Then this is the Gospel of Jesus Christ, to know the only true and living God and His Son whom He has sent into the world, which knowledge comes through obedience to all His commandments, faith, repentance of sin, baptism by immersion for the remission of sins, the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands by divine authority, and not by the will of man. This then is the Gospel of Jesus Christ which is the power of God unto salvation; obedience to the truth, submission to the order that God has established in His house, for the house of God is a house of order and not a house of confusion. God has set in His Church apostles and prophets and evangelists and pastors and teachers whose duty is to administer to the people, to teach, instruct, expound, exhort, admonish and lead in the path of righteousness. The people who are associated in this organization, must harken to the voice of him who has divine authority to guide and direct and counsel in the midst of Israel. All these are necessary in the Gospel of Jesus Christ and many things, too many for me to mention here, are necessary, including the ordinances of the house of God, revealed in greater plainness in this dispensation than perhaps in any former dispensation since the world was formed. All these ordinances are essential, in their place and in their time, and none of us are big enough or good enough or possess sufficient independence in ourselves to ignore these things that God has revealed and required of us. No man is too big, too great or knows so much, that he is independent of God. We are here on His earth, we breathe His air, we behold His sunlight, we eat His food and we wear His clothing; He has provided all the elements by which we are clothed and fed and live and move and have our being in the world. We are not independent of God, not for one moment. Not only do we believe in the Father and in the Son and in their words and counsel and divine authority which they brought and gave to men in the flesh, but we believe also in the divinity of the mission of Joseph the Prophet. We accept him as the one authorized, empowered, clothed with wisdom and knowledge in our day and time, to lay the foundations of the Church of Jesus Christ and to restore the fullness of the Gospel of salvation to the world ;to revive and renew in the hearts of the children of men the doctrines of Christ, the ordinances of His Gospel which He taught, which He administered anil which He authorized His disciples to administer to all that would, calling upon all men to repent and believe in the name of the Father and of the Son. We believe that God has restored the divine priesthood, which holds the keys of ministration of the ordinances of life, to the children of men. Without that divine priesthood no man could receive or would receive a remission of sins by being buried in the water. It has to be by divine authority and without that divine authority our works would not be acceptable to the Lord, for He will not accept at the hands of the children of men that which He has not authorized them to do, which He has not qualified them to do, and called and appointed them to do; but when God calls men and ordains, and appoints, and gives them authority to administer in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, what they do can not fail to be sanctioned and approved by the author and giver of the authority. When we receive the priesthood of God, and we do according to His word, then is He bound, and otherwise there is no promise. Now I can’t tell you all that I would like to. Time will not permit, and there are others to speak and all these, your brethren, that are called to the apostleship and to minister in the midst of the house of Israel are endowed, or ought to be endowed, richly with the spirit of their calling. For instance these twelve disciples of Christ are supposed to be eye and ear witnesses of the divine mission of Jesus Christ. It is not permissible for them to say, I believe, simply; I have accepted it simply because I believe it. Read the revelation, the Lord informs us they must know, they must get the knowledge for themselves, it must be with them as though they had seen with their eyes and heard with their ears and they know the truth. That is their mission, to testify of Jesus Christ and Him crucified and risen from the dead and clothed now with almighty power at the right hand of God, the Savior of the world. That is their mission, and their duty, and that is the doctrine and the truth that it is their duty to preach to the world and see that it is preached to the world. Where they can not go themselves they are to have the help of others called to their assistance, the Seventies first, also the elders and the high priests. Those who hold the Melchizedek priesthood who are not otherwise appointed are under their direction to preach the Gospel to the world and to declare the truth—that Jesus is the Christ and that Joseph is a prophet of God and was authorized and qualified to lay the foundation of the Kingdom of God. And when I say Kingdom of God I mean what I say. Christ is the King—not man. No man is king of the Kingdom of God; God is the King of it and we acknowledge Him and Him only as Sovereign of His Kingdom.
Now we all need patience, forbearance, forgiveness, humility, charity, love unfeigned, devotion to the truth, abhorrence of sin and wickedness, rebellion and disobedience to the requirements of the Gospel. These are the qualifications requisite to Latter-day Saints and to becoming Latter-day Saints and members in good standing in the Church of Jesus Christ and heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ. No member in good standing in the Church will be drunken or riotous or profane or will take advantage of his brother or his neighbor or will violate the principles of virtue and honor and righteousness. No member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in good standing will ever be chargeable with such offenses as these because they will avoid these evils and they will live above them. Then we have a mission in the world, each man, each woman, each child, who has grown to understanding or to the years of accountability, ought to be examples to the world, ought, not only to be qualified to preach the truth, to bear testimony of the truth, but they ought to live so that the very life they live, the very words they speak, their every action in life, will be a sermon to the unwary and to the ignorant, teaching them goodness, purity, uprightness, faith in God and love for the human family.
Now I have a few figures that I want to read to you. They are only a few. They cover a space of about fourteen years. I do not wish in doing this to appear to be in any way distinguished from any of my brethren, I do not wish to claim any honor more than my brethren, but I do think that we have a record that we need not be ashamed of for the last fourteen or fifteen years or more.
The report which follows will inform you concerning some of the Church expenditures and activities from the year 1901 to December 31. 1915:
At the close of the year 1906 the One Million Dollar bonded indebtedness and interest had been paid, making a total of $1,200,000.00
There has been paid on account of Church Schools 3,714,455.00
For repairs, improvements, operation, maintenance and building of temples 1,169,499.00
For building stake and ward meeting houses and amusement halls 2,007,733.00
For real estate and buildings, for mission house and meeting house purposes in Europe 266,236.00
For real estate and buildings, for mission house and meeting house purposes in the United States 292,795.00
For Agricultural Colleges and for meeting houses in New Zealand and Samoa 78,000.00
Expended in the missions for all purposes, less amount expended for real estate and buildings 2,625,328.00
For the Joseph Smith Memorial Farm and monument, and for the Joseph Smith Farm at Palmyra; for real estate covering Adam-Ondi-Ahman; for Carthage Jail, and for real estate at Independence, Jackson County, Missouri. 161.000.00
For real estate and buildings surrounding the Temple Block at Salt Lake City, and for new buildings that have been erected thereon 1.555.000.00
For buildings and equipment for the Dr. W. H. Groves’ Latter-day Saints Hospital 600.000.00
There has been paid to the poor through all Church channels 3,279.900.00
There has been a net increase in the Church membership of 187,733 souls; and there has been organized 22 stakes of Zion, 202 wards and 6 missions. There are now 72 stakes of Zion. 797 wards and 22 missions. There have been erected and remodeled 465 meeting houses in the stakes of Zion, besides branch and mission meeting houses in the various missions of the Church.
There have been 1,468,437 baptisms performed for the dead in the temples.
The Relief Society membership has increased 34%; the Sunday School 40%; the Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Association 23%; the Young Ladies’ Mutual Improvement Association 27%; the Primary Association 39%: and the Religion Class 85%.
I scarcely need to add one remark to this report; but I want to tell you this, that the tithes and means of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have not stuck to my hands nor to the hands of any of my associates. They have gone to their legitimate purposes.
Now we are building a temple in Canada. We are building another in Hawaii, and we are building an office building for the Church, a library, and a record depository that will be safe for the records of the Church, which for many years have been exposed to danger of destruction by fire or by other means; and we hope soon to have a place that will be practically fire-proof and that will be capacious enough to hold the records of the Church for many years to come.
How has it been done? How can we continue to do such things as these? Simply by the Latter-day Saints observing the laws of God and the rules of His Church; and while you do your duty I will guarantee to you, so long as my brethren are in charge, with whom I am associated, you will never have cause to suspect that your means will be misused or misappropriated. God bless you and all the household of faith, and help us to be true and faithful to the end, realizing that the battle is not to the strong, nor the race to the swift, but to him that endures to the end. Amen.
A soprano solo, “The Plains of Peace,” was sung by Sister Magdaline Anderson.
PRESIDENT ANTHON H. LUND.
The past fourteen years of increased tithe paying marks great progress in Church affairs—Remarkable increase in Temple work, and additions in Church membership—Faithful activity of workers in Church organizations — Extensive work of Church educational institutions—Detailed explanation of Religion Class work—The Universe governed by law, and God makes the law.
I feel the need of your sympathy and prayers in presenting myself before this large congregation. I have rejoiced in the good words spoken by our president. The uplifting and inspiring speech he has given us I know will be remembered by all present. I feel, as he told us, that we all stand in the presence of our Heavenly Father, who has means whereby He can know all about us, even of our inmost thoughts. Knowing this ought to make us careful to walk in His ways and obey H's commandments.
I was also pleased to hear the figures read by the President, telling us what has been done during the past fourteen years. I thought, many small amounts have amounted to great sums. Millions have been spent in the upbuilding of this work, and the books are open to show where every cent has gone that has been paid into the funds of the Church, and I believe you all approve the purposes for which the money has been expended. Millions have been appropriated to the poor, to the erection of houses of worship where the Saints can go and be built up in their holy faith; great amounts have been paid towards the temples, the missions, and so on. I feel thankful that the Saints have opened their hearts and contributed of their means for the purposes we have just heard stated. They have felt to obey the law of tithing which the Lord has given us, and they have had full confidence that the money would be spent in the upbuilding of the Kingdom of God.
It is a large number of persons who have joined the Church in the short time that President Smith has stood at the head of this administration, and a great number also that have passed through the temples. It is encouraging to hear of the increase in our different associations; for they are all useful in the strengthening of the faith of their members.
The last statistics read stated that the Religion Classes had increased eighty-five per cent. I am pleased to hear this, for I have thought that the Saints hardly know what the Religion Class stands for, and in a good many places they have considered it was an extra burden upon the bishops and teachers. Now, I believe that when it is fully understood, the Saints will see the great necessity of sustaining and cherishing these classes.
At the beginning of Brother Woodruff’s administration, the First Presidency were impressed to start more Church schools. They felt that places should be prepared where our young people could receive a systematic training in the principles of the Gospel. A Church Board of Education was organized whose members came together and discussed the problem of what would be the best plan for educating our children in the branch of theology, which could not be taught in the secular schools. The Church schools were started and were organized on the plan of the Brigham Young Academy. The Principal of that school, the able and devoted teacher, Brother Maeser, was appointed superintendent of the Church school system. You know how faithfully he worked to organize the Church schools, and how thankful hundreds and thousands of our-young people are that they were favored by receiving an education in these institutions. These schools have continued to prosper, and their membership reaches as high a number as we are able to accommodate. They have done and are doing a world of good among our young people. We would like to have all our children educated in an institution where not only the hand and the brain could be trained, but where spiritual matters could also be attended to; but it is not possible for us to reach so far with the means at our disposal, although millions have been spent, of the tithing, to sustain the Church schools.
We have a splendid public school system in 'this State. Our grade schools, our high schools, our agricultural college and university stand high. I believe they compare favorably with any in the land. Of course there are higher institutions of learning, in other states much more highly endowed than our university, and able to do more; but for the means that are invested and have been spent here in the state, I think we see good results. Last year, our Governor told me, we spent on education in the state schools from eighty-six to eighty-eight per cent of the state taxes. This shows how great an interest is taken in education. I doubt that any other state in the Union can show so great a percentage of state means set apart for educational purposes as the Utah legislatures have done. But although the school system of Utah stands as high as any, there is a defect in schools that are conducted without religious instruction. Educators east and west who have studied this matter have come to that conclusion.
Recently a large convention was held in Chicago, in which educators discussed the problem of teaching religion in our public schools. It is not so easy to do this here as it is in countries where they have a state religion, and consequently can teach that religion in their educational institutions, but here, where the public schools are open to children of parents belonging to different denominations, it is more difficult. Some of the educators present at this convention suggested that a certain time for studying religion might be put into the curriculum of the schools, and the children go into rooms where teachers or ministers could teach them the religion of their fathers. I don't know what conclusion was arrived at, as I have not read the full proceedings of the convention, but the suggestion referred to was something like what they do in Canada. There they have a law that provides for religious education in the public schools, and those who teach it are paid by the state. Their statesmen know that it is for the good of the children not only to have their intellects trained, but also the heart and the emotions, and to learn concerning God and His will with men. In Canada the public school is the same as here, free and open to all denominations, and the ministers of these have been given the right to gather the children around them in the school house and teach them the principles their parents believe in.
We realize the defect in an education without religious and moral instruction, and we want to supply some means whereby this lack can be remedied. In some places we gather the children once a week in the Religion Classes to teach them practical religion. In other places these classes meet five times a week or once every school day. The objection that has been raised that it lays too much burden upon the children to attend these classes, because they have so much to learn in the day school that they cannot attend to the studies which the Religion Classes would give them, is not of much weight, as the children are not asked to study these lessons outside of the Religion Classes. When they meet in the classes they are taught by concrete examples, and in a way that requires of them only their attention while in the classes; and teachers of such children say that they are more easily managed and pay better attention than they did before they took the studies in the Religion Classes.
As these classes were parts of the Church school system, Brother Maeser was placed in charge of them also, and during his last years he worked hard to make them a success. His whole soul was absorbed in studying the best way of reaching the children's hearts. Once when he was going to a place to organize the Religion Class, he asked himself the question, “What shall be the procedure ?’’ He prayed about it, and the method we follow, called the six steps, came to his mind, and we have found this mode very successful.
We would like you who have not attended a session of the Religion Classes to do so and see how our brethren and sisters are teaching the young that attend the classes. The classes are opened by singing, led by the teacher or by one of the children, as he or she may direct. The singing is not accompanied with instrumental music. We like them to be independent of such help and able to strike the right pitch themselves. When our young men are called to go out into the missionary field, you know what a blessing it is to them to be able to sing. When they stand on the street corner, with their backs to a lamp-post and a large congregation before them, they have no instrument to help them in starting the song, it is well for them if they are able to do it correctly. How many of you brethren have not had experience of this kind?
After the children have sung a hymn, their hearts are attuned for the second step, which is prayer. Here one of the boys or girls will volunteer to offer the prayer when the teacher calls on them to do so, and the boy or girl chosen to lead will utter a short sentence or a short phrase, which all repeat in concert, and then the next sentence will be given and repeated, and so on until the prayer is ended. Repeating the words spoken by the one offering the prayer secures attention, for all are alert to join in the prayers and to pronounce the words which the leader has spoken.
The third step is to learn a memory gem, or good thought. The teacher will lead out with a short part of the quotation and the children repeat it after her. When it is learned the next part of the quotation is given, and so to the end of it. By this method a great many precious thoughts are stored away in the minds of the children that will help them in time to come.
Then comes the fourth step, which is the real lesson, and takes the longest time. The lesson and the memory gem are generally so related that one explains the other. The lessons generally consist in narratives and concrete examples, which the children love to hear, and which will make such an impression upon their minds that they will remember them, and will try to carry out that which has been taught them.
The fifth step is testimony-bearing. We ask the children to bear testimony of what they have themselves experienced, what they know of the goodness of God, the goodness of their parents, and of others, what joy has come to their hearts in performing a good act, an unselfish act to others. All of this we consider good material for testimony bearing, and if you listen to these children bearing their testimony, it will often melt your heart, for you know they are innocent and honest in what they say, and we can see how the Spirit of the Lord is working upon their young hearts. They will tell of visiting a sick comrade and comforting them, perhaps bringing him flowers; they will tell of taking part in cutting the wood of a widow for winter use, and of so many other things that they have done. The object of the Religion Class is to imbue their hearts with practical religion, that is, as James defines it, “to visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction, and to keep themselves unspotted from the world.” The sixth step is singing and prayer, conducted as were the opening exercises.
You ought not to neglect sending your children to the Religion Classes, for they need the instruction given there. I have heard many examples mentioned in our Board where these young children have been able to bring their parents to renewed diligence in the performance of their duty, and even bringing families into the Church that had not before understood the Gospel. It gives us joy to hear these things, and I will plead with you, my brethren and sisters, to sustain the movement of our Religion Classes. The children will be built up and encouraged in welldoing, and the time they spend there does not interfere with their other studies. I hope the time will come when educators in the whole land will be able to devise some plan whereby such religious teaching as the parents desire the children to receive can be given them in the public schools.
A short time ago I attended the dedication of the Brigham City Theological Seminary. It has been erected for the purpose of giving the students of our faith, who attend the high school there, an opportunity to study the history of the Bible and the principles of the Gospel. More than two hundred students are enrolled, and are enthusiastic in taking this branch of study. Having a school building on an adjoining lot to that of the high school gives the students attending it nearly all the benefits of a Church school education. There are a few other seminaries similarly located in the neighborhood of high schools, which are also doing excellent work. We do not want to induce the children of parents not belonging to our faith to attend these classes, but we would like our own students to do so, for we do see a great need of having their hearts fortified against the many theories that will be presented before them, and which tend to taking away their faith. We want to have them fortified against the insinuating suggestions they may hear of learned men, that the world is a self-sustaining machine, and consequently there is no need of a God, that there is no spirit in man, and hence there will be no resurrection; that everything is ruled by law and therefore prayer is useless. Now, we want a foundation of faith in God laid so firmly in the hearts of our children that it cannot be shaken. But some ask are you afraid, then, of evolution and other theories that are taught so extensively? We are not afraid that the revealed Gospel shall be proved untrue by anything that men may discover; for truth will always square with truth, but theories of men are not always true; the scientists often take hypotheses as proven facts, and they assume that it has taken millions of years to produce the changes which they claim have gradually taken place in plants and animals, during the different periods of the earth.
We believe that everything is ruled by law. We are thankful that it is so, for otherwise we would live in a world of chance, in a fearful uncertainty of what would happen next. I believe that the material laws that can be traced in the creation had an intelligent will behind them, that the laws themselves were never superior to the will of God. He made those laws, and by His power they became effective to accomplish His purposes. It is to Him that we pray, and we know he is almighty and does hear prayers, and though He uses material laws to carry out His plans, His will was never subjected to the laws, but the laws have ever been subservient to Him. Let no one think that God is impotent, that the laws He has made stand in the way of His hearing His children and answering their prayers.
I see the time is going. I feel thankful to be here with you brethren and sisters, to bear my testimony to the truth of the Gospel, which is that Jesus is the Savior and Redeemer of the world, and that He is the Only Begotten of the Father. May the Lord help us ever to be true and faithful in the covenants we have made with Him, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
President Smith read a notice, issued by the Presiding Bishopric, informing conference visitors concerning arrangements made for their lodging, etc., and made other announcements.
The choir sang the anthem, “Lift up the voice in singing.”
The benediction was pronounced by Elder Henry H. Rolapp.
Conference adjourned until 2 p. m.
The past fourteen years of increased tithe paying marks great progress in Church affairs—Remarkable increase in Temple work, and additions in Church membership—Faithful activity of workers in Church organizations — Extensive work of Church educational institutions—Detailed explanation of Religion Class work—The Universe governed by law, and God makes the law.
I feel the need of your sympathy and prayers in presenting myself before this large congregation. I have rejoiced in the good words spoken by our president. The uplifting and inspiring speech he has given us I know will be remembered by all present. I feel, as he told us, that we all stand in the presence of our Heavenly Father, who has means whereby He can know all about us, even of our inmost thoughts. Knowing this ought to make us careful to walk in His ways and obey H's commandments.
I was also pleased to hear the figures read by the President, telling us what has been done during the past fourteen years. I thought, many small amounts have amounted to great sums. Millions have been spent in the upbuilding of this work, and the books are open to show where every cent has gone that has been paid into the funds of the Church, and I believe you all approve the purposes for which the money has been expended. Millions have been appropriated to the poor, to the erection of houses of worship where the Saints can go and be built up in their holy faith; great amounts have been paid towards the temples, the missions, and so on. I feel thankful that the Saints have opened their hearts and contributed of their means for the purposes we have just heard stated. They have felt to obey the law of tithing which the Lord has given us, and they have had full confidence that the money would be spent in the upbuilding of the Kingdom of God.
It is a large number of persons who have joined the Church in the short time that President Smith has stood at the head of this administration, and a great number also that have passed through the temples. It is encouraging to hear of the increase in our different associations; for they are all useful in the strengthening of the faith of their members.
The last statistics read stated that the Religion Classes had increased eighty-five per cent. I am pleased to hear this, for I have thought that the Saints hardly know what the Religion Class stands for, and in a good many places they have considered it was an extra burden upon the bishops and teachers. Now, I believe that when it is fully understood, the Saints will see the great necessity of sustaining and cherishing these classes.
At the beginning of Brother Woodruff’s administration, the First Presidency were impressed to start more Church schools. They felt that places should be prepared where our young people could receive a systematic training in the principles of the Gospel. A Church Board of Education was organized whose members came together and discussed the problem of what would be the best plan for educating our children in the branch of theology, which could not be taught in the secular schools. The Church schools were started and were organized on the plan of the Brigham Young Academy. The Principal of that school, the able and devoted teacher, Brother Maeser, was appointed superintendent of the Church school system. You know how faithfully he worked to organize the Church schools, and how thankful hundreds and thousands of our-young people are that they were favored by receiving an education in these institutions. These schools have continued to prosper, and their membership reaches as high a number as we are able to accommodate. They have done and are doing a world of good among our young people. We would like to have all our children educated in an institution where not only the hand and the brain could be trained, but where spiritual matters could also be attended to; but it is not possible for us to reach so far with the means at our disposal, although millions have been spent, of the tithing, to sustain the Church schools.
We have a splendid public school system in 'this State. Our grade schools, our high schools, our agricultural college and university stand high. I believe they compare favorably with any in the land. Of course there are higher institutions of learning, in other states much more highly endowed than our university, and able to do more; but for the means that are invested and have been spent here in the state, I think we see good results. Last year, our Governor told me, we spent on education in the state schools from eighty-six to eighty-eight per cent of the state taxes. This shows how great an interest is taken in education. I doubt that any other state in the Union can show so great a percentage of state means set apart for educational purposes as the Utah legislatures have done. But although the school system of Utah stands as high as any, there is a defect in schools that are conducted without religious instruction. Educators east and west who have studied this matter have come to that conclusion.
Recently a large convention was held in Chicago, in which educators discussed the problem of teaching religion in our public schools. It is not so easy to do this here as it is in countries where they have a state religion, and consequently can teach that religion in their educational institutions, but here, where the public schools are open to children of parents belonging to different denominations, it is more difficult. Some of the educators present at this convention suggested that a certain time for studying religion might be put into the curriculum of the schools, and the children go into rooms where teachers or ministers could teach them the religion of their fathers. I don't know what conclusion was arrived at, as I have not read the full proceedings of the convention, but the suggestion referred to was something like what they do in Canada. There they have a law that provides for religious education in the public schools, and those who teach it are paid by the state. Their statesmen know that it is for the good of the children not only to have their intellects trained, but also the heart and the emotions, and to learn concerning God and His will with men. In Canada the public school is the same as here, free and open to all denominations, and the ministers of these have been given the right to gather the children around them in the school house and teach them the principles their parents believe in.
We realize the defect in an education without religious and moral instruction, and we want to supply some means whereby this lack can be remedied. In some places we gather the children once a week in the Religion Classes to teach them practical religion. In other places these classes meet five times a week or once every school day. The objection that has been raised that it lays too much burden upon the children to attend these classes, because they have so much to learn in the day school that they cannot attend to the studies which the Religion Classes would give them, is not of much weight, as the children are not asked to study these lessons outside of the Religion Classes. When they meet in the classes they are taught by concrete examples, and in a way that requires of them only their attention while in the classes; and teachers of such children say that they are more easily managed and pay better attention than they did before they took the studies in the Religion Classes.
As these classes were parts of the Church school system, Brother Maeser was placed in charge of them also, and during his last years he worked hard to make them a success. His whole soul was absorbed in studying the best way of reaching the children's hearts. Once when he was going to a place to organize the Religion Class, he asked himself the question, “What shall be the procedure ?’’ He prayed about it, and the method we follow, called the six steps, came to his mind, and we have found this mode very successful.
We would like you who have not attended a session of the Religion Classes to do so and see how our brethren and sisters are teaching the young that attend the classes. The classes are opened by singing, led by the teacher or by one of the children, as he or she may direct. The singing is not accompanied with instrumental music. We like them to be independent of such help and able to strike the right pitch themselves. When our young men are called to go out into the missionary field, you know what a blessing it is to them to be able to sing. When they stand on the street corner, with their backs to a lamp-post and a large congregation before them, they have no instrument to help them in starting the song, it is well for them if they are able to do it correctly. How many of you brethren have not had experience of this kind?
After the children have sung a hymn, their hearts are attuned for the second step, which is prayer. Here one of the boys or girls will volunteer to offer the prayer when the teacher calls on them to do so, and the boy or girl chosen to lead will utter a short sentence or a short phrase, which all repeat in concert, and then the next sentence will be given and repeated, and so on until the prayer is ended. Repeating the words spoken by the one offering the prayer secures attention, for all are alert to join in the prayers and to pronounce the words which the leader has spoken.
The third step is to learn a memory gem, or good thought. The teacher will lead out with a short part of the quotation and the children repeat it after her. When it is learned the next part of the quotation is given, and so to the end of it. By this method a great many precious thoughts are stored away in the minds of the children that will help them in time to come.
Then comes the fourth step, which is the real lesson, and takes the longest time. The lesson and the memory gem are generally so related that one explains the other. The lessons generally consist in narratives and concrete examples, which the children love to hear, and which will make such an impression upon their minds that they will remember them, and will try to carry out that which has been taught them.
The fifth step is testimony-bearing. We ask the children to bear testimony of what they have themselves experienced, what they know of the goodness of God, the goodness of their parents, and of others, what joy has come to their hearts in performing a good act, an unselfish act to others. All of this we consider good material for testimony bearing, and if you listen to these children bearing their testimony, it will often melt your heart, for you know they are innocent and honest in what they say, and we can see how the Spirit of the Lord is working upon their young hearts. They will tell of visiting a sick comrade and comforting them, perhaps bringing him flowers; they will tell of taking part in cutting the wood of a widow for winter use, and of so many other things that they have done. The object of the Religion Class is to imbue their hearts with practical religion, that is, as James defines it, “to visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction, and to keep themselves unspotted from the world.” The sixth step is singing and prayer, conducted as were the opening exercises.
You ought not to neglect sending your children to the Religion Classes, for they need the instruction given there. I have heard many examples mentioned in our Board where these young children have been able to bring their parents to renewed diligence in the performance of their duty, and even bringing families into the Church that had not before understood the Gospel. It gives us joy to hear these things, and I will plead with you, my brethren and sisters, to sustain the movement of our Religion Classes. The children will be built up and encouraged in welldoing, and the time they spend there does not interfere with their other studies. I hope the time will come when educators in the whole land will be able to devise some plan whereby such religious teaching as the parents desire the children to receive can be given them in the public schools.
A short time ago I attended the dedication of the Brigham City Theological Seminary. It has been erected for the purpose of giving the students of our faith, who attend the high school there, an opportunity to study the history of the Bible and the principles of the Gospel. More than two hundred students are enrolled, and are enthusiastic in taking this branch of study. Having a school building on an adjoining lot to that of the high school gives the students attending it nearly all the benefits of a Church school education. There are a few other seminaries similarly located in the neighborhood of high schools, which are also doing excellent work. We do not want to induce the children of parents not belonging to our faith to attend these classes, but we would like our own students to do so, for we do see a great need of having their hearts fortified against the many theories that will be presented before them, and which tend to taking away their faith. We want to have them fortified against the insinuating suggestions they may hear of learned men, that the world is a self-sustaining machine, and consequently there is no need of a God, that there is no spirit in man, and hence there will be no resurrection; that everything is ruled by law and therefore prayer is useless. Now, we want a foundation of faith in God laid so firmly in the hearts of our children that it cannot be shaken. But some ask are you afraid, then, of evolution and other theories that are taught so extensively? We are not afraid that the revealed Gospel shall be proved untrue by anything that men may discover; for truth will always square with truth, but theories of men are not always true; the scientists often take hypotheses as proven facts, and they assume that it has taken millions of years to produce the changes which they claim have gradually taken place in plants and animals, during the different periods of the earth.
We believe that everything is ruled by law. We are thankful that it is so, for otherwise we would live in a world of chance, in a fearful uncertainty of what would happen next. I believe that the material laws that can be traced in the creation had an intelligent will behind them, that the laws themselves were never superior to the will of God. He made those laws, and by His power they became effective to accomplish His purposes. It is to Him that we pray, and we know he is almighty and does hear prayers, and though He uses material laws to carry out His plans, His will was never subjected to the laws, but the laws have ever been subservient to Him. Let no one think that God is impotent, that the laws He has made stand in the way of His hearing His children and answering their prayers.
I see the time is going. I feel thankful to be here with you brethren and sisters, to bear my testimony to the truth of the Gospel, which is that Jesus is the Savior and Redeemer of the world, and that He is the Only Begotten of the Father. May the Lord help us ever to be true and faithful in the covenants we have made with Him, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
President Smith read a notice, issued by the Presiding Bishopric, informing conference visitors concerning arrangements made for their lodging, etc., and made other announcements.
The choir sang the anthem, “Lift up the voice in singing.”
The benediction was pronounced by Elder Henry H. Rolapp.
Conference adjourned until 2 p. m.
AFTERNOON SESSION.
In the Tabernacle.
Conference was resumed at 2 p. m.
President Joseph F. Smith called the meeting to order.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “God moves in a mysterious way.”
The invocation was offered by Elder Arthur Winter.
The choir sang the hymn, “Our mountain home so dear.”
In the Tabernacle.
Conference was resumed at 2 p. m.
President Joseph F. Smith called the meeting to order.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “God moves in a mysterious way.”
The invocation was offered by Elder Arthur Winter.
The choir sang the hymn, “Our mountain home so dear.”
PREST. CHARLES W. PENROSE.
Universal redemption through obedience—Evil of contentions—Trinity of the Godhead—God the Father of spirit—Christ the Firstborn—Elohim, Jehovah and Michael in the creation—Adam head of the mortal human race, but not one of the Godhead — Preexistence of Jesus Christ as Jehovah, a Personage of Spirit—Personality of the Holy Ghost—Plurality of Gods—Angels bearing name of Deity—Christ the Word of God, the Redeemer of the World—God the Eternal Father to be worshiped and obeyed.
I feel very much like President Smith did this morning in arising to address the congregation—1 have not language to express the emotions of my heart in being privileged to assemble with you, my brethren and sisters, in this great congregation of Latter-day Saints. I am very thankful to God, our Eternal Father, for this blessing, and for having the testimony in my soul of the truth of those principles which were so grandly placed before us this morning by our President. There is nothing in the world that I know of which is so dear to my heart as the truth which has been revealed in these last days from God through His servant Joseph, the prophet. And when I think of the goodness of God to me during all the years that I have been associated with the Saints and labored in the ministry, I feel overwhelmed with gratitude and thanksgiving and praise. Praise be unto God our Eternal Father and His Son Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost, and His servants who have been called in these last days to lay the foundations of the Church and Kingdom of our God!
I would that all the world could see and understand these things as we do, but that is at present—I was going to say impossible—it can not be done at present, but I rejoice in the assurance given in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, in the revelations of the Lord to us, that the time will come when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is the Lord, the Christ, to the glory of God the Father, and this will not be by compulsion or constraint, but by the willing desires of those who bow, they having been brought through sorrow and pain and suffering, penalties for their sins, into a condition of repentance and desire for the truth and a willingness to obey it. That to me is a glorious prospect. And the work of preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ which now devolves upon a few, will never be consummated entirely until that time shall come when every soul of Adam’s race will have the opportunity of receiving and bowing to the truth as it is in Jesus Christ.
There is a very great work to be performed when we think of that which has to be clone in this regard. The gospel must be preached to every creature in the flesh and afterwards to every person in the spirit who has not heard it, until all the millions upon millions of the race of Adam shall have had the opportunity of bowing in obedience to the commandments of God and coming, to some degree, in communion with Him. At present, as we were told this morning, the duty devolves upon the Priesthood of this Church, in both its branches, in the Melchizedek and Aaronic branches of the priesthood, to minister in the name of the Lord by divine authority, and what they do under that authority in the way that the Lord has commanded is valid, and it has power and force in the heavens. What they administer on earth in the way that the Lord has appointed is recognized on high, and is of the same force and effect as though performed by Deity.
The truth which the Lord has revealed, naturally comes into collision with error wherever it is found, and the time will come when all error, all untruth will have to give way and the truth will abound. It is by the truth that we shall be sanctified, that is, by obedience to it, as was explained to us today, not merely its reception in the mind, but its actual possession of us in all our being; that we live for the truth and by the truth and according to the truth and to the degree that we do that we become sanctified in our nature and come nearer to Him who is the fountain of truth, to us. Truth itself in the abstract is eternal, but there have been individuals who have been the embodiments of the truth and of all that is good and great, and our Heavenly Father is that embodiment, and Jesus Christ also, and the expression of it to us of all that is right and true and good. The eternal verities are embodied in them and are communicated to us as we are willing to receive them. When we do receive them, not merely in theory, but also in practice and make them ours in our lives, in our constitution, in our very being, so far we approach towards the perfection of Deity.
The very first principle of our faith, announced in what is called the articles of our faith, is that we believe in God the Eternal Father, and in His Son Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost. These three separate personalities are placed in the very foundation of our faith, as its first doctrine or principle, and we ought to become thoroughly familiar with that which has been revealed concerning them and we ought to understand them alike. One of the very great beauties of our Church is that we are coming io union—the unity of the faith by the knowledge of the truth. When we know the truth and see it clearly we are alike in our perceptions and our understandings, and measureably according to our obedience in the government of our own natures by the truth. Sometimes, however, even in the Church of Christ, in which we are “all baptized by one spirit into one body, whether we be Jew or Gentile, bond or free,” of every race and tribe and kingdom and color, although we are baptized by water and by the spirit into one body and should be perfectly united, especially in doctrine and principle, yet like it was in the early Christian Church there are sometimes divisions among us in regard to many important things, and sometimes there are very sharp divisions upon things that are not so important. Our brethren in some of their class meetings and quorum meetings, sometimes even in the theological departments of the Sunday schools they get divided in their opinions in regard to some very simple things—I was going to say silly things, but I don’t want to be censorious—some things that are not worth spending time over. The reason I know about this is because I frequently personally receive letters from good friends in different parts of the Church, asking questions and declaring that there is a division of opinion among our brethren in regard to them. And the First Presidency frequently receive communications from the brethren asking for a decision on certain points that are really not worth discussing, that do not amount to anything, but there are some things which are important for us to understand aright.
It was very clearly shown to us this morning that we have one Eternal Father and that Jesus Christ is His Son, and that we also are His sons, with this difference, that we are all the sons of God in the spirit, that is in the spirit part of our nature, but Christ is also His Son in the flesh. I do not think there is any division of sentiment or opinion among our brethren an 1 sisters in the Church concerning this fact, that the spirit part of man—that of course means woman too—is the offspring of God, God is the Father of our spirits. We often quote the saying of Paul, who seemed to have a very good idea in regard to all these things, or rather, if you do not believe that Paul wrote the Epistle to the Hebrews as I do—(great dispute about that in the world)—in the Epistle to the Hebrews we are told that “we have had fathers of our flesh who corrected us and we gave them reverence,” and the question is asked, “How much rather should we be in subjection to the Father of spirits, Heb. 12:9. There are many other texts in the old scriptures, in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, that I will not take time to quote this afternoon, because, as I have said, I think we are all agreed in regard to this one very important fact, this very encouraging truth, this thing that lifts up the soul of man above earthly things to the realization that his origin is not from the dust but from the Eternal God, the Creator, the Ruler, the Architect of the universe. He who made the worlds, and as we heard today, controls and governs and directs them, is actually our Father, not in some mystical sense, not in some mere theory, but we were begotten of Him. In the revelation contained in the 76th Section of the Doctrine and Covenants we are told that the inhabitants of the worlds are “begotten sons and daughters unto God.” There may be more in that than we see at the first glance, but the result of it all is in our minds, if we are at all logical, that the great Eternal God is our Father and we are begotten of Him or UNTO Him and to Him we owe allegiance, to Him we owe obedience, because He is our Father and our God and our King. We should obey Him because of His parentage to us; we should obey Him because we are His children and He has the right to our obedience, and being so high and exalted and lifted up, He understands us better than we understand ourselves and He has our destiny in His hands and He has power over life and over death and we should be obedient to Him because of our relationship to Him. That seems clear to me and I believe it is to you and to the great body of the Latter-day Saints, the Church.
There still remains, I can tell by the letters I have alluded to, an idea among some of the people that Adam was and is the Almighty and Eternal God. He is the father of his race, of course, the great patriarch over the human family, and being begotten unto him, he is the father of us in our earthly condition, in our mortality, and stands as the primal patriarch. But God says He put him there. Now, so far as that is concerned that is all right. In the 107th Section of the Doctrine and Covenants, you will read about that. Three years before his death we are told Adam gathered together the majority of his posterity who were righteous into the valley of Adam-OndiAhman, and they rose up and blessed him and called him Michael the prince, the arch-angel, and the Lord appeared unto them. Now, mark you, there was Adam and his posterity, so far as they were brought forth at that time, and the Lord appeared to them — that wasn’t Adam, was it? “And the Lord administered comfort unto Adam and said: I have set thee to be at the head”—the head of his race, the head of the human family in their mortal condition—“I have set thee to be at the head; a multitude of nations shall come of thee and thou art a prince over them forever” (verses 53-55).
Here is Adam with his posterity, they recognizing him and acknowledging him as their patriarch and father and prince, and recognizing the fact that in his first estate he was Michael, recognizing also that the Lord appears and declares He places Adam at the head. Now. Adam had transgressed a law and because of that he had to pay the penalty, and because of that, death came upon his posterity on natural principles, (as we will understand better when we comprehend fully how these things occur, and how our tendencies and traits and taints are handed down from the fathers to the children to the different generations that come). But although he had transgressed, that had been foreseen, and, according to the revelations that we have, a plan had been prepared before this transgression took place whereby the results of it might be removed and whereby a blessing might come in that very thing that was called “the curse.” That the knowledge of good and evil might come to mankind, that they might have an opportunity of showing whether they loved the truth and loved the good or loved the evil and the untruth, and that they might be judged according to their works, and that their different capabilities and their different degrees of worthiness or unworthiness might be exhibited and developed and showed forth so that justice might be done and that mercy might be extended where it was needful, that mercy should not rob justice and justice should not rob mercy, the Lord, in view of the fact that a Redeemer had been prepared from the foundation of the world for the redemption of the whole human family, in their different degrees, smiled upon Adam and blessed him and placed him at the head of his posterity as the great patriarch of the race, as a prince over them forever.
Now, because of that and some other little matters that might be mentioned, the notion has taken hold of some of our brethren that Adam is the being that we should worship. This has been explained, I think, from this stand several times, but notwithstanding that, peculiar ideas get into people’s minds, not always because, they are stubborn and wilfull and wicked or that they desire anything that is wrong, but because it gets into their heads and it is a very hard job to get it out of their heads, like the Scotchman who asked the Lord to keep him in the right path so that he might not go “wrang, for the Lord knew that if he once got anything into his head, it would be a mighty hard job to get it out of him.” That is the way it is with lots of our folks, not because they are all Scotchmen, however, the idea has obtained in the minds of some of the brethren and we ought to get right concerning it. I am sorry that has not been rectified long ago, because plain answers have been given to brethren and sisters who write and desire to know about it, and yet it still lingers, and contentions arise in regard to it, and there should be no contentions among the Latter-day Saints. It is all right for people to have their own views and express them, if they will do it in a proper spirit; it is all right for people to stand up for what they really believe to be true, but when this spirit oi contention comes, then, as we are told in the Book of Mormon, it is of the devil.
Now, if Adam, as claimed by some of our brethren, is the being that we should worship, to whom we should pray, who was that person that put Adam at the head of his race? Who was the person that Adam prayed to? Adam prayed to God and we are told, as we can find in the Pearl of Great Price, which gives us a great deal of information on this matter, as revealed to Moses, and as revealed to Enoch, that Adam, after his transgression, was taught the gospel, the same gospel that we have, and the Lord said He would not suffer that Adam should die as to the temporal death until He “sent forth angels to proclaim faith and redemption through the name of His Only Begotten Son” (see Doc. and Cov. Sec. 29). So that Adam had to believe and repent and be baptized as we have to do. and we are told that he was baptized “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.” So Adam was neither the Father, nor the Son, nor the Holy Ghost, was he? Then, who was he? Why, we are told he was Michael in his first estate, and as Adam he will stand at the head of his race. Daniel saw him “in the night vision”—Michael who was the archangel before he came here. Remember when you talk about Adam, that name only applies to the man Adam on the earth with a body made out of the dust, but Michael, the archangel, the Ancient of days did sit; so Daniel saw, and “ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him.” And, then, we are told, “One like the Son of Man came in the clouds of heaven and was brought before the Ancient of days, and there was given Him dominion and an everlasting kingdom that all people should serve him” (Daniel 7:9-14). We will find that this will be the case; for when we learn a little more about this person—the Son of Man—we will see that this is His due—that He will be at the head of the Kingdom; He will be King of kings, and Lord of lords. He is “the first and the last,” so He proclaims. You will find it in the Old Testament and in the New, and in the Book of Mormon, and in the Pearl of Great Price, that He is “The First and the last” and that all things were made by Him and they are of Him and through Him and for Him.
Now, who is this person, this Jesus Christ? Is He Adam or a son of Adam? Not at all, except in the sense that Jesus of Nazareth was born of Mary, and therein was His humanity and that is traced right up to Adam, of course, in the scriptural genealogy. But who was the Father of Jesus Christ before He came on the earth in the flesh? We read in the Book of Mormon that when He appeared to the Nephites on this continent, He told them that He was the person that gave the law unto Moses. Who was it that gave the law to Moses? We are told it was Jehovah. Well, was Jesus Jehovah? Yes, according to the scriptures, both ancient and modern, and that seems to be a stumbling block in the way of a few of our brethren. (See Doc. and Cov., Sec. 10:3, 4.) We are told by revelation that in the creation of the earth there were three individuals, personally engaged. This is more particularly for the Temple of God, but sufficient of it has been published over and over again to permit me to refer to it. Elohim,—not Eloheim, as we spell it sometimes— that is a plural word meaning the gods, but it is attached to the individual who is the Father of all, the person whom we look to as the great Eternal Father. Elohim. Jehovah and Michael, were engaged in the construction of this globe. Jehovah, commanded by Elohim, went down to where there was space, saying to Michael: “Let us go down, for there is space there, and we will organize an earth whereon these [the spirits that are around us] may dwell, and we will prove them herewith to see if they will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them.” You can read about that in the Pearl of Great Price—Book of Abraham, chapter 3. Now. when the work was done, which you rea l about in the Book of Genesis and more particularly in the Book of Moses and in the Book of Abraham in the Pearl of Great Price, when that was done, Michael became Adam and was placed in the Garden of Eden, as we read in ancient and modern revelations, and Eve was given to him to be his wife, bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh, and it is announced that no man should nut asunder that which God had joined together.
You see, do you not, that Michael became Adam and that Adam was not the Son Jehovah, and he was not Elohim the Father. He occupied his own place and position in the organization of the earth and in the production of mortal beings on the earth. Jesus of Nazareth was the Jehovah who was engaged with the Father in the beginning, and we are told in the 93rd Section of the Doctrine and Covenants that Jesus says concerning Himself, “I also was in the beginning with the Father and am the first-born.” “Ye were also in the beginning with the Father, that which is spirit.” That part of us which is spirit, was in the beginning with God, because we are His children and Jesus was there, the person that is called Jesus in the flesh, and He was the firstborn, that is how He is the first. “I am the first and the last. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end.” He was the beginning of the spirits who people this earth, “the beginning of the creation of God,” as we read in the Colossians and in the Book of Revelation, “the first-born of every creature” in the spirit. But, in the flesh He was the “Only Begotten Son” of the Father. Mary was his mother. She was of the House of David and therefore Jesus fulfilled the prediction that the Messiah was to be of the House of David, and of the seed of Abraham, and the seed of the woman who should bruise the serpent's head, as we read in the Book of Genesis, 3:15.
I want to draw a clear distinction between these individuals that we may stop this discussion that is going on to no purpose. Who is Adam? Adam is our father, certainly. He is the great father of the race, but we have had fathers that corrected us at home and we gave them reverence. Yes, that is right, but do we worship them and pray to them? Oh, no. Then why should we want to pray to Adam, who away back in the remote centuries was at the head of his race and in that sense is our father? He occupies the place that he was expected to occupy and did the work he was expected to perform, but after he transgressed and brought death into the world, “as by one man’s disobedience death came into the world so by one man’s obedience and righteousness life came into the world. So that “as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive,” all be resurrected, every one, bad and good and indifferent, all races and colors, and sizes and ages as they were laid down, so they will come forth, and it is through the power of the resurrection in Jesus Christ that they come forth.
Let us cite the Book of John the Apostle, it is a splendid thesis. The Lord refers to it in the 93rd Section of the Doctrine and Covenants, wherein John proclaimed that Jesus was in the beginning with God. He says: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made,” and Jesus declares in this revelation, 93rd section, that He was the person called the Word. He was not merely the word coming from the mouth of God, but He was the expression of the Father, He was the expression of God’s word and will. All things are of God. as Paul said, and we of Him and all things by Jesus Christ and we by Him. When Joseph the prophet received his first manifestation from God, the Father and the Son appeared. The Father did not say a great deal, but we shall find that has been His course from the very beginning, because the Son was His Word. He declared: “This is my beloved Son, hear Him.” And He, the Son, was that being, as He told the Nephites, who gave the law to Moses (3 Nephi 15:5) and He was the Being who had charge of matters from the very beginning. In the Deity there are the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, and our father Adam was baptized in their holy name and he is not either one of them. Just remember that.
In the fifth chapter of the Gospel according to St. John, Jesus speaks very clearly on matters that may seem mysterious to some people. You know there are some of our brethren who have thought that Jesus, in His first estate, as we call it, or in His former state, was a resurrected being. I do not know where they get the idea from, but it is likely from this, that He was called God by John the Revelator and by a great number of writers in the Book of Mormon and in the Doctrine and Covenants and in other revelations. “He was in the beginning with God, and was God;” and He could not be a god, they say, unless He had a body, had passed through mortality and had been resurrected. What scripture did they find to suggest that notion? I don’t know of any revelation that declares it. I don’t know of any that intimates at all that He could not be God unless He had passed through a mortal probation and had been tried and tempted and had suffered; that He could not be God beforehand; but we are told that in the beginning He was with God, and He says that the Father had shown Him all things that He Himself doeth. That is in the fifth chapter of the Gospel according to St. John. I will not take time to stop and turn to it. You read it. He was in conversation with some of the Pharisees, and they did not like His proclaiming Himself to be the .Son of God. In the 10th chapter it is said they took up stones to throw at Him because He said He was the Son of God. And Jesus proclaimed the truth that there are several persons called God, just as Paul does in his First Epistle to the Corinthians. (Chapter 8:5, 6.) “Though there be many that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth,” says Paul, “as there be gods many and lords many. But to us there is but one God, the Father of whom are all things and we in Him and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by Him.” Jesus quoted the Psalms in regard to this. The Psalmist said, “I have said ye are gods, and all of you are children of the most high.” (82:6.) Now, said Jesus, if he called them Gods, to whom the word of the Lord came, why do you find fault with me and desire to stone me for saying that I am the son of God? In the Psalm 82 it begins, “God standeth in the congregation of the mighty. He judgeth among the gods.”
There are gods many and lords many, but unto us. for our obedience and our worship, and our adherence to His word, there is one living and true God the Creator of this and many other worlds, and we look to Him as the author of our life, by and through His Beloved Son, who was with Him from the beginning. The Holy Ghost is a personage of spirit as we are told, in the 130th section of the Doctrine and Covenants, the Father is a person with a body of flesh and bones, and the Son also, (He is now, undoubtedly), and the Holy Ghost is a personage of spirit. Now that Holy Ghost, a personage of spirit, is also called God. Take the 20th Section of the Doctrine and Covenants. In the laying of the very foundation of the organization of the Church it is declared most distinctly that, “The Father, Son and Holy Ghost, are one God.” Just as in the presidency of a stake or of a quorum or of the Church there are three distinct and separate individuals, but one presidency of the quorum, or of the stake, or of the Church, so there are three separate and distinct persons, the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, as one Deity. Now who is the Son? The first-born, the beloved Son of God, whom He put at the head of all things, the heir of all things “by whom also He made the worlds.” I am quoting scripture. Now, when God the Father placed Jesus Christ in a position, or placed Jehovah in any position and gave Him commandment to do this that and the other, He would not tell Him to do anything that He could not do. That is one of the fundamentals of our Gospel. “Surely the Lord God will command nothing of the children of men but He prepareth a way whereby they can accomplish it.” God gave full power and authority to Jesus Christ, as we call Him now, that is His name, and He was named beforehand in the revelations of God, as we can read in the Pearl of Great Price. His Beloved Son, He was with Him from the beginning. He was obedient in all things. He did no wrong when He was in that condition, nor when He was in the body. He as innocent of any transgression. He loved righteousness, He hated iniquity; and “therefore God anointed Him with the oil of gladness above His fellows.”
How many millions of ages ago it was when He became the firstborn, I don’t know; it is not revealed. A great many things concerning our history before we came here are not revealed and will not be, perhaps, until we get into a further state of progression; but the Father placed His Son, His' “Beloved Son,” to look after the affairs of this world and to. direct them, and He was in the creation, as I have explained and as I have quoted from the scriptures. In this Sth Chapter of John, Jesus goes on to explain to the people that He did nothing of Himself, but that which the Father sent Him to do, that He did; and He said, “The Son doeth nothing but what He seeth the Father do, for the Father loveth the Son and showeth Him all things that He Himself doeth.” (verse 20.) Now, if the Father, in the course of His great experience as revealed through the Prophet Joseph, had passed through the “estate” of mortals that He might be placed in the same conditions of trial, so was Jesus thus placed, and the Lord showed to Jesus all about this. He showed to Him all about the organization of the worlds. “The Father loveth the Son and showeth Him all things that He Himself doeth, and He will show Him greater works than these, that ye may marvel;” so we read. Then He goes on to tell, in regard to the resurrection, from the dead, what will become of all people. All being brought forth from their graves through His power as “the resurrection and the life,” some to eternal life and glory and some to everlasting condemnation. That being the case. He understood all about it by sight, and the time being set when He should come to the earth and take a body, He was qualified to do that for which He was appointed in the beginning. We need not have any dubiety about His understanding all that. There is no need for the theory that He must have had a body before coming to this earth, and there is nothing that establishes it by revelation. The mere opinions of men do not count for very much.
The Holy Ghost as “a personage of spirit,” whom Jesus Christ said he would send from the Father, and who would not come unless Jesus went away (John 16:7) was not and is not a “being of tabernacle,” but, without a body of flesh and bones, he represents both the Father and the Son and is one of the Godhead. (I John 5:7.) The Holy Trinity operate by the power and presence of the Divine spirit which permeates all things and is the life and the light of all things. Thus our Father is everywhere present, while as an individual He dwells in heaven “in the midst of all things,” and so with the other personages in the Godhead.
If you will read the first and second chapters of the Epistle to the Hebrews, you will learn there that it became necessary, in order to lead many sons unto glory and salvation, that Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, should be in all points as they are. If that is so, then he was a spirit in the spirit world when we were spirits and He was the first-born. Therefore it says, “as the children are made partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise took part of the same,” so that He might suffer temptations like the rest, that He might pass through all these conditions of mortality in His own experience, and be raised from the dead. "Wherefore in all things it behoved Him to be made like unto His-brethren.” (Heb. 2:14-17.)
One other point in regard to it: When Jesus was on the cross, what did He say just before His last, expiring moment? “Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit!” and having said thus He gave up the ghost..’’ (Luke 23:26.) He was a spirit dwelling in a mortal body and He gave up the spirit just like we have to—“gave up the ghost.” As I said, He was the first of all and He will be the last, because when He receives the kingdom from the Ancient of Days, after it is all purified and perfected, and the earth is redeemed, and the inhabitants thereof are cleansed from their transgressions through His atonement, He will present the kingdom to the Father. “The first and the last!” He is the only begotten of the Father in the flesh, the first begotten in the spirit, a great and mighty Being. He wrought more wonders when He came on the earth than we have any understanding of. He was the Mighty God, as proclaimed by the Prophet Isaiah, the Wonderful Counselor, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace, whom we can gladly adore. When we pray, we are told directly how to pray, and a sample is given to us in the blessing of the bread and of the water in the sacrament: “Oh, God, the Eternal Father, we ask Thee in the name of Jesus Christ, Thy Son,” so and so; that is the pattern for our prayers. We pray to the Eternal Father, whom we have named Elohim. We pray to Him in the name of Jesus Christ, for Jesus Christ is His Word, He is the expression of God's will, lie was with the Father in the beginning. The Father has placed His name upon Him. God sometimes places His name in angelic beings, ministering spirits, as you can read in the first chapter of Revelation and the first verse: “The revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave to Him to show unto His servant things which must shortly come to pass, and He sent by His angel and delivered it to His servant, John.” In the last chapter of the Book we read about John bowing to worship that being but he told him not to do it, for he was one of his fellow-servants and of his brethren, the prophets.” Then the angel said, “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginnig and the end, the first and the last.” (Rev. 22:13.) Well, was He? He was speaking for Jesus, the Christ, as Christ speaks for the Father when He is so appointed. See also the appointment of the angel spoken of in Exodus 23:20: “Behold I send an angel before thee to keep thee in the way. Beware of him and obey his voice: provoke him not for he will not pardon your transgressions for My Name is in him.”
There isn’t time for me to go any further on this matter. I have taken up a great deal more time than I had intended to do, but I have started on this point and it is for the purpose that we may avoid contentions and discussions that arise among us for no needful purpose. God the Eternal Father who made the world, by and through Jesus Christ, is our Father and our God and we worship and adore Him, and as we have been taught to do today we should obey Him. That is the great point. Take His word and live by it. Live by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Jesus taught that “a man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God.” Jesus of in Nazareth, born of the virgin Mary, was literally' and truly the Son of! the Father, the Eternal God, not! of Adam. Don't think so for a I moment. Christ was the Son of God. of God the Father; the Father of His Spirit was the Father of His body. He was an exalted man who had passed through all things that Jesus Christ, His Beloved Son, afterwards passed through. It was a repetition of the things that had been done from remote, eternal ages, the great plan of salvation for all the people of all the worlds that God has created. He is not a mere force or ethereal immateriality, but is the embodiment in His personality of light, truth, virtue, justice, mercy, energy and all the eternal verities.
God help us to see and understand the truth and to avoid error! And don’t let us be too strong in our feelings in regard to our opinions of matters. Let us try to be right. I have prayed from a boy, when I first heard the Gospel, that I might see the truth as God sees it, that I might have it as it really is, and the Lord has blessed me in answer to that prayer. I don’t pretend to say that I do not make mistakes like other people do. I don't mean that, but I mean that my heart is set to find out the right and the truth; and while “God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform,” I don't expect to have made known to me anything that should not be revealed, but the things that have been revealed I have studied and reflected upon and prayed about, and I know that the light of God, by the power of the Holy Ghost, has rested upon me and qualified me in my labors and lit up my soul with the light of eternity and drawn me nearer to Him. He is my Father and my God. And I venerate and rejoice in the atonement of Jesus Christ His Son and believe in Him with all my heart. Jesus of Nazareth, who was put to death on the cross, is the Son of God in the spirit and in the body. He is, therefore, our elder brother, and we should follow Him and emulate His example, embody all His virtues as near as we can, for He is our head over this Church, the living spiritual head. He made it, he organized it under the direction of the Holy One, our great Eternal Father. And now, praise and glory be unto God the Father, and to His Son Jesus Christ and to the Holy Ghost, who speaks for both the Father and the Son and is with the Church to enlighten it by the power of the Eternal spirit, even so. Amen.
A duet, entitled, “Stay Thou with me,” was sung by Geneva Harris and James II. Neilson; words and music by Evan Stephens.
Universal redemption through obedience—Evil of contentions—Trinity of the Godhead—God the Father of spirit—Christ the Firstborn—Elohim, Jehovah and Michael in the creation—Adam head of the mortal human race, but not one of the Godhead — Preexistence of Jesus Christ as Jehovah, a Personage of Spirit—Personality of the Holy Ghost—Plurality of Gods—Angels bearing name of Deity—Christ the Word of God, the Redeemer of the World—God the Eternal Father to be worshiped and obeyed.
I feel very much like President Smith did this morning in arising to address the congregation—1 have not language to express the emotions of my heart in being privileged to assemble with you, my brethren and sisters, in this great congregation of Latter-day Saints. I am very thankful to God, our Eternal Father, for this blessing, and for having the testimony in my soul of the truth of those principles which were so grandly placed before us this morning by our President. There is nothing in the world that I know of which is so dear to my heart as the truth which has been revealed in these last days from God through His servant Joseph, the prophet. And when I think of the goodness of God to me during all the years that I have been associated with the Saints and labored in the ministry, I feel overwhelmed with gratitude and thanksgiving and praise. Praise be unto God our Eternal Father and His Son Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost, and His servants who have been called in these last days to lay the foundations of the Church and Kingdom of our God!
I would that all the world could see and understand these things as we do, but that is at present—I was going to say impossible—it can not be done at present, but I rejoice in the assurance given in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, in the revelations of the Lord to us, that the time will come when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is the Lord, the Christ, to the glory of God the Father, and this will not be by compulsion or constraint, but by the willing desires of those who bow, they having been brought through sorrow and pain and suffering, penalties for their sins, into a condition of repentance and desire for the truth and a willingness to obey it. That to me is a glorious prospect. And the work of preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ which now devolves upon a few, will never be consummated entirely until that time shall come when every soul of Adam’s race will have the opportunity of receiving and bowing to the truth as it is in Jesus Christ.
There is a very great work to be performed when we think of that which has to be clone in this regard. The gospel must be preached to every creature in the flesh and afterwards to every person in the spirit who has not heard it, until all the millions upon millions of the race of Adam shall have had the opportunity of bowing in obedience to the commandments of God and coming, to some degree, in communion with Him. At present, as we were told this morning, the duty devolves upon the Priesthood of this Church, in both its branches, in the Melchizedek and Aaronic branches of the priesthood, to minister in the name of the Lord by divine authority, and what they do under that authority in the way that the Lord has commanded is valid, and it has power and force in the heavens. What they administer on earth in the way that the Lord has appointed is recognized on high, and is of the same force and effect as though performed by Deity.
The truth which the Lord has revealed, naturally comes into collision with error wherever it is found, and the time will come when all error, all untruth will have to give way and the truth will abound. It is by the truth that we shall be sanctified, that is, by obedience to it, as was explained to us today, not merely its reception in the mind, but its actual possession of us in all our being; that we live for the truth and by the truth and according to the truth and to the degree that we do that we become sanctified in our nature and come nearer to Him who is the fountain of truth, to us. Truth itself in the abstract is eternal, but there have been individuals who have been the embodiments of the truth and of all that is good and great, and our Heavenly Father is that embodiment, and Jesus Christ also, and the expression of it to us of all that is right and true and good. The eternal verities are embodied in them and are communicated to us as we are willing to receive them. When we do receive them, not merely in theory, but also in practice and make them ours in our lives, in our constitution, in our very being, so far we approach towards the perfection of Deity.
The very first principle of our faith, announced in what is called the articles of our faith, is that we believe in God the Eternal Father, and in His Son Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost. These three separate personalities are placed in the very foundation of our faith, as its first doctrine or principle, and we ought to become thoroughly familiar with that which has been revealed concerning them and we ought to understand them alike. One of the very great beauties of our Church is that we are coming io union—the unity of the faith by the knowledge of the truth. When we know the truth and see it clearly we are alike in our perceptions and our understandings, and measureably according to our obedience in the government of our own natures by the truth. Sometimes, however, even in the Church of Christ, in which we are “all baptized by one spirit into one body, whether we be Jew or Gentile, bond or free,” of every race and tribe and kingdom and color, although we are baptized by water and by the spirit into one body and should be perfectly united, especially in doctrine and principle, yet like it was in the early Christian Church there are sometimes divisions among us in regard to many important things, and sometimes there are very sharp divisions upon things that are not so important. Our brethren in some of their class meetings and quorum meetings, sometimes even in the theological departments of the Sunday schools they get divided in their opinions in regard to some very simple things—I was going to say silly things, but I don’t want to be censorious—some things that are not worth spending time over. The reason I know about this is because I frequently personally receive letters from good friends in different parts of the Church, asking questions and declaring that there is a division of opinion among our brethren in regard to them. And the First Presidency frequently receive communications from the brethren asking for a decision on certain points that are really not worth discussing, that do not amount to anything, but there are some things which are important for us to understand aright.
It was very clearly shown to us this morning that we have one Eternal Father and that Jesus Christ is His Son, and that we also are His sons, with this difference, that we are all the sons of God in the spirit, that is in the spirit part of our nature, but Christ is also His Son in the flesh. I do not think there is any division of sentiment or opinion among our brethren an 1 sisters in the Church concerning this fact, that the spirit part of man—that of course means woman too—is the offspring of God, God is the Father of our spirits. We often quote the saying of Paul, who seemed to have a very good idea in regard to all these things, or rather, if you do not believe that Paul wrote the Epistle to the Hebrews as I do—(great dispute about that in the world)—in the Epistle to the Hebrews we are told that “we have had fathers of our flesh who corrected us and we gave them reverence,” and the question is asked, “How much rather should we be in subjection to the Father of spirits, Heb. 12:9. There are many other texts in the old scriptures, in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, that I will not take time to quote this afternoon, because, as I have said, I think we are all agreed in regard to this one very important fact, this very encouraging truth, this thing that lifts up the soul of man above earthly things to the realization that his origin is not from the dust but from the Eternal God, the Creator, the Ruler, the Architect of the universe. He who made the worlds, and as we heard today, controls and governs and directs them, is actually our Father, not in some mystical sense, not in some mere theory, but we were begotten of Him. In the revelation contained in the 76th Section of the Doctrine and Covenants we are told that the inhabitants of the worlds are “begotten sons and daughters unto God.” There may be more in that than we see at the first glance, but the result of it all is in our minds, if we are at all logical, that the great Eternal God is our Father and we are begotten of Him or UNTO Him and to Him we owe allegiance, to Him we owe obedience, because He is our Father and our God and our King. We should obey Him because of His parentage to us; we should obey Him because we are His children and He has the right to our obedience, and being so high and exalted and lifted up, He understands us better than we understand ourselves and He has our destiny in His hands and He has power over life and over death and we should be obedient to Him because of our relationship to Him. That seems clear to me and I believe it is to you and to the great body of the Latter-day Saints, the Church.
There still remains, I can tell by the letters I have alluded to, an idea among some of the people that Adam was and is the Almighty and Eternal God. He is the father of his race, of course, the great patriarch over the human family, and being begotten unto him, he is the father of us in our earthly condition, in our mortality, and stands as the primal patriarch. But God says He put him there. Now, so far as that is concerned that is all right. In the 107th Section of the Doctrine and Covenants, you will read about that. Three years before his death we are told Adam gathered together the majority of his posterity who were righteous into the valley of Adam-OndiAhman, and they rose up and blessed him and called him Michael the prince, the arch-angel, and the Lord appeared unto them. Now, mark you, there was Adam and his posterity, so far as they were brought forth at that time, and the Lord appeared to them — that wasn’t Adam, was it? “And the Lord administered comfort unto Adam and said: I have set thee to be at the head”—the head of his race, the head of the human family in their mortal condition—“I have set thee to be at the head; a multitude of nations shall come of thee and thou art a prince over them forever” (verses 53-55).
Here is Adam with his posterity, they recognizing him and acknowledging him as their patriarch and father and prince, and recognizing the fact that in his first estate he was Michael, recognizing also that the Lord appears and declares He places Adam at the head. Now. Adam had transgressed a law and because of that he had to pay the penalty, and because of that, death came upon his posterity on natural principles, (as we will understand better when we comprehend fully how these things occur, and how our tendencies and traits and taints are handed down from the fathers to the children to the different generations that come). But although he had transgressed, that had been foreseen, and, according to the revelations that we have, a plan had been prepared before this transgression took place whereby the results of it might be removed and whereby a blessing might come in that very thing that was called “the curse.” That the knowledge of good and evil might come to mankind, that they might have an opportunity of showing whether they loved the truth and loved the good or loved the evil and the untruth, and that they might be judged according to their works, and that their different capabilities and their different degrees of worthiness or unworthiness might be exhibited and developed and showed forth so that justice might be done and that mercy might be extended where it was needful, that mercy should not rob justice and justice should not rob mercy, the Lord, in view of the fact that a Redeemer had been prepared from the foundation of the world for the redemption of the whole human family, in their different degrees, smiled upon Adam and blessed him and placed him at the head of his posterity as the great patriarch of the race, as a prince over them forever.
Now, because of that and some other little matters that might be mentioned, the notion has taken hold of some of our brethren that Adam is the being that we should worship. This has been explained, I think, from this stand several times, but notwithstanding that, peculiar ideas get into people’s minds, not always because, they are stubborn and wilfull and wicked or that they desire anything that is wrong, but because it gets into their heads and it is a very hard job to get it out of their heads, like the Scotchman who asked the Lord to keep him in the right path so that he might not go “wrang, for the Lord knew that if he once got anything into his head, it would be a mighty hard job to get it out of him.” That is the way it is with lots of our folks, not because they are all Scotchmen, however, the idea has obtained in the minds of some of the brethren and we ought to get right concerning it. I am sorry that has not been rectified long ago, because plain answers have been given to brethren and sisters who write and desire to know about it, and yet it still lingers, and contentions arise in regard to it, and there should be no contentions among the Latter-day Saints. It is all right for people to have their own views and express them, if they will do it in a proper spirit; it is all right for people to stand up for what they really believe to be true, but when this spirit oi contention comes, then, as we are told in the Book of Mormon, it is of the devil.
Now, if Adam, as claimed by some of our brethren, is the being that we should worship, to whom we should pray, who was that person that put Adam at the head of his race? Who was the person that Adam prayed to? Adam prayed to God and we are told, as we can find in the Pearl of Great Price, which gives us a great deal of information on this matter, as revealed to Moses, and as revealed to Enoch, that Adam, after his transgression, was taught the gospel, the same gospel that we have, and the Lord said He would not suffer that Adam should die as to the temporal death until He “sent forth angels to proclaim faith and redemption through the name of His Only Begotten Son” (see Doc. and Cov. Sec. 29). So that Adam had to believe and repent and be baptized as we have to do. and we are told that he was baptized “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.” So Adam was neither the Father, nor the Son, nor the Holy Ghost, was he? Then, who was he? Why, we are told he was Michael in his first estate, and as Adam he will stand at the head of his race. Daniel saw him “in the night vision”—Michael who was the archangel before he came here. Remember when you talk about Adam, that name only applies to the man Adam on the earth with a body made out of the dust, but Michael, the archangel, the Ancient of days did sit; so Daniel saw, and “ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him.” And, then, we are told, “One like the Son of Man came in the clouds of heaven and was brought before the Ancient of days, and there was given Him dominion and an everlasting kingdom that all people should serve him” (Daniel 7:9-14). We will find that this will be the case; for when we learn a little more about this person—the Son of Man—we will see that this is His due—that He will be at the head of the Kingdom; He will be King of kings, and Lord of lords. He is “the first and the last,” so He proclaims. You will find it in the Old Testament and in the New, and in the Book of Mormon, and in the Pearl of Great Price, that He is “The First and the last” and that all things were made by Him and they are of Him and through Him and for Him.
Now, who is this person, this Jesus Christ? Is He Adam or a son of Adam? Not at all, except in the sense that Jesus of Nazareth was born of Mary, and therein was His humanity and that is traced right up to Adam, of course, in the scriptural genealogy. But who was the Father of Jesus Christ before He came on the earth in the flesh? We read in the Book of Mormon that when He appeared to the Nephites on this continent, He told them that He was the person that gave the law unto Moses. Who was it that gave the law to Moses? We are told it was Jehovah. Well, was Jesus Jehovah? Yes, according to the scriptures, both ancient and modern, and that seems to be a stumbling block in the way of a few of our brethren. (See Doc. and Cov., Sec. 10:3, 4.) We are told by revelation that in the creation of the earth there were three individuals, personally engaged. This is more particularly for the Temple of God, but sufficient of it has been published over and over again to permit me to refer to it. Elohim,—not Eloheim, as we spell it sometimes— that is a plural word meaning the gods, but it is attached to the individual who is the Father of all, the person whom we look to as the great Eternal Father. Elohim. Jehovah and Michael, were engaged in the construction of this globe. Jehovah, commanded by Elohim, went down to where there was space, saying to Michael: “Let us go down, for there is space there, and we will organize an earth whereon these [the spirits that are around us] may dwell, and we will prove them herewith to see if they will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them.” You can read about that in the Pearl of Great Price—Book of Abraham, chapter 3. Now. when the work was done, which you rea l about in the Book of Genesis and more particularly in the Book of Moses and in the Book of Abraham in the Pearl of Great Price, when that was done, Michael became Adam and was placed in the Garden of Eden, as we read in ancient and modern revelations, and Eve was given to him to be his wife, bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh, and it is announced that no man should nut asunder that which God had joined together.
You see, do you not, that Michael became Adam and that Adam was not the Son Jehovah, and he was not Elohim the Father. He occupied his own place and position in the organization of the earth and in the production of mortal beings on the earth. Jesus of Nazareth was the Jehovah who was engaged with the Father in the beginning, and we are told in the 93rd Section of the Doctrine and Covenants that Jesus says concerning Himself, “I also was in the beginning with the Father and am the first-born.” “Ye were also in the beginning with the Father, that which is spirit.” That part of us which is spirit, was in the beginning with God, because we are His children and Jesus was there, the person that is called Jesus in the flesh, and He was the firstborn, that is how He is the first. “I am the first and the last. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end.” He was the beginning of the spirits who people this earth, “the beginning of the creation of God,” as we read in the Colossians and in the Book of Revelation, “the first-born of every creature” in the spirit. But, in the flesh He was the “Only Begotten Son” of the Father. Mary was his mother. She was of the House of David and therefore Jesus fulfilled the prediction that the Messiah was to be of the House of David, and of the seed of Abraham, and the seed of the woman who should bruise the serpent's head, as we read in the Book of Genesis, 3:15.
I want to draw a clear distinction between these individuals that we may stop this discussion that is going on to no purpose. Who is Adam? Adam is our father, certainly. He is the great father of the race, but we have had fathers that corrected us at home and we gave them reverence. Yes, that is right, but do we worship them and pray to them? Oh, no. Then why should we want to pray to Adam, who away back in the remote centuries was at the head of his race and in that sense is our father? He occupies the place that he was expected to occupy and did the work he was expected to perform, but after he transgressed and brought death into the world, “as by one man’s disobedience death came into the world so by one man’s obedience and righteousness life came into the world. So that “as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive,” all be resurrected, every one, bad and good and indifferent, all races and colors, and sizes and ages as they were laid down, so they will come forth, and it is through the power of the resurrection in Jesus Christ that they come forth.
Let us cite the Book of John the Apostle, it is a splendid thesis. The Lord refers to it in the 93rd Section of the Doctrine and Covenants, wherein John proclaimed that Jesus was in the beginning with God. He says: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made,” and Jesus declares in this revelation, 93rd section, that He was the person called the Word. He was not merely the word coming from the mouth of God, but He was the expression of the Father, He was the expression of God’s word and will. All things are of God. as Paul said, and we of Him and all things by Jesus Christ and we by Him. When Joseph the prophet received his first manifestation from God, the Father and the Son appeared. The Father did not say a great deal, but we shall find that has been His course from the very beginning, because the Son was His Word. He declared: “This is my beloved Son, hear Him.” And He, the Son, was that being, as He told the Nephites, who gave the law to Moses (3 Nephi 15:5) and He was the Being who had charge of matters from the very beginning. In the Deity there are the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, and our father Adam was baptized in their holy name and he is not either one of them. Just remember that.
In the fifth chapter of the Gospel according to St. John, Jesus speaks very clearly on matters that may seem mysterious to some people. You know there are some of our brethren who have thought that Jesus, in His first estate, as we call it, or in His former state, was a resurrected being. I do not know where they get the idea from, but it is likely from this, that He was called God by John the Revelator and by a great number of writers in the Book of Mormon and in the Doctrine and Covenants and in other revelations. “He was in the beginning with God, and was God;” and He could not be a god, they say, unless He had a body, had passed through mortality and had been resurrected. What scripture did they find to suggest that notion? I don’t know of any revelation that declares it. I don’t know of any that intimates at all that He could not be God unless He had passed through a mortal probation and had been tried and tempted and had suffered; that He could not be God beforehand; but we are told that in the beginning He was with God, and He says that the Father had shown Him all things that He Himself doeth. That is in the fifth chapter of the Gospel according to St. John. I will not take time to stop and turn to it. You read it. He was in conversation with some of the Pharisees, and they did not like His proclaiming Himself to be the .Son of God. In the 10th chapter it is said they took up stones to throw at Him because He said He was the Son of God. And Jesus proclaimed the truth that there are several persons called God, just as Paul does in his First Epistle to the Corinthians. (Chapter 8:5, 6.) “Though there be many that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth,” says Paul, “as there be gods many and lords many. But to us there is but one God, the Father of whom are all things and we in Him and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by Him.” Jesus quoted the Psalms in regard to this. The Psalmist said, “I have said ye are gods, and all of you are children of the most high.” (82:6.) Now, said Jesus, if he called them Gods, to whom the word of the Lord came, why do you find fault with me and desire to stone me for saying that I am the son of God? In the Psalm 82 it begins, “God standeth in the congregation of the mighty. He judgeth among the gods.”
There are gods many and lords many, but unto us. for our obedience and our worship, and our adherence to His word, there is one living and true God the Creator of this and many other worlds, and we look to Him as the author of our life, by and through His Beloved Son, who was with Him from the beginning. The Holy Ghost is a personage of spirit as we are told, in the 130th section of the Doctrine and Covenants, the Father is a person with a body of flesh and bones, and the Son also, (He is now, undoubtedly), and the Holy Ghost is a personage of spirit. Now that Holy Ghost, a personage of spirit, is also called God. Take the 20th Section of the Doctrine and Covenants. In the laying of the very foundation of the organization of the Church it is declared most distinctly that, “The Father, Son and Holy Ghost, are one God.” Just as in the presidency of a stake or of a quorum or of the Church there are three distinct and separate individuals, but one presidency of the quorum, or of the stake, or of the Church, so there are three separate and distinct persons, the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, as one Deity. Now who is the Son? The first-born, the beloved Son of God, whom He put at the head of all things, the heir of all things “by whom also He made the worlds.” I am quoting scripture. Now, when God the Father placed Jesus Christ in a position, or placed Jehovah in any position and gave Him commandment to do this that and the other, He would not tell Him to do anything that He could not do. That is one of the fundamentals of our Gospel. “Surely the Lord God will command nothing of the children of men but He prepareth a way whereby they can accomplish it.” God gave full power and authority to Jesus Christ, as we call Him now, that is His name, and He was named beforehand in the revelations of God, as we can read in the Pearl of Great Price. His Beloved Son, He was with Him from the beginning. He was obedient in all things. He did no wrong when He was in that condition, nor when He was in the body. He as innocent of any transgression. He loved righteousness, He hated iniquity; and “therefore God anointed Him with the oil of gladness above His fellows.”
How many millions of ages ago it was when He became the firstborn, I don’t know; it is not revealed. A great many things concerning our history before we came here are not revealed and will not be, perhaps, until we get into a further state of progression; but the Father placed His Son, His' “Beloved Son,” to look after the affairs of this world and to. direct them, and He was in the creation, as I have explained and as I have quoted from the scriptures. In this Sth Chapter of John, Jesus goes on to explain to the people that He did nothing of Himself, but that which the Father sent Him to do, that He did; and He said, “The Son doeth nothing but what He seeth the Father do, for the Father loveth the Son and showeth Him all things that He Himself doeth.” (verse 20.) Now, if the Father, in the course of His great experience as revealed through the Prophet Joseph, had passed through the “estate” of mortals that He might be placed in the same conditions of trial, so was Jesus thus placed, and the Lord showed to Jesus all about this. He showed to Him all about the organization of the worlds. “The Father loveth the Son and showeth Him all things that He Himself doeth, and He will show Him greater works than these, that ye may marvel;” so we read. Then He goes on to tell, in regard to the resurrection, from the dead, what will become of all people. All being brought forth from their graves through His power as “the resurrection and the life,” some to eternal life and glory and some to everlasting condemnation. That being the case. He understood all about it by sight, and the time being set when He should come to the earth and take a body, He was qualified to do that for which He was appointed in the beginning. We need not have any dubiety about His understanding all that. There is no need for the theory that He must have had a body before coming to this earth, and there is nothing that establishes it by revelation. The mere opinions of men do not count for very much.
The Holy Ghost as “a personage of spirit,” whom Jesus Christ said he would send from the Father, and who would not come unless Jesus went away (John 16:7) was not and is not a “being of tabernacle,” but, without a body of flesh and bones, he represents both the Father and the Son and is one of the Godhead. (I John 5:7.) The Holy Trinity operate by the power and presence of the Divine spirit which permeates all things and is the life and the light of all things. Thus our Father is everywhere present, while as an individual He dwells in heaven “in the midst of all things,” and so with the other personages in the Godhead.
If you will read the first and second chapters of the Epistle to the Hebrews, you will learn there that it became necessary, in order to lead many sons unto glory and salvation, that Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, should be in all points as they are. If that is so, then he was a spirit in the spirit world when we were spirits and He was the first-born. Therefore it says, “as the children are made partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise took part of the same,” so that He might suffer temptations like the rest, that He might pass through all these conditions of mortality in His own experience, and be raised from the dead. "Wherefore in all things it behoved Him to be made like unto His-brethren.” (Heb. 2:14-17.)
One other point in regard to it: When Jesus was on the cross, what did He say just before His last, expiring moment? “Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit!” and having said thus He gave up the ghost..’’ (Luke 23:26.) He was a spirit dwelling in a mortal body and He gave up the spirit just like we have to—“gave up the ghost.” As I said, He was the first of all and He will be the last, because when He receives the kingdom from the Ancient of Days, after it is all purified and perfected, and the earth is redeemed, and the inhabitants thereof are cleansed from their transgressions through His atonement, He will present the kingdom to the Father. “The first and the last!” He is the only begotten of the Father in the flesh, the first begotten in the spirit, a great and mighty Being. He wrought more wonders when He came on the earth than we have any understanding of. He was the Mighty God, as proclaimed by the Prophet Isaiah, the Wonderful Counselor, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace, whom we can gladly adore. When we pray, we are told directly how to pray, and a sample is given to us in the blessing of the bread and of the water in the sacrament: “Oh, God, the Eternal Father, we ask Thee in the name of Jesus Christ, Thy Son,” so and so; that is the pattern for our prayers. We pray to the Eternal Father, whom we have named Elohim. We pray to Him in the name of Jesus Christ, for Jesus Christ is His Word, He is the expression of God's will, lie was with the Father in the beginning. The Father has placed His name upon Him. God sometimes places His name in angelic beings, ministering spirits, as you can read in the first chapter of Revelation and the first verse: “The revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave to Him to show unto His servant things which must shortly come to pass, and He sent by His angel and delivered it to His servant, John.” In the last chapter of the Book we read about John bowing to worship that being but he told him not to do it, for he was one of his fellow-servants and of his brethren, the prophets.” Then the angel said, “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginnig and the end, the first and the last.” (Rev. 22:13.) Well, was He? He was speaking for Jesus, the Christ, as Christ speaks for the Father when He is so appointed. See also the appointment of the angel spoken of in Exodus 23:20: “Behold I send an angel before thee to keep thee in the way. Beware of him and obey his voice: provoke him not for he will not pardon your transgressions for My Name is in him.”
There isn’t time for me to go any further on this matter. I have taken up a great deal more time than I had intended to do, but I have started on this point and it is for the purpose that we may avoid contentions and discussions that arise among us for no needful purpose. God the Eternal Father who made the world, by and through Jesus Christ, is our Father and our God and we worship and adore Him, and as we have been taught to do today we should obey Him. That is the great point. Take His word and live by it. Live by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Jesus taught that “a man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God.” Jesus of in Nazareth, born of the virgin Mary, was literally' and truly the Son of! the Father, the Eternal God, not! of Adam. Don't think so for a I moment. Christ was the Son of God. of God the Father; the Father of His Spirit was the Father of His body. He was an exalted man who had passed through all things that Jesus Christ, His Beloved Son, afterwards passed through. It was a repetition of the things that had been done from remote, eternal ages, the great plan of salvation for all the people of all the worlds that God has created. He is not a mere force or ethereal immateriality, but is the embodiment in His personality of light, truth, virtue, justice, mercy, energy and all the eternal verities.
God help us to see and understand the truth and to avoid error! And don’t let us be too strong in our feelings in regard to our opinions of matters. Let us try to be right. I have prayed from a boy, when I first heard the Gospel, that I might see the truth as God sees it, that I might have it as it really is, and the Lord has blessed me in answer to that prayer. I don’t pretend to say that I do not make mistakes like other people do. I don't mean that, but I mean that my heart is set to find out the right and the truth; and while “God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform,” I don't expect to have made known to me anything that should not be revealed, but the things that have been revealed I have studied and reflected upon and prayed about, and I know that the light of God, by the power of the Holy Ghost, has rested upon me and qualified me in my labors and lit up my soul with the light of eternity and drawn me nearer to Him. He is my Father and my God. And I venerate and rejoice in the atonement of Jesus Christ His Son and believe in Him with all my heart. Jesus of Nazareth, who was put to death on the cross, is the Son of God in the spirit and in the body. He is, therefore, our elder brother, and we should follow Him and emulate His example, embody all His virtues as near as we can, for He is our head over this Church, the living spiritual head. He made it, he organized it under the direction of the Holy One, our great Eternal Father. And now, praise and glory be unto God the Father, and to His Son Jesus Christ and to the Holy Ghost, who speaks for both the Father and the Son and is with the Church to enlighten it by the power of the Eternal spirit, even so. Amen.
A duet, entitled, “Stay Thou with me,” was sung by Geneva Harris and James II. Neilson; words and music by Evan Stephens.
PREST. FRANCIS M. LYMAN.
Temporal salvation of our people carefully considered—Worthy and capable persons selected for Church offices—Each President of Church specially qualified for -time of ministry—Astonishing outlay by Church for educational purposes, etc.,—Successful efforts in home industries—Great advantages in obeying Word of Wisdom—Honest tithe-payers also pay their debts—The habit of saving inculcated.
I feel very grateful for our presence on this occasion and for the splendid Spirit that has attended the First Presidency in their discourses to us today, for they have been superior. They always talk well, but I feel that they have talked a little better today than usual. I am sure that the Latter-day Saints have felt fed with the word of the Lord. Our understanding of the Gospel has been enlightened, and our faith strengthened; and I trust that we will do better in the future, serve the Lord more perfectly and have His favor and fellowship abiding always with us.
I am reminded occasionally, as I presume all the brethren are, of the necessity of employment for the Latter-day Saints. I suppose the Presiding Bishopric are advised of these necessities and are doing everything in their power to find labor for those who are unemployed. In our state, as I suppose in other states as well, there are armies of people quite generally at labor, and yet always some needing employment. We are admonished of the necessity of production from the rich soils that we enjoy and the resources about us to provide for the temporal salvation of the people; for we not only need salvation spiritually but we need salvation temporally. I thought of this today, when looking over one of the revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants, that refers particularly to the temporal salvation of the people. I was led, a few weeks ago, at one or two different conferences, to draw the attention of the presiding brethren and the people generally to the temporal salvation that is necessary for us; and I believe that it is not only good for Latter-day Saints but for everybody in the world. It is a doctrine that secures temporal salvation and prosperity to all people who will observe it. It has been given to us now for a great many years, at least, before I was born, and has been before us. It has been taught us continuously and we have undertaken to observe it, and have done so fairly well in very many instances. Still, hardly any of us have been quite perfect in that law. I don’t know that there is any other revelation in which that same expression is used, except the one—a revelation for the temporal salvation of the Saints, and yet applicable and good to everybody else. I have discovered also that many other people have been imbued with this doctrine and principle, and are advocating it. It looks to me as though the Lord was working among the children of men for their temporal salvation as well as ours. I thank the Lord for this word and will, doctrine and counsel, which He gave to us so early in our history, and I thank Him for the hold it has upon the Latter-day Saints. I am proud to discover, as I have been able to do, that our chief brethren at home and abroad, those who are entrusted with responsibility and are required to be the shepherds of the people, and who stand as men sounding a note of warning upon the walls of Zion, for the welfare of the people—that these men as a rule are well established in the faith and in the practice of the doctrine I refer to.
I listened on fast day to a very excellent discourse by President Smith in which he drew our attention to the splendid elements that have been developed in our posterity, in our children, who are born unto the Lord under the new covenant; to the integrity that has been inherited by them, and how reliable and trusty and true they are to the cause of Zion. I appreciated it, as I am sure all did who heard him speak. Since that my mind has been turned also to the field of labor which I have been in since I was twenty years of age; practically all my life, so far as that is concerned; but since I was twenty years of age it has fallen to my lot to be associated with leading brethren, presiding brethren in quorums and wards, and in stakes and missions. I want to say that the testimony given by President Smith in regard to the results of our family relations, the fruit that has been produced under the covenant, the reliability and trustworthiness of our children, can also be borne concerning the remainder of those brethren and sisters, produced among the Latter-day Saints, who hold responsible positions. And a feature that I discover and bear in mind is that in our organization, so complete and so perfect, so valuable and so saving in its nature, it is the rule that we seek always, under the direction of the Lord and His counsel, for the very choicest and best men and women for positions of responsibility; and I want to bear this testimony in the presence of this congregation, that almost universally, we have been well satisfied, and have rarely ever made a mistake. It is very seldom that we find a brother or a sister who is not trustworthy. I want to say this for those upon whom this authority and responsibility rest at this time. There may be quite a percentage who are not, possibly, doing the very best they can, yet are all struggling to do the right thing. But when we go into the field we never find competition among the brethren and sisters to see who shall obtain positions of responsibility. We do in politics, but not in any of our religious organizations. In the wards and in the stakes of Zion, in the councils and quorums and associations and departments of Zion, we take time to deliberate, to consider carefully, and to weigh men and women for positions, and always try to find the best suited, the best qualified, those that fit the position and responsibility best. We have done that and are doing it all the time; and it is a delightful thing to us that there is no struggle one against another and no anxiety to see which shall overcome. We advise with our brethren and sisters in regard to the positions in which they are interested; and I want to say in their behalf that it is a very rare thing, I can hardly tell when one has been censured, or fault found with. Changes are made, must be, necessarily so, occasionally, as circumstances require on account of removal of people or the arising of new conditions; but it is a rare thing that one is ever dismissed because of transgression, either at home or abroad. I wanted to say that much for the record of the Latter-day Saints.
When I heard the President’s report as to what has been accomplished in fourteen years, I was brought to remember that his administration is just about the same length as the Prophet Joseph's, just about fourteen years. I have, during the last few months, referred on some occasions to the various administrations. There have been no two of them alike. There never has been one just like the present, never was one just like President Snow’s, never one just like President Woodruff’s; never one just like President Taylor’s; never one just like President Young’s, never one just like the Prophet Joseph’s. His was the first, laying the foundation. He was the law-giver, giving the word and will of God, and establishing it and perpetuating it to his successors and the Church. I spoke of these administrations and I felt as though it was very proper I should. There may be those here present who heard me speak on that subject. I would not wonder if there were; but I drew attention to the fact that every administration had its peculiar features, for which it has been remarkable, and that this administration is the administration for building, at home and abroad, and the establishment of Church schools and their support. It is astonishing the amount that we have done for the cause of education. We have all helped with our tithing and offerings, our labors and our intelligence. We have done marvels; no people in the world that have made such an effort in regard to Sunday schools and the training of young people. I sometimes think we have pretty near overdone, by the efforts we have made, and there is a rule to regulate and put everything in order as it should be so that no one could slip out or be lost. The efforts of splendid scholarly men who are gathered together in our general boards and associations, the best that we have among the people, with all the advantages that can be brought to their assistance, are being employed now for the benefit of the rising generation.
It is astonishing what is being accomplished, but I want to say just briefly that it is very desirable for the temporal salvation of the Latter-day Saints and of the people of our state. (I speak of the Latter-day Saints because we are talking of them, and to them, and our work is with them; but we are also with the people of the state), it is necessary for the temporal salvation of the people of our state that there should be employment and home industries established. The earth should be cultivated and give forth its rich fruits in all the various lines that are necessary. We have done wonders in a few lines—just what should be done in very many others. The sugar industry is one of the most prominent achievements. It was the ideal thought apparently of President Young in his day, and of President Taylor following him, both of them together making efforts for that purpose. It just seemed as though it was the most important industry, more important than anything else that could be established. And now it has been made a grand success. Now, those who grow the fruit, and vegetables should arrange for canning and taking care of them and supplying them to our neighbors; instead of our buying from our California neighbors and other neighbors, we want to be selling to them. We want to do the same and make the same success in the canning and taking care of fruits and meats that we have done in the sugar business, so that we shall bring means into the country, furnish employment, that there shall be nobody in Zion without labor, but all have something to do, to remunerate them.
Then further, I want us to bear in mind this doctrine that I have been referring to. I shall not read the whole revelation but just a little of it that was given for the especial temporal salvation of the people, and I would like to emphasize some parts of this revelation that possibly we have not thought so much of as we should do; for it is given not only that we may have health and strength in our bodies and live a long time, that the destroyer may pass us by as he did in the days of Israel, but it is for our temporal salvation, that is, that we should have all our temporal necessities met and that we should not be clamoring as of the poor and those that are needy.
SECTION 89.
Revelation Given Through Joseph, the Seer, at Kirtland, Geauga County, Ohio, February 27th, 1833.
1. A Word of Wisdom, for the benefit of the Council of High Priests, assembled in Kirtland, and church; and also the Saints in Zion.
2. To be sent greeting—not by commandment or constraint, but by revelation and the word of wisdom, showing forth the order and will of God in the temporal salvation of all saints in the last days.
3. Given for a principle with promise, adapted to the capacity of the weak and the weakest of all saints, who are or can be called saints.
4. Behold, verily, thus saith the Lord unto you, in consequence of evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring men in the last days, I have warned you, and forewarn you, by giving unto you this word of wisdom by revelation,
5. That _ inasmuch as any man drinketh wine or strong drink among you, behold it is not good, neither meet in the sight of your Father, only in assembling yourselves together to offer up your sacraments before Him.
6. And, behold, this should be wine, yea, pure wine of the grape of the vine, of your own make.
7. And, again, strong drinks are not for the belly, but for the washing of your bodies.
8. And again, tobacco is not for the body, neither for the belly, and is not good for man. but is an herb for bruises and all sick cattle, to be used with judgment and skill.
9. And again, hot drinks are not for the body or belly.
10 And again, verily I say unto you, all wholesome herbs .God hath ordained for the constitution, nature, and use of man.
11. Every herb in the season thereof, and every fruit in the season thereof; all these to be used with prudence and thanksgiving.
12. Yea, flesh also of beasts and of the fowls of the air, I, the Lord, have ordained for the use of man with thanksgiving; nevertheless they are to be used sparingly; etc.
And the things that are thus forbidden in the law,—strong drinks and wine, and tea and coffee, (called hot drinks that were in vogue in the days when this revelation was given), and tobacco,— these things that are expensive, extravagant, destructive of life and health and destructive of means, it is more than wasteful, it is very serious and dangerous to the people to indulge in them, and they tend to poverty. They may be of some profit to those who deal in them, those who buy and sell them, but it is poverty to most of those who engage in the use of these things, which are altogether worthless, improper and wicked, injurious, hurtful, taking life, shortening life and giving us trouble. For if the tea and coffee, and the tobacco and the liquor and the beer that are used in our state, were let alone and the means turned to its proper use and purpose, everybody would be suitably clothed, suitably housed, and all our obligations would be reasonably met, and we would not be in debt. We would be out of debt and have everything that we require, instead of suffering and having those among us begging for employment. We would know how to save our little means, as it should be taken care of. For the tobacco money and the liquor money and the money for tea and coffee, every dollar of it, as a rule, should be saved, except that which is used for medicine, carefully used, as it should be in case of sickness; and we would find that the Latter-day Saints would be thrifty and prosperous, and we would now be living more perfectly under this law, given long before I can remember, and which we have straggled to observe and done fairly well. As I say, the leading men and the leading women of the Church as a rule have made a splendid effort and have set good examples before us. I was delighted, in regard to our financial matters, to find what the President has reported today, the truth in regard to what has been accomplished in fourteen years. Only fourteen years ago, if you will remember, the Church had passed through a very serious straggle under the administration of President John Taylor and President Wilford Woodruff; and when it came to the inauguration of President Snow’s administration, it was the burning question with the leaders of this Church, to know what to do and how to do it, to redeem our obligations. Brethren had to come to the rescue of the Church at that time and before, as the Church was embarrassed and was straggling under difficulties. But when the Lord in simple language to President Snow, said, “Let my people pay their tithing." and the people responded in such measure that, as reported by the President here, in 1906 we met our obligations and have been in good condition ever since. And those who have been faithful in the meeting of their obligations to the Lord have also, I have no doubt, been faithful in their obligations to their brethren; for it is as great a virtue for a man to do by his brother as he would do by the Lord. His obligations to his brother are just as sacred as the obligations to the Lord. Hence you will find, as a rule, those who are very strict and careful in regard to settling with the Lord and in due season thereof, will do the same with their brethren, so that our neighbors will not suffer because of what we owe them. Our merchants, bankers, and business men will receive their own; those that labor for us, build for us, we will meet these obligations honorably, and thus the circulating medium will pass with the people and all our obligations be met, and the necessities of those who help us will be met also. Hence. I want to exhort my brethren and sisters, that we remember this law and that we observe it so that we shall have the sinews of life and of business that are necessary to meet the requirements of our present condition.
It takes a world of means to supply our missionary field. I don't know that the President quite gave us that information, but you would be astonished if the figures were shown to you of what it costs to handle the missionary work of the Latter-day Saints; including the time of the men, and the means that they have to furnish, to pay their own expenses. It amounts to figures of large proportions. The Twelve are laboring constantly to try and have the brethren be just as economical and careful as they can in their ministry.
We want to be economical and careful in our home ministry, in our affairs at home, and every man and every woman should have faith enough in their employment and in their posterity to lay by a little something in the savings department, so that they always have something ahead instead of always being in debt. I teach that lesson to the boys, I teach it to the girls, so that when they start in life they start with the understanding that it is possible for them to save a little something. And I want to tell you what to save—save all the tea and coffee money, all the tobacco, money, every dollar of it, every dollar of the beer and liquor and whisky money. Let no money go for these things at all. I fear that sometimes young people are growing up with an inclination to using those things that are forbidden. They should be restrained. We should take great care with our children, and with our neighbors, and with each other to prevent the waste of means upon those things that are destructive to human life and destructive to our temporal interests. Let us look out and be careful in this regard. Let the Latter-day Saints take this warning and advice and see that there is a saving in this respect; for in the way of every family, there is none so poor but what there are times and opportunities where something can be saved. No family so poor, if they are so inclined, but what they can furnish tea and coffee, and no man so poor that he can’t buy his cigar or tobacco or cigarette; no man so poor that cannot find his beer and his liquor if it is in the country. They have resources to meet those things, and those are the resources that should be turned to savings accounts, so that all may have something to help them on a “rainy day” and in times of sickness. I want to make that exhortation in your presence, my brethren and sisters, and trust that the Latter-day Saints may profit thereby, and our friends and neighbors as well.
May the Lord bless and sanctify to our good the things that we have heard this day and that we shall hear during this conference, that it may be a time of rejoicing. I don’t know when I have ever come to a conference that I felt more delighted and happy than on this occasion; and I leave my blessing, as I am sure you have the blessing of my brethren. The testimony of President Smith as given in our favor here today, I think is wonderfully fine, and I want to bear the same kind of testimony for our brethren that are “treading the winepress’’ in their various stakes and wards and missions, and the sisters who are laboring in their various positions, seconding our efforts and labors for the salvation of the people. May the Lord bless us and bless all Israel, I humbly pray in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
Temporal salvation of our people carefully considered—Worthy and capable persons selected for Church offices—Each President of Church specially qualified for -time of ministry—Astonishing outlay by Church for educational purposes, etc.,—Successful efforts in home industries—Great advantages in obeying Word of Wisdom—Honest tithe-payers also pay their debts—The habit of saving inculcated.
I feel very grateful for our presence on this occasion and for the splendid Spirit that has attended the First Presidency in their discourses to us today, for they have been superior. They always talk well, but I feel that they have talked a little better today than usual. I am sure that the Latter-day Saints have felt fed with the word of the Lord. Our understanding of the Gospel has been enlightened, and our faith strengthened; and I trust that we will do better in the future, serve the Lord more perfectly and have His favor and fellowship abiding always with us.
I am reminded occasionally, as I presume all the brethren are, of the necessity of employment for the Latter-day Saints. I suppose the Presiding Bishopric are advised of these necessities and are doing everything in their power to find labor for those who are unemployed. In our state, as I suppose in other states as well, there are armies of people quite generally at labor, and yet always some needing employment. We are admonished of the necessity of production from the rich soils that we enjoy and the resources about us to provide for the temporal salvation of the people; for we not only need salvation spiritually but we need salvation temporally. I thought of this today, when looking over one of the revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants, that refers particularly to the temporal salvation of the people. I was led, a few weeks ago, at one or two different conferences, to draw the attention of the presiding brethren and the people generally to the temporal salvation that is necessary for us; and I believe that it is not only good for Latter-day Saints but for everybody in the world. It is a doctrine that secures temporal salvation and prosperity to all people who will observe it. It has been given to us now for a great many years, at least, before I was born, and has been before us. It has been taught us continuously and we have undertaken to observe it, and have done so fairly well in very many instances. Still, hardly any of us have been quite perfect in that law. I don’t know that there is any other revelation in which that same expression is used, except the one—a revelation for the temporal salvation of the Saints, and yet applicable and good to everybody else. I have discovered also that many other people have been imbued with this doctrine and principle, and are advocating it. It looks to me as though the Lord was working among the children of men for their temporal salvation as well as ours. I thank the Lord for this word and will, doctrine and counsel, which He gave to us so early in our history, and I thank Him for the hold it has upon the Latter-day Saints. I am proud to discover, as I have been able to do, that our chief brethren at home and abroad, those who are entrusted with responsibility and are required to be the shepherds of the people, and who stand as men sounding a note of warning upon the walls of Zion, for the welfare of the people—that these men as a rule are well established in the faith and in the practice of the doctrine I refer to.
I listened on fast day to a very excellent discourse by President Smith in which he drew our attention to the splendid elements that have been developed in our posterity, in our children, who are born unto the Lord under the new covenant; to the integrity that has been inherited by them, and how reliable and trusty and true they are to the cause of Zion. I appreciated it, as I am sure all did who heard him speak. Since that my mind has been turned also to the field of labor which I have been in since I was twenty years of age; practically all my life, so far as that is concerned; but since I was twenty years of age it has fallen to my lot to be associated with leading brethren, presiding brethren in quorums and wards, and in stakes and missions. I want to say that the testimony given by President Smith in regard to the results of our family relations, the fruit that has been produced under the covenant, the reliability and trustworthiness of our children, can also be borne concerning the remainder of those brethren and sisters, produced among the Latter-day Saints, who hold responsible positions. And a feature that I discover and bear in mind is that in our organization, so complete and so perfect, so valuable and so saving in its nature, it is the rule that we seek always, under the direction of the Lord and His counsel, for the very choicest and best men and women for positions of responsibility; and I want to bear this testimony in the presence of this congregation, that almost universally, we have been well satisfied, and have rarely ever made a mistake. It is very seldom that we find a brother or a sister who is not trustworthy. I want to say this for those upon whom this authority and responsibility rest at this time. There may be quite a percentage who are not, possibly, doing the very best they can, yet are all struggling to do the right thing. But when we go into the field we never find competition among the brethren and sisters to see who shall obtain positions of responsibility. We do in politics, but not in any of our religious organizations. In the wards and in the stakes of Zion, in the councils and quorums and associations and departments of Zion, we take time to deliberate, to consider carefully, and to weigh men and women for positions, and always try to find the best suited, the best qualified, those that fit the position and responsibility best. We have done that and are doing it all the time; and it is a delightful thing to us that there is no struggle one against another and no anxiety to see which shall overcome. We advise with our brethren and sisters in regard to the positions in which they are interested; and I want to say in their behalf that it is a very rare thing, I can hardly tell when one has been censured, or fault found with. Changes are made, must be, necessarily so, occasionally, as circumstances require on account of removal of people or the arising of new conditions; but it is a rare thing that one is ever dismissed because of transgression, either at home or abroad. I wanted to say that much for the record of the Latter-day Saints.
When I heard the President’s report as to what has been accomplished in fourteen years, I was brought to remember that his administration is just about the same length as the Prophet Joseph's, just about fourteen years. I have, during the last few months, referred on some occasions to the various administrations. There have been no two of them alike. There never has been one just like the present, never was one just like President Snow’s, never one just like President Woodruff’s; never one just like President Taylor’s; never one just like President Young’s, never one just like the Prophet Joseph’s. His was the first, laying the foundation. He was the law-giver, giving the word and will of God, and establishing it and perpetuating it to his successors and the Church. I spoke of these administrations and I felt as though it was very proper I should. There may be those here present who heard me speak on that subject. I would not wonder if there were; but I drew attention to the fact that every administration had its peculiar features, for which it has been remarkable, and that this administration is the administration for building, at home and abroad, and the establishment of Church schools and their support. It is astonishing the amount that we have done for the cause of education. We have all helped with our tithing and offerings, our labors and our intelligence. We have done marvels; no people in the world that have made such an effort in regard to Sunday schools and the training of young people. I sometimes think we have pretty near overdone, by the efforts we have made, and there is a rule to regulate and put everything in order as it should be so that no one could slip out or be lost. The efforts of splendid scholarly men who are gathered together in our general boards and associations, the best that we have among the people, with all the advantages that can be brought to their assistance, are being employed now for the benefit of the rising generation.
It is astonishing what is being accomplished, but I want to say just briefly that it is very desirable for the temporal salvation of the Latter-day Saints and of the people of our state. (I speak of the Latter-day Saints because we are talking of them, and to them, and our work is with them; but we are also with the people of the state), it is necessary for the temporal salvation of the people of our state that there should be employment and home industries established. The earth should be cultivated and give forth its rich fruits in all the various lines that are necessary. We have done wonders in a few lines—just what should be done in very many others. The sugar industry is one of the most prominent achievements. It was the ideal thought apparently of President Young in his day, and of President Taylor following him, both of them together making efforts for that purpose. It just seemed as though it was the most important industry, more important than anything else that could be established. And now it has been made a grand success. Now, those who grow the fruit, and vegetables should arrange for canning and taking care of them and supplying them to our neighbors; instead of our buying from our California neighbors and other neighbors, we want to be selling to them. We want to do the same and make the same success in the canning and taking care of fruits and meats that we have done in the sugar business, so that we shall bring means into the country, furnish employment, that there shall be nobody in Zion without labor, but all have something to do, to remunerate them.
Then further, I want us to bear in mind this doctrine that I have been referring to. I shall not read the whole revelation but just a little of it that was given for the especial temporal salvation of the people, and I would like to emphasize some parts of this revelation that possibly we have not thought so much of as we should do; for it is given not only that we may have health and strength in our bodies and live a long time, that the destroyer may pass us by as he did in the days of Israel, but it is for our temporal salvation, that is, that we should have all our temporal necessities met and that we should not be clamoring as of the poor and those that are needy.
SECTION 89.
Revelation Given Through Joseph, the Seer, at Kirtland, Geauga County, Ohio, February 27th, 1833.
1. A Word of Wisdom, for the benefit of the Council of High Priests, assembled in Kirtland, and church; and also the Saints in Zion.
2. To be sent greeting—not by commandment or constraint, but by revelation and the word of wisdom, showing forth the order and will of God in the temporal salvation of all saints in the last days.
3. Given for a principle with promise, adapted to the capacity of the weak and the weakest of all saints, who are or can be called saints.
4. Behold, verily, thus saith the Lord unto you, in consequence of evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring men in the last days, I have warned you, and forewarn you, by giving unto you this word of wisdom by revelation,
5. That _ inasmuch as any man drinketh wine or strong drink among you, behold it is not good, neither meet in the sight of your Father, only in assembling yourselves together to offer up your sacraments before Him.
6. And, behold, this should be wine, yea, pure wine of the grape of the vine, of your own make.
7. And, again, strong drinks are not for the belly, but for the washing of your bodies.
8. And again, tobacco is not for the body, neither for the belly, and is not good for man. but is an herb for bruises and all sick cattle, to be used with judgment and skill.
9. And again, hot drinks are not for the body or belly.
10 And again, verily I say unto you, all wholesome herbs .God hath ordained for the constitution, nature, and use of man.
11. Every herb in the season thereof, and every fruit in the season thereof; all these to be used with prudence and thanksgiving.
12. Yea, flesh also of beasts and of the fowls of the air, I, the Lord, have ordained for the use of man with thanksgiving; nevertheless they are to be used sparingly; etc.
And the things that are thus forbidden in the law,—strong drinks and wine, and tea and coffee, (called hot drinks that were in vogue in the days when this revelation was given), and tobacco,— these things that are expensive, extravagant, destructive of life and health and destructive of means, it is more than wasteful, it is very serious and dangerous to the people to indulge in them, and they tend to poverty. They may be of some profit to those who deal in them, those who buy and sell them, but it is poverty to most of those who engage in the use of these things, which are altogether worthless, improper and wicked, injurious, hurtful, taking life, shortening life and giving us trouble. For if the tea and coffee, and the tobacco and the liquor and the beer that are used in our state, were let alone and the means turned to its proper use and purpose, everybody would be suitably clothed, suitably housed, and all our obligations would be reasonably met, and we would not be in debt. We would be out of debt and have everything that we require, instead of suffering and having those among us begging for employment. We would know how to save our little means, as it should be taken care of. For the tobacco money and the liquor money and the money for tea and coffee, every dollar of it, as a rule, should be saved, except that which is used for medicine, carefully used, as it should be in case of sickness; and we would find that the Latter-day Saints would be thrifty and prosperous, and we would now be living more perfectly under this law, given long before I can remember, and which we have straggled to observe and done fairly well. As I say, the leading men and the leading women of the Church as a rule have made a splendid effort and have set good examples before us. I was delighted, in regard to our financial matters, to find what the President has reported today, the truth in regard to what has been accomplished in fourteen years. Only fourteen years ago, if you will remember, the Church had passed through a very serious straggle under the administration of President John Taylor and President Wilford Woodruff; and when it came to the inauguration of President Snow’s administration, it was the burning question with the leaders of this Church, to know what to do and how to do it, to redeem our obligations. Brethren had to come to the rescue of the Church at that time and before, as the Church was embarrassed and was straggling under difficulties. But when the Lord in simple language to President Snow, said, “Let my people pay their tithing." and the people responded in such measure that, as reported by the President here, in 1906 we met our obligations and have been in good condition ever since. And those who have been faithful in the meeting of their obligations to the Lord have also, I have no doubt, been faithful in their obligations to their brethren; for it is as great a virtue for a man to do by his brother as he would do by the Lord. His obligations to his brother are just as sacred as the obligations to the Lord. Hence you will find, as a rule, those who are very strict and careful in regard to settling with the Lord and in due season thereof, will do the same with their brethren, so that our neighbors will not suffer because of what we owe them. Our merchants, bankers, and business men will receive their own; those that labor for us, build for us, we will meet these obligations honorably, and thus the circulating medium will pass with the people and all our obligations be met, and the necessities of those who help us will be met also. Hence. I want to exhort my brethren and sisters, that we remember this law and that we observe it so that we shall have the sinews of life and of business that are necessary to meet the requirements of our present condition.
It takes a world of means to supply our missionary field. I don't know that the President quite gave us that information, but you would be astonished if the figures were shown to you of what it costs to handle the missionary work of the Latter-day Saints; including the time of the men, and the means that they have to furnish, to pay their own expenses. It amounts to figures of large proportions. The Twelve are laboring constantly to try and have the brethren be just as economical and careful as they can in their ministry.
We want to be economical and careful in our home ministry, in our affairs at home, and every man and every woman should have faith enough in their employment and in their posterity to lay by a little something in the savings department, so that they always have something ahead instead of always being in debt. I teach that lesson to the boys, I teach it to the girls, so that when they start in life they start with the understanding that it is possible for them to save a little something. And I want to tell you what to save—save all the tea and coffee money, all the tobacco, money, every dollar of it, every dollar of the beer and liquor and whisky money. Let no money go for these things at all. I fear that sometimes young people are growing up with an inclination to using those things that are forbidden. They should be restrained. We should take great care with our children, and with our neighbors, and with each other to prevent the waste of means upon those things that are destructive to human life and destructive to our temporal interests. Let us look out and be careful in this regard. Let the Latter-day Saints take this warning and advice and see that there is a saving in this respect; for in the way of every family, there is none so poor but what there are times and opportunities where something can be saved. No family so poor, if they are so inclined, but what they can furnish tea and coffee, and no man so poor that he can’t buy his cigar or tobacco or cigarette; no man so poor that cannot find his beer and his liquor if it is in the country. They have resources to meet those things, and those are the resources that should be turned to savings accounts, so that all may have something to help them on a “rainy day” and in times of sickness. I want to make that exhortation in your presence, my brethren and sisters, and trust that the Latter-day Saints may profit thereby, and our friends and neighbors as well.
May the Lord bless and sanctify to our good the things that we have heard this day and that we shall hear during this conference, that it may be a time of rejoicing. I don’t know when I have ever come to a conference that I felt more delighted and happy than on this occasion; and I leave my blessing, as I am sure you have the blessing of my brethren. The testimony of President Smith as given in our favor here today, I think is wonderfully fine, and I want to bear the same kind of testimony for our brethren that are “treading the winepress’’ in their various stakes and wards and missions, and the sisters who are laboring in their various positions, seconding our efforts and labors for the salvation of the people. May the Lord bless us and bless all Israel, I humbly pray in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
AUTHORITIES SUSTAINED.
Elder Heber J. Grant presented the names of the General Authorities of the Church, to be voted upon by the assembly, as follows:
Joseph F. Smith, as Prophet, Seer and Revelator and President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Anthon H. Lund, as First Counselor in the First Presidency.
Charles W. Penrose, as Second Counselor in the First Presidency.
Francis M. Lyman as President of the Twelve Apostles.
As members of the Council of Twelve Apostles: Francis M. Lyman, Heber J. Grant, Rudger Clawson, Reed Smoot, Hyrum M. Smith, George Albert Smith, George F. Richards, Orson F. Whitney, David O. McKay, Anthony W. Ivins, Joseph F. Smith, Jr., and James E. Talmage.
Hyrum G. Smith, as presiding Patriarch of the Church.
The counselors in the First Presidency, the Twelve Apostles and the Presiding Patriarch, as Prophets, Seers and Revelators.
First Seven Presidents of Seventies: Seymour B. Young, Brigham H. Roberts, Jonathan G. Kimball, Rulon S. Wells, Joseph W. McMurrin, Charles H. Hart and Levi Edgar Young.
Charles W. Nibley, as Presiding Bishop, with Orrin P. Miller and David A. Smith, as his first and second Counselors.
Joseph F. Smith, as Trustee-in-Trust for the body of religious worshipers known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Anthon H. Lund, as Church Historian and General Church Recorder.
Andrew Jenson, Brigham H. Roberts, Joseph F. Smith, Jr., and August William Lund, assistant Historians.
As members of the General Church Board of Education: Joseph F. Smith, Williard Young, Anthon H. Lund, George H. Brimhall, Rudger Clawson, Charles W. Penrose, Horace H. Cummings, Orson F. Whitney and Francis M. Lyman.
Arthur Winter, as Secretary and Treasurer of the General Church Board of Education.
Horace H. Cummings, General Superintendent of Church Schools.
Board of Examiners for Church Schools: Horace II. Cummings, chairman; George H. Brimhall, C. N. Jensen and Guy C. Wilson. Auditing Committee: William W. Writer, Henry H. Rolapp, John C. Cutler, Heber Scowcroft, and Joseph S. Wells.
Tabernacle Choir: Evan Stephens, conductor; Horace S. Ensign, assistant conductor; John J. McClellan, organist; Edward P. Kimball and Tracy Y. Cannon, assistant organists; George C. Smith, secretary and treasurer; John Drakeford, librarian; and all the members.
Duncan M. McAllister as Clerk of the Conference.
Each and all of those named were duly sustained in the positions designated, by unanimous vote of the Conference.
Elder Heber J. Grant read the annual report of the Church Auditing Committee, as follows:
Salt Lake City, Utah;
April 6th, 1916.
Presidents Joseph F. Smith, Anthon H. Lund, Charles W. Penrose,
First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Dear Brethren: The Church Auditing Committee begs leave to report that we have critically examined the books and accounts for 1915 of the Trustee-in-Trust and of the Presiding Bishopric, as well as the reports made by the various Stakes, Wards, Temples, general auxiliary organizations and other institutions in which the Church is interested. All of the accounts of receipts and disbursements of the Church funds are set out in full detail, and have been accurately kept and recorded.
Your committee is especially pleased to comment again on the diligence and careful bookkeeping exhibited in all accounts that have been inspected. Our audit discloses not only faithful and accurate work, but also skill and devotion in using the funds contributed by the Saints for the best interests of the people. It is pleasing to make special mention of the liberal appropriations that have been made for the support of the poor, both at home and abroad, for the education of the children of the Saints, for the erection, enlargement and improvement of meeting houses in the Stakes and Wards of Zion, and in the Missions abroad.
May the blessings of God continue to abide with you in discharging the great responsibilities connected with the work of the Lord,
Respectfully submitted.
Your Brethren in the Gospel,
W. W. Riter, Henry H. Rolapp, John C. Cutler, Joseph S. Wells, Heber Scowcroft,
Church Auditing Committee.
On motion, the foregoing was accepted, and approved, by unanimous vote of the congregation.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “We thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet.”
The closing prayer was offered by Elder John Wells.
Conference adjourned until Friday, April 7th, at 10 a. m.
Elder Heber J. Grant presented the names of the General Authorities of the Church, to be voted upon by the assembly, as follows:
Joseph F. Smith, as Prophet, Seer and Revelator and President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Anthon H. Lund, as First Counselor in the First Presidency.
Charles W. Penrose, as Second Counselor in the First Presidency.
Francis M. Lyman as President of the Twelve Apostles.
As members of the Council of Twelve Apostles: Francis M. Lyman, Heber J. Grant, Rudger Clawson, Reed Smoot, Hyrum M. Smith, George Albert Smith, George F. Richards, Orson F. Whitney, David O. McKay, Anthony W. Ivins, Joseph F. Smith, Jr., and James E. Talmage.
Hyrum G. Smith, as presiding Patriarch of the Church.
The counselors in the First Presidency, the Twelve Apostles and the Presiding Patriarch, as Prophets, Seers and Revelators.
First Seven Presidents of Seventies: Seymour B. Young, Brigham H. Roberts, Jonathan G. Kimball, Rulon S. Wells, Joseph W. McMurrin, Charles H. Hart and Levi Edgar Young.
Charles W. Nibley, as Presiding Bishop, with Orrin P. Miller and David A. Smith, as his first and second Counselors.
Joseph F. Smith, as Trustee-in-Trust for the body of religious worshipers known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Anthon H. Lund, as Church Historian and General Church Recorder.
Andrew Jenson, Brigham H. Roberts, Joseph F. Smith, Jr., and August William Lund, assistant Historians.
As members of the General Church Board of Education: Joseph F. Smith, Williard Young, Anthon H. Lund, George H. Brimhall, Rudger Clawson, Charles W. Penrose, Horace H. Cummings, Orson F. Whitney and Francis M. Lyman.
Arthur Winter, as Secretary and Treasurer of the General Church Board of Education.
Horace H. Cummings, General Superintendent of Church Schools.
Board of Examiners for Church Schools: Horace II. Cummings, chairman; George H. Brimhall, C. N. Jensen and Guy C. Wilson. Auditing Committee: William W. Writer, Henry H. Rolapp, John C. Cutler, Heber Scowcroft, and Joseph S. Wells.
Tabernacle Choir: Evan Stephens, conductor; Horace S. Ensign, assistant conductor; John J. McClellan, organist; Edward P. Kimball and Tracy Y. Cannon, assistant organists; George C. Smith, secretary and treasurer; John Drakeford, librarian; and all the members.
Duncan M. McAllister as Clerk of the Conference.
Each and all of those named were duly sustained in the positions designated, by unanimous vote of the Conference.
Elder Heber J. Grant read the annual report of the Church Auditing Committee, as follows:
Salt Lake City, Utah;
April 6th, 1916.
Presidents Joseph F. Smith, Anthon H. Lund, Charles W. Penrose,
First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Dear Brethren: The Church Auditing Committee begs leave to report that we have critically examined the books and accounts for 1915 of the Trustee-in-Trust and of the Presiding Bishopric, as well as the reports made by the various Stakes, Wards, Temples, general auxiliary organizations and other institutions in which the Church is interested. All of the accounts of receipts and disbursements of the Church funds are set out in full detail, and have been accurately kept and recorded.
Your committee is especially pleased to comment again on the diligence and careful bookkeeping exhibited in all accounts that have been inspected. Our audit discloses not only faithful and accurate work, but also skill and devotion in using the funds contributed by the Saints for the best interests of the people. It is pleasing to make special mention of the liberal appropriations that have been made for the support of the poor, both at home and abroad, for the education of the children of the Saints, for the erection, enlargement and improvement of meeting houses in the Stakes and Wards of Zion, and in the Missions abroad.
May the blessings of God continue to abide with you in discharging the great responsibilities connected with the work of the Lord,
Respectfully submitted.
Your Brethren in the Gospel,
W. W. Riter, Henry H. Rolapp, John C. Cutler, Joseph S. Wells, Heber Scowcroft,
Church Auditing Committee.
On motion, the foregoing was accepted, and approved, by unanimous vote of the congregation.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “We thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet.”
The closing prayer was offered by Elder John Wells.
Conference adjourned until Friday, April 7th, at 10 a. m.
SECOND DAY.
In the Tabernacle, Friday, April 7th, 10 a. m.
Conference was called to order by President Joseph F. Smith.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “O ye mountains high, where the clear blue sky.”
Elder Thomas D. Rees, Jr., offered the opening prayer.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “Redeemer of Israel, our only delight.”
In the Tabernacle, Friday, April 7th, 10 a. m.
Conference was called to order by President Joseph F. Smith.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “O ye mountains high, where the clear blue sky.”
Elder Thomas D. Rees, Jr., offered the opening prayer.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “Redeemer of Israel, our only delight.”
ELDER JOSEPH C. BENTLY.
(President Juarez Stake.)
My brethren and sisters, I am very grateful this morning for the privilege that I have of attending this conference, and listening to the instructions that come to us from our Heavenly Father, through His servants who preside over us. I am thankful for the privilege of associating with my brethren and sisters, and enjoying the Spirit of the Lord which accompanies us upon our gathering together in our general conferences. I am sure it is a great strength to all of us to have this privilege of associating together, and being encouraged of the Lord in this great latter-day work, in which we are all engaged. Our only desire is to serve the Lord and to accomplish His purposes; and while we desire to do or accomplish the purposes of our Heavenly Father, we need strength from time to time, and a renewal of the Spirit of the Lord in order to enable us to continue the struggle, and the effort that is necessary.
I have anticipated for some time the pleasure of attending this conference. but a few weeks ago I concluded that I would not be enabled to come here, because of the unsettled condition in our part of the Mexican country. Our condition for the last two weeks has been unusually trying. I suppose all of you are aware that the Latter-day Saints in Mexico are located in the heart of the-revolutionary section of that country, where revolutions are manufactured. Our condition for a number of years has not been as satisfactory as we should like to have had it, especially since the recognition of General Carranza by this government. It has produced an unusual disturbing and unsettled condition. Our people who reside in Mexico have endeavored to maintain a neutral position, so far as we are concerned. In the beginning of this trouble in Mexico, we were counseled by the brethren who preside over us, that our position should be absolutely neutral; that we should not engage in the conflict that was going On in that country. We have endeavored to maintain this position and to maintain friendly relationship with all the different contending parties that come into our community. While we have been regarded as foreigners, as American citizens or people belonging to the United States, yet there has always been more or less distinction in the minds of the people of Mexico concerning the Latter-day Saints and other Americans who come there for the purpose of gaining a livelihood, engaging in mining and other industries that do not identify them especially with the country.
After the recognition of General Carranza. General Villa returned, and in our locality he kept about twelve thousand of his followers for a period of six weeks, most of them located among our people in Colonia Dublan. They were surprised to find so many American people there, although there really were but a few, and they were surprised to find so much food and substance. They were a hungry lot; they had been whipped and chased over the hills, and when they reached our part of the country they were a famished crowd of people; it did their hearts good to see somebody that could give them something to eat. They paid for what they got in their own kind of money, but of course that was of no value to us, nor to anyone else for that matter, because it had so decreased in value that it was not worth any more than the counterfeit, nevertheless we sold them our produce. We kept that body of men, women, and children in our locality for about six weeks, and fed them corn and other products of the colony. After they had gone we reaped the greatest crops that we have ever harvested in Mexico. This surprised us, and we can not understand it yet. After feeding that great army for that length of time, we had the greatest harvest we have ever reaped, in proportion to the number of people and acreage, since we have been located in Mexico. Our granaries were full, and we had plenty to eat and to wear.
After being defeated in Sonora, a portion of that army returned again to us. They were not in quite as friendly a mood on their return as they were when they went away, but still we managed to get along with them. We treated them kindly: we endeavored to impress upon their minds that we were there for the good of the Mexican people. They destroyed some of our property, but were astonished at being treated kindly after they arrived, and did comparatively little damage, and they passed us by again. A few weeks ago, after the Americans were killed down at the mining camp, General Villa and his company of soldiers passed near our colony again, on his way to Columbus. Friendly Mexicans brought word that he said he was going to destroy Colony Juarez, and kill all the “Mormons;” but he passed us by, and afterward said it entirely slipped his mind, and he had gone so far past that he guessed he would not go back. We were very thankful that he did not, and greatly appreciated the fact that he had passed by without coming to see us.
After the terrible attack on Columbus, and the destruction of property and lives of Americans, and many of their own people who came in contact with them, it caused great concern to those of us in the colonies, especially the natives and Carranza’s Mexican soldiers. They were very much concerned because his return brought him again in the direction of the colonies. It is a good, rich, fertile country, and is a good place in which to recruit. It has been a favorite place for the revolutionists, ever since the beginning of this trouble. They have been able to get more good horses, and good provisions, in that locality than in any other part of Mexico where they have been; consequently, on Villa’s return a few weeks ago, after the attack on Columbus, there was considerable anxiety. I want to say this for the Carranza troops at Colonia Dublan, they are not well equipped, and they are not disciplined soldiers, but they had an interest in our people. They did not have a sufficient number to provide any defense for us, but they were careful to keep us posted. No doubt we received a great many reports that were not true, but they sent us all the information they received, and there was not any of it very comforting. The indications were that Villa, with his straggling army and the wounded, were coming back again to the colonies. We were instructed, by the general in charge of the Carranza troops, to move our families into their garrison, and they would take care of us; but, bless your heart, they could not take care of themselves, let alone us. They could not have provided for us and our families; and so we expressed to them our gratitude for their kind invitation, and said that if we should get frightened, and want to leave our homes, we would come. But, we called our brethren and sisters together and appointed a general fast day. We asked all our brethren and sisters to fast, and to pray unto the Lord that we might get an impression concerning what we should do. We were entirely helpless, so far as worldly defense was concerned; guns were very scarce in the colony. I was asked this morning about how many people we had in Colonia Juarez. We had about twenty-five men. and about two hundred fifty women and children. The same questioner wanted to know if we were well armed, and I said no, we did not have any arms; and were thankful to the Lord we did not. We met on the fast day. and while the reports that came to us were not very comforting. and we realized that our brethren and sisters in this country were very much exercised as to our safety and welfare, and as to the wisdom of our remaining in Mexico, yet the unanimous expression of our brethren and sisters in that fast meeting was that the Spirit of the Lord prompted we should remain at home, and serve the Lord and keep His commandments, and put our trust in Him, and He would take care of us whatever the conditions were. We felt that, if General Villa and his army should come to us, the Lord could soften his heart and that he would pass by and leave us with a better feeding of friendship than had existed before. At the conclusion of the meeting, the brethren and sisters returned to their homes, calm and happy, and the night that General Villa passed those colonies the people slept in peace. There was no one on guard, the Carranza soldiers had withdrawn, every man was put into the pits to defend themselves against the approach of General Villa. You may not understand, my brethren and sisters, how that Villa’s name strikes terror to the hearts of those people. It is not only Americans that he does not like, when he takes it into his head to destroy life he seems to have no regard to race or color. The Mexicans were very much exercised when they heard that he was only three miles away from our colony, and that it would only be a matter of an hour’s time till he could enter it. There was not a person in Colonia Dublan except Latter-day Saints, but we retired to our homes, slept peacefully, and during the night Villa and his guards came into Colony Dublan, within a half a mile of our homes, looked over the town and passed on; he never even disturbed us.
I want to say to you, my brethren and sisters, the people of those colonies feel that the Lord has preserved us. He has heard and answered our prayers. President Joseph F. Smith, in the beginning of our return to the colonies, told us that the key to our safety was the spirit of love, the spirit of kindness, the Spirit of the Lord, and the exercise of patience towards the people by whom we were surrounded. If we would manifest this Spirit, and put our trust in the Lord, He would take care of us. It has been a wonderful testimony to the Latter-day Saints and especially to our children, that when we serve the Lord and keep His commandments, and put our trust in Him. He will take care of us. We had no other defense, there was no other possible show for us, and we know that the Lord heard and answered the prayers of the Latter-day Saints concerning His people in that dangerous position in Mexico.
I feel very grateful for the privilege I have had of living in the land of Mexico. I love that people, notwithstanding their degradation. When I realize that they have lived under a curse for many hundreds of years, it is a marvel to me that there is as much good in Mexico and among her people as there is today. They are a child-like people; and if the spirit of kindness, of patience, and of love can be exercised by the American people, toward them, that will do more towards establishing peace in that country than all of the guns and ammunition that can be manufactured. It seems to me—it has always seemed to me—that the mission of the Latter-day Saints in Mexico, in fact, the mission of the Latter-day Saints in all the world, is a mission of peace. We should live peacefully, speak peacefully, and breathe the spirit of peace among all mankind. We are living in a time when the spirit of war is being poured out upon all nations, and it seems to me that the great mission of the Latter-day Saints is to endeavor to establish peace. I know that by dealing with the Mexican people in the spirit of love and kindness, and showing to them true friendliness, you can win their hearts; they are a very approachable people.
The Lord has a work to do in that country. It is not a battle of men; it is not a struggle between men especially, it is a struggle between the power of our Heavenly Father and the powers of darkness that have spread over that country. Darkness has been over the minds of the people, and they are in a degraded and distressing condition. My belief has been that whenever the time shall come that the Gospel of Jesus Christ shall be planted in that land it will be by the faith of men and women who are willing to put their trust in the Lord, men and women who can exhibit a spirit of kindness, a spirit of love and charity, even to those who would do them evil. The instructions of our Lord and Savior is the key-note to the success of the Latter-day Saints, not only in Mexico, but in every other part of the country where we shall go, that is to “do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you,” love our enemies and treat all mankind kindly. It is a mighty hard person who would continually fight against the spirit of kindness.
While we have not been, perhaps, as careful as we should have been, while we have not always lived as near to the Lord as we might have done, yet I believe we stand among the Mexican people today nearer to their hearts than we have even been before. If they were to have their choice they would like to have us continue to remain in their midst. We have gained their friendship and their respect. There has not been a single party, (unless General Felix Diaz has succeeded in starting a new revolution), that has not been into our colonies, and every one of them has left us feeling better than when they came. To be sure, they have robbed us, to some extent, they have taken horses, and saddles, and merchandise, but thank the Lord they have not taken our lives. We have been preserved; the Lord has manifested His Spirit, and the men who have robbed us, who have taken our property, and destroyed much of that which the Lord has blessed us with, have acknowledge that they would rather have their families among the Latter-day Saints than any other place in Mexico. Notwithstanding they have robbed and persecuted us, they realize that their families are safe among the Saints.
My brethren and sisters, I rejoice in the work of the Lord. Our living in Mexico is not so much the acquiring and maintaining homes and property, but it has always seemed to me that it was the will of the Lord. I desire to say that I know there is a mighty work to do among that people. If we can only maintain the spirit of kindness, of humanity, of charity, and of patience, the time will come when we will see the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ take hold of that people, when they will be brought into the fold of Christ, and a great and mighty work accomplished.
May the Lord bless us, and help us to establish peace upon the earth, not only in that country but in all the world, including our own country, the United States. We need to live in accord with the spirit of peace, to assist in establishing it in all the world, that we may help our Father bring about the great plan of peace on earth, and prepare for the coming of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. May we live worthy, my brethren and sisters to take part in this great latter-day work, is my prayer, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
A poem entitled, “A Temple in Hawaii,” written by Sister Ruth M. Fox, melody composed by Elder Orson Clark, was sung, as a quartette, by Ethelyn Walker, Hazel B. Neilson, James H. Neilson, and Almy C. Clayton.
(President Juarez Stake.)
My brethren and sisters, I am very grateful this morning for the privilege that I have of attending this conference, and listening to the instructions that come to us from our Heavenly Father, through His servants who preside over us. I am thankful for the privilege of associating with my brethren and sisters, and enjoying the Spirit of the Lord which accompanies us upon our gathering together in our general conferences. I am sure it is a great strength to all of us to have this privilege of associating together, and being encouraged of the Lord in this great latter-day work, in which we are all engaged. Our only desire is to serve the Lord and to accomplish His purposes; and while we desire to do or accomplish the purposes of our Heavenly Father, we need strength from time to time, and a renewal of the Spirit of the Lord in order to enable us to continue the struggle, and the effort that is necessary.
I have anticipated for some time the pleasure of attending this conference. but a few weeks ago I concluded that I would not be enabled to come here, because of the unsettled condition in our part of the Mexican country. Our condition for the last two weeks has been unusually trying. I suppose all of you are aware that the Latter-day Saints in Mexico are located in the heart of the-revolutionary section of that country, where revolutions are manufactured. Our condition for a number of years has not been as satisfactory as we should like to have had it, especially since the recognition of General Carranza by this government. It has produced an unusual disturbing and unsettled condition. Our people who reside in Mexico have endeavored to maintain a neutral position, so far as we are concerned. In the beginning of this trouble in Mexico, we were counseled by the brethren who preside over us, that our position should be absolutely neutral; that we should not engage in the conflict that was going On in that country. We have endeavored to maintain this position and to maintain friendly relationship with all the different contending parties that come into our community. While we have been regarded as foreigners, as American citizens or people belonging to the United States, yet there has always been more or less distinction in the minds of the people of Mexico concerning the Latter-day Saints and other Americans who come there for the purpose of gaining a livelihood, engaging in mining and other industries that do not identify them especially with the country.
After the recognition of General Carranza. General Villa returned, and in our locality he kept about twelve thousand of his followers for a period of six weeks, most of them located among our people in Colonia Dublan. They were surprised to find so many American people there, although there really were but a few, and they were surprised to find so much food and substance. They were a hungry lot; they had been whipped and chased over the hills, and when they reached our part of the country they were a famished crowd of people; it did their hearts good to see somebody that could give them something to eat. They paid for what they got in their own kind of money, but of course that was of no value to us, nor to anyone else for that matter, because it had so decreased in value that it was not worth any more than the counterfeit, nevertheless we sold them our produce. We kept that body of men, women, and children in our locality for about six weeks, and fed them corn and other products of the colony. After they had gone we reaped the greatest crops that we have ever harvested in Mexico. This surprised us, and we can not understand it yet. After feeding that great army for that length of time, we had the greatest harvest we have ever reaped, in proportion to the number of people and acreage, since we have been located in Mexico. Our granaries were full, and we had plenty to eat and to wear.
After being defeated in Sonora, a portion of that army returned again to us. They were not in quite as friendly a mood on their return as they were when they went away, but still we managed to get along with them. We treated them kindly: we endeavored to impress upon their minds that we were there for the good of the Mexican people. They destroyed some of our property, but were astonished at being treated kindly after they arrived, and did comparatively little damage, and they passed us by again. A few weeks ago, after the Americans were killed down at the mining camp, General Villa and his company of soldiers passed near our colony again, on his way to Columbus. Friendly Mexicans brought word that he said he was going to destroy Colony Juarez, and kill all the “Mormons;” but he passed us by, and afterward said it entirely slipped his mind, and he had gone so far past that he guessed he would not go back. We were very thankful that he did not, and greatly appreciated the fact that he had passed by without coming to see us.
After the terrible attack on Columbus, and the destruction of property and lives of Americans, and many of their own people who came in contact with them, it caused great concern to those of us in the colonies, especially the natives and Carranza’s Mexican soldiers. They were very much concerned because his return brought him again in the direction of the colonies. It is a good, rich, fertile country, and is a good place in which to recruit. It has been a favorite place for the revolutionists, ever since the beginning of this trouble. They have been able to get more good horses, and good provisions, in that locality than in any other part of Mexico where they have been; consequently, on Villa’s return a few weeks ago, after the attack on Columbus, there was considerable anxiety. I want to say this for the Carranza troops at Colonia Dublan, they are not well equipped, and they are not disciplined soldiers, but they had an interest in our people. They did not have a sufficient number to provide any defense for us, but they were careful to keep us posted. No doubt we received a great many reports that were not true, but they sent us all the information they received, and there was not any of it very comforting. The indications were that Villa, with his straggling army and the wounded, were coming back again to the colonies. We were instructed, by the general in charge of the Carranza troops, to move our families into their garrison, and they would take care of us; but, bless your heart, they could not take care of themselves, let alone us. They could not have provided for us and our families; and so we expressed to them our gratitude for their kind invitation, and said that if we should get frightened, and want to leave our homes, we would come. But, we called our brethren and sisters together and appointed a general fast day. We asked all our brethren and sisters to fast, and to pray unto the Lord that we might get an impression concerning what we should do. We were entirely helpless, so far as worldly defense was concerned; guns were very scarce in the colony. I was asked this morning about how many people we had in Colonia Juarez. We had about twenty-five men. and about two hundred fifty women and children. The same questioner wanted to know if we were well armed, and I said no, we did not have any arms; and were thankful to the Lord we did not. We met on the fast day. and while the reports that came to us were not very comforting. and we realized that our brethren and sisters in this country were very much exercised as to our safety and welfare, and as to the wisdom of our remaining in Mexico, yet the unanimous expression of our brethren and sisters in that fast meeting was that the Spirit of the Lord prompted we should remain at home, and serve the Lord and keep His commandments, and put our trust in Him, and He would take care of us whatever the conditions were. We felt that, if General Villa and his army should come to us, the Lord could soften his heart and that he would pass by and leave us with a better feeding of friendship than had existed before. At the conclusion of the meeting, the brethren and sisters returned to their homes, calm and happy, and the night that General Villa passed those colonies the people slept in peace. There was no one on guard, the Carranza soldiers had withdrawn, every man was put into the pits to defend themselves against the approach of General Villa. You may not understand, my brethren and sisters, how that Villa’s name strikes terror to the hearts of those people. It is not only Americans that he does not like, when he takes it into his head to destroy life he seems to have no regard to race or color. The Mexicans were very much exercised when they heard that he was only three miles away from our colony, and that it would only be a matter of an hour’s time till he could enter it. There was not a person in Colonia Dublan except Latter-day Saints, but we retired to our homes, slept peacefully, and during the night Villa and his guards came into Colony Dublan, within a half a mile of our homes, looked over the town and passed on; he never even disturbed us.
I want to say to you, my brethren and sisters, the people of those colonies feel that the Lord has preserved us. He has heard and answered our prayers. President Joseph F. Smith, in the beginning of our return to the colonies, told us that the key to our safety was the spirit of love, the spirit of kindness, the Spirit of the Lord, and the exercise of patience towards the people by whom we were surrounded. If we would manifest this Spirit, and put our trust in the Lord, He would take care of us. It has been a wonderful testimony to the Latter-day Saints and especially to our children, that when we serve the Lord and keep His commandments, and put our trust in Him. He will take care of us. We had no other defense, there was no other possible show for us, and we know that the Lord heard and answered the prayers of the Latter-day Saints concerning His people in that dangerous position in Mexico.
I feel very grateful for the privilege I have had of living in the land of Mexico. I love that people, notwithstanding their degradation. When I realize that they have lived under a curse for many hundreds of years, it is a marvel to me that there is as much good in Mexico and among her people as there is today. They are a child-like people; and if the spirit of kindness, of patience, and of love can be exercised by the American people, toward them, that will do more towards establishing peace in that country than all of the guns and ammunition that can be manufactured. It seems to me—it has always seemed to me—that the mission of the Latter-day Saints in Mexico, in fact, the mission of the Latter-day Saints in all the world, is a mission of peace. We should live peacefully, speak peacefully, and breathe the spirit of peace among all mankind. We are living in a time when the spirit of war is being poured out upon all nations, and it seems to me that the great mission of the Latter-day Saints is to endeavor to establish peace. I know that by dealing with the Mexican people in the spirit of love and kindness, and showing to them true friendliness, you can win their hearts; they are a very approachable people.
The Lord has a work to do in that country. It is not a battle of men; it is not a struggle between men especially, it is a struggle between the power of our Heavenly Father and the powers of darkness that have spread over that country. Darkness has been over the minds of the people, and they are in a degraded and distressing condition. My belief has been that whenever the time shall come that the Gospel of Jesus Christ shall be planted in that land it will be by the faith of men and women who are willing to put their trust in the Lord, men and women who can exhibit a spirit of kindness, a spirit of love and charity, even to those who would do them evil. The instructions of our Lord and Savior is the key-note to the success of the Latter-day Saints, not only in Mexico, but in every other part of the country where we shall go, that is to “do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you,” love our enemies and treat all mankind kindly. It is a mighty hard person who would continually fight against the spirit of kindness.
While we have not been, perhaps, as careful as we should have been, while we have not always lived as near to the Lord as we might have done, yet I believe we stand among the Mexican people today nearer to their hearts than we have even been before. If they were to have their choice they would like to have us continue to remain in their midst. We have gained their friendship and their respect. There has not been a single party, (unless General Felix Diaz has succeeded in starting a new revolution), that has not been into our colonies, and every one of them has left us feeling better than when they came. To be sure, they have robbed us, to some extent, they have taken horses, and saddles, and merchandise, but thank the Lord they have not taken our lives. We have been preserved; the Lord has manifested His Spirit, and the men who have robbed us, who have taken our property, and destroyed much of that which the Lord has blessed us with, have acknowledge that they would rather have their families among the Latter-day Saints than any other place in Mexico. Notwithstanding they have robbed and persecuted us, they realize that their families are safe among the Saints.
My brethren and sisters, I rejoice in the work of the Lord. Our living in Mexico is not so much the acquiring and maintaining homes and property, but it has always seemed to me that it was the will of the Lord. I desire to say that I know there is a mighty work to do among that people. If we can only maintain the spirit of kindness, of humanity, of charity, and of patience, the time will come when we will see the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ take hold of that people, when they will be brought into the fold of Christ, and a great and mighty work accomplished.
May the Lord bless us, and help us to establish peace upon the earth, not only in that country but in all the world, including our own country, the United States. We need to live in accord with the spirit of peace, to assist in establishing it in all the world, that we may help our Father bring about the great plan of peace on earth, and prepare for the coming of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. May we live worthy, my brethren and sisters to take part in this great latter-day work, is my prayer, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
A poem entitled, “A Temple in Hawaii,” written by Sister Ruth M. Fox, melody composed by Elder Orson Clark, was sung, as a quartette, by Ethelyn Walker, Hazel B. Neilson, James H. Neilson, and Almy C. Clayton.
PREST. JOSEPH F. SMITH.
After the announcement here, last conference, that we intended to build a temple upon one of the Hawaiian Islands, Sister Ruth May Fox was inspired to write a hymn which was sent over to the Islands, and one of our elders there, Brother Orson Clark, composed music to it, and on the recent visit of Bishop Nibley and myself, we found them singing this beautiful song. We brought a copy of the words and music home with us, and Brother Stephens has prepared it to be sung today. If you will indulge with me for a moment, I will read you the words:
"Sound forth your strains of gladness, ye islands of the sea,
And lift your hearts in praises, O Saints of Hawaii;
The Lord hath heard your pleadings, your long sought day is here
When to the great Jehovah a temple you shall rear.
Chorus:
“A temple, a temple, in Hawaii!
Foreshadowing the glories and splendors yet to be.
“The spirit of Elijah shall permeate its halls,
A choice beloved remnant, within its sacred walls
Receive the promised blessings their father Lehi saw
The Lord would shower upon them when they obey His law.
"Samuel, the Lamanite, forecast this blessed day;
Nephi and Moroni and the faithful passed away
Who lived, believed, and perished on Joseph’s glorious land
Unite with you in praises for God’s all guiding hand.”
After the announcement here, last conference, that we intended to build a temple upon one of the Hawaiian Islands, Sister Ruth May Fox was inspired to write a hymn which was sent over to the Islands, and one of our elders there, Brother Orson Clark, composed music to it, and on the recent visit of Bishop Nibley and myself, we found them singing this beautiful song. We brought a copy of the words and music home with us, and Brother Stephens has prepared it to be sung today. If you will indulge with me for a moment, I will read you the words:
"Sound forth your strains of gladness, ye islands of the sea,
And lift your hearts in praises, O Saints of Hawaii;
The Lord hath heard your pleadings, your long sought day is here
When to the great Jehovah a temple you shall rear.
Chorus:
“A temple, a temple, in Hawaii!
Foreshadowing the glories and splendors yet to be.
“The spirit of Elijah shall permeate its halls,
A choice beloved remnant, within its sacred walls
Receive the promised blessings their father Lehi saw
The Lord would shower upon them when they obey His law.
"Samuel, the Lamanite, forecast this blessed day;
Nephi and Moroni and the faithful passed away
Who lived, believed, and perished on Joseph’s glorious land
Unite with you in praises for God’s all guiding hand.”
ELDER HEBER J. GRANT.
Observance of Word of Wisdom would vastly increase community wealth—Man’s efficiency destroyed by intoxicating liquors—Each dollar retained in circulation, in Utah, increases citizens’ average wealth— Deadly character of the cigarette— The cigarette smoker always a failure.
I rejoice, beyond the ability with which God has given me the power to express my feelings, in having a testimony of the divinity of the work in which we are engaged. I rejoice in being able to bear witness to you here today that the Lord has blessed me with a knowledge that He lives, that He hears, and that He answers our prayers. I rejoice in knowing that Jesus is the Redeemer of the world, our elder brother, and that His name and His name alone, is the only one under heaven whereby we can gain salvation and come back and dwell with our Heavenly Father and our Savior, and our loved ones who have gone before. I rejoice in the knowledge that Joseph Smith was the prophet of the true and the living God, and the revelations that have come to us from him, which are recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants, are in very deed the commandments of the Lord and of His Son our Redeemer, and that it is our duty and an obligation resting upon us to obey those commandments. Every word that I have heard, the testimonies and the expounding of the doctrines of Christ, since this conference has opened, have found an echo in my heart and I have thanked God for the testimonies which have been borne to us, thus far in this conference.
I acknowledge the hand of God in the preservation of our people in Mexico. It is a miracle, and there should be a feeling of gratitude in our hearts to our Heavenly Father for the preservation of those of our brethren and sisters who have been located in that land. I confess that their faith has been superior to mine. I am afraid that if I had been located in Mexico, I would have left that country long ago.
I was particularly impressed yesterday with the remarks made here by the President of the Council to which I have the honor to belong, and I desire during the time that I occupy, if the Lord will only bless me with His Spirit, to make some remarks along the same line upon which President Lyman spoke yesterday.
I remember years ago, one of the most sarcastic and splendid letters that I ever read, being handed to me by Brother Junius F. Wells, written by his father while presiding over the European mission, and it showed up the hypocrisy of those at that time who were pretending to stand for the purity of the American home. Brother Junius published the letter in the Contributor, not signing his father's name to it but signing “Forty-niner,” and when the Contributor arrived in Liverpool, Brother Wells wrote back and wanted to know who that old man was that signed himself “Forty-niner.” He said, “Darn his buttons, he is stealing my thunder.”
I had it in my heart yesterday, as I sat upon this stand, to talk upon the temporal salvation of this people, which is sure to come if we only obey the commandments of the Lord which He has given for our temporal salvation; and lo and behold, Brother Lyman stole nearly all of my thunder. He quoted the identical part of the Word of Wisdom that I had intended to quote, but, like the frequent singing of our songs—“O, ye mountains high,” and “We thank thee, O God, for a prophet,” we can never repeat too often the commandments of the Lord to this people, and urge upon the Saints to live up to them. I have said from this stand time and time again, I believe that if we as a people had only obeyed the Word of Wisdom, temporal salvation would have come to us, and we would have become the wealthiest state west of the Mississippi River; that while we were driven from Nauvoo and came here to what was then considered a barren and worthless country; that, had we obeyed this one simple law of God, the wealth of this community would have been so great that no other section of the country between here and Illinois would have had anywhere near the wealth which we would have possessed.
There is being consumed today in the United States twenty-one dollars per capita by the users of intoxicating liquors. I am sure the good people of Utah are not consuming their pro rata of this amount. If we were as progressive and as prosperous as the average of the United States, according to the ideas of some people who call themselves financiers we would be spending the same as others and thus be worse than wasting today, because we have about four hundred thousand people, eight million dollars a year, and all we would have to show for this prosperity (?) would be empty bottles and empty barrels. I believe in home manufacture.
I believe in wearing home-made clothes. I believe in patronizing our different factories which are built here. And from my early childhood, in the days when I listened to President Brigham Young and others, it was burned into my very vitals that financial success would come to this community by building up our industries. But how under the heavens any man with the ordinary intelligence with which God has endowed him believes and can believe that empty barrels and empty bottles will bring wealth to this community, when the contents have first destroyed the manhood and the intellectuality and the efficiency of the people who have emptied the bottles and barrels, is one of the untold mysteries to me. Success in life comes with the efficiency of the individual; and what applies to the individual applies to the city, applies to the county, applies to the state. Anything under the heavens that destroys the individual efficiency of a man destroys the individual efficiency of all the community in proportion as they are destroyed as individuals.
There is in the last Collier's Weekly an (article entitled, “The ruin prohibition brought to Kansas,” and I would like to read just a little of the ruin that has come to Kansas from prohibition.
“While the people of Kansas talk very little about this, being a reticent folk, it is generally realized that prohibition has killed in this state about every industry except the raising of wheat and corn and alfalfa and fruit and live stock; potatoes and peas and cabbages and 'garden sass’; chickens and ducks and geese and horses and mules. Almost immediately prohibition ruined our most prominent gamblers, blighted our beer gardens, and killed the bartenders’ union.
“Prohibition has left very little of Kansas except the growing crops in her field, the stock in her stock pens, the dreary round of work, work, work in her factories and stores and other industries. It has left us little to do in hours of leisure except just to fall in love, get married, send our children to school, go abroad occasionally, join the church when we feel like it, run into each other with expensive automobiles, and store our money away in dusty bank vaults instead of giving it to cheerful gentlemen with white aprons who used to stand in front of cut-glass bars and say occasionally, (And I might say mighty occasionally): ‘This one is on the house.'
“Where once the thriving business of the saloon sent the clamorous odor of its prosperity out upon the sidewalk and clear across the street, (generally the product was kicked out upon the street, and not able to get a quarter way across), we find nothing but shoe stores, clothing stores, dry-goods stores, meat markets, grocery stores, and other sordid activities of an unhappy people.* * * * *
“There hasn’t even been a case of delirium tremens in the state since 1896, and at the time that was thought by inexperienced surgeons to be due to the free-silver campaign. * * * “Then, too, we have driven out of Kansas a class that was very useful to us, that relieved us entirely of the responsibility of local government. In the day before the state went dry no one ever worried about who was to be alderman or chief of police or mayor. We knew that the saloon men would look after that—it was part of their business. They wielded the balance of power and the political bickerings which sometimes now enter into the selection of our local officers in Kansas were wholly unnecessary in that old day. The saloon men got together and made up the ticket and got it elected. All we had to do was to pay the bills.
“Now heaven alone knows when a campaign opens who is going to be elected, and when he is elected he spends so much of his time worrying about the recall provisions of the charter that it spoils much of the pleasure and all of the profit which his old-time predecessors used to get out of the job.
“With the example of Kansas being constantly pointed out by the liquor men, why will state after state rise up and kick these benefactors in the face in the ungrateful way they are now doing?”
Brother Edward H. Anderson has written to Collier’s for permission to publish the whole article in the Era, so I shall not read any more of it.
In the American Patriot we find an article on the worms that are destroying the harvest in the United States. It goes on to tell of the terrible ravages, but science has brought remedies whereby these can be obliterated and all this trouble of the worms has no effect. It tells that in one of the old readers there was an article that gave an account of a deadly worm that preyed upon men, which was found in every section of the country. The article in the old reader pointed out that this worm was one of the most destructive agencies to the life of man known in the history of the world, in a way that the young readers could understand, and gave a graphic picture of this strange worm, together with an unmistakable account of its fearful effects upon humanity. “By this means many young people learned of the most venomous thing in existence, and learned by this plain warning to avoid it. Many names had been given it, but, in this account, the real name of the creature was given. It was called the worm of the Still.”
“The worm of the still,” when men use it destroys them so that they are not capable of having temporal salvation, because it destroys their intellect, it destroys their physical as well as their mental power. It is estimated, by students of finance, that every dollar of circulating medium goes over and over in a community and does in a year from twenty-five to one hundred dollars’ worth of work. In the United States there is seven hundred and fifty million dollars a year expended in tobacco alone, and two billion and one hundred million dollars expended on liquor. Nearly every dollar which we spend on liquor and tobacco is sent away from the state—and say that we only spend a quarter of what other people do—it would amount to at least two millions and a half dollars a year, which is drained from our fair state—thus adding to our prosperity according to the whisky men’s arguments. Multiply these two millions and a half by twenty-five or one hundred and you will then see what a capacity the good people of Utah would have to support our industries because of the immense amount of circulating medium which the people would possess. Truly our capacity because of the possession of this vast sum added to our circulating medium annually would indeed be marvelous. The Lord knew exactly what He was saying when He told us that if we would obey His law—the Word of Wisdom—it would bring us temporal salvation. That is exactly what it will do for us from the day we obey it. It is not what a man makes that gives him strength and power financially in the community, but it is what he saves. This sure rule applies to all the people as well as the individual. If we had kept the money here which has been worse than wasted by sending it abroad for tobacco and liquor, we would have had power, as money is power, we would have secured temporal salvation. Men who have acquired the appetite will have tobacco and liquor, even if they have to sacrifice the ordinary wants of their families to secure these things.
I hold in my hand a little pamphlet of which I have given away hundreds of copies. It is entitled, “The case against the little white slaver.” It is a book against the cigarette published in pamphlet form, by Henry Ford, the manufacturer of the Ford automobile. Some years ago we had on our Mutual Improvement course of reading a book entitled, “The strength of being clean,” by David Starr Jordan; and President Joseph F. Smith remarked that it was one of the finest vindications, by a great educator, of the inspiration of God to Joseph Smith in giving us the Word of Wisdom, that had ever been published by a non-“Mormon.” David Starr Jordan is not only a national but an international character. I have written in the front of Mr. Ford’s pamphlet a remark of Mr. Jordan’s: “The boy who smokes cigarettes need not be anxious about his future. He has none.” I would like that to “soak in.” Just think it over: “The boy who smokes cigarettes need not be anxious about his future. He has none.” Recently the Bureau of Information received a letter making some inquiry about certain doctrines of the Church. I have here one or two quotations from what was printed on the back of the letter and these I have also written in this pamphlet of Mr. Ford’s.
"A prominent banker ‘I have never yet employed a young man who said he used tobacco or liquor.’"
Fathers and mothers, do you want bankers to employ your boys? Remember the day is coming when they will not do it if they use tobacco or liquor.
“Fidelity Insurance Company—‘We will not bond a man who uses cigarettes, for such men are not safe physically nor morally.’ ”
Think of it! Cigarette users can’t even pay money enough to get this company to insure their honesty.
“Charles W. Murphy—‘All the ‘Cub’ baseball players must leave liquor alone at all times, must abstain from the use of cigarettes.’ ”
No wonder they are one of the greatest clubs in the world.
"Conclusion—'My son, as long as thou hast in thy skull the sense of a jay-bird, break away from the cigarette, for lo, it causeth thy breath to stink like a glue factory; it rendereth thy. mind less intelligent than that of a cigar store dummy, yea thou art a cipher with the rim knocked off.’—Bob Burdette.”
Thomas A. Edison—one of the greatest minds the world has ever produced—writes to Mr. Ford:
“The injurious agent in cigarettes comes principally from the burning paper wrapper. The substance thereby formed is. called ‘acrolein.’ It has a violent action on the nerve centers, producing degeneration of the cells of the brain, which is quite rapid among boys. Unlike most narcotics this degeneration is permanent and uncontrollable. I employ no person who smokes cigarettes.”
Think of it! Degeneration of the brains of our children comes from using cigarettes, and this degeneration becomes permanent and uncontrollable and yet people go on saying that we can drink and smoke and chew and we injure nobody but ourselves. It is false! If we degenerate our brain power we injure our posterity after us.
John Wannamaker, Henry Ford, Marshall Field & Company, the Cadillac Motor Company, some of the great railroads with hundreds of millions of capital invested, refuse to employ cigarette smokers.
"A new arithmetic. ‘I am not much of a mathematician,’ said the cigarette, ‘but I can add nervous troubles to a boy, I can subtract from, his physical energy, I can multiply his aches and pains, I can divide his mental powers, I can take interest from his work and discount his chances for success.’ ’’
I would like the last part of the sentence to soak in—“and discount his chances for success.”
The head of the tobacco trust writes a long letter to Mr. Ford and demands that he apologize for his attack on the cigarette, claiming it is not injurious, and tells of the wonderful increase in the use of cigarettes and says that this is an argument in favor of it. He says that in 1900 there were two billion, six hundred million cigarettes used. In 1913 there were fifteen billion, eight hundred million cigarettes used—(nails in the coffins of those that used them and a partial destruction of their intellectuality)— an increase of seven hundred per cent. Mr. Henry Ford’s secretary answers and calls this tobacco man's attention to the fact that one of the magistrates in New York City announces that "ninety-nine per cent of all the boys between the ages of ten and seventeen who come before him charged with crime have their fingers disfigured with cigarette stains.” Dr. T. D. Crothers says that, "In young persons who begin on cigarettes there are always pronounced symptoms of poisoning, such as pallor and dullness of activity,” and the brain fails to act. We find that Dr. Fred J. Pack of our own University of Utah made an investigation which was published in one of the eastern magazines. The Temperance Journal.
"Two hundred ten men held a contest for positions on the athletic team. Of the non-smokers, sixty-live per cent were successful: of the smokers only thirty-three per cent were successful. This was not only true in the six institutions which furnished the data about the try-outs when taken as a total, but in each of the six the nonsmokers far outstripped the smokers. In one institution not a single smoker obtained a place on the team."
I called up Doctor Pack this morning and got some additional information. Dr. Pack is the head of the Geological Department in the University of Utah, and during the summer vacations he goes out with the boys and they climb mountains and they take hikes and they have long trials of endurance. They climb many a mountain which takes more than one day to get to the summit; and Dr. Pack notifies the boys, puts them on their mettle, before they start announcing that “No cigarette smokers will arrive at the top of the mountain with the boys that do not smoke;” and his promise of failure for the smokers has always been fulfilled. You can pick the smokers out down the hill by the number of the nails, figuratively speaking, that they have been putting in their coffins by using cigarettes.
Speaking of the failure of men reminds me of an article that I borrowed this morning from Brother Joseph W. McMurrin. I see my time is running on and I must not attempt to read it. (President Smith: “Go on.”) This article, published in August, 1914, in The Literary Digest, tells that in fifty long years no single solitary boy that used tobacco has graduated at the head of his class in Harvard University. How I do thank the Lord that all over the world the doctrines of the Lord Jesus Christ which have come to us through the Prophet Joseph Smith are being vindicated. Fifty long years and no smoker at the head of his class in Harvard! And yet there were five smokers out of every six students, so we are entitled to multiply the fifty years by five and announce that in two hundred and fifty years, man to man, the smoker has failed. What a wonderful record! what a marvelous vindication of the inspiration of Almighty God to that young man, Joseph Smith. It is not only in the Word of Wisdom, but it is in every doctrine that God has revealed to us that this vindication is coming, day after day and year after year. Dr. Kress says that the cigarette injures young men morally. Mike Donovan, the head of the great New York Athletic Club, says:
“Any boy who smokes can never hope to succeed in any line of endeavor, as smoking weakens the heart and lungs and ruins the stomach and affects the entire nervous system. If a boy or young man expects to amount to anything in athletics, he must let smoking and all kinds of liquor alone. They are rank poison to his athletic ambitions.”
Mrs. Paterson, president of the Georgia Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, says:
"Several years ago I stepped into a grocery store and asked to buy a package of cigarette papers, such as were given away at that time with Durham smoking tobacco. I took two small bottles, each holding about three tablespoonfuls of water. In one I placed fifteen of these cigarette papers, and in the other an equal thickness of leaves of tissue, paper from between visiting cards, for the tissue papers were much thinner and it took a larger number of leaves.
“I found that a few drops of the water from the bottle containing the cigarette paper would kill a mouse, quicker than you could say ‘Jack Robinson,’ and a teaspoonful of the water from the other papers seemed to cause a mouse to suffer no inconvenience.
“I have killed dozens of mice with this water and there are others who have tried the experiment with the same success. Will Mr. Hill please tell me what made the difference in the same water, in the same kind of bottles, except the papers that were placed in the bottle?” (Mr. Hill is the president of the tobacco company who wrote Mr. Ford for an apology because he claimed cigarettes were not injurious.)
Here is the one thing above all others in Mr. Ford’s pamphlet which has impressed me:
“Several of my young acquaintances are in their graves who gave promise of making happy and useful citizens,” declares Luther Burbank, the wizard of the plant and vegetable kingdom whose experiments have caused the civilized world to wonder, and whose experiments have benefited the civilized world by millions upon millions, in increase of prosperity, by the increase in the various things that he has done in improvement in flowers and in seeds and in fruits and in the redemption of the cactus in Arizona, taking the thorns out; he is in very deed the wizard of the agricultural world and one of the benefactors of mankind. He says: “And there is no question whatever that cigarettes alone were the cause of their destruction. No boy living would commence the use of cigarettes if he knew what a useless, soulless, worthless thing they would make of him.”
May the Lord help us in keeping our sons from becoming “useless, soulless, worthless things,” is my prayer, and I ask it in the name of Jesus. Amen.
Observance of Word of Wisdom would vastly increase community wealth—Man’s efficiency destroyed by intoxicating liquors—Each dollar retained in circulation, in Utah, increases citizens’ average wealth— Deadly character of the cigarette— The cigarette smoker always a failure.
I rejoice, beyond the ability with which God has given me the power to express my feelings, in having a testimony of the divinity of the work in which we are engaged. I rejoice in being able to bear witness to you here today that the Lord has blessed me with a knowledge that He lives, that He hears, and that He answers our prayers. I rejoice in knowing that Jesus is the Redeemer of the world, our elder brother, and that His name and His name alone, is the only one under heaven whereby we can gain salvation and come back and dwell with our Heavenly Father and our Savior, and our loved ones who have gone before. I rejoice in the knowledge that Joseph Smith was the prophet of the true and the living God, and the revelations that have come to us from him, which are recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants, are in very deed the commandments of the Lord and of His Son our Redeemer, and that it is our duty and an obligation resting upon us to obey those commandments. Every word that I have heard, the testimonies and the expounding of the doctrines of Christ, since this conference has opened, have found an echo in my heart and I have thanked God for the testimonies which have been borne to us, thus far in this conference.
I acknowledge the hand of God in the preservation of our people in Mexico. It is a miracle, and there should be a feeling of gratitude in our hearts to our Heavenly Father for the preservation of those of our brethren and sisters who have been located in that land. I confess that their faith has been superior to mine. I am afraid that if I had been located in Mexico, I would have left that country long ago.
I was particularly impressed yesterday with the remarks made here by the President of the Council to which I have the honor to belong, and I desire during the time that I occupy, if the Lord will only bless me with His Spirit, to make some remarks along the same line upon which President Lyman spoke yesterday.
I remember years ago, one of the most sarcastic and splendid letters that I ever read, being handed to me by Brother Junius F. Wells, written by his father while presiding over the European mission, and it showed up the hypocrisy of those at that time who were pretending to stand for the purity of the American home. Brother Junius published the letter in the Contributor, not signing his father's name to it but signing “Forty-niner,” and when the Contributor arrived in Liverpool, Brother Wells wrote back and wanted to know who that old man was that signed himself “Forty-niner.” He said, “Darn his buttons, he is stealing my thunder.”
I had it in my heart yesterday, as I sat upon this stand, to talk upon the temporal salvation of this people, which is sure to come if we only obey the commandments of the Lord which He has given for our temporal salvation; and lo and behold, Brother Lyman stole nearly all of my thunder. He quoted the identical part of the Word of Wisdom that I had intended to quote, but, like the frequent singing of our songs—“O, ye mountains high,” and “We thank thee, O God, for a prophet,” we can never repeat too often the commandments of the Lord to this people, and urge upon the Saints to live up to them. I have said from this stand time and time again, I believe that if we as a people had only obeyed the Word of Wisdom, temporal salvation would have come to us, and we would have become the wealthiest state west of the Mississippi River; that while we were driven from Nauvoo and came here to what was then considered a barren and worthless country; that, had we obeyed this one simple law of God, the wealth of this community would have been so great that no other section of the country between here and Illinois would have had anywhere near the wealth which we would have possessed.
There is being consumed today in the United States twenty-one dollars per capita by the users of intoxicating liquors. I am sure the good people of Utah are not consuming their pro rata of this amount. If we were as progressive and as prosperous as the average of the United States, according to the ideas of some people who call themselves financiers we would be spending the same as others and thus be worse than wasting today, because we have about four hundred thousand people, eight million dollars a year, and all we would have to show for this prosperity (?) would be empty bottles and empty barrels. I believe in home manufacture.
I believe in wearing home-made clothes. I believe in patronizing our different factories which are built here. And from my early childhood, in the days when I listened to President Brigham Young and others, it was burned into my very vitals that financial success would come to this community by building up our industries. But how under the heavens any man with the ordinary intelligence with which God has endowed him believes and can believe that empty barrels and empty bottles will bring wealth to this community, when the contents have first destroyed the manhood and the intellectuality and the efficiency of the people who have emptied the bottles and barrels, is one of the untold mysteries to me. Success in life comes with the efficiency of the individual; and what applies to the individual applies to the city, applies to the county, applies to the state. Anything under the heavens that destroys the individual efficiency of a man destroys the individual efficiency of all the community in proportion as they are destroyed as individuals.
There is in the last Collier's Weekly an (article entitled, “The ruin prohibition brought to Kansas,” and I would like to read just a little of the ruin that has come to Kansas from prohibition.
“While the people of Kansas talk very little about this, being a reticent folk, it is generally realized that prohibition has killed in this state about every industry except the raising of wheat and corn and alfalfa and fruit and live stock; potatoes and peas and cabbages and 'garden sass’; chickens and ducks and geese and horses and mules. Almost immediately prohibition ruined our most prominent gamblers, blighted our beer gardens, and killed the bartenders’ union.
“Prohibition has left very little of Kansas except the growing crops in her field, the stock in her stock pens, the dreary round of work, work, work in her factories and stores and other industries. It has left us little to do in hours of leisure except just to fall in love, get married, send our children to school, go abroad occasionally, join the church when we feel like it, run into each other with expensive automobiles, and store our money away in dusty bank vaults instead of giving it to cheerful gentlemen with white aprons who used to stand in front of cut-glass bars and say occasionally, (And I might say mighty occasionally): ‘This one is on the house.'
“Where once the thriving business of the saloon sent the clamorous odor of its prosperity out upon the sidewalk and clear across the street, (generally the product was kicked out upon the street, and not able to get a quarter way across), we find nothing but shoe stores, clothing stores, dry-goods stores, meat markets, grocery stores, and other sordid activities of an unhappy people.* * * * *
“There hasn’t even been a case of delirium tremens in the state since 1896, and at the time that was thought by inexperienced surgeons to be due to the free-silver campaign. * * * “Then, too, we have driven out of Kansas a class that was very useful to us, that relieved us entirely of the responsibility of local government. In the day before the state went dry no one ever worried about who was to be alderman or chief of police or mayor. We knew that the saloon men would look after that—it was part of their business. They wielded the balance of power and the political bickerings which sometimes now enter into the selection of our local officers in Kansas were wholly unnecessary in that old day. The saloon men got together and made up the ticket and got it elected. All we had to do was to pay the bills.
“Now heaven alone knows when a campaign opens who is going to be elected, and when he is elected he spends so much of his time worrying about the recall provisions of the charter that it spoils much of the pleasure and all of the profit which his old-time predecessors used to get out of the job.
“With the example of Kansas being constantly pointed out by the liquor men, why will state after state rise up and kick these benefactors in the face in the ungrateful way they are now doing?”
Brother Edward H. Anderson has written to Collier’s for permission to publish the whole article in the Era, so I shall not read any more of it.
In the American Patriot we find an article on the worms that are destroying the harvest in the United States. It goes on to tell of the terrible ravages, but science has brought remedies whereby these can be obliterated and all this trouble of the worms has no effect. It tells that in one of the old readers there was an article that gave an account of a deadly worm that preyed upon men, which was found in every section of the country. The article in the old reader pointed out that this worm was one of the most destructive agencies to the life of man known in the history of the world, in a way that the young readers could understand, and gave a graphic picture of this strange worm, together with an unmistakable account of its fearful effects upon humanity. “By this means many young people learned of the most venomous thing in existence, and learned by this plain warning to avoid it. Many names had been given it, but, in this account, the real name of the creature was given. It was called the worm of the Still.”
“The worm of the still,” when men use it destroys them so that they are not capable of having temporal salvation, because it destroys their intellect, it destroys their physical as well as their mental power. It is estimated, by students of finance, that every dollar of circulating medium goes over and over in a community and does in a year from twenty-five to one hundred dollars’ worth of work. In the United States there is seven hundred and fifty million dollars a year expended in tobacco alone, and two billion and one hundred million dollars expended on liquor. Nearly every dollar which we spend on liquor and tobacco is sent away from the state—and say that we only spend a quarter of what other people do—it would amount to at least two millions and a half dollars a year, which is drained from our fair state—thus adding to our prosperity according to the whisky men’s arguments. Multiply these two millions and a half by twenty-five or one hundred and you will then see what a capacity the good people of Utah would have to support our industries because of the immense amount of circulating medium which the people would possess. Truly our capacity because of the possession of this vast sum added to our circulating medium annually would indeed be marvelous. The Lord knew exactly what He was saying when He told us that if we would obey His law—the Word of Wisdom—it would bring us temporal salvation. That is exactly what it will do for us from the day we obey it. It is not what a man makes that gives him strength and power financially in the community, but it is what he saves. This sure rule applies to all the people as well as the individual. If we had kept the money here which has been worse than wasted by sending it abroad for tobacco and liquor, we would have had power, as money is power, we would have secured temporal salvation. Men who have acquired the appetite will have tobacco and liquor, even if they have to sacrifice the ordinary wants of their families to secure these things.
I hold in my hand a little pamphlet of which I have given away hundreds of copies. It is entitled, “The case against the little white slaver.” It is a book against the cigarette published in pamphlet form, by Henry Ford, the manufacturer of the Ford automobile. Some years ago we had on our Mutual Improvement course of reading a book entitled, “The strength of being clean,” by David Starr Jordan; and President Joseph F. Smith remarked that it was one of the finest vindications, by a great educator, of the inspiration of God to Joseph Smith in giving us the Word of Wisdom, that had ever been published by a non-“Mormon.” David Starr Jordan is not only a national but an international character. I have written in the front of Mr. Ford’s pamphlet a remark of Mr. Jordan’s: “The boy who smokes cigarettes need not be anxious about his future. He has none.” I would like that to “soak in.” Just think it over: “The boy who smokes cigarettes need not be anxious about his future. He has none.” Recently the Bureau of Information received a letter making some inquiry about certain doctrines of the Church. I have here one or two quotations from what was printed on the back of the letter and these I have also written in this pamphlet of Mr. Ford’s.
"A prominent banker ‘I have never yet employed a young man who said he used tobacco or liquor.’"
Fathers and mothers, do you want bankers to employ your boys? Remember the day is coming when they will not do it if they use tobacco or liquor.
“Fidelity Insurance Company—‘We will not bond a man who uses cigarettes, for such men are not safe physically nor morally.’ ”
Think of it! Cigarette users can’t even pay money enough to get this company to insure their honesty.
“Charles W. Murphy—‘All the ‘Cub’ baseball players must leave liquor alone at all times, must abstain from the use of cigarettes.’ ”
No wonder they are one of the greatest clubs in the world.
"Conclusion—'My son, as long as thou hast in thy skull the sense of a jay-bird, break away from the cigarette, for lo, it causeth thy breath to stink like a glue factory; it rendereth thy. mind less intelligent than that of a cigar store dummy, yea thou art a cipher with the rim knocked off.’—Bob Burdette.”
Thomas A. Edison—one of the greatest minds the world has ever produced—writes to Mr. Ford:
“The injurious agent in cigarettes comes principally from the burning paper wrapper. The substance thereby formed is. called ‘acrolein.’ It has a violent action on the nerve centers, producing degeneration of the cells of the brain, which is quite rapid among boys. Unlike most narcotics this degeneration is permanent and uncontrollable. I employ no person who smokes cigarettes.”
Think of it! Degeneration of the brains of our children comes from using cigarettes, and this degeneration becomes permanent and uncontrollable and yet people go on saying that we can drink and smoke and chew and we injure nobody but ourselves. It is false! If we degenerate our brain power we injure our posterity after us.
John Wannamaker, Henry Ford, Marshall Field & Company, the Cadillac Motor Company, some of the great railroads with hundreds of millions of capital invested, refuse to employ cigarette smokers.
"A new arithmetic. ‘I am not much of a mathematician,’ said the cigarette, ‘but I can add nervous troubles to a boy, I can subtract from, his physical energy, I can multiply his aches and pains, I can divide his mental powers, I can take interest from his work and discount his chances for success.’ ’’
I would like the last part of the sentence to soak in—“and discount his chances for success.”
The head of the tobacco trust writes a long letter to Mr. Ford and demands that he apologize for his attack on the cigarette, claiming it is not injurious, and tells of the wonderful increase in the use of cigarettes and says that this is an argument in favor of it. He says that in 1900 there were two billion, six hundred million cigarettes used. In 1913 there were fifteen billion, eight hundred million cigarettes used—(nails in the coffins of those that used them and a partial destruction of their intellectuality)— an increase of seven hundred per cent. Mr. Henry Ford’s secretary answers and calls this tobacco man's attention to the fact that one of the magistrates in New York City announces that "ninety-nine per cent of all the boys between the ages of ten and seventeen who come before him charged with crime have their fingers disfigured with cigarette stains.” Dr. T. D. Crothers says that, "In young persons who begin on cigarettes there are always pronounced symptoms of poisoning, such as pallor and dullness of activity,” and the brain fails to act. We find that Dr. Fred J. Pack of our own University of Utah made an investigation which was published in one of the eastern magazines. The Temperance Journal.
"Two hundred ten men held a contest for positions on the athletic team. Of the non-smokers, sixty-live per cent were successful: of the smokers only thirty-three per cent were successful. This was not only true in the six institutions which furnished the data about the try-outs when taken as a total, but in each of the six the nonsmokers far outstripped the smokers. In one institution not a single smoker obtained a place on the team."
I called up Doctor Pack this morning and got some additional information. Dr. Pack is the head of the Geological Department in the University of Utah, and during the summer vacations he goes out with the boys and they climb mountains and they take hikes and they have long trials of endurance. They climb many a mountain which takes more than one day to get to the summit; and Dr. Pack notifies the boys, puts them on their mettle, before they start announcing that “No cigarette smokers will arrive at the top of the mountain with the boys that do not smoke;” and his promise of failure for the smokers has always been fulfilled. You can pick the smokers out down the hill by the number of the nails, figuratively speaking, that they have been putting in their coffins by using cigarettes.
Speaking of the failure of men reminds me of an article that I borrowed this morning from Brother Joseph W. McMurrin. I see my time is running on and I must not attempt to read it. (President Smith: “Go on.”) This article, published in August, 1914, in The Literary Digest, tells that in fifty long years no single solitary boy that used tobacco has graduated at the head of his class in Harvard University. How I do thank the Lord that all over the world the doctrines of the Lord Jesus Christ which have come to us through the Prophet Joseph Smith are being vindicated. Fifty long years and no smoker at the head of his class in Harvard! And yet there were five smokers out of every six students, so we are entitled to multiply the fifty years by five and announce that in two hundred and fifty years, man to man, the smoker has failed. What a wonderful record! what a marvelous vindication of the inspiration of Almighty God to that young man, Joseph Smith. It is not only in the Word of Wisdom, but it is in every doctrine that God has revealed to us that this vindication is coming, day after day and year after year. Dr. Kress says that the cigarette injures young men morally. Mike Donovan, the head of the great New York Athletic Club, says:
“Any boy who smokes can never hope to succeed in any line of endeavor, as smoking weakens the heart and lungs and ruins the stomach and affects the entire nervous system. If a boy or young man expects to amount to anything in athletics, he must let smoking and all kinds of liquor alone. They are rank poison to his athletic ambitions.”
Mrs. Paterson, president of the Georgia Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, says:
"Several years ago I stepped into a grocery store and asked to buy a package of cigarette papers, such as were given away at that time with Durham smoking tobacco. I took two small bottles, each holding about three tablespoonfuls of water. In one I placed fifteen of these cigarette papers, and in the other an equal thickness of leaves of tissue, paper from between visiting cards, for the tissue papers were much thinner and it took a larger number of leaves.
“I found that a few drops of the water from the bottle containing the cigarette paper would kill a mouse, quicker than you could say ‘Jack Robinson,’ and a teaspoonful of the water from the other papers seemed to cause a mouse to suffer no inconvenience.
“I have killed dozens of mice with this water and there are others who have tried the experiment with the same success. Will Mr. Hill please tell me what made the difference in the same water, in the same kind of bottles, except the papers that were placed in the bottle?” (Mr. Hill is the president of the tobacco company who wrote Mr. Ford for an apology because he claimed cigarettes were not injurious.)
Here is the one thing above all others in Mr. Ford’s pamphlet which has impressed me:
“Several of my young acquaintances are in their graves who gave promise of making happy and useful citizens,” declares Luther Burbank, the wizard of the plant and vegetable kingdom whose experiments have caused the civilized world to wonder, and whose experiments have benefited the civilized world by millions upon millions, in increase of prosperity, by the increase in the various things that he has done in improvement in flowers and in seeds and in fruits and in the redemption of the cactus in Arizona, taking the thorns out; he is in very deed the wizard of the agricultural world and one of the benefactors of mankind. He says: “And there is no question whatever that cigarettes alone were the cause of their destruction. No boy living would commence the use of cigarettes if he knew what a useless, soulless, worthless thing they would make of him.”
May the Lord help us in keeping our sons from becoming “useless, soulless, worthless things,” is my prayer, and I ask it in the name of Jesus. Amen.
ELDER RUDGER CLAWSON
The Prophet Joseph Smith the most striking figure of the 19th century— His first glorious vision—Authorized to re-establish the Church of Jesus Christ—Priesthood restored—Established saving ordinances in behalf of the dead—Translated the Book of Mormon—Many glorious revelations received, and published, by him—Head of the greatest, the last, dispensation.
My brethren and sisters, I desire an interest in your faith and prayers this morning while I stand before you for a few moments, that I may be led, like others who have spoken, to say something that shall be instructive and faith-promoting.
Joseph Smith, the prophet, was by far the most striking figure of the nineteenth century. I realize that this is a very bold declaration and while many will readily concede to it, others will regard it as presumptuous, but let me say to you, brethren and sisters and friends, that there is ample evidence to sustain it. The following are a few things that make Joseph Smith, the prophet, conspicuous among men:
In the first place, he was favored with a personal visit of God the Father, and of Jesus Christ, His Son. He testified that he knew they lived, because he had seen their faces and heard their voices, and that they were in the form and likeness of a man. Thus was restored to the earth again the knowledge of God, at a time when many supposed Him to be a being without body, parts or passions. This first glorious vision of the prophet swept darkness and doubt, ignorance and unbelief from the minds of men, at least hundreds and thousands, and a great flood of light burst in upon them and filled their souls.
Joseph Smith, the prophet, under divine guidance, founded the Church of Jesus Christ, the only Church under the heavens in this age of the world known and called by that name.
In connection with the founding of the Church-, Joseph Smith received and transmitted to others the holy Priesthood, representing divine authority, by which the Gospel is preached and the ordinances thereof administered for the salvation of souls, or, in other words, by which men are baptized by immersion for the remission of their sins and have hands laid upon them for the gift of the Holy Ghost. Jesus said: “Except a man is born of the water and of the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven.” The gift of the Holy Ghost is the key that unlocks the deep and hidden mysteries of God.
The Church founded by the Prophet Joseph Smith not only provided a plan of salvation for the living but also for the dead, being broad enough in its scope to reach every child of God, whether in this world or the world to come. The latter-day Church, like the former day Church-is built upon the foundations of apostles and prophets, evangelists, high priests, seventies, elders, bishops, priests, teachers and deacons, Jesus Christ being the chief corner-stone.
By the power of God, Joseph Smith translated into the English language the Book of Mormon, a record which is quite as sacred and precious as the Bible itself. He also gave to the Church the Doctrine and Covenants, a book containing the revelations of God’s will to His prophet and His people; also that wonderful little record, the Pearl of Great Price. If all other books in the world were destroyed in an instant and these four hooks still remained—the Bible, the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price—they would constitute a library of priceless value, and would form a solid basis from which and by which to regenerate the world.
In the providences of the Lord, and by His word and power, Joseph Smith the prophet restored to the earth again the everlasting covenant, called the new and everlasting covenant, a covenant that binds the husband to the wife and the wife to the husband for time and all eternity, thus securing to them the power of eternal increase and the blessing of endless lives, and emphasizing, as no earthly covenant alone could do, the sanctity of the marriage bond, and by inference or contrast, condemning the monstrous evil of divorce, when resorted to for trivial causes.
Brethren and sisters, these are a few things which, I contend, raised Joseph Smith head and shoulders above his fellows and attracted to him and to the Church converts from the nations of the earth, until the Church has prospered and grown to an extent beyond our expectations.
The Lord said to Joseph Smith:
“And verily, verily, I say unto you. whatsoever you seal upon the earth shall be sealed in heaven, and whatsoever you bind upon the earth, in my name and by my word, shall be eternally bound in the heavens, and whatsoever you loose upon the earth shall be loosed in heaven: and whosesoever sins you remit on earth shall be remitted eternally in the heavens; and whosesoever sins you retain on earth, shall be retained in heaven.”
And again: “Verily I say. whomsoever you bless. I will bless: and whomsoever you curse. I will curse, saith the Lord; for I. the Lord, am thy God.”
Thus to Joseph Smith, like Peter of old, was given the keys of the kingdom of heaven and thus was Joseph Smith, unlike any prophet that ever lived, placed at the head of this great last dispensation, the dispensation of dispensations, even the dispensation of the fulness of times, when all things will be restored to their proper place and order and all things gathered into one.
Brethren and sisters, I again solemnly repeat—Joseph Smith, the mighty prophet of God, was the most striking figure of the nineteenth century. The Lord bless you, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The Prophet Joseph Smith the most striking figure of the 19th century— His first glorious vision—Authorized to re-establish the Church of Jesus Christ—Priesthood restored—Established saving ordinances in behalf of the dead—Translated the Book of Mormon—Many glorious revelations received, and published, by him—Head of the greatest, the last, dispensation.
My brethren and sisters, I desire an interest in your faith and prayers this morning while I stand before you for a few moments, that I may be led, like others who have spoken, to say something that shall be instructive and faith-promoting.
Joseph Smith, the prophet, was by far the most striking figure of the nineteenth century. I realize that this is a very bold declaration and while many will readily concede to it, others will regard it as presumptuous, but let me say to you, brethren and sisters and friends, that there is ample evidence to sustain it. The following are a few things that make Joseph Smith, the prophet, conspicuous among men:
In the first place, he was favored with a personal visit of God the Father, and of Jesus Christ, His Son. He testified that he knew they lived, because he had seen their faces and heard their voices, and that they were in the form and likeness of a man. Thus was restored to the earth again the knowledge of God, at a time when many supposed Him to be a being without body, parts or passions. This first glorious vision of the prophet swept darkness and doubt, ignorance and unbelief from the minds of men, at least hundreds and thousands, and a great flood of light burst in upon them and filled their souls.
Joseph Smith, the prophet, under divine guidance, founded the Church of Jesus Christ, the only Church under the heavens in this age of the world known and called by that name.
In connection with the founding of the Church-, Joseph Smith received and transmitted to others the holy Priesthood, representing divine authority, by which the Gospel is preached and the ordinances thereof administered for the salvation of souls, or, in other words, by which men are baptized by immersion for the remission of their sins and have hands laid upon them for the gift of the Holy Ghost. Jesus said: “Except a man is born of the water and of the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven.” The gift of the Holy Ghost is the key that unlocks the deep and hidden mysteries of God.
The Church founded by the Prophet Joseph Smith not only provided a plan of salvation for the living but also for the dead, being broad enough in its scope to reach every child of God, whether in this world or the world to come. The latter-day Church, like the former day Church-is built upon the foundations of apostles and prophets, evangelists, high priests, seventies, elders, bishops, priests, teachers and deacons, Jesus Christ being the chief corner-stone.
By the power of God, Joseph Smith translated into the English language the Book of Mormon, a record which is quite as sacred and precious as the Bible itself. He also gave to the Church the Doctrine and Covenants, a book containing the revelations of God’s will to His prophet and His people; also that wonderful little record, the Pearl of Great Price. If all other books in the world were destroyed in an instant and these four hooks still remained—the Bible, the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price—they would constitute a library of priceless value, and would form a solid basis from which and by which to regenerate the world.
In the providences of the Lord, and by His word and power, Joseph Smith the prophet restored to the earth again the everlasting covenant, called the new and everlasting covenant, a covenant that binds the husband to the wife and the wife to the husband for time and all eternity, thus securing to them the power of eternal increase and the blessing of endless lives, and emphasizing, as no earthly covenant alone could do, the sanctity of the marriage bond, and by inference or contrast, condemning the monstrous evil of divorce, when resorted to for trivial causes.
Brethren and sisters, these are a few things which, I contend, raised Joseph Smith head and shoulders above his fellows and attracted to him and to the Church converts from the nations of the earth, until the Church has prospered and grown to an extent beyond our expectations.
The Lord said to Joseph Smith:
“And verily, verily, I say unto you. whatsoever you seal upon the earth shall be sealed in heaven, and whatsoever you bind upon the earth, in my name and by my word, shall be eternally bound in the heavens, and whatsoever you loose upon the earth shall be loosed in heaven: and whosesoever sins you remit on earth shall be remitted eternally in the heavens; and whosesoever sins you retain on earth, shall be retained in heaven.”
And again: “Verily I say. whomsoever you bless. I will bless: and whomsoever you curse. I will curse, saith the Lord; for I. the Lord, am thy God.”
Thus to Joseph Smith, like Peter of old, was given the keys of the kingdom of heaven and thus was Joseph Smith, unlike any prophet that ever lived, placed at the head of this great last dispensation, the dispensation of dispensations, even the dispensation of the fulness of times, when all things will be restored to their proper place and order and all things gathered into one.
Brethren and sisters, I again solemnly repeat—Joseph Smith, the mighty prophet of God, was the most striking figure of the nineteenth century. The Lord bless you, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
ELDER GEORGE A. SMITH.
Selfishness, a principal cause of war—Peace and salvation result of heeding teaching of God’s servants—The Gospel should be taught in our households, and to our neighbors—God’s message to the world against liquor and tobacco.
My brethren and sisters, I trust that the few words I speak this morning may be indited by our Heavenly Father, for I have no desire to talk unless He inspires me.
The good things we have listened to during this conference will be food for reflection for me for many weeks to come, and I am grateful to be here, where all is peace. The world is in confusion, men running hither and thither, not thirsting for the word of God, but seeking to gratify their selfish desires and destroy each other’s lives; and in Europe it has resulted in bringing about the greatest war this world has ever seen. In Mexico the spirit of murder, due to selfishness, has brought the people to a very unfortunate condition, all of which would not exist if the warring people understood and lived the Gospel. It is gratifying to hear President Bentley sav that the charity and patience of the Latter-day Saints south of the Pio Grande is bearing fruit among their Mexican neighbors. It is quite difficult, usually. when we are smitten upon one cheek, to turn the other, but that is the Lord’s way to overcome the world. That is the commandment that has been given to the Latter-day Saints, it is the Gospel of the Redeemer.
Since our first parents lived in the Garden of Eden, the Lord has revealed Himself to the human family from time to time, and sought to safeguard them from the sorrow that overtakes men on account of selfishness. At intervals He has sent His prophets upon the earth, and they have repeated the kind advice of a loving Father to His children. The Old and New Testament scriptures are filled with counsel of the Lord, through His faithful servants in the old world. The Book of Mormon consists largely of the teachings of the prophets who, from age to age, taught the Gospel to the people of ancient America; and now, in our day, the Lord has raised up a prophet, revealed Himself to him. inspired him and illumined his mind to teach what is necessary for this generation to know. The thing that appeals to me is that the people, from father Adam until the present time, who have had the greatest joy and happiness in life have been those who have followed the teachings of the prophets of the Lord; those who have ignored them have paid the penalty in many cases by sorrow and destruction, missing the great blessings that our Father has placed within their reach.
The Gospel that our Heavenly Father desires all to understand is being promulgated in our day an 1 those who accept and live it will reap the happiness that follows. Fortunate are we who are assembled here today, that we understand and have accepted the truth and that we are striving to make it a part of our lives. We send missionaries to the nations of the earth to proclaim the Gospel as revealed in this latter day. But that is not all our duty. Right at our doors, by the hundreds and thousands, are choice sons and daughters of our Heavenly Father. They live among us, we become friends, but we fail to teach them to the extent we should, concerning the Gospel that we know is the power of God unto salvation. The Presidency of the Church are doing all that lies in their power; they devote their time during the day, and often into the late hours of the night, in the interest of the Church. The brethren who are associated with them give liberally of their time, traveling and teaching the Latter-day Saints and carrying the Gospel to our Father’s children. The presidents of stakes, high counselors, bishops of wards, and their assistants, labor unceasingly to bless the people, and their reward is sure. But are we doing all we ought, so that when we stand before the bar of our Heavenly Father He will say we have done our full duty by our fellows. His children? Are we setting our own houses in order? Are we teaching our children faith in God that when sickness invades our homes they will call for the elders of the Church and have faith that our Father, the Great Physician, will heal them of their infirmities? Are we teaching those of our own household to repent of their shortcomings, teaching them not to follow after the fashions of the world, that are calculated to destroy faith in God and detract from the glorious opportunities within our reach? Are we teaching our children the necessity of baptism by immersion for the remission of sins, calling their attention to the fact that it is the law of the Lord, who required His Only Begotten Son to go down into the waters of baptism in order to fulfill all righteousness? Are we teaching our children the necessity of having the hands of the servants of God laid upon their heads, that they may receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, which we are told will bring things past to our remembrance and teach us things that are yet to come?
These are the first principles of the Gospel, They have been revealed anew in the day in which we live and fortunate, I say. are we that we have understood, them and that we are partakers of the blessings that follow their observance, for there is no other way. The Latter-day Saints are the only ones who bear the authority of our Heavenly Father to administer in the ordinances of the Gospel. The world has need of us. Throughout the earth are men and women who. if they understood, as we understand. would receive the Gospel of our Lord. I feel sometimes that we do not sufficiently sense the importance of it, that we do not teach it with the earnestness -it demands. Speaking of faith, something that I read recently comes to my mind. It is the teachings of the Prophet referred to by Moroni in the 7th chapter of the Book of Mormon, and reads as follows:
“Wherefore, my beloved brethren, hath miracles ceased, because Christ hath ascended into heaven, and hath set down on the right hand of God, to claim of the Father His right of mercy which He hath upon the children of men?
“For He hath answered the ends of the law, and He claimeth all those who have faith in Him, and they who have faith in Him. will cleave unto every good thing; wherefore He advocateth the cause of the children of men. and He dwelleth eternally in the heavens."
This is the point, all those who have faith in Him will cleave unto every good thing. If we can but implant a knowledge of the Gospel of our Lord and faith in His ministry, in the hearts of the rising generation, we have gone a long way towards neutralizing the temptations and power of the adversary in this world.
Quoting Moroni again,
“Behold, I say unto you, it is by faith that miracles are wrought; and it is by faith that angels appear and minister unto men; wherefore, if these things have ceased, woe be unto the children of men, for it is because of unbelief, and all is vain.”
“For behold, the Spirit of Christ is given to-every man that he may know good from evil; wherefore I shew unto you the way to judge; for everything which inviteth to do good, and to persuade to believe in Christ, is sent forth by the power and gift of Christ; wherefore you may know with a perfect knowledge it is of God.
“But whatsoever thing persuadeth men to do evil, and believe not in Christ, and deny Him. and serve not God, then ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of the devil, for after this manner doth the devil work, for he persuadeth no man to do good, no, not one: neither doth his angels, neither do they who subject themselves unto him.
“And now, my brethren, see that ye know the light by which ye may judge, which light is the light of Christ, see that ye do not judge wrongfully; for with the same judgment, ye shall also be judged.
“Wherefore I beseech of you, brethren, that ye should search diligently in the light of Christ, that ye may know good from evil; and if ye will lay hold upon every good thing, and condemn it not ye certainly will be a child of Christ.”
Our temporal welfare is of great importance. I endorse the teachings of this conference, to avoid the things that are so totally unnecessary and so terribly destructive of our lives. Our dear President in his opening address announced that we even now may be in the presence of our faithful leaders who have gone before. I am grateful for that suggestion and that testimony. What a happy influence it ought to have on our lives, if day by day, we could live so that our departed dear ones would desire to be near us. What a splendid thing it would be to live so that we could feel their presence and enjoy their companionship, even though they have passed to the other side. What joy will be ours if, day by day, we labor to radiate sunshine and inspire faith in the souls of man, that they may work righteousness, keep the commandments of our Father and look forward to a reunion with those who have gone before.
I rejoice this day in a testimony of the divinity of the mission of Jesus Christ, the Redeemer of the world. I know, as I know that I live, that He is what we believe Him to be. I know that there is no other name under heaven whereby we may hope to gain exaltation, but the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior. There is no other Gospel of salvation, and we. my brethren who bear the holy priesthood, have the responsibility of carrying that message, not only to the nations of the earth, but of exemplifying it in our lives and teaching it to those who are our neighbors, not of our faith. I warn you this day that the Lord holds us responsible to call 'His children to repentance and for the promulgation of His truth. If we fail to take advantage of our opportunities to teach the sons and daughters of God, who are not of our faith, who dwell in our midst, this Gospel of our Lord, He will require at our hands on the other side of the veil what we have failed to do, so let us not be recreant.
I rejoice that a wave of prohibition is spreading over the land— another evidence of the Spirit of the Lord. I desire to read a testimony that is of the utmost importance with reference to the use of liquor and of tobacco. Wise men have testified that these things are not good, but I want to read to you the testimony of the Father of our spirits, the God who created us and who has placed us here that we might gain an exaltation. He says with reference to these things:
“And, again, strong drinks are not for the belly, but for the washing of your bodies.”
And again. “Tobacco is not for the body, neither for the belly and is not good for man.”
What greater evidence should the Latter-day Saints require of the futility and the unwisdom of using those things, than the word of our Creator who gave us life? I am grateful that in the world men are beginning to understand. If they will not comprehend the scriptures, then by experience they are learning the lessons that our Father would have us know, that if we will keep His commandments, we will enjoy life here and farther than that, it will prepare us for the fife beyond the veil. Oh, how grateful I am for the knowledge that my Heavenly Father has given me. I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet of the living God and that the revelations given by our Father through him are for our uplift and our exaltation if we will only obey them.
Brethren and sisters, let us do our part, let us this day make up our minds that from henceforth we will use our influence to drive from our midst every evil thing, by beginning at home, setting our own houses in order and then radiating our influence in love and kindness and by good works wherever possible. It is only a question of time until the liquor interests of this country will be banished and I hope and pray that the Latter-day Saints will see to it that when they choose men to represent them in the State or Nation, that they will exercise their franchise as our Father in Heaven would have them do, and see to it that honorable men and good men are placed in positions who will remove from us, so far as possible, the temptations of the adversary, that our boys and girls may grow up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord and gain eternal life. May the Lord add His blessings, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The choir sang the anthem. ‘‘Jerusalem, my Glorious Home.”
Elder Theodore Brandley pronounced the benediction.
Conference adjourned until 2 p. m.
Selfishness, a principal cause of war—Peace and salvation result of heeding teaching of God’s servants—The Gospel should be taught in our households, and to our neighbors—God’s message to the world against liquor and tobacco.
My brethren and sisters, I trust that the few words I speak this morning may be indited by our Heavenly Father, for I have no desire to talk unless He inspires me.
The good things we have listened to during this conference will be food for reflection for me for many weeks to come, and I am grateful to be here, where all is peace. The world is in confusion, men running hither and thither, not thirsting for the word of God, but seeking to gratify their selfish desires and destroy each other’s lives; and in Europe it has resulted in bringing about the greatest war this world has ever seen. In Mexico the spirit of murder, due to selfishness, has brought the people to a very unfortunate condition, all of which would not exist if the warring people understood and lived the Gospel. It is gratifying to hear President Bentley sav that the charity and patience of the Latter-day Saints south of the Pio Grande is bearing fruit among their Mexican neighbors. It is quite difficult, usually. when we are smitten upon one cheek, to turn the other, but that is the Lord’s way to overcome the world. That is the commandment that has been given to the Latter-day Saints, it is the Gospel of the Redeemer.
Since our first parents lived in the Garden of Eden, the Lord has revealed Himself to the human family from time to time, and sought to safeguard them from the sorrow that overtakes men on account of selfishness. At intervals He has sent His prophets upon the earth, and they have repeated the kind advice of a loving Father to His children. The Old and New Testament scriptures are filled with counsel of the Lord, through His faithful servants in the old world. The Book of Mormon consists largely of the teachings of the prophets who, from age to age, taught the Gospel to the people of ancient America; and now, in our day, the Lord has raised up a prophet, revealed Himself to him. inspired him and illumined his mind to teach what is necessary for this generation to know. The thing that appeals to me is that the people, from father Adam until the present time, who have had the greatest joy and happiness in life have been those who have followed the teachings of the prophets of the Lord; those who have ignored them have paid the penalty in many cases by sorrow and destruction, missing the great blessings that our Father has placed within their reach.
The Gospel that our Heavenly Father desires all to understand is being promulgated in our day an 1 those who accept and live it will reap the happiness that follows. Fortunate are we who are assembled here today, that we understand and have accepted the truth and that we are striving to make it a part of our lives. We send missionaries to the nations of the earth to proclaim the Gospel as revealed in this latter day. But that is not all our duty. Right at our doors, by the hundreds and thousands, are choice sons and daughters of our Heavenly Father. They live among us, we become friends, but we fail to teach them to the extent we should, concerning the Gospel that we know is the power of God unto salvation. The Presidency of the Church are doing all that lies in their power; they devote their time during the day, and often into the late hours of the night, in the interest of the Church. The brethren who are associated with them give liberally of their time, traveling and teaching the Latter-day Saints and carrying the Gospel to our Father’s children. The presidents of stakes, high counselors, bishops of wards, and their assistants, labor unceasingly to bless the people, and their reward is sure. But are we doing all we ought, so that when we stand before the bar of our Heavenly Father He will say we have done our full duty by our fellows. His children? Are we setting our own houses in order? Are we teaching our children faith in God that when sickness invades our homes they will call for the elders of the Church and have faith that our Father, the Great Physician, will heal them of their infirmities? Are we teaching those of our own household to repent of their shortcomings, teaching them not to follow after the fashions of the world, that are calculated to destroy faith in God and detract from the glorious opportunities within our reach? Are we teaching our children the necessity of baptism by immersion for the remission of sins, calling their attention to the fact that it is the law of the Lord, who required His Only Begotten Son to go down into the waters of baptism in order to fulfill all righteousness? Are we teaching our children the necessity of having the hands of the servants of God laid upon their heads, that they may receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, which we are told will bring things past to our remembrance and teach us things that are yet to come?
These are the first principles of the Gospel, They have been revealed anew in the day in which we live and fortunate, I say. are we that we have understood, them and that we are partakers of the blessings that follow their observance, for there is no other way. The Latter-day Saints are the only ones who bear the authority of our Heavenly Father to administer in the ordinances of the Gospel. The world has need of us. Throughout the earth are men and women who. if they understood, as we understand. would receive the Gospel of our Lord. I feel sometimes that we do not sufficiently sense the importance of it, that we do not teach it with the earnestness -it demands. Speaking of faith, something that I read recently comes to my mind. It is the teachings of the Prophet referred to by Moroni in the 7th chapter of the Book of Mormon, and reads as follows:
“Wherefore, my beloved brethren, hath miracles ceased, because Christ hath ascended into heaven, and hath set down on the right hand of God, to claim of the Father His right of mercy which He hath upon the children of men?
“For He hath answered the ends of the law, and He claimeth all those who have faith in Him, and they who have faith in Him. will cleave unto every good thing; wherefore He advocateth the cause of the children of men. and He dwelleth eternally in the heavens."
This is the point, all those who have faith in Him will cleave unto every good thing. If we can but implant a knowledge of the Gospel of our Lord and faith in His ministry, in the hearts of the rising generation, we have gone a long way towards neutralizing the temptations and power of the adversary in this world.
Quoting Moroni again,
“Behold, I say unto you, it is by faith that miracles are wrought; and it is by faith that angels appear and minister unto men; wherefore, if these things have ceased, woe be unto the children of men, for it is because of unbelief, and all is vain.”
“For behold, the Spirit of Christ is given to-every man that he may know good from evil; wherefore I shew unto you the way to judge; for everything which inviteth to do good, and to persuade to believe in Christ, is sent forth by the power and gift of Christ; wherefore you may know with a perfect knowledge it is of God.
“But whatsoever thing persuadeth men to do evil, and believe not in Christ, and deny Him. and serve not God, then ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of the devil, for after this manner doth the devil work, for he persuadeth no man to do good, no, not one: neither doth his angels, neither do they who subject themselves unto him.
“And now, my brethren, see that ye know the light by which ye may judge, which light is the light of Christ, see that ye do not judge wrongfully; for with the same judgment, ye shall also be judged.
“Wherefore I beseech of you, brethren, that ye should search diligently in the light of Christ, that ye may know good from evil; and if ye will lay hold upon every good thing, and condemn it not ye certainly will be a child of Christ.”
Our temporal welfare is of great importance. I endorse the teachings of this conference, to avoid the things that are so totally unnecessary and so terribly destructive of our lives. Our dear President in his opening address announced that we even now may be in the presence of our faithful leaders who have gone before. I am grateful for that suggestion and that testimony. What a happy influence it ought to have on our lives, if day by day, we could live so that our departed dear ones would desire to be near us. What a splendid thing it would be to live so that we could feel their presence and enjoy their companionship, even though they have passed to the other side. What joy will be ours if, day by day, we labor to radiate sunshine and inspire faith in the souls of man, that they may work righteousness, keep the commandments of our Father and look forward to a reunion with those who have gone before.
I rejoice this day in a testimony of the divinity of the mission of Jesus Christ, the Redeemer of the world. I know, as I know that I live, that He is what we believe Him to be. I know that there is no other name under heaven whereby we may hope to gain exaltation, but the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior. There is no other Gospel of salvation, and we. my brethren who bear the holy priesthood, have the responsibility of carrying that message, not only to the nations of the earth, but of exemplifying it in our lives and teaching it to those who are our neighbors, not of our faith. I warn you this day that the Lord holds us responsible to call 'His children to repentance and for the promulgation of His truth. If we fail to take advantage of our opportunities to teach the sons and daughters of God, who are not of our faith, who dwell in our midst, this Gospel of our Lord, He will require at our hands on the other side of the veil what we have failed to do, so let us not be recreant.
I rejoice that a wave of prohibition is spreading over the land— another evidence of the Spirit of the Lord. I desire to read a testimony that is of the utmost importance with reference to the use of liquor and of tobacco. Wise men have testified that these things are not good, but I want to read to you the testimony of the Father of our spirits, the God who created us and who has placed us here that we might gain an exaltation. He says with reference to these things:
“And, again, strong drinks are not for the belly, but for the washing of your bodies.”
And again. “Tobacco is not for the body, neither for the belly and is not good for man.”
What greater evidence should the Latter-day Saints require of the futility and the unwisdom of using those things, than the word of our Creator who gave us life? I am grateful that in the world men are beginning to understand. If they will not comprehend the scriptures, then by experience they are learning the lessons that our Father would have us know, that if we will keep His commandments, we will enjoy life here and farther than that, it will prepare us for the fife beyond the veil. Oh, how grateful I am for the knowledge that my Heavenly Father has given me. I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet of the living God and that the revelations given by our Father through him are for our uplift and our exaltation if we will only obey them.
Brethren and sisters, let us do our part, let us this day make up our minds that from henceforth we will use our influence to drive from our midst every evil thing, by beginning at home, setting our own houses in order and then radiating our influence in love and kindness and by good works wherever possible. It is only a question of time until the liquor interests of this country will be banished and I hope and pray that the Latter-day Saints will see to it that when they choose men to represent them in the State or Nation, that they will exercise their franchise as our Father in Heaven would have them do, and see to it that honorable men and good men are placed in positions who will remove from us, so far as possible, the temptations of the adversary, that our boys and girls may grow up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord and gain eternal life. May the Lord add His blessings, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The choir sang the anthem. ‘‘Jerusalem, my Glorious Home.”
Elder Theodore Brandley pronounced the benediction.
Conference adjourned until 2 p. m.
AFTERNOON SESSION.
Conference was resumed at 2 p. m.. President Joseph F. Smith presiding.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn. “Come, come, ye Saints, no toil nor labor fear.”
Elder German E. Ellsworth, offered the invocation.
The choir sang the hymn, "Lol the mighty God appearing.”
Conference was resumed at 2 p. m.. President Joseph F. Smith presiding.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn. “Come, come, ye Saints, no toil nor labor fear.”
Elder German E. Ellsworth, offered the invocation.
The choir sang the hymn, "Lol the mighty God appearing.”
ELDER PHILIP H. HURST.
(Of Juarez Stake.)
My beloved brethren and sisters, I can say that it is indeed a surprise unto me to be called to this position, to address the Latter-day Saints in the general conference of the Church. I feel my unworthiness, my inability to say anything unto you that would be edifying or instructive, unless the Lord will be with me and assist me upon this occasion.
I want to say, in beginning, that I do know that this is the work of the Lord; that I have a testimony in regard to the truth of the Gospel we have received. I have been endeavoring to bear this testimony to all those I have come in contact with, and especially during the last three or four years, since my lot has been cast in the city of El Paso, among people who are not of our faith. I have endeavored to proclaim the Gospel unto them. A number of years ago our brethren endeavored to do missionary work in that city, but at that time were unable to accomplish anything, on account of the prejudices of the people, but since our people have come out from Mexico, many from our colonies have resided in the city. We have become acquainted with many of the people of El Paso, and have been enabled to remove a great deal of prejudice from their minds and hearts. At the present time we have some elders preaching upon the streets, and holding meetings, and the results of their labors have been very satisfactory.
While I have not been in the colonies for some months, I have been upon the border, and probably we have had more excitement immediately along the border than what our brethren have had in the colonies. The missionary work has been hindered to a certain extent during those trying times. I want to say, in regard to the preservation of our people, that men who are unbelievers, who do not have the faith that the Latter-day Saints have, admit that our people have been miraculously preserved. We all admit that. We believe that the Lord is handling the nations of the earth, and we believe that He has raised up friends who have come to the assistance of our people in their time of need. All of you know, or have heard of, that great general and soldier, Hugh L. Scott, who was in command of the border patrol for a number of years. I have met this great man and talked with him, on a number of occasions. and he always wanted to talk about the Latter-day Saints: he wanted to know something about the Book of Mormon, the history of the American Indians. I made the General a present of a copy of the Book of Mormon, and he said he would read it. and he took it with him when he went to Washington. He has said to me, repeatedly. “Mr. Hurst, I am a soldier, my orders at the present time are for me to stay on this side of the border, but if the time ever comes when we are ordered to go to the other side, let me know what I can do for your people and we will do it.” In the present emergency, we feel, as I said before, that the Lord preserved our people in the colonies: the danger that they would be destroyed seemed threatening, but it passed them before the United States forces arrived there. We do believe that, had they not have arrived those bandit marauders, would have returned, and massacred our people. It seemed a great contrast to me to what the conditions were many years ago. I remarked to our people in meeting, the other Sunday in El Paso, that it looked to me like a great change has come over the American people. in this great land of ours. You know that once there was an army hastening to these valleys of the mountains with the avowed purpose of destroying the Latter-day Saints; but we recently had an example of American cavalry riding on forced marches across the plains and deserts of Mexico to preserve some of the Latter-day Saints. We feel that a great change has come over the people of this great nation in their feelings towards us. I want to say that, during our sojourn in El Paso, we have been able to make friends among the best men in that city, men of influence, representatives of the President of the United States and of the State Department. These men have worked unceasingly and untiringly for the safety and salvation of the Latter-day Saints in the colonies of Mexico. A few have criticized and said. “We owe them nothing: they have paid no attention to the request of the United States Government, when they were asked to withdraw from Mexico.” But many other men, greater than these, have said. “They are our own people, our own flesh and blood, and we must continue to work for their safety and preservation.”
None of us know what the end of this trouble will be in Mexico. You all know the revolutionary condition has continued now for over five years. At times it has seemed as though a stable government would be established among that people, but just as soon as that appeared about to be accomplished, we find them dividing again, turning against each other and starting new revolutions. It seems, to us who have been observers of this situation, that those people are unable to control the situation, and establish a government among themselves. The spirit of confidence in each other does not exist. It seems to us that the time must come, if it has not already come, when some power other than that which they possess will have to be exercised for the establishment of a stable government in that land, under which the people's lives will be protected, and their property and rights will not be molested. In looking over the situation of our people we find that, although our lives have been preserved, we have been robbed, plundered, and peeled by all factions, none of them have passed us by. I have wondered whether we would be able to hold on until peace is established. As far as this world’s goods are concerned, it has been a losing proposition with us from the commencement of this trouble until the present time. Our horses and wagons have been taken, our fences have been destroyed, and a number of our houses have been burned. The implements that our people had new and in good condition, five years ago. are now worn out, and they have not got the money with which to replace these implements. In talking with merchants in El Paso last Monday, some of our brethren asked for credit some who need wagons, mowing machines and other implements to harvest this year’s crop, and the question arises, who is going to stand good for these things? Of course, those of our people who have anything left, that they can sell, can dispose of it for real money, for American coin, but our people have but little left. While some of the bandit leaders have offered to pay in the past for the produce that they have taken, they have paid in money that was worth, perhaps, two cents on the dollar, practically nothing. At the present time, we feel that our people are safe in the colonies, as long as the United States forces are there we feel that they are amply protected. We do not know what the condition may be if those forces are withdrawn.
My brethren and sisters, I do not wish to take up more time this afternoon. There are others who can edify you better than I can; but I want to say again, as I said in the beginning of my remarks, that I do know that the Gospel is true,’ that the hand of the Lord is over this great latter-day work anti over His people. We know that He is able to protect us, and provide for us. May we live so that we will be worthy of His blessings from day to day. is my prayer, in the name of Jesus. Amen.
(Of Juarez Stake.)
My beloved brethren and sisters, I can say that it is indeed a surprise unto me to be called to this position, to address the Latter-day Saints in the general conference of the Church. I feel my unworthiness, my inability to say anything unto you that would be edifying or instructive, unless the Lord will be with me and assist me upon this occasion.
I want to say, in beginning, that I do know that this is the work of the Lord; that I have a testimony in regard to the truth of the Gospel we have received. I have been endeavoring to bear this testimony to all those I have come in contact with, and especially during the last three or four years, since my lot has been cast in the city of El Paso, among people who are not of our faith. I have endeavored to proclaim the Gospel unto them. A number of years ago our brethren endeavored to do missionary work in that city, but at that time were unable to accomplish anything, on account of the prejudices of the people, but since our people have come out from Mexico, many from our colonies have resided in the city. We have become acquainted with many of the people of El Paso, and have been enabled to remove a great deal of prejudice from their minds and hearts. At the present time we have some elders preaching upon the streets, and holding meetings, and the results of their labors have been very satisfactory.
While I have not been in the colonies for some months, I have been upon the border, and probably we have had more excitement immediately along the border than what our brethren have had in the colonies. The missionary work has been hindered to a certain extent during those trying times. I want to say, in regard to the preservation of our people, that men who are unbelievers, who do not have the faith that the Latter-day Saints have, admit that our people have been miraculously preserved. We all admit that. We believe that the Lord is handling the nations of the earth, and we believe that He has raised up friends who have come to the assistance of our people in their time of need. All of you know, or have heard of, that great general and soldier, Hugh L. Scott, who was in command of the border patrol for a number of years. I have met this great man and talked with him, on a number of occasions. and he always wanted to talk about the Latter-day Saints: he wanted to know something about the Book of Mormon, the history of the American Indians. I made the General a present of a copy of the Book of Mormon, and he said he would read it. and he took it with him when he went to Washington. He has said to me, repeatedly. “Mr. Hurst, I am a soldier, my orders at the present time are for me to stay on this side of the border, but if the time ever comes when we are ordered to go to the other side, let me know what I can do for your people and we will do it.” In the present emergency, we feel, as I said before, that the Lord preserved our people in the colonies: the danger that they would be destroyed seemed threatening, but it passed them before the United States forces arrived there. We do believe that, had they not have arrived those bandit marauders, would have returned, and massacred our people. It seemed a great contrast to me to what the conditions were many years ago. I remarked to our people in meeting, the other Sunday in El Paso, that it looked to me like a great change has come over the American people. in this great land of ours. You know that once there was an army hastening to these valleys of the mountains with the avowed purpose of destroying the Latter-day Saints; but we recently had an example of American cavalry riding on forced marches across the plains and deserts of Mexico to preserve some of the Latter-day Saints. We feel that a great change has come over the people of this great nation in their feelings towards us. I want to say that, during our sojourn in El Paso, we have been able to make friends among the best men in that city, men of influence, representatives of the President of the United States and of the State Department. These men have worked unceasingly and untiringly for the safety and salvation of the Latter-day Saints in the colonies of Mexico. A few have criticized and said. “We owe them nothing: they have paid no attention to the request of the United States Government, when they were asked to withdraw from Mexico.” But many other men, greater than these, have said. “They are our own people, our own flesh and blood, and we must continue to work for their safety and preservation.”
None of us know what the end of this trouble will be in Mexico. You all know the revolutionary condition has continued now for over five years. At times it has seemed as though a stable government would be established among that people, but just as soon as that appeared about to be accomplished, we find them dividing again, turning against each other and starting new revolutions. It seems, to us who have been observers of this situation, that those people are unable to control the situation, and establish a government among themselves. The spirit of confidence in each other does not exist. It seems to us that the time must come, if it has not already come, when some power other than that which they possess will have to be exercised for the establishment of a stable government in that land, under which the people's lives will be protected, and their property and rights will not be molested. In looking over the situation of our people we find that, although our lives have been preserved, we have been robbed, plundered, and peeled by all factions, none of them have passed us by. I have wondered whether we would be able to hold on until peace is established. As far as this world’s goods are concerned, it has been a losing proposition with us from the commencement of this trouble until the present time. Our horses and wagons have been taken, our fences have been destroyed, and a number of our houses have been burned. The implements that our people had new and in good condition, five years ago. are now worn out, and they have not got the money with which to replace these implements. In talking with merchants in El Paso last Monday, some of our brethren asked for credit some who need wagons, mowing machines and other implements to harvest this year’s crop, and the question arises, who is going to stand good for these things? Of course, those of our people who have anything left, that they can sell, can dispose of it for real money, for American coin, but our people have but little left. While some of the bandit leaders have offered to pay in the past for the produce that they have taken, they have paid in money that was worth, perhaps, two cents on the dollar, practically nothing. At the present time, we feel that our people are safe in the colonies, as long as the United States forces are there we feel that they are amply protected. We do not know what the condition may be if those forces are withdrawn.
My brethren and sisters, I do not wish to take up more time this afternoon. There are others who can edify you better than I can; but I want to say again, as I said in the beginning of my remarks, that I do know that the Gospel is true,’ that the hand of the Lord is over this great latter-day work anti over His people. We know that He is able to protect us, and provide for us. May we live so that we will be worthy of His blessings from day to day. is my prayer, in the name of Jesus. Amen.
ELDER GEORGE F. RICHARDS.
Meaning of immortality—Eternal life is salvation and glorification of the soul—Man’s futile substitute for God’s plan—Disbelief in Christ's atonement hinders salvation—The principles and ordinances of the Gospel must be obeyed.
I have been honored, my brethren and sisters, with the privilege of addressing this large assembly of Latter-day Saints and our friends who have gathered with us, and while I occupy this position I desire to speak so that all can hear, and more than this, I desire to say something that is worth your hearing. In this I am sure you can very materially aid me. “The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” It is also true that the prayers and faith of many righteous men and women availeth much with the Lord. I desire to feel that I am in the presence of the Lord, and that you are in His presence and that we are influenced by His presence and by His Spirit, for I desire to say those things only which the Lord would have me to say, on this occasion.
I have thought to use as my text the word of the Lord to His servant Moses, as it is recorded in the Pearl of Great Price, Book of Moses, first chapter, 39th verse, which reads as follows: “For behold, this is my work and my glory, to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” This being the work and glory of the Lord, which I take to mean the all important work of the Lord, it is important that we analyze this expression, and obtain, if possible, a proper understanding of its meaning.
The word immortal means not mortal; that is, not subject to the power of death. I would define immortality as being that state to which we attain in the progress of life when we have passed through death and the resurrection, the spirit and body being reunited and inseparably connected, constituting the soul of man prepared to receive a fulness of the glory of God. Immortality is a means to an end, the end being the accomplishment of man’s eternal salvation and glory. In support of this statement, I call attention to the word of the Lord to the Prophet Joseph, as recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants, sec. 93, verses 33 and 34, as follows: “For man is Spirit. The elements are eternal, and spirit and element, inseparably connected, receiveth a fulness of joy, and when separated, man can not receive a fulness of joy.” Hence the importance of bringing about the immortality of man.
The eternal life here referred to means something more than that man shall not cease to live. I read the word of the Lord from Doctrine and Covenants, Sec. 14, verse 7, as follows: “And, if you keep my commandments and endure to the end, you shall have eternal life, which gift is the greatest of all the gifts of God.” The revelations of the Lord indicate to us the height, depth and grandeur of the glory of God to which the righteous may attain. Eternal life, as here used, being the greatest gift of God, must include a fulness of glory of God, in His celestial kingdom.
The Lord uses the expressions “eternal life” and “salvation” synonymously (See Doctrine and Covenants, Sec. 6:13): “If thou wilt do good, yea, and hold out faithful to the end, thou shalt be saved in the kingdom of God, which is the greatest of all the gifts of God: for there is no gift greater than the gift of salvation.” My text, then, might be stated in other terms expressing the same meaning, such, for example, as the “resurrection and glorification of man,” or what, for my purpose, I like better, “the saving of souls.” The institution of the Gospel plan from the foundation of the world including the creation of the world, was accomplished with this end in view, the saving of souls. I am convinced that the Lord never planned nor engaged in a greater work than that of saving souls. All His works so far as we have any account, were accomplished with that end in view, and such is the magnitude and importance of the work in which we as Latter-day Saints are engaged as instruments in the hands of the Lord, authorized and directed by Him. The Gospel, which has been revealed from heaven through the instrumentality of the Prophet Joseph Smith, with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as its vehicle, represents the means by which this great work is to be accomplished.
It is a tremendous responsibility men assume when they presume to set aside the plan which the Lord has instituted for the saving of the souls of men, substituting therefor one of man’s making. There are, however, thousands and millions who have so done. I think it was this class to whom the Lord referred in his expression contained in John 10:1, which reads as follows: “Verily, verily I say unto you, he that entereth not by the door into the sheep fold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.”
There is another class whose responsibility is still greater, for they have not only accepted a substitute plan for the saving of souls, but they have adopted as their vocation the preaching and teaching of the same to their fellows, thus blinding their eyes to the simple truths of the Gospel, and prejudicing their minds against the true cause of God. I have authority for this statement in the words of the Apostle Paul as addressed 80 the Galatian Saints (Gal. 1:8), “But though we or an angel from heaven preach any other Gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.”
I thank the Lord with all my soul that the light of the everlasting Gospel has come to me as He has revealed it, that my environment and teachings have been such that the Gospel has appealed to me, that I have accepted it, and so far obeyed it that I have learned of its truth. To those who will obey the Gospel it is one of salvation both in this life and in the life to come. Talk about Christianity in the world! If you can find a people who have not rejected Jesus Christ as the Son of God in the flesh, the Messiah, the Savior and Redeemer of the world, then we will not question their right to be called Christians; but, we do not acknowledge those as Christians who deny Him in part or whole of what He is. I understand that many, if not most, of the preachers of today, professed Christians, reject Jesus Christ as the Savior and Redeemer of the world, accepting Him only as a great philosopher or wise teacher. They have rejected the chief cornerstone of Christianity, and have undermined and rendered powerless for salvation their professed Christianity. Not so with the Latter-day Saints. We realize that there is no virtue for salvation and exaltation outside of the atoning blood of Jesus Christ, our Savior. There is no other name under heaven by which man may obtain salvation. The whole plan of salvation is founded upon revelation and Jesus Christ; rejecting these there is no foundation left upon which to build nor to stand. The ordinances of the Gospel have virtue in them by reason of the atoning blood of Jesus Christ, and without it there would be no virtue in them for salvation.
In this Gospel of Jesus Christ, revealed to earth through the instrumentality of the Prophet Joseph Smith, through which to accomplish the immortality and eternal life of man, there are certain indispensable principles and ordinances, such, for example, as faith, repentance, baptism, confirmation and the bestowal of the Holy Ghost, etc. Faith in God the eternal Father is an absolute necessity to salvation. The Apostle Paul presents this fact clearly to the Hebrews (Heb. 11:6), “But without faith it is impossible to please Him; for he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him.” Do men hope to obtain salvation outside of His presence, that they can reject Him or believe Him to be but the shadow of one's self or of one’s imagination? I think that such doctrines are as pernicious as the doctrine that there is no God, and those who accept such doctrines place themselves in the condition of those of whom the Psalmist wrote, Psalms 14:1, “The fool hath said in his heart ‘There is no God.’ ” God has given us sufficient evidence of His existence, His personality and attributes that unbelieving man is left without excuse. It is no less important that we accept Jesus Christ as the Savior and Redeemer of man, as has been already explained.
Repentance is also a necessity. As long as we are mortals we, will have sins to be repented of, for sins not repented of will not be forgiven, and, in our sins unforgiven, we cannot attain to salvation. But repentance means something more than to forsake our sins. If we have transgressed against others it is our duty to right the wrong done as far as lies in our power, and, if it so be that we can not fully do so, then he whom we have wronged is under obligation by commandment of the Lord to forgive us and the Lord will forgive us inasmuch as other conditions are satisfactory, for we must forgive others who have transgressed against us (Matt. 6: 15), “But if ye forgive not men their trespasses neither will your Father forgive your trespass.” Another condition making our repentance perfect and effective is the water baptism or burial in the grave of water in likeness and typical of the burial and resurrection of the Lamb of God by which the sins are washed away. This ordinance of baptism by water is followed by the baptism of the Spirit or confirmation to membership in the Church of Christ, and the bestowal of the Holy Ghost by those who are duly authorized. We are then to go on to perfection, adding to our faith virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, chastity, etc. We are to seek after that which is virtuous, lovely, of good report and praiseworthy and obey all commandments of the Lord living by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God. This indicates the method of securing salvation for our own souls. There is the further responsibility of laboring for the saving of the souls of others, by the preaching of the Gospel abroad, by laboring in the organizations of the Church where called, and by perceptive teaching wherever opportunity is afforded as well as preaching, always and wherever our lots may be cast, by the consistent exemplary life. If we have uppermost in our minds and hearts the saving of souls we will find ample opportunity of laboring to this end.
I bear my testimony to you, my brethren and sisters, of the truth of these things which I do in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
A contralto solo entitled, “Supplication” was sung by Sister Mamie F. Stark; it was written by S. B. Mitton.
Meaning of immortality—Eternal life is salvation and glorification of the soul—Man’s futile substitute for God’s plan—Disbelief in Christ's atonement hinders salvation—The principles and ordinances of the Gospel must be obeyed.
I have been honored, my brethren and sisters, with the privilege of addressing this large assembly of Latter-day Saints and our friends who have gathered with us, and while I occupy this position I desire to speak so that all can hear, and more than this, I desire to say something that is worth your hearing. In this I am sure you can very materially aid me. “The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” It is also true that the prayers and faith of many righteous men and women availeth much with the Lord. I desire to feel that I am in the presence of the Lord, and that you are in His presence and that we are influenced by His presence and by His Spirit, for I desire to say those things only which the Lord would have me to say, on this occasion.
I have thought to use as my text the word of the Lord to His servant Moses, as it is recorded in the Pearl of Great Price, Book of Moses, first chapter, 39th verse, which reads as follows: “For behold, this is my work and my glory, to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” This being the work and glory of the Lord, which I take to mean the all important work of the Lord, it is important that we analyze this expression, and obtain, if possible, a proper understanding of its meaning.
The word immortal means not mortal; that is, not subject to the power of death. I would define immortality as being that state to which we attain in the progress of life when we have passed through death and the resurrection, the spirit and body being reunited and inseparably connected, constituting the soul of man prepared to receive a fulness of the glory of God. Immortality is a means to an end, the end being the accomplishment of man’s eternal salvation and glory. In support of this statement, I call attention to the word of the Lord to the Prophet Joseph, as recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants, sec. 93, verses 33 and 34, as follows: “For man is Spirit. The elements are eternal, and spirit and element, inseparably connected, receiveth a fulness of joy, and when separated, man can not receive a fulness of joy.” Hence the importance of bringing about the immortality of man.
The eternal life here referred to means something more than that man shall not cease to live. I read the word of the Lord from Doctrine and Covenants, Sec. 14, verse 7, as follows: “And, if you keep my commandments and endure to the end, you shall have eternal life, which gift is the greatest of all the gifts of God.” The revelations of the Lord indicate to us the height, depth and grandeur of the glory of God to which the righteous may attain. Eternal life, as here used, being the greatest gift of God, must include a fulness of glory of God, in His celestial kingdom.
The Lord uses the expressions “eternal life” and “salvation” synonymously (See Doctrine and Covenants, Sec. 6:13): “If thou wilt do good, yea, and hold out faithful to the end, thou shalt be saved in the kingdom of God, which is the greatest of all the gifts of God: for there is no gift greater than the gift of salvation.” My text, then, might be stated in other terms expressing the same meaning, such, for example, as the “resurrection and glorification of man,” or what, for my purpose, I like better, “the saving of souls.” The institution of the Gospel plan from the foundation of the world including the creation of the world, was accomplished with this end in view, the saving of souls. I am convinced that the Lord never planned nor engaged in a greater work than that of saving souls. All His works so far as we have any account, were accomplished with that end in view, and such is the magnitude and importance of the work in which we as Latter-day Saints are engaged as instruments in the hands of the Lord, authorized and directed by Him. The Gospel, which has been revealed from heaven through the instrumentality of the Prophet Joseph Smith, with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as its vehicle, represents the means by which this great work is to be accomplished.
It is a tremendous responsibility men assume when they presume to set aside the plan which the Lord has instituted for the saving of the souls of men, substituting therefor one of man’s making. There are, however, thousands and millions who have so done. I think it was this class to whom the Lord referred in his expression contained in John 10:1, which reads as follows: “Verily, verily I say unto you, he that entereth not by the door into the sheep fold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.”
There is another class whose responsibility is still greater, for they have not only accepted a substitute plan for the saving of souls, but they have adopted as their vocation the preaching and teaching of the same to their fellows, thus blinding their eyes to the simple truths of the Gospel, and prejudicing their minds against the true cause of God. I have authority for this statement in the words of the Apostle Paul as addressed 80 the Galatian Saints (Gal. 1:8), “But though we or an angel from heaven preach any other Gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.”
I thank the Lord with all my soul that the light of the everlasting Gospel has come to me as He has revealed it, that my environment and teachings have been such that the Gospel has appealed to me, that I have accepted it, and so far obeyed it that I have learned of its truth. To those who will obey the Gospel it is one of salvation both in this life and in the life to come. Talk about Christianity in the world! If you can find a people who have not rejected Jesus Christ as the Son of God in the flesh, the Messiah, the Savior and Redeemer of the world, then we will not question their right to be called Christians; but, we do not acknowledge those as Christians who deny Him in part or whole of what He is. I understand that many, if not most, of the preachers of today, professed Christians, reject Jesus Christ as the Savior and Redeemer of the world, accepting Him only as a great philosopher or wise teacher. They have rejected the chief cornerstone of Christianity, and have undermined and rendered powerless for salvation their professed Christianity. Not so with the Latter-day Saints. We realize that there is no virtue for salvation and exaltation outside of the atoning blood of Jesus Christ, our Savior. There is no other name under heaven by which man may obtain salvation. The whole plan of salvation is founded upon revelation and Jesus Christ; rejecting these there is no foundation left upon which to build nor to stand. The ordinances of the Gospel have virtue in them by reason of the atoning blood of Jesus Christ, and without it there would be no virtue in them for salvation.
In this Gospel of Jesus Christ, revealed to earth through the instrumentality of the Prophet Joseph Smith, through which to accomplish the immortality and eternal life of man, there are certain indispensable principles and ordinances, such, for example, as faith, repentance, baptism, confirmation and the bestowal of the Holy Ghost, etc. Faith in God the eternal Father is an absolute necessity to salvation. The Apostle Paul presents this fact clearly to the Hebrews (Heb. 11:6), “But without faith it is impossible to please Him; for he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him.” Do men hope to obtain salvation outside of His presence, that they can reject Him or believe Him to be but the shadow of one's self or of one’s imagination? I think that such doctrines are as pernicious as the doctrine that there is no God, and those who accept such doctrines place themselves in the condition of those of whom the Psalmist wrote, Psalms 14:1, “The fool hath said in his heart ‘There is no God.’ ” God has given us sufficient evidence of His existence, His personality and attributes that unbelieving man is left without excuse. It is no less important that we accept Jesus Christ as the Savior and Redeemer of man, as has been already explained.
Repentance is also a necessity. As long as we are mortals we, will have sins to be repented of, for sins not repented of will not be forgiven, and, in our sins unforgiven, we cannot attain to salvation. But repentance means something more than to forsake our sins. If we have transgressed against others it is our duty to right the wrong done as far as lies in our power, and, if it so be that we can not fully do so, then he whom we have wronged is under obligation by commandment of the Lord to forgive us and the Lord will forgive us inasmuch as other conditions are satisfactory, for we must forgive others who have transgressed against us (Matt. 6: 15), “But if ye forgive not men their trespasses neither will your Father forgive your trespass.” Another condition making our repentance perfect and effective is the water baptism or burial in the grave of water in likeness and typical of the burial and resurrection of the Lamb of God by which the sins are washed away. This ordinance of baptism by water is followed by the baptism of the Spirit or confirmation to membership in the Church of Christ, and the bestowal of the Holy Ghost by those who are duly authorized. We are then to go on to perfection, adding to our faith virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, chastity, etc. We are to seek after that which is virtuous, lovely, of good report and praiseworthy and obey all commandments of the Lord living by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God. This indicates the method of securing salvation for our own souls. There is the further responsibility of laboring for the saving of the souls of others, by the preaching of the Gospel abroad, by laboring in the organizations of the Church where called, and by perceptive teaching wherever opportunity is afforded as well as preaching, always and wherever our lots may be cast, by the consistent exemplary life. If we have uppermost in our minds and hearts the saving of souls we will find ample opportunity of laboring to this end.
I bear my testimony to you, my brethren and sisters, of the truth of these things which I do in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
A contralto solo entitled, “Supplication” was sung by Sister Mamie F. Stark; it was written by S. B. Mitton.
ELDER ANTHONY W. IVINS.
Evidences of continued and accelerated progress of the Church—Important mission of the Church in Peace movement—The Saints an example of peace and righteousness—’Vital questions now perplexing the world—Present great need of nations is just men to make and administer laws—Responsibility of the people to elect good men—The Church wants prohibition.
The proceedings of this conference, my brethren and sisters, have been very gratifying to me as I believe they have to all of the Latter-day Saints who have been present. The definite, unmistakable manner in which the fundamental doctrines of the Church have been presented by the Presidency, the testimony to the divinity of the work which has been borne by the presiding authorities of the Church and our brethren who have addressed us, the reports made to us in regard to the development and progress of the Church during the past fourteen years have all been very gratifying indeed to me, and I think ought to put at rest any doubt, if doubt there is, or has been, either in the Church or out of it, as to its development, its progress, its stability.
I have been thinking that if comparative figures were available, it would be seen that since the organization of the Church, eighty-six years ago until today, development has been consistent and constant, that from year to year the Church has gained greater strength, greater prestige, and that greater faith has come to the people as the years have passed. I have been asking myself the question, what will the next fifteen years of the history of the Church develop? Where will we be, what will be our numbers, what will be our increased influence in the world, what progress will the Church of Christ have made? I look forward with optimism because I believe that, just as from year to year there has been greater development, just as during the fourteen years of the history of the Church, which have been reviewed, its progress has been greater comparatively, perhaps, than at any other period of its history, so in the future will there be increased development. This is the Lord’s work and is in the world to prevail, to become better understood and to gain greater influence for good among the people.
I have been thinking if we could confine ourselves to this environment, if we could always be together, if we could always enjoy the spirit of testimony and assurance as the Lord gives it to us in these conferences, we ought to be a very happy, and contented, and satisfied people, and I believe that we are as a rule. But we go out from these conferences, and find ourselves in the world a very small part of the world, but nevertheless, a very important part of it, because the work of the Lord is not confined to the state of Utah; it is not confined to these United States; it is a world work, and consequently it must be vitally interested in world conditions, and its influence and power must be exercised in the affairs of the world if its destiny is to be accomplished. So as I have thought of the peace which prevails at home, of the satisfactory condition of the Church and the comparatively satisfactory condition of our country compared with other countries of the world, I reach the conclusion that our work is not by any means accomplished. It is just beginning, the influence that we expect to attain, the power of the Gospel for good, the establishment of peace and order in the 'religious and the civil world, for we cannot separate them, is a mission that has tremendous possibilities. Perhaps I should not say possibilities, but tremendous certainty before it.
I have been thinking, while sitting here, of the words of Paul. Some of his words have been quoted this afternoon. He wrote, you know, to Timothy whom he addressed as his son, one who had accepted the truth just as we have accepted it. The spirit of those epistles, his whole admonition to Timothy was that he should continue devoted to the Lord, that he should retain the faith, never wavering; that he should remember the law of the Lord which he had pledged himself to keep and observe; that he should remember to honor and uphold the law of the land; and being devoted to these doctrines himself, admonish all other men and women to observe them. That he should teach men to keep the commandments of the Lord; that he should teach them to be industrious, providing for their own families, avoiding extravagance; that he should teach women to be modest in their apparel, not adorning themselves extravagantly. That he should teach the poor to be obedient and acknowledge God in their poverty, and the rich to seek righteousness rather than riches, admonishing them that the love of money was the root of all evil, but that if they acquired riches they must acknowledge God in it and give Him the credit. He told him that these things must be taught in the Church in order that men’s feet might be firmly established in the truth; for he bore witness that the time would come, which he called the last days, when men would be lovers of their own selves, rather than lovers of God; they would be covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemous, disobedient, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce-breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof. From all such turn away, for such people he says, are ever learning yet never able to come to a knowledge of the truth. Comparing the condition of the Church with the condition which prevails in the world generally, I thought of these words of the apostle-prophet. Do you know, my brethren and sisters, how fruitless, in accomplishment have been the teachings of modern Christianity? The Christian world is engaged in deadly strife, nation arrayed against nation, people against people. They have taken up the sword one against the other, are killing each other, and yet professing to be followers of the Redeemer of the world, all having the Bible, all having the word of the Lord as it is contained here in these scriptures, and yet are engaged in the most heartless and bloody war the world has ever known, in modern times at least.
While Brother Grant was quoting statistics this morning I thought of, and during the noon hour copied from remarks made in the British Parliament, just a few days ago, by the Premier of England, these facts, that the European War is costing Great Britain alone twenty-five millions of dollars every day, or nine billion, one hundred twenty-five million dollars a year—figures that are staggering, almost beyond our comprehension. Statesmen in that country, and not in that country alone, for the very same question is being asked here in the United States, are asking what can we do to be saved? It is not so much spiritual salvation that they are asking for, but to save ourselves from ourselves, for they realize that this dissipation and waste in the wealth of the world cannot long continue, to say nothing of the waste in human life and human sacrifice which is being made. So these statesmen in England begin to look around for means of retrenchment. The English people are warned against extravagance, they are warned against needless expenditures; and among other things, and one of the most important things to which their attention is being called, is the fact that in that country every year there is expended for strong drink and narcotics, that might better be done without, the tremendous sum of five hundred fifty millions of dollars, or half a billion dollars every year.
We are not asking in the United States, so directly, what we may do to be saved, but we are asking what can we do to perpetuate existing conditions? Can we save ourselves from this world war? Will we be attacked? Will our resources be too dissipated and wasted? Men advocate greater navies, greater armies, stronger fortifications, in order that the God-given principles of liberty that exist in the United States, as they exist in no other part of the world, may be maintained and this heritage of our fathers be perpetuated. They are vital questions, questions that are before the world. They are before us and we cannot escape nor shirk them. Now there must be a cause for this condition, and a remedy, and I take it for granted that if I see, or think I see the cause, and if I see or think I see the remedy, it is not only my privilege but my duty to say so. I asked myself the question, the first day of this conference, in what does the strength of the Church consist? And the answer very readily came to me—in the first place it is the work of the Lord restored to the earth in the dispensation in which we live, divinely established through the instrumentality of the Prophet Joseph Smith; the Gospel in its fulness has come to us. We understand it, we know that the laws and ordinances, of the Church are perfect, but I thought to myself, except those laws and ordinances are administered in righteousness, by trustworthy men. they amount to nothing. We may have the word of the Lord. We may profess righteousness, we may know His will, but if the will of the Lord is not manifest in our works, works being the expression of faith, they amount to nothing. I know that you could begin at the very head of the Church, and go down through all these quorums, to the presidents of stakes, the members of high councils, the bishops of wards, those who preside over the auxiliary organizations of the Church, and you will find that every man of them are selected with the greatest care, because of their integrity, and integrity expresses it all. If a man profess faith in God and has integrity, he will adhere to God’s commandments; and you will find in the Church that these are clean men, devoted men. You cannot find an immoral man among them, not one. You cannot find an intemperate man among them, you cannot find a man whose word is not to be relied upon, you cannot find a man who is a hypocrite, who professes religion and does not exemplify it in his life; and that constitutes the strength of the Church, the strength of the men who are in it and who control its affairs. There can be no strength in the Church, there can be no strength in the state, except that condition shall prevail, no matter what the constitutional law of the land may be.
They have just as good a constitution in Mexico as we have in the United States, but there has never been men there to execute it. They have perverted the laws; men have transgressed the law of God, changed the ordinances of the Church, and broken the everlasting covenant, while they profess to speak in the name of the Lord, so have men there perverted the just laws that have been written into the statute books by their fathers, until anarchy and confusion prevail. Now, in the scripture that I have read, Paul said the conditions referred to there would come in the last days. The Lord said to the Prophet Joseph, “In the last days, even now, the day in which I am beginning my work, the angels of the Lord stand ready constantly crying to Him to be permitted to go out and reap down the world, for the harvest is ripe.” So we are living in the last days. Do you need to be told that men manifesting in their lives the condition referred to by Paul exist? We come in contact with them wherever we go, and so I say—and I have little fear of successful contradiction— that the condition of confusion that exists in the world, both in the religious and in the civil world, is the result of the administration of the affairs of the church, and of the state by men who have departed from the way of the Lord. They are not men of faith, they take honor to themselves, they do not give Him the credit. They misinterpret the word of the Lord, because to properly interpret it would defeat their purposes.
Now, what is the remedy? Our Church needs no present remedy because it adheres to the word of the Lord, as I have borne witness to you. The responsibility of calling these men to conduct its affairs rests with the presiding authorities of the Church. Every one of these men know how they have been catechised, how their lives have been scrutinized and criticised before they are called to responsible positions, and they know that they must pass successfully that criticism if they are selected and sustained as representatives of the Lord’s work and that if one of them should cease to be a man of integrity and character, no matter who he may be, one of us or one of them, the minute we depart from the way of the Lord, we lose our place. The minute we forget the obligation which rests upon us in His service, no matter what may have been our calling, the moment we place our personal affairs before the affairs of the kingdom, the minute we seek to gratify our own ambition or to accomplish our own selfish purposes through the influences of the priesthood, the Lord has told us that we lose the power that He has given us, and amen to the priesthood or authority of that man. He cannot be an immoral or wicked man and hold his place in the Church. Just as long as that condition continues, the Church is absolutely safe.
The state needs the very same thing. I am going to assume to say that the one thing in the world that is needed today, the one great preparedness that the world needs is the men—men of integrity, men of faith, men of economy, men of industry, men who will control and manage your public affairs as you manage and control your private affairs, men selected by the voice of the people.
If conditions of confusion exist in the world I always look to the word of the Lord for a remedy, because I believe in it, I believe in it as He gave it to His people anciently, I believe in it as He revealed it to us through His prophet in this dispensation, I believe in it as it comes to us through living oracles of God who declare His word to us in the day in which we live. If the word of the Lord is to be depended upon the safety and development and welfare of the people of all nations depends upon the selection of good men, and honest men, and righteous men to represent them in public affairs.
How are you going to separate the church from the state? The state controls the church absolutely, controls your property, controls your lives. It takes your property from you if it wishes, it presses you into service, it declares war or makes peace and you cannot avoid it, however much you may desire, and however much we may claim that we are independent, that what we have belongs to us. After all the finality is that the state controls us. Is it necessary or important, then, that good men administer public affairs, trustworthy men? It seems to me that it is; not only necessary, but absolutely indispensable, and that is the reason I am calling your attention to it. There can be no peace, there can be no perpetuity of the institutions of this country without it, there can be no proper development in this state of ours without it.
I don't know that I need take time to read it to you, but here, in the Doctrine and Covenants, the Lord tells us that in order that these conditions may be maintained it is our duty to seek out good men, and wise men and just men to control our civil affairs. I want to put emphasis on these words “Seek out.” It seems to me that it has almost come to a point when, instead of seeking out men to serve us, we sit supinely down and let the men seek the office and hunt their way in. A man said to me the
other day, “I have been approached and asked to run for governor. I have been told that if I can put up ten thousand dollars I will have a good chance to be elected.” That kind of politics is dangerous. Men ought to be sought out by the people. Do you know what the Lord said to the Nephites who lived upon this continent of ours, and who were destroyed because of the very forces to which I am referring? Mosiah said, when they would have elected him king, that it was not wise, nor proper that a king should be elected among them, but rather he said let men be chosen by the voice of the people to frame laws, and administer them. It was done, and they administered the law in righteousness. For sixty years there was peace but at the end of that time there came an element into the politics of the nation which, under the very same laws, the very same constitution, so ingratiated themselves into the hearts of the people that the majority voted for wicked men instead of good ones, and the historian bears record that in the beginning of that sixtieth year, when the majority of the people accepted wicked men as their chief judges and rulers, their dissolution and destruction commenced.
So it is going to continue to be in all nations, and I wanted to sound this note of warning. Men who do the will of the people should be sought for office. Have I had any reason to doubt that the will of the people will be done, or has been done by men that you have elected to office, I think you only need to review the history of the last six years for an answer to this question. In a congregation similar to this the Presidency of the Church, the presiding authorities of the Church, expressed themselves clearly and unmistakably upon a great issue which was before the people, and we voted here to sustain that issue. The words were published, and have gone out to the world, and repeatedly you have sent men up here who absolutely ignored it, ignored your will, for I believe it was the will of the majority. Who was responsible for it? We don’t want you to hold us responsible. We do not elect legislators. You who hold the franchise in this state are responsible and if you don’t want good laws, if you want this state to continue to stand abashed and humiliated among its neighbors, if you want it to continue to sustain the two most pernicious influences that are at work today in the world for the destruction of your sons and daughters, go on sending up men that will vote for liquor, for open saloons, and with them for houses of prostitution, and it won’t be very long till you will get it. I tell you that you must control it, you must subject it to your will, or it will subject you to its will.
I do not want to be misunderstood on this question. If you are like those people to whom I have referred, if the majority want a wicked man, a man who will disregard your will send him up; but do not be deceived; in the words of Rudyard Kipling, “Do not allow knaves to twist the truth men utter to make traps for foolish men and women,” and lead them to believe that truth is error, and error truth; but exercise your judgment, with the Spirit of the Lord to direct you, and take this matter in hand and control it. There has been no change of policy so far as the Church is concerned upon that great question of prohibition. It stands right where it did in the beginning. We are for it and want it.
God bless you, my brethren and sisters, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
Evidences of continued and accelerated progress of the Church—Important mission of the Church in Peace movement—The Saints an example of peace and righteousness—’Vital questions now perplexing the world—Present great need of nations is just men to make and administer laws—Responsibility of the people to elect good men—The Church wants prohibition.
The proceedings of this conference, my brethren and sisters, have been very gratifying to me as I believe they have to all of the Latter-day Saints who have been present. The definite, unmistakable manner in which the fundamental doctrines of the Church have been presented by the Presidency, the testimony to the divinity of the work which has been borne by the presiding authorities of the Church and our brethren who have addressed us, the reports made to us in regard to the development and progress of the Church during the past fourteen years have all been very gratifying indeed to me, and I think ought to put at rest any doubt, if doubt there is, or has been, either in the Church or out of it, as to its development, its progress, its stability.
I have been thinking that if comparative figures were available, it would be seen that since the organization of the Church, eighty-six years ago until today, development has been consistent and constant, that from year to year the Church has gained greater strength, greater prestige, and that greater faith has come to the people as the years have passed. I have been asking myself the question, what will the next fifteen years of the history of the Church develop? Where will we be, what will be our numbers, what will be our increased influence in the world, what progress will the Church of Christ have made? I look forward with optimism because I believe that, just as from year to year there has been greater development, just as during the fourteen years of the history of the Church, which have been reviewed, its progress has been greater comparatively, perhaps, than at any other period of its history, so in the future will there be increased development. This is the Lord’s work and is in the world to prevail, to become better understood and to gain greater influence for good among the people.
I have been thinking if we could confine ourselves to this environment, if we could always be together, if we could always enjoy the spirit of testimony and assurance as the Lord gives it to us in these conferences, we ought to be a very happy, and contented, and satisfied people, and I believe that we are as a rule. But we go out from these conferences, and find ourselves in the world a very small part of the world, but nevertheless, a very important part of it, because the work of the Lord is not confined to the state of Utah; it is not confined to these United States; it is a world work, and consequently it must be vitally interested in world conditions, and its influence and power must be exercised in the affairs of the world if its destiny is to be accomplished. So as I have thought of the peace which prevails at home, of the satisfactory condition of the Church and the comparatively satisfactory condition of our country compared with other countries of the world, I reach the conclusion that our work is not by any means accomplished. It is just beginning, the influence that we expect to attain, the power of the Gospel for good, the establishment of peace and order in the 'religious and the civil world, for we cannot separate them, is a mission that has tremendous possibilities. Perhaps I should not say possibilities, but tremendous certainty before it.
I have been thinking, while sitting here, of the words of Paul. Some of his words have been quoted this afternoon. He wrote, you know, to Timothy whom he addressed as his son, one who had accepted the truth just as we have accepted it. The spirit of those epistles, his whole admonition to Timothy was that he should continue devoted to the Lord, that he should retain the faith, never wavering; that he should remember the law of the Lord which he had pledged himself to keep and observe; that he should remember to honor and uphold the law of the land; and being devoted to these doctrines himself, admonish all other men and women to observe them. That he should teach men to keep the commandments of the Lord; that he should teach them to be industrious, providing for their own families, avoiding extravagance; that he should teach women to be modest in their apparel, not adorning themselves extravagantly. That he should teach the poor to be obedient and acknowledge God in their poverty, and the rich to seek righteousness rather than riches, admonishing them that the love of money was the root of all evil, but that if they acquired riches they must acknowledge God in it and give Him the credit. He told him that these things must be taught in the Church in order that men’s feet might be firmly established in the truth; for he bore witness that the time would come, which he called the last days, when men would be lovers of their own selves, rather than lovers of God; they would be covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemous, disobedient, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce-breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof. From all such turn away, for such people he says, are ever learning yet never able to come to a knowledge of the truth. Comparing the condition of the Church with the condition which prevails in the world generally, I thought of these words of the apostle-prophet. Do you know, my brethren and sisters, how fruitless, in accomplishment have been the teachings of modern Christianity? The Christian world is engaged in deadly strife, nation arrayed against nation, people against people. They have taken up the sword one against the other, are killing each other, and yet professing to be followers of the Redeemer of the world, all having the Bible, all having the word of the Lord as it is contained here in these scriptures, and yet are engaged in the most heartless and bloody war the world has ever known, in modern times at least.
While Brother Grant was quoting statistics this morning I thought of, and during the noon hour copied from remarks made in the British Parliament, just a few days ago, by the Premier of England, these facts, that the European War is costing Great Britain alone twenty-five millions of dollars every day, or nine billion, one hundred twenty-five million dollars a year—figures that are staggering, almost beyond our comprehension. Statesmen in that country, and not in that country alone, for the very same question is being asked here in the United States, are asking what can we do to be saved? It is not so much spiritual salvation that they are asking for, but to save ourselves from ourselves, for they realize that this dissipation and waste in the wealth of the world cannot long continue, to say nothing of the waste in human life and human sacrifice which is being made. So these statesmen in England begin to look around for means of retrenchment. The English people are warned against extravagance, they are warned against needless expenditures; and among other things, and one of the most important things to which their attention is being called, is the fact that in that country every year there is expended for strong drink and narcotics, that might better be done without, the tremendous sum of five hundred fifty millions of dollars, or half a billion dollars every year.
We are not asking in the United States, so directly, what we may do to be saved, but we are asking what can we do to perpetuate existing conditions? Can we save ourselves from this world war? Will we be attacked? Will our resources be too dissipated and wasted? Men advocate greater navies, greater armies, stronger fortifications, in order that the God-given principles of liberty that exist in the United States, as they exist in no other part of the world, may be maintained and this heritage of our fathers be perpetuated. They are vital questions, questions that are before the world. They are before us and we cannot escape nor shirk them. Now there must be a cause for this condition, and a remedy, and I take it for granted that if I see, or think I see the cause, and if I see or think I see the remedy, it is not only my privilege but my duty to say so. I asked myself the question, the first day of this conference, in what does the strength of the Church consist? And the answer very readily came to me—in the first place it is the work of the Lord restored to the earth in the dispensation in which we live, divinely established through the instrumentality of the Prophet Joseph Smith; the Gospel in its fulness has come to us. We understand it, we know that the laws and ordinances, of the Church are perfect, but I thought to myself, except those laws and ordinances are administered in righteousness, by trustworthy men. they amount to nothing. We may have the word of the Lord. We may profess righteousness, we may know His will, but if the will of the Lord is not manifest in our works, works being the expression of faith, they amount to nothing. I know that you could begin at the very head of the Church, and go down through all these quorums, to the presidents of stakes, the members of high councils, the bishops of wards, those who preside over the auxiliary organizations of the Church, and you will find that every man of them are selected with the greatest care, because of their integrity, and integrity expresses it all. If a man profess faith in God and has integrity, he will adhere to God’s commandments; and you will find in the Church that these are clean men, devoted men. You cannot find an immoral man among them, not one. You cannot find an intemperate man among them, you cannot find a man whose word is not to be relied upon, you cannot find a man who is a hypocrite, who professes religion and does not exemplify it in his life; and that constitutes the strength of the Church, the strength of the men who are in it and who control its affairs. There can be no strength in the Church, there can be no strength in the state, except that condition shall prevail, no matter what the constitutional law of the land may be.
They have just as good a constitution in Mexico as we have in the United States, but there has never been men there to execute it. They have perverted the laws; men have transgressed the law of God, changed the ordinances of the Church, and broken the everlasting covenant, while they profess to speak in the name of the Lord, so have men there perverted the just laws that have been written into the statute books by their fathers, until anarchy and confusion prevail. Now, in the scripture that I have read, Paul said the conditions referred to there would come in the last days. The Lord said to the Prophet Joseph, “In the last days, even now, the day in which I am beginning my work, the angels of the Lord stand ready constantly crying to Him to be permitted to go out and reap down the world, for the harvest is ripe.” So we are living in the last days. Do you need to be told that men manifesting in their lives the condition referred to by Paul exist? We come in contact with them wherever we go, and so I say—and I have little fear of successful contradiction— that the condition of confusion that exists in the world, both in the religious and in the civil world, is the result of the administration of the affairs of the church, and of the state by men who have departed from the way of the Lord. They are not men of faith, they take honor to themselves, they do not give Him the credit. They misinterpret the word of the Lord, because to properly interpret it would defeat their purposes.
Now, what is the remedy? Our Church needs no present remedy because it adheres to the word of the Lord, as I have borne witness to you. The responsibility of calling these men to conduct its affairs rests with the presiding authorities of the Church. Every one of these men know how they have been catechised, how their lives have been scrutinized and criticised before they are called to responsible positions, and they know that they must pass successfully that criticism if they are selected and sustained as representatives of the Lord’s work and that if one of them should cease to be a man of integrity and character, no matter who he may be, one of us or one of them, the minute we depart from the way of the Lord, we lose our place. The minute we forget the obligation which rests upon us in His service, no matter what may have been our calling, the moment we place our personal affairs before the affairs of the kingdom, the minute we seek to gratify our own ambition or to accomplish our own selfish purposes through the influences of the priesthood, the Lord has told us that we lose the power that He has given us, and amen to the priesthood or authority of that man. He cannot be an immoral or wicked man and hold his place in the Church. Just as long as that condition continues, the Church is absolutely safe.
The state needs the very same thing. I am going to assume to say that the one thing in the world that is needed today, the one great preparedness that the world needs is the men—men of integrity, men of faith, men of economy, men of industry, men who will control and manage your public affairs as you manage and control your private affairs, men selected by the voice of the people.
If conditions of confusion exist in the world I always look to the word of the Lord for a remedy, because I believe in it, I believe in it as He gave it to His people anciently, I believe in it as He revealed it to us through His prophet in this dispensation, I believe in it as it comes to us through living oracles of God who declare His word to us in the day in which we live. If the word of the Lord is to be depended upon the safety and development and welfare of the people of all nations depends upon the selection of good men, and honest men, and righteous men to represent them in public affairs.
How are you going to separate the church from the state? The state controls the church absolutely, controls your property, controls your lives. It takes your property from you if it wishes, it presses you into service, it declares war or makes peace and you cannot avoid it, however much you may desire, and however much we may claim that we are independent, that what we have belongs to us. After all the finality is that the state controls us. Is it necessary or important, then, that good men administer public affairs, trustworthy men? It seems to me that it is; not only necessary, but absolutely indispensable, and that is the reason I am calling your attention to it. There can be no peace, there can be no perpetuity of the institutions of this country without it, there can be no proper development in this state of ours without it.
I don't know that I need take time to read it to you, but here, in the Doctrine and Covenants, the Lord tells us that in order that these conditions may be maintained it is our duty to seek out good men, and wise men and just men to control our civil affairs. I want to put emphasis on these words “Seek out.” It seems to me that it has almost come to a point when, instead of seeking out men to serve us, we sit supinely down and let the men seek the office and hunt their way in. A man said to me the
other day, “I have been approached and asked to run for governor. I have been told that if I can put up ten thousand dollars I will have a good chance to be elected.” That kind of politics is dangerous. Men ought to be sought out by the people. Do you know what the Lord said to the Nephites who lived upon this continent of ours, and who were destroyed because of the very forces to which I am referring? Mosiah said, when they would have elected him king, that it was not wise, nor proper that a king should be elected among them, but rather he said let men be chosen by the voice of the people to frame laws, and administer them. It was done, and they administered the law in righteousness. For sixty years there was peace but at the end of that time there came an element into the politics of the nation which, under the very same laws, the very same constitution, so ingratiated themselves into the hearts of the people that the majority voted for wicked men instead of good ones, and the historian bears record that in the beginning of that sixtieth year, when the majority of the people accepted wicked men as their chief judges and rulers, their dissolution and destruction commenced.
So it is going to continue to be in all nations, and I wanted to sound this note of warning. Men who do the will of the people should be sought for office. Have I had any reason to doubt that the will of the people will be done, or has been done by men that you have elected to office, I think you only need to review the history of the last six years for an answer to this question. In a congregation similar to this the Presidency of the Church, the presiding authorities of the Church, expressed themselves clearly and unmistakably upon a great issue which was before the people, and we voted here to sustain that issue. The words were published, and have gone out to the world, and repeatedly you have sent men up here who absolutely ignored it, ignored your will, for I believe it was the will of the majority. Who was responsible for it? We don’t want you to hold us responsible. We do not elect legislators. You who hold the franchise in this state are responsible and if you don’t want good laws, if you want this state to continue to stand abashed and humiliated among its neighbors, if you want it to continue to sustain the two most pernicious influences that are at work today in the world for the destruction of your sons and daughters, go on sending up men that will vote for liquor, for open saloons, and with them for houses of prostitution, and it won’t be very long till you will get it. I tell you that you must control it, you must subject it to your will, or it will subject you to its will.
I do not want to be misunderstood on this question. If you are like those people to whom I have referred, if the majority want a wicked man, a man who will disregard your will send him up; but do not be deceived; in the words of Rudyard Kipling, “Do not allow knaves to twist the truth men utter to make traps for foolish men and women,” and lead them to believe that truth is error, and error truth; but exercise your judgment, with the Spirit of the Lord to direct you, and take this matter in hand and control it. There has been no change of policy so far as the Church is concerned upon that great question of prohibition. It stands right where it did in the beginning. We are for it and want it.
God bless you, my brethren and sisters, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
PATRIARCH HYRUM G. SMITH.
Testimony that the Lord is pleased with His Church officials—Duty of Church members to marry in the Temple—Man and wife should be of same religious faith—Observance of Word of Wisdom enjoined—Wonders of sound transmission—Blessings invoked upon the Church and its members.
My brethren and sisters, I am grateful for the privilege of standing before you for a few moments. I know that this is the work of the Lord, and I am very grateful to Him for the experiences I have received in His service during my visits throughout the Stakes of Zion; I have visited nearly all of them during the last three and a half years. I have made a number of observations, and have learned that the Lord is pleased with those who preside over the Church, those whom He has honored to hold responsible positions, who have been referred to in this conference as the General Authorities of the Church, including the presidencies of stakes of Zion, high councilors, the bishoprics of wards, and many others who bear the Holy Priesthood. This is my testimony, the Spirit of the Lord is with them wherever they are called to labor, even from the greatest down to the least.
The blessings of the Lord are with this people, yet in spite of this condition there are a few things existing in our midst with which the Lord is not pleased. I have noticed this particularly among some of our young people. Our young people are choice, they are the sons and daughters of Israel, the chosen blood of Ephraim, upon whom responsibility rests in this age. The thing to which I specially refer that is not pleasing in the sight of the Lord, nor to our faithful fathers and mothers in Israel, is the fact that too many of our boys and girls, choice young men and women, are not availing themselves of the blessings of the Lord as administered in the Holy Temples. To the Latter-day Saints, the Lord has given His law, which provides that if they abide not by it, there will come a time when there will be weeping and wailing, distress and sorrow, and we do not have to wait until after death, either, because we see these conditions in this life, because of our disobedience, and because of the fact that altogether too many of our young people, when they marry, accept the laws of the land only, and not the laws of God, both of which are legal and lawful as far as this life is concerned, but only the laws of God are valid after death. This conduct on the part of many of our young people, to marry outside the Temples, or to marry those not of their own faith is not pleasing in the sight of the Lord. I counsel my brothers and sisters, particularly those who are born and raised in the Church, to avail themselves of the blessings of the House of the Lord; and, if they are not now prepared to do this, that they humble themselves and repent, and prepare to live worthy of the teachings of their faithful parents.
Very much has been said in this conference about the Word of Wisdom. I believe that the time has passed when the Lord will look upon us as a people, or as individuals, and, as was said anciently, will wink at our failings and weaknesses. I believe that the Lord expects the youths of Israel today to live clean and pure lives, and leave alone the things which He has said are not good for us. My exhortation to the youths of Israel today, and to the parents in Israel, that we should obey the laws of the Lord, and abstain from the things which He has said are not good for us, repent of our present failings, and live hereafter in accordance with the laws of God. Let the youths of Israel secure their blessings in the House of the Lord, that their future generations may not condemn and censure them for having neglected their privileges as fathers and mothers.
I am thankful for the blessings of the House of the Lord, and I thank the Lord for my present standing in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I know that the Lord lives and that He will hear and answer our prayers. As a people, our prayers will be answered if we will humble ourselves and call upon the Lord in faith. We are living in an age when developments in the scientific world are bringing forth many valuable lessons. There are many good men and women in the world who do not humble themselves in prayer because they cannot see and understand the philosophy of it, they cannot reason it out in their own minds. Some of those who possess bright minds have invented and manufactured apparatus with which they can send the human voice across the continent, or ocean, thousands of miles, even without the use of wires, but yet individuals of such intellectual ability do not humble themselves sufficiently to admit that in the human mind there is an apparatus which has the power, if operated in obedience to the laws of God, to send the human voice into the heavens. This is a force which the world’s scientists do not understand at present; but, as Latter-day Saints, we have been praying to our Father in heaven for many years, and have learned that our prayers will be answered as long as we keep our minds in tune with the Spirit of the Lord. The key-note to it all is humility and faith. I pray that the Lord will bless us with faith to understand and appreciate the plainness of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, and render obedience to it. May we comprehend the revelations, live by them, and teach them to our children that they also may live by them. May the youths of Israel be valiant in defense of the truth and live worthy to receive the promised blessings.
By virtue of my calling, I bless this people, the Latter-day Saints in all the world. May God bless all Israel; bless the choice youths of Israel that they may have confidence in their parents’ teachings, and listen to them with honor and respect. May we not turn away from sacred things, and laugh or scoff at them, but may we have in our minds respect and reverence for sacred things and sacred rites, that the Lord may not withhold His blessings from us. I pray the blessings of the Lord upon you, and upon the Church from first to last, all the faithful in the House of Israel, gathered and scattered, that the time may speedily come, my brethren and sisters, when the purposes of the Lord shall be accomplished in the earth. May we think seriously of the sacred things of life, and not turn away from the laws of God nor the blessings promised to the children of Israel in these the last days. I pray our Father's blessings upon us all in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
'‘God bless our mountain home,” a duet and chorus, was rendered by Sarah L. Wood, James Moncarr and the choir.
Elder Rey L. Pratt offered the closing prayer.
Conference adjourned until Sunday. April 9th, at 10 a. m.
Testimony that the Lord is pleased with His Church officials—Duty of Church members to marry in the Temple—Man and wife should be of same religious faith—Observance of Word of Wisdom enjoined—Wonders of sound transmission—Blessings invoked upon the Church and its members.
My brethren and sisters, I am grateful for the privilege of standing before you for a few moments. I know that this is the work of the Lord, and I am very grateful to Him for the experiences I have received in His service during my visits throughout the Stakes of Zion; I have visited nearly all of them during the last three and a half years. I have made a number of observations, and have learned that the Lord is pleased with those who preside over the Church, those whom He has honored to hold responsible positions, who have been referred to in this conference as the General Authorities of the Church, including the presidencies of stakes of Zion, high councilors, the bishoprics of wards, and many others who bear the Holy Priesthood. This is my testimony, the Spirit of the Lord is with them wherever they are called to labor, even from the greatest down to the least.
The blessings of the Lord are with this people, yet in spite of this condition there are a few things existing in our midst with which the Lord is not pleased. I have noticed this particularly among some of our young people. Our young people are choice, they are the sons and daughters of Israel, the chosen blood of Ephraim, upon whom responsibility rests in this age. The thing to which I specially refer that is not pleasing in the sight of the Lord, nor to our faithful fathers and mothers in Israel, is the fact that too many of our boys and girls, choice young men and women, are not availing themselves of the blessings of the Lord as administered in the Holy Temples. To the Latter-day Saints, the Lord has given His law, which provides that if they abide not by it, there will come a time when there will be weeping and wailing, distress and sorrow, and we do not have to wait until after death, either, because we see these conditions in this life, because of our disobedience, and because of the fact that altogether too many of our young people, when they marry, accept the laws of the land only, and not the laws of God, both of which are legal and lawful as far as this life is concerned, but only the laws of God are valid after death. This conduct on the part of many of our young people, to marry outside the Temples, or to marry those not of their own faith is not pleasing in the sight of the Lord. I counsel my brothers and sisters, particularly those who are born and raised in the Church, to avail themselves of the blessings of the House of the Lord; and, if they are not now prepared to do this, that they humble themselves and repent, and prepare to live worthy of the teachings of their faithful parents.
Very much has been said in this conference about the Word of Wisdom. I believe that the time has passed when the Lord will look upon us as a people, or as individuals, and, as was said anciently, will wink at our failings and weaknesses. I believe that the Lord expects the youths of Israel today to live clean and pure lives, and leave alone the things which He has said are not good for us. My exhortation to the youths of Israel today, and to the parents in Israel, that we should obey the laws of the Lord, and abstain from the things which He has said are not good for us, repent of our present failings, and live hereafter in accordance with the laws of God. Let the youths of Israel secure their blessings in the House of the Lord, that their future generations may not condemn and censure them for having neglected their privileges as fathers and mothers.
I am thankful for the blessings of the House of the Lord, and I thank the Lord for my present standing in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I know that the Lord lives and that He will hear and answer our prayers. As a people, our prayers will be answered if we will humble ourselves and call upon the Lord in faith. We are living in an age when developments in the scientific world are bringing forth many valuable lessons. There are many good men and women in the world who do not humble themselves in prayer because they cannot see and understand the philosophy of it, they cannot reason it out in their own minds. Some of those who possess bright minds have invented and manufactured apparatus with which they can send the human voice across the continent, or ocean, thousands of miles, even without the use of wires, but yet individuals of such intellectual ability do not humble themselves sufficiently to admit that in the human mind there is an apparatus which has the power, if operated in obedience to the laws of God, to send the human voice into the heavens. This is a force which the world’s scientists do not understand at present; but, as Latter-day Saints, we have been praying to our Father in heaven for many years, and have learned that our prayers will be answered as long as we keep our minds in tune with the Spirit of the Lord. The key-note to it all is humility and faith. I pray that the Lord will bless us with faith to understand and appreciate the plainness of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, and render obedience to it. May we comprehend the revelations, live by them, and teach them to our children that they also may live by them. May the youths of Israel be valiant in defense of the truth and live worthy to receive the promised blessings.
By virtue of my calling, I bless this people, the Latter-day Saints in all the world. May God bless all Israel; bless the choice youths of Israel that they may have confidence in their parents’ teachings, and listen to them with honor and respect. May we not turn away from sacred things, and laugh or scoff at them, but may we have in our minds respect and reverence for sacred things and sacred rites, that the Lord may not withhold His blessings from us. I pray the blessings of the Lord upon you, and upon the Church from first to last, all the faithful in the House of Israel, gathered and scattered, that the time may speedily come, my brethren and sisters, when the purposes of the Lord shall be accomplished in the earth. May we think seriously of the sacred things of life, and not turn away from the laws of God nor the blessings promised to the children of Israel in these the last days. I pray our Father's blessings upon us all in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
'‘God bless our mountain home,” a duet and chorus, was rendered by Sarah L. Wood, James Moncarr and the choir.
Elder Rey L. Pratt offered the closing prayer.
Conference adjourned until Sunday. April 9th, at 10 a. m.
THIRD DAY.
Conference was resumed in the Tabernacle, at 10 a. m., Sunday, April 9th; President Joseph F. Smith presiding.
President Smith announced an overflow meeting to be held this a. m., in the adjoining Assembly Hall, under direction of Elder Heber J. Grant, for the benefit of those who cannot be accommodated in the Tabernacle, now overcrowded.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “Now let us rejoice in the day of salvation.”
Prayer was offered by Elder John A. Elison.
The male members of the choir sang the hymn, “See, the mighty angel flying.”
Conference was resumed in the Tabernacle, at 10 a. m., Sunday, April 9th; President Joseph F. Smith presiding.
President Smith announced an overflow meeting to be held this a. m., in the adjoining Assembly Hall, under direction of Elder Heber J. Grant, for the benefit of those who cannot be accommodated in the Tabernacle, now overcrowded.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “Now let us rejoice in the day of salvation.”
Prayer was offered by Elder John A. Elison.
The male members of the choir sang the hymn, “See, the mighty angel flying.”
ELDER ORSON F. WHITNEY.
Past, present and future—The Missouri troubles and events that followed—Prophecies concerning Zion and her stakes—Joseph Smith and the exodus—Anson Call’s Statement—What Brigham Young beheld— “Mormonism’s” monument.
“Look not mournfully into the past; wisely improve the present, and go forth to meet the future with a manly heart.” So says the poet Longfellow.
I am convinced of the uselessness of dreaming too much upon the past, or of speculating too much about the future. I regard the duty of the present hour as paramount. The present is the outcome of the past; and it is the great hook upon which the future hangs. Its importance is not to be undervalued. Nevertheless, I believe it is sometimes a good thing to reflect upon the past, which is as a guide book to the present and future; to read the history of God’s people, to ponder upon the predictions of His servants and their recorded hopes and expectations concerning things to come. And in this spirit I wish to draw the minds of the congregation toward a revelation given through Joseph the Seer in the month of December, 1833, just after the expulsion of our people from Jackson County, Missouri. Therein the Lord says:
“Verily. I say unto you concerning your brethren who have been afflicted and persecuted and cast out from the land of their inheritance,
“I, the Lord, have suffered the affliction to come upon them wherewith they have been afflicted, in consequence of their transgressions;
"Yet I will own them and they shall be mine in that day when I shall come to make un my jewels.
“Behold, I say unto you, there were jarrings and contentions and envyings and strifes and lustful and covetous desires among them; therefore by these things they polluted their inheritances.”
“They were slow to hearken unto the voice of the Lord their God, therefore the Lord their God is slow to hearken unto their prayers, to answer them in the day of their trouble. * * *
“Verily I say unto you, notwithstanding their sins, my bowels are filled with compassion towards them; I will not utterly cast them off; and in the day of wrath I will remember mercy.
“I have sworn, and the decree hath gone forth by a former commandment which I have given unto you, that I would let fall the sword of mine indignation in behalf of my people; and even as I have said, it shall come to pass.
“Mine indignation is soon to be poured out without measure upon all nations, and this will I do when the cup of their iniquity is full.
“And in that day all who are found upon the watch tower, or in other words, all mine Israel shall be saved.
“Therefore, let your hearts be comforted concerning Zion; for all flesh is in mine hands: be still and know that I am God.
“Zion shall not be moved out of her place, notwithstanding her children are scattered; “They that remain, and are pure in heart, shall return, and come to their inheritances, they and their children, with songs of everlasting joy, to build up the waste places of Zion.”
“I have other places which I will appoint unto them, and they shall be called Stakes, for the curtains or the strength of Zion.”
Several very important facts are here presented for the consideration of God’s people. In the first place, they are reminded of the great object for which this Latter-day work was instituted, namely, the building up of Zion, preparatory to the glorious coming of the Lord. Prior to that expulsion, the place for the city, New Jerusalem, unto which a people will gather, to make the preparation that is absolutely essential before the Lord will come—the very place for the city had been designated, and from this revelation we learn why those who had been sent to Jackson County to build up Zion were not permitted to accomplish the work at that time. Inferentially—nay, directly, we are told what kind of a people will be permitted to do that work, namely, “the pure in heart,” for that is the meaning of Zion, according to the word of the Lord. A prophecy is contained in this revelation: The colony driven from that land in 1833, or their descendants, joined with Zion’s other children, or a people gathered out from among them, a pure-hearted people, are eventually to return and build up the waste places of Zion. In the meantime other places, called Stakes of Zion, likewise appointed of God, are to be inhabited by the Latter-day Saints.
How wonderfully the history of our people has fulfilled, thus far, that great prediction. How can we doubt that the God of Israel, who has made good His word in so many respects, will keep His promise as to the greater fulfillment? There is no room for doubt in my heart, nor in yours, as I believe, brethren and sisters, concerning these things. A few years after this revelation was given, the Church of Christ, the Latter-day Saints, were once more on the move. They emigrated from Northern Ohio, where they then had their headquarters, to Western Missouri—not to Jackson County, from which part a portion of the community had been driven, but to Caldwell, Daviess, and other counties, where Stakes of Zion were organized or projected. There the Saints gathered to the number of
about fifteen thousand. But a repetition of the troubles that had driven the colony from Jackson County, caused the cruel expulsion of the entire body from the State of Missouri, in 1838-1839.
Four years later, or thereabout, the Prophet Joseph Smith voiced a great prediction which you and I are now helping to fulfill; a prediction fulfilled in part by our parents and grandparents who came to the Rocky Mountains to build up these Stakes of Zion. I will read to you just what the Prophet said on that occasion. At Nauvoo, Illinois, under date of the 6th of August, 1842, he made this entry in his journal:
“Passed over the river to Montrose, Iowa, in company with General Adams, Colonel Brewer and others, and witnessed the installation of the officers of the Rising Sun Lodge, Ancient York Masons, at Montrose, by General James Adams, Deputy Grand Master of Illinois. While the Deputy Grand Master was engaged in giving the requisite instructions to the Master-elect, I had a conversation with a number of brethren in the shade of the building on the subject of our persecutions in Missouri and the constant annoyance which has followed us since we were driven from that State. I prophesied that the Saints would continue to suffer much affliction, and would be driven to the Rocky Mountains, many would apostatize, others would be put to death by our persecutors or lose their lives in consequence of exposure or disease, and some of you will live to go and assist in making settlements and build cities and see the Saints become a mighty people in the midst of the Rocky Mountains.”
One of the men who was present on that occasion and heard this prophecy, has left a statement concerning it which I will also read. That man was Anson Call. He lived to come to the Rocky Mountains and assist in fulfilling the Prophet’s prediction. He was the pioneer of Millard County; he with others founded Fillmore, the original capital of the Territory of Utah. Afterwards he established Call’s Landing on the Colorado River, there being a project at that time to bring immigrants and freight up the river to a certain point, and thence convey them northward into Utah— a project that would have succeeded but for the construction of the transcontinental railroad. Anson Call was subsequently a prominent figure in Davis County, where many of his descendants still dwell. He was a man of sterling worth, truthful, and reliable, and here is the statement that he authorized concerning Joseph Smith’s prediction:
"A block schoolhouse had been prepared with shade in front, under which was a barrel of ice water. Judge Adams, the highest Masonic authority in the State of Illinois, had been sent there to organize this lodge. He, Hyrum Smith and J. C. Bennett, being high Masons, went into the house to perform some ceremonies which the others were not entitled to witness. These, including Joseph Smith, remained under the bowery. Joseph as he was tasting the cold water, warned the brethren not to be too free with it. With the tumbler still in his hand, he prophesied that the Saints would yet go to the Rocky Mountains, and said he, ‘This water tastes much like that of the crystal streams that are running from the snow-capped mountains. I had before seen him in a vision, and now saw, while he was talking, his countenance change to white, not the deadly white of a bloodless face, but a living, brilliant white. He seemed absorbed in gazing upon something at a great distance and said, “I am gazing upon the valleys of those mountains.’
“It is impossible,” continues Anson Call, “to represent in words this scene which is still vivid in my mind, the grandeur of Joseph’s appearance, his beautiful descriptions of this land, and his wonderful prophetic utterances as they emanated from the glorious inspirations that overshadowed him; There was a force and power in his exclamations, of which the following i= but a faint echo: “Oh, the beauty of those snow-capped mountains! The cool, refreshing streams that are running down through those mountain gorges!’ Then, gazing in another direction, as if there was a change of locality, ‘Oh, the scenes that this people will pass through, the dead that will lie between here and there!’ Then, turning in another direction, as if the scene had again changed, ‘Oh, the apostasy that will take place before my brethren reach that land! But,’ he continued, 'the priesthood shall prevail over its enemies, triumph over the devil, and be established upon the earth, never more to be thrown down!’”
Joseph Smith, when he uttered this prophecy, when he beheld this vision, was standing upon the banks of the Mississippi River, fifteen hundred miles from where we now are. Yet he saw the Rocky Mountains, and the crystal streams flowing from yonder canyons, and I doubt not that if he had led his people to this land, as he once purposed doing, he would have recognized it as a familiar scene, having beheld it in vision, by the seeric gift, before he saw it with the natural eye. But the Prophet was not destined to fulfill his own prediction; his martyrdom prevented; and the Lord raised up another mighty man to carry out the project, to become the founder of Utah, and the redeemer of the Great American Desert.
Erastus Snow, one of the Utah pioneers, declared from this stand, in July, 1880, that Brigham Young beheld Salt Lake Valley while crossing the plains in the spring or early summer of 1847—beheld it in vision, and so vividly that when his eye, his natural eye, rested upon it, he could say with assurance: “This is the place.” General Grant’s famous phrase, “Let us have peace,” is scarcely more noted now than Brigham Young’s historic utterance, “This is the place.” I notice that the “Gentiles” are beginning to use it to advertise this beautiful valley, which the great Pioneer saw peopled and inhabited while it was yet a barren waste—saw it filled with towns and villages—yes, saw it as one great city; and his prophetic vision concerning it has been ratified by the practical judgment of one of the biggest railroad men that this country has produced—the lamented E. H. Harriman, who expressed the conviction that Salt Lake City was destined to be one of the four greatest American cities. The point I wish to press home is this, that Brigham Young beheld it in vision, by the gift of seership, just as Joseph Smith had beheld it previously. According to Erastus Snow, President Young saw a tent settling down from heaven over this very spot, and heard a voice from above proclaiming: “This is the place where my people Israel shall pitch their tents.”
What availed it, after that, for men to come from the Coast, as did Samuel Brannan and others, and try to persuade President Young to pass by this then forbidding spot, and establish his colony on the fertile slopes of the Pacific? Brigham Young knew what was best for God’s people. He had the word of the Prophet, that the Latter-day Saints would become mighty, not in California, not in Mexico, not in Canada, nor in the islands of the sea (though there might be stakes of Zion there), but “in the midst of the Rocky Mountains.” That was Joseph Smith’s prediction. Brigham Young would not go past that prophecy, and to confirm his judgment and his reverence for the word of God, he had a vision showing him that this was indeed the place that the Lord had selected for His people. Colonel Bridger could not dissuade him from settling here; Samuel Brannan could not; and after the Pioneers had entered the Valley, and while they were organizing parties to explore the surrounding country, their leader said to them: “Brethren, you can go north, south, east and west, and you will find many-eligible sites for settlements, but you will come back and say with me that this is the place for our chief city.” Driving his cane into the soil upon the very spot where now stands the Salt Lake Temple, he exclaimed: “Here we will build the city and temple of our God.”
Brigham Young was Joseph Smith’s executor. The Prophet had beheld these scenes and foretold these happenings. God had spoken to him concerning-them. And we of today are participating in the fulfillment of his wonderful prophecy. We are building upon the foundation that he laid. President Young built upon it, the Latter-day Saints have built upon it, and are still fulfilling his inspired words concerning this western land.
But will our mission end here? Is the State of Utah the proper monument of the “Mormon” people? No. Utah, symbolized by her State Capitol, the noble structure crowning yonder hill, is the monument of the composite people of this commonwealth. The State of Utah is not big enough to be the monument of the “Mormon” people. It represents only a part of their work, and a preliminary part at that. The monument to “Mormonism” will stand in Jackson County, Missouri. There the great City will be built: there Zion will arise and shine, “the joy of the whole earth,” and there the Lord will come to His Temple in His own time, when His people shall have made the required preparation.
Meanwhile, what are we doing? We are establishing Stakes of Zion, and getting ready to build the Zion of the future. We are here only long enough to become strong enough to fulfill our greater destiny. The same Prophet who foretold the mightiness of the Saints in the midst of these mountains, declared that the much maligned, misunderstood ‘Mormon” people would yet be the saviors of their country, would stand with their feet firm upon the rocky ramparts of liberty, holding aloft the Flag and the Constitution at a time when traitors and anarchists would fain trample them in the mire. They would call to their aid lovers of law and order from every part of the Nation and from every comer of the world, and would stand for freedom on 1 equal rights, for justice and mercy and peace, when all the world around them would be at war, one nation with another, and every man against his neighbor. They would protect and maintain the sacred, God-inspired principles upon which the American Government is founded, and in due time would go down in the might of the God of Israel and sweep the land free from anarchy and evil in all its forms.
Zion, the great monument yet to be reared, will stand in the proper place, upon the goodly land pointed out by the finger of God and consecrated for that purpose. No other place has been appointed for the New Jerusalem. The “Gentiles” used to say in derision that whenever the “Mormons” were driven from one Zion they had a revelation that Zion was to be somewhere else. This was intended to be funny, I suppose, though the theme is somewhat tragic. The “joke” would have more point if there was a grain of truth in it. It is sheer fiction. I have already refuted it by reading the word of the Lord: “Zion shall not be moved out of her place, notwithstanding her children are scattered.” Teach these things to your sons and daughters. Tell them why their ancestors came to this land. It was for something more than to redeem a desert, and found a State. They came here to prepare themselves for a far greater work, and the lion is only crouching before he springs. God bless von. Amen.
Sister Romania Hyde rendered a violin solo, with organ accompaniment by Prof. John J. McClellan.
Past, present and future—The Missouri troubles and events that followed—Prophecies concerning Zion and her stakes—Joseph Smith and the exodus—Anson Call’s Statement—What Brigham Young beheld— “Mormonism’s” monument.
“Look not mournfully into the past; wisely improve the present, and go forth to meet the future with a manly heart.” So says the poet Longfellow.
I am convinced of the uselessness of dreaming too much upon the past, or of speculating too much about the future. I regard the duty of the present hour as paramount. The present is the outcome of the past; and it is the great hook upon which the future hangs. Its importance is not to be undervalued. Nevertheless, I believe it is sometimes a good thing to reflect upon the past, which is as a guide book to the present and future; to read the history of God’s people, to ponder upon the predictions of His servants and their recorded hopes and expectations concerning things to come. And in this spirit I wish to draw the minds of the congregation toward a revelation given through Joseph the Seer in the month of December, 1833, just after the expulsion of our people from Jackson County, Missouri. Therein the Lord says:
“Verily. I say unto you concerning your brethren who have been afflicted and persecuted and cast out from the land of their inheritance,
“I, the Lord, have suffered the affliction to come upon them wherewith they have been afflicted, in consequence of their transgressions;
"Yet I will own them and they shall be mine in that day when I shall come to make un my jewels.
“Behold, I say unto you, there were jarrings and contentions and envyings and strifes and lustful and covetous desires among them; therefore by these things they polluted their inheritances.”
“They were slow to hearken unto the voice of the Lord their God, therefore the Lord their God is slow to hearken unto their prayers, to answer them in the day of their trouble. * * *
“Verily I say unto you, notwithstanding their sins, my bowels are filled with compassion towards them; I will not utterly cast them off; and in the day of wrath I will remember mercy.
“I have sworn, and the decree hath gone forth by a former commandment which I have given unto you, that I would let fall the sword of mine indignation in behalf of my people; and even as I have said, it shall come to pass.
“Mine indignation is soon to be poured out without measure upon all nations, and this will I do when the cup of their iniquity is full.
“And in that day all who are found upon the watch tower, or in other words, all mine Israel shall be saved.
“Therefore, let your hearts be comforted concerning Zion; for all flesh is in mine hands: be still and know that I am God.
“Zion shall not be moved out of her place, notwithstanding her children are scattered; “They that remain, and are pure in heart, shall return, and come to their inheritances, they and their children, with songs of everlasting joy, to build up the waste places of Zion.”
“I have other places which I will appoint unto them, and they shall be called Stakes, for the curtains or the strength of Zion.”
Several very important facts are here presented for the consideration of God’s people. In the first place, they are reminded of the great object for which this Latter-day work was instituted, namely, the building up of Zion, preparatory to the glorious coming of the Lord. Prior to that expulsion, the place for the city, New Jerusalem, unto which a people will gather, to make the preparation that is absolutely essential before the Lord will come—the very place for the city had been designated, and from this revelation we learn why those who had been sent to Jackson County to build up Zion were not permitted to accomplish the work at that time. Inferentially—nay, directly, we are told what kind of a people will be permitted to do that work, namely, “the pure in heart,” for that is the meaning of Zion, according to the word of the Lord. A prophecy is contained in this revelation: The colony driven from that land in 1833, or their descendants, joined with Zion’s other children, or a people gathered out from among them, a pure-hearted people, are eventually to return and build up the waste places of Zion. In the meantime other places, called Stakes of Zion, likewise appointed of God, are to be inhabited by the Latter-day Saints.
How wonderfully the history of our people has fulfilled, thus far, that great prediction. How can we doubt that the God of Israel, who has made good His word in so many respects, will keep His promise as to the greater fulfillment? There is no room for doubt in my heart, nor in yours, as I believe, brethren and sisters, concerning these things. A few years after this revelation was given, the Church of Christ, the Latter-day Saints, were once more on the move. They emigrated from Northern Ohio, where they then had their headquarters, to Western Missouri—not to Jackson County, from which part a portion of the community had been driven, but to Caldwell, Daviess, and other counties, where Stakes of Zion were organized or projected. There the Saints gathered to the number of
about fifteen thousand. But a repetition of the troubles that had driven the colony from Jackson County, caused the cruel expulsion of the entire body from the State of Missouri, in 1838-1839.
Four years later, or thereabout, the Prophet Joseph Smith voiced a great prediction which you and I are now helping to fulfill; a prediction fulfilled in part by our parents and grandparents who came to the Rocky Mountains to build up these Stakes of Zion. I will read to you just what the Prophet said on that occasion. At Nauvoo, Illinois, under date of the 6th of August, 1842, he made this entry in his journal:
“Passed over the river to Montrose, Iowa, in company with General Adams, Colonel Brewer and others, and witnessed the installation of the officers of the Rising Sun Lodge, Ancient York Masons, at Montrose, by General James Adams, Deputy Grand Master of Illinois. While the Deputy Grand Master was engaged in giving the requisite instructions to the Master-elect, I had a conversation with a number of brethren in the shade of the building on the subject of our persecutions in Missouri and the constant annoyance which has followed us since we were driven from that State. I prophesied that the Saints would continue to suffer much affliction, and would be driven to the Rocky Mountains, many would apostatize, others would be put to death by our persecutors or lose their lives in consequence of exposure or disease, and some of you will live to go and assist in making settlements and build cities and see the Saints become a mighty people in the midst of the Rocky Mountains.”
One of the men who was present on that occasion and heard this prophecy, has left a statement concerning it which I will also read. That man was Anson Call. He lived to come to the Rocky Mountains and assist in fulfilling the Prophet’s prediction. He was the pioneer of Millard County; he with others founded Fillmore, the original capital of the Territory of Utah. Afterwards he established Call’s Landing on the Colorado River, there being a project at that time to bring immigrants and freight up the river to a certain point, and thence convey them northward into Utah— a project that would have succeeded but for the construction of the transcontinental railroad. Anson Call was subsequently a prominent figure in Davis County, where many of his descendants still dwell. He was a man of sterling worth, truthful, and reliable, and here is the statement that he authorized concerning Joseph Smith’s prediction:
"A block schoolhouse had been prepared with shade in front, under which was a barrel of ice water. Judge Adams, the highest Masonic authority in the State of Illinois, had been sent there to organize this lodge. He, Hyrum Smith and J. C. Bennett, being high Masons, went into the house to perform some ceremonies which the others were not entitled to witness. These, including Joseph Smith, remained under the bowery. Joseph as he was tasting the cold water, warned the brethren not to be too free with it. With the tumbler still in his hand, he prophesied that the Saints would yet go to the Rocky Mountains, and said he, ‘This water tastes much like that of the crystal streams that are running from the snow-capped mountains. I had before seen him in a vision, and now saw, while he was talking, his countenance change to white, not the deadly white of a bloodless face, but a living, brilliant white. He seemed absorbed in gazing upon something at a great distance and said, “I am gazing upon the valleys of those mountains.’
“It is impossible,” continues Anson Call, “to represent in words this scene which is still vivid in my mind, the grandeur of Joseph’s appearance, his beautiful descriptions of this land, and his wonderful prophetic utterances as they emanated from the glorious inspirations that overshadowed him; There was a force and power in his exclamations, of which the following i= but a faint echo: “Oh, the beauty of those snow-capped mountains! The cool, refreshing streams that are running down through those mountain gorges!’ Then, gazing in another direction, as if there was a change of locality, ‘Oh, the scenes that this people will pass through, the dead that will lie between here and there!’ Then, turning in another direction, as if the scene had again changed, ‘Oh, the apostasy that will take place before my brethren reach that land! But,’ he continued, 'the priesthood shall prevail over its enemies, triumph over the devil, and be established upon the earth, never more to be thrown down!’”
Joseph Smith, when he uttered this prophecy, when he beheld this vision, was standing upon the banks of the Mississippi River, fifteen hundred miles from where we now are. Yet he saw the Rocky Mountains, and the crystal streams flowing from yonder canyons, and I doubt not that if he had led his people to this land, as he once purposed doing, he would have recognized it as a familiar scene, having beheld it in vision, by the seeric gift, before he saw it with the natural eye. But the Prophet was not destined to fulfill his own prediction; his martyrdom prevented; and the Lord raised up another mighty man to carry out the project, to become the founder of Utah, and the redeemer of the Great American Desert.
Erastus Snow, one of the Utah pioneers, declared from this stand, in July, 1880, that Brigham Young beheld Salt Lake Valley while crossing the plains in the spring or early summer of 1847—beheld it in vision, and so vividly that when his eye, his natural eye, rested upon it, he could say with assurance: “This is the place.” General Grant’s famous phrase, “Let us have peace,” is scarcely more noted now than Brigham Young’s historic utterance, “This is the place.” I notice that the “Gentiles” are beginning to use it to advertise this beautiful valley, which the great Pioneer saw peopled and inhabited while it was yet a barren waste—saw it filled with towns and villages—yes, saw it as one great city; and his prophetic vision concerning it has been ratified by the practical judgment of one of the biggest railroad men that this country has produced—the lamented E. H. Harriman, who expressed the conviction that Salt Lake City was destined to be one of the four greatest American cities. The point I wish to press home is this, that Brigham Young beheld it in vision, by the gift of seership, just as Joseph Smith had beheld it previously. According to Erastus Snow, President Young saw a tent settling down from heaven over this very spot, and heard a voice from above proclaiming: “This is the place where my people Israel shall pitch their tents.”
What availed it, after that, for men to come from the Coast, as did Samuel Brannan and others, and try to persuade President Young to pass by this then forbidding spot, and establish his colony on the fertile slopes of the Pacific? Brigham Young knew what was best for God’s people. He had the word of the Prophet, that the Latter-day Saints would become mighty, not in California, not in Mexico, not in Canada, nor in the islands of the sea (though there might be stakes of Zion there), but “in the midst of the Rocky Mountains.” That was Joseph Smith’s prediction. Brigham Young would not go past that prophecy, and to confirm his judgment and his reverence for the word of God, he had a vision showing him that this was indeed the place that the Lord had selected for His people. Colonel Bridger could not dissuade him from settling here; Samuel Brannan could not; and after the Pioneers had entered the Valley, and while they were organizing parties to explore the surrounding country, their leader said to them: “Brethren, you can go north, south, east and west, and you will find many-eligible sites for settlements, but you will come back and say with me that this is the place for our chief city.” Driving his cane into the soil upon the very spot where now stands the Salt Lake Temple, he exclaimed: “Here we will build the city and temple of our God.”
Brigham Young was Joseph Smith’s executor. The Prophet had beheld these scenes and foretold these happenings. God had spoken to him concerning-them. And we of today are participating in the fulfillment of his wonderful prophecy. We are building upon the foundation that he laid. President Young built upon it, the Latter-day Saints have built upon it, and are still fulfilling his inspired words concerning this western land.
But will our mission end here? Is the State of Utah the proper monument of the “Mormon” people? No. Utah, symbolized by her State Capitol, the noble structure crowning yonder hill, is the monument of the composite people of this commonwealth. The State of Utah is not big enough to be the monument of the “Mormon” people. It represents only a part of their work, and a preliminary part at that. The monument to “Mormonism” will stand in Jackson County, Missouri. There the great City will be built: there Zion will arise and shine, “the joy of the whole earth,” and there the Lord will come to His Temple in His own time, when His people shall have made the required preparation.
Meanwhile, what are we doing? We are establishing Stakes of Zion, and getting ready to build the Zion of the future. We are here only long enough to become strong enough to fulfill our greater destiny. The same Prophet who foretold the mightiness of the Saints in the midst of these mountains, declared that the much maligned, misunderstood ‘Mormon” people would yet be the saviors of their country, would stand with their feet firm upon the rocky ramparts of liberty, holding aloft the Flag and the Constitution at a time when traitors and anarchists would fain trample them in the mire. They would call to their aid lovers of law and order from every part of the Nation and from every comer of the world, and would stand for freedom on 1 equal rights, for justice and mercy and peace, when all the world around them would be at war, one nation with another, and every man against his neighbor. They would protect and maintain the sacred, God-inspired principles upon which the American Government is founded, and in due time would go down in the might of the God of Israel and sweep the land free from anarchy and evil in all its forms.
Zion, the great monument yet to be reared, will stand in the proper place, upon the goodly land pointed out by the finger of God and consecrated for that purpose. No other place has been appointed for the New Jerusalem. The “Gentiles” used to say in derision that whenever the “Mormons” were driven from one Zion they had a revelation that Zion was to be somewhere else. This was intended to be funny, I suppose, though the theme is somewhat tragic. The “joke” would have more point if there was a grain of truth in it. It is sheer fiction. I have already refuted it by reading the word of the Lord: “Zion shall not be moved out of her place, notwithstanding her children are scattered.” Teach these things to your sons and daughters. Tell them why their ancestors came to this land. It was for something more than to redeem a desert, and found a State. They came here to prepare themselves for a far greater work, and the lion is only crouching before he springs. God bless von. Amen.
Sister Romania Hyde rendered a violin solo, with organ accompaniment by Prof. John J. McClellan.
ELDER JOSEPH F. SMITH, JR.
The Latter-day Saints have received the words of eternal life—“Christians” who do not believe in Christ’s Divinity—Man’s reason needs the Spirit’s guidance—Prevalent disbelief in Scripture statements—The Infinite cannot be comprehended by finite reasoning —Fallacious dogmas of modern scientists—Essentiality of Spiritual guidance demonstrated.
My brethren and sisters, I am very greatly impressed, this morning, with the many evidences that proclaim this to be in very deed the place—the place of Zion; that here are found the people of the Lord with whom He has made covenant, and who have made covenant with Him to serve Him and keep His commandments; that Zion will grow and prosper until her fame shall fill the earth and her glory and majesty shall cover the face thereof.
I feel this morning very much as Peter did in his answer to the Lord after the feeding of the five thousand, when he confessed the Lord to be the Son of God. We read in the sixth chapter of John’s Gospel that the Savior departed secretly from the people after this miracle was performed, and crossed to the other side of the sea of Galilee, to the city of Capernaum. The next morning when the people discovered that the Lord had departed, they followed Him and asked when He came hither, and Jesus rebuked them because they had not followed Him because of the things He taught them, but because of the loaves and fishes. He thereupon instructed them to seek for the meat which endureth unto everlasting life which He could give unto them. They promptly informed Him that their fathers did eat manna in the wilderness which was bread from heaven. He answered that the bread Moses gave was not the true bread from heaven, but He was the bread of life, and that whoever came to Him should never hunger, and those who believed on Him should never thirst. This caused them to murmur, and to make it more emphatic the Lord declared unto them: “I am that bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness and are dead. * * * I am the living bread which cometh down from heaven.” He offended them still more by saying, “Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man. and drink his blood, ye have no life in you.” referring to the ordinance which He later instituted, the sacrament of the Lord’s supper. When He made this statement they were greatly offended, and many of those who had professed belief in Him declared that it was a very hard saying, and they could not receive it. Or, as it is written: “From that time many of His disciples went back and walked no more with Him. Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered Him: Lord to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.
And I say, my brethren and sisters, that I feel this morning, after hearing the testimonies of the brethren at this conference, very much as Peter did in answering the Lord. Where can we go and find the words of eternal life? We cannot turn to the right hand neither to the’ left for there spiritual darkness reigns. Right here are to be found the words of eternal life, as they are given by revelation and inspiration to the people of Zion, and we know, as Peter did, that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God. This is our message to the world; and it is a very timely message, for the so-called Christian world is departing from the fundamentals, if they ever had them, of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They are rejecting Him; they do not accept Him as the Christ, the Son of the Living God. Now, I do not wish to be misunderstood, for I realize there are many in the world who do accept Jesus Christ as the Savior of mankind and as the Son of God; but the tendency among the religious thinkers and speakers today is very largely in the direction of which I speak. During the year 1914. and running into the year 1915, a number of articles appeared in the New York Independent, one of the leading weekly papers of the United States which has a circulation in all the states of the Union and in many countries abroad. These articles appeared at intervals of a week or two during that year and were entitled, “What I believe and Why.”
The writers were men who are moulding the thought religiously and educationally, of the people of this land. I read quite a number of these articles, and as I remember it now, there was not among them all, one declaration, clear cut and without modification, accepting Jesus Christ as the Only Begotten Son of God, and the Redeemer of the world; and yet these articles were written by men who profess to be ministers of His gospel. They call themselves Christians, but they taught most everything else except the fact that Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God. They were very modern in their views, and accepted the theories and the ideas that prevail so largely now in the world, in contrast and contradiction to the Gospel of our Lord, as His doctrine is set forth in the Holy Scriptures. The final article of these papers, appeared in the issue of that weekly for March 15, 1915, and was entitled “The Sum of the Whole Matter. What I Believe and Why,” and was introduced as the final paper or word on these religious subjects. The author of this final paper was Dr. William Hays Ward. I want to read to you just a few sentences. Mr. Ward said:
“The sum of the whole matter is this: Reason is the last arbiter; our Own reason, our individual reason, my reason, nobody’s else. There are various sources of authority. Bible, or church, or God, but each one must be tested by our personal reason before it is believed. We are all of us at bottom rationalists, can not help being. What God is, whether there be a God, we must decide by the best reason we have. If we are made in the image of God, that image is in reason, not in body.” Now I want you to reflect and remember that. “If we are made in the image of God,” he says, “that image is in reason, not in body; and our little reason can and must get some true view of God, just as our little blinking myopic eyes can truly, if imperfectly, decry the infinite spangled universe. Reason may see faintly, even erringly, but it is all we have to guide us. It may rest on custom, tradition, social inheritance, the teaching from childhood of those whom we think possessed of more knowledge and judgment than we, but all our beliefs rest on such reason as we have. * * It is by reason that we too must test the Bible as well as the Vedas, Moses as well as Hesiod or Zarathustra. If we find in our Bible anything of cosmogony, or history or morals that does not approve itself to our reason, we must reject it, we can not help it That did not, could not come direct from God, but came through fallible men, the framework and the chord of whose harp was constructed after the fashion of their day, and could not sound perfect music. Reason prefers our school text-book to our Bible on matters of. geology and astronomy, sifts Bible history by comparison with contemporary records recovered from the sands and clay of ancient empires; and reason it is that judges the teachings, of Jesus to be superior to the sacrificial cult of Leviticus, or the cursings of Ezekiel and Amos. Our light is better than theirs, for our reason has more knowledge, more experience, on which to rest. The best human reason—I think I do not err—whether it looks outward or inward, finds God.”
And I say it does not! Reason is all right when intelligently used. There is not a principle of the gospel that will not appeal to the reason of man, for every principle of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is reasonable, clear and easily understood with the aid of the spirit of truth. But man cannot determine upon the strength of his own reason unaided by the Spirit of God the power and saving grace of the gospel principles, and expect to find out God. He cannot do it! The judgment of these men in the world, is not by any means as good as the judgment of Ezekiel, the judgment of Amos and the judgment of Leviticus, that is, the word of the Lord as found in the book of Leviticus; neither is it as good as the judgment of Moses or any other of the old prophets, for the very good reason that Moses and the prophets were led and directed by the Spirit of God. These men are not so led, they have rejected the Lord and in His place have set up, as they did at one time in the nation of France, the god of reason which they worship, and which leads them into all kinds of errors because of their faulty and erroneous reasoning, such as these sentences express which I have read to you.
Of course our reason is in the form and the likeness of the reason of God our Father, but His is infinite and ours are limited and very imperfect. And it is true, notwithstanding what man may say or think, that we were created in the image of God physically, and this man’s reason unaided by the spirit of truth has led him astray in this regard because he has rejected the assistance of the Holy Spirit.
I am reminded of an expression found in the eleventh chapter of the book of Job. One of his comforters expressed it but it is nevertheless a true statement. He said to Job: “Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?” And the answer to that naturally is: No, you cannot, unaided by the Holy Ghost! It is impossible for man to discover God unto perfection by the aid of his reason and that -alone. We have the word of God for it. Paul tells us in the second chapter of Corinthians:
“It is written, eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him, but God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit; for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God.” Or in other words, unless he has the Spirit of God. “Now we have received,” he says, "not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
Now these modern religionists— we have some of them in our own city—I happen to think I have a clipping in my pocket from which I want to read a paragraph to you. This is the purported statement of a minister of this city taken from a discourse delivered not many weeks ago. He said:
“I for one can’t see why men should accept the proposition that there is a hereafter simply because it is so written in the books. What more did the writers hundreds of years ago know about that than we do, and why should we particularly believe them? No man has ever journeyed to the beyond and returned to earth to prove to us we do go on.”
And I say he is wrong! But this is the way these modem religionists reason. Many of those who have gone to the great beyond have returned and we have witnesses raised up in our day who can testify that they have seen and conversed with them. The Lord Himself. even the Son of God. appeared in the Kirtland Temple to the Prophet Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery and ministered to them. The Prophet and Sidney Rigdon saw the Son of God in heavenly vision and they bore witness of it and their testimony is a matter of record before the world. They saw Him and bore witness, as they declared it, “last of all” that He lives for they saw Him. Angels, who are men that lived upon this earth and have been glorified, receiving their resurrection, returned and conferred upon the heads of Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery, keys and powers and priesthood which they held, and this same priesthood has been handed down and you hold it, my brethren.
It is the extreme of foolishness for a man to rise up and say, because those who have gone to the beyond have not appeared to him, therefore they have not returned, that no one has returned from the great beyond to prove we do go on! and to teach such nonsense in his ignorance to the people, because it appeals to his reason. He never will receive such visitations and knowledge as long as he holds to such views, and rejects the Lord Jesus Christ as the Redeemer of the world. Peter says:
“We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye. take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts: knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.”
Now this man asks, what did the prophets of old know more than we? And Mr. Ward, one of the great teachers in the religious world asks the same question, or, declares that we have more light and a better vision than the prophets had, because of our greater experience. And I say unless we are in communication and fellowship with the Spirit of God we do not know as well as they knew, for we have it in the words of the chief of the apostles that these holy men of old, Moses, Elias, Elijah—all of the prophets of old—spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, and that which they declared to the people was the vital truth. The Lord taught His disciples that the mission of the Comforter, or Holy Ghost, was to teach the truth and that He would teach us and lead us in all truth; that He would show us things to come—which is the spirit of prophecy. He would take of the things of the Father and of the Son and reveal them unto us, providing, of course, that we are in fellowship with Him. And so Peter bears witness that these prophets spoke under the inspiration of the Lord and gave unto us the word of the Lord.
We. have even a greater witness. The Lord Himself has borne record of this fact. You remember having read in the twenty-fourth chapter of Luke how, after His resurrection, He walked along the road with two of His disciples going to the little city of Emmaus, not far from Jerusalem, and the scriptures say, their eyes were holden, that they should not know Him. As He walked with them they were surprised, thinking Him a stranger and ignorant of what had taken place during the past three days, so they commenced to instruct Him as they walked along. They told Him how the Jews had taken Jesus of Nazareth, the one whom they thought had come to redeem Israel, and had put Him to death. They were very much concerned about it, and they were feeling in their hearts that all was over, their hopes and promises were at an end. The Savior listened patiently for some time and finally He said to them: “O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken: ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.” So He testified to the fact that Moses and all the prophets whose records we have in the old scriptures—which today are quite generally discarded in the so-called Christian world—had declared that He was to come into the world, suffer and have His blood shed for the redemption of the world, to die upon the cross and that He was verily the Son of God the Redeemer of mankind. Thus He opened the scriptures to their understanding and taught His disciples after His resurrection, that these things were true, bearing witness and record to the fact that the prophets of old spoke, and wrote also, as they were moved and commanded by the Spirit of God. This is what we Latter-day Saints believe.
Now these modernists who are instructing and leading astray the people of this and other lands, reject the doctrine of the atonement of Christ; they reject the resurrection of the Son of God, and consequently the resurrection of all mankind. They have discarded entirely the miracles of the scriptures and make light of the saving ordinances of the gospel which the Lord declared to be so essential to our salvation; and in the stead thereof they have accepted the theories and notions advanced by modern scientists which are evidently false, and have taken to their hearts and hugged to their bosoms the falsehoods set forth in the theories of evolution and of higher criticism of the scriptures. And why have they done this thing? Because the simple truth, which is understood by the Spirit of God and not understood and comprehended by the spirit of man, does not appeal to their reason. They have refused to hearken to the words of the Son of God wherein he rebuked the unrepentant Jews:
“I have greater witness than that of John: for the works which the Father hath given me to finish, the same works that I do bear witness of me. And the Father himself, which hath sent me, hath borne witness of me. Ye have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape. And ye have not his word abiding in you: for whom he hath sent, him ye believe not. Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life; and they are they which testify of me.”
All manner of theory and error they teach to the world, declaring that we cannot accept anything, only that which our reason teaches us. Therefore, if reason teaches me that baptism is not essential to salvation and it teaches you that it is, we are both right, which is a contradiction which cannot be true; and unless reason teaches us the same thing and we are agreed, both cannot have the truth and we are not in the narrow path, we are not in fellowship with God. We must walk in holiness of life in the light and in the truth with proper understanding which comes through the gift and power of the Holy Ghost which is promised to all who will believe unto repentance and receive the words of eternal life. If we are in fellowship with this Spirit then we walk in the light and have fellowship with God. He who is without the guiding light of the Spirit of God is in the midst of darkness and cannot with his reason unaided and unenlightened search and find out God.
My testimony is that Jesus is the Christ, the Redeemer of the world, that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, that he did receive ministrations of angels, and even of the Son and of the Father; that he was called to establish this work in truth and righteousness, and this message has gone forth to the world and many—even the great majority, have rejected it. However, this is my testimony and the testimony of the elders of Israel, and may it prevail, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The Latter-day Saints have received the words of eternal life—“Christians” who do not believe in Christ’s Divinity—Man’s reason needs the Spirit’s guidance—Prevalent disbelief in Scripture statements—The Infinite cannot be comprehended by finite reasoning —Fallacious dogmas of modern scientists—Essentiality of Spiritual guidance demonstrated.
My brethren and sisters, I am very greatly impressed, this morning, with the many evidences that proclaim this to be in very deed the place—the place of Zion; that here are found the people of the Lord with whom He has made covenant, and who have made covenant with Him to serve Him and keep His commandments; that Zion will grow and prosper until her fame shall fill the earth and her glory and majesty shall cover the face thereof.
I feel this morning very much as Peter did in his answer to the Lord after the feeding of the five thousand, when he confessed the Lord to be the Son of God. We read in the sixth chapter of John’s Gospel that the Savior departed secretly from the people after this miracle was performed, and crossed to the other side of the sea of Galilee, to the city of Capernaum. The next morning when the people discovered that the Lord had departed, they followed Him and asked when He came hither, and Jesus rebuked them because they had not followed Him because of the things He taught them, but because of the loaves and fishes. He thereupon instructed them to seek for the meat which endureth unto everlasting life which He could give unto them. They promptly informed Him that their fathers did eat manna in the wilderness which was bread from heaven. He answered that the bread Moses gave was not the true bread from heaven, but He was the bread of life, and that whoever came to Him should never hunger, and those who believed on Him should never thirst. This caused them to murmur, and to make it more emphatic the Lord declared unto them: “I am that bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness and are dead. * * * I am the living bread which cometh down from heaven.” He offended them still more by saying, “Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man. and drink his blood, ye have no life in you.” referring to the ordinance which He later instituted, the sacrament of the Lord’s supper. When He made this statement they were greatly offended, and many of those who had professed belief in Him declared that it was a very hard saying, and they could not receive it. Or, as it is written: “From that time many of His disciples went back and walked no more with Him. Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered Him: Lord to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.
And I say, my brethren and sisters, that I feel this morning, after hearing the testimonies of the brethren at this conference, very much as Peter did in answering the Lord. Where can we go and find the words of eternal life? We cannot turn to the right hand neither to the’ left for there spiritual darkness reigns. Right here are to be found the words of eternal life, as they are given by revelation and inspiration to the people of Zion, and we know, as Peter did, that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God. This is our message to the world; and it is a very timely message, for the so-called Christian world is departing from the fundamentals, if they ever had them, of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They are rejecting Him; they do not accept Him as the Christ, the Son of the Living God. Now, I do not wish to be misunderstood, for I realize there are many in the world who do accept Jesus Christ as the Savior of mankind and as the Son of God; but the tendency among the religious thinkers and speakers today is very largely in the direction of which I speak. During the year 1914. and running into the year 1915, a number of articles appeared in the New York Independent, one of the leading weekly papers of the United States which has a circulation in all the states of the Union and in many countries abroad. These articles appeared at intervals of a week or two during that year and were entitled, “What I believe and Why.”
The writers were men who are moulding the thought religiously and educationally, of the people of this land. I read quite a number of these articles, and as I remember it now, there was not among them all, one declaration, clear cut and without modification, accepting Jesus Christ as the Only Begotten Son of God, and the Redeemer of the world; and yet these articles were written by men who profess to be ministers of His gospel. They call themselves Christians, but they taught most everything else except the fact that Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God. They were very modern in their views, and accepted the theories and the ideas that prevail so largely now in the world, in contrast and contradiction to the Gospel of our Lord, as His doctrine is set forth in the Holy Scriptures. The final article of these papers, appeared in the issue of that weekly for March 15, 1915, and was entitled “The Sum of the Whole Matter. What I Believe and Why,” and was introduced as the final paper or word on these religious subjects. The author of this final paper was Dr. William Hays Ward. I want to read to you just a few sentences. Mr. Ward said:
“The sum of the whole matter is this: Reason is the last arbiter; our Own reason, our individual reason, my reason, nobody’s else. There are various sources of authority. Bible, or church, or God, but each one must be tested by our personal reason before it is believed. We are all of us at bottom rationalists, can not help being. What God is, whether there be a God, we must decide by the best reason we have. If we are made in the image of God, that image is in reason, not in body.” Now I want you to reflect and remember that. “If we are made in the image of God,” he says, “that image is in reason, not in body; and our little reason can and must get some true view of God, just as our little blinking myopic eyes can truly, if imperfectly, decry the infinite spangled universe. Reason may see faintly, even erringly, but it is all we have to guide us. It may rest on custom, tradition, social inheritance, the teaching from childhood of those whom we think possessed of more knowledge and judgment than we, but all our beliefs rest on such reason as we have. * * It is by reason that we too must test the Bible as well as the Vedas, Moses as well as Hesiod or Zarathustra. If we find in our Bible anything of cosmogony, or history or morals that does not approve itself to our reason, we must reject it, we can not help it That did not, could not come direct from God, but came through fallible men, the framework and the chord of whose harp was constructed after the fashion of their day, and could not sound perfect music. Reason prefers our school text-book to our Bible on matters of. geology and astronomy, sifts Bible history by comparison with contemporary records recovered from the sands and clay of ancient empires; and reason it is that judges the teachings, of Jesus to be superior to the sacrificial cult of Leviticus, or the cursings of Ezekiel and Amos. Our light is better than theirs, for our reason has more knowledge, more experience, on which to rest. The best human reason—I think I do not err—whether it looks outward or inward, finds God.”
And I say it does not! Reason is all right when intelligently used. There is not a principle of the gospel that will not appeal to the reason of man, for every principle of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is reasonable, clear and easily understood with the aid of the spirit of truth. But man cannot determine upon the strength of his own reason unaided by the Spirit of God the power and saving grace of the gospel principles, and expect to find out God. He cannot do it! The judgment of these men in the world, is not by any means as good as the judgment of Ezekiel, the judgment of Amos and the judgment of Leviticus, that is, the word of the Lord as found in the book of Leviticus; neither is it as good as the judgment of Moses or any other of the old prophets, for the very good reason that Moses and the prophets were led and directed by the Spirit of God. These men are not so led, they have rejected the Lord and in His place have set up, as they did at one time in the nation of France, the god of reason which they worship, and which leads them into all kinds of errors because of their faulty and erroneous reasoning, such as these sentences express which I have read to you.
Of course our reason is in the form and the likeness of the reason of God our Father, but His is infinite and ours are limited and very imperfect. And it is true, notwithstanding what man may say or think, that we were created in the image of God physically, and this man’s reason unaided by the spirit of truth has led him astray in this regard because he has rejected the assistance of the Holy Spirit.
I am reminded of an expression found in the eleventh chapter of the book of Job. One of his comforters expressed it but it is nevertheless a true statement. He said to Job: “Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?” And the answer to that naturally is: No, you cannot, unaided by the Holy Ghost! It is impossible for man to discover God unto perfection by the aid of his reason and that -alone. We have the word of God for it. Paul tells us in the second chapter of Corinthians:
“It is written, eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him, but God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit; for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God.” Or in other words, unless he has the Spirit of God. “Now we have received,” he says, "not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
Now these modern religionists— we have some of them in our own city—I happen to think I have a clipping in my pocket from which I want to read a paragraph to you. This is the purported statement of a minister of this city taken from a discourse delivered not many weeks ago. He said:
“I for one can’t see why men should accept the proposition that there is a hereafter simply because it is so written in the books. What more did the writers hundreds of years ago know about that than we do, and why should we particularly believe them? No man has ever journeyed to the beyond and returned to earth to prove to us we do go on.”
And I say he is wrong! But this is the way these modem religionists reason. Many of those who have gone to the great beyond have returned and we have witnesses raised up in our day who can testify that they have seen and conversed with them. The Lord Himself. even the Son of God. appeared in the Kirtland Temple to the Prophet Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery and ministered to them. The Prophet and Sidney Rigdon saw the Son of God in heavenly vision and they bore witness of it and their testimony is a matter of record before the world. They saw Him and bore witness, as they declared it, “last of all” that He lives for they saw Him. Angels, who are men that lived upon this earth and have been glorified, receiving their resurrection, returned and conferred upon the heads of Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery, keys and powers and priesthood which they held, and this same priesthood has been handed down and you hold it, my brethren.
It is the extreme of foolishness for a man to rise up and say, because those who have gone to the beyond have not appeared to him, therefore they have not returned, that no one has returned from the great beyond to prove we do go on! and to teach such nonsense in his ignorance to the people, because it appeals to his reason. He never will receive such visitations and knowledge as long as he holds to such views, and rejects the Lord Jesus Christ as the Redeemer of the world. Peter says:
“We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye. take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts: knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.”
Now this man asks, what did the prophets of old know more than we? And Mr. Ward, one of the great teachers in the religious world asks the same question, or, declares that we have more light and a better vision than the prophets had, because of our greater experience. And I say unless we are in communication and fellowship with the Spirit of God we do not know as well as they knew, for we have it in the words of the chief of the apostles that these holy men of old, Moses, Elias, Elijah—all of the prophets of old—spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, and that which they declared to the people was the vital truth. The Lord taught His disciples that the mission of the Comforter, or Holy Ghost, was to teach the truth and that He would teach us and lead us in all truth; that He would show us things to come—which is the spirit of prophecy. He would take of the things of the Father and of the Son and reveal them unto us, providing, of course, that we are in fellowship with Him. And so Peter bears witness that these prophets spoke under the inspiration of the Lord and gave unto us the word of the Lord.
We. have even a greater witness. The Lord Himself has borne record of this fact. You remember having read in the twenty-fourth chapter of Luke how, after His resurrection, He walked along the road with two of His disciples going to the little city of Emmaus, not far from Jerusalem, and the scriptures say, their eyes were holden, that they should not know Him. As He walked with them they were surprised, thinking Him a stranger and ignorant of what had taken place during the past three days, so they commenced to instruct Him as they walked along. They told Him how the Jews had taken Jesus of Nazareth, the one whom they thought had come to redeem Israel, and had put Him to death. They were very much concerned about it, and they were feeling in their hearts that all was over, their hopes and promises were at an end. The Savior listened patiently for some time and finally He said to them: “O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken: ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.” So He testified to the fact that Moses and all the prophets whose records we have in the old scriptures—which today are quite generally discarded in the so-called Christian world—had declared that He was to come into the world, suffer and have His blood shed for the redemption of the world, to die upon the cross and that He was verily the Son of God the Redeemer of mankind. Thus He opened the scriptures to their understanding and taught His disciples after His resurrection, that these things were true, bearing witness and record to the fact that the prophets of old spoke, and wrote also, as they were moved and commanded by the Spirit of God. This is what we Latter-day Saints believe.
Now these modernists who are instructing and leading astray the people of this and other lands, reject the doctrine of the atonement of Christ; they reject the resurrection of the Son of God, and consequently the resurrection of all mankind. They have discarded entirely the miracles of the scriptures and make light of the saving ordinances of the gospel which the Lord declared to be so essential to our salvation; and in the stead thereof they have accepted the theories and notions advanced by modern scientists which are evidently false, and have taken to their hearts and hugged to their bosoms the falsehoods set forth in the theories of evolution and of higher criticism of the scriptures. And why have they done this thing? Because the simple truth, which is understood by the Spirit of God and not understood and comprehended by the spirit of man, does not appeal to their reason. They have refused to hearken to the words of the Son of God wherein he rebuked the unrepentant Jews:
“I have greater witness than that of John: for the works which the Father hath given me to finish, the same works that I do bear witness of me. And the Father himself, which hath sent me, hath borne witness of me. Ye have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape. And ye have not his word abiding in you: for whom he hath sent, him ye believe not. Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life; and they are they which testify of me.”
All manner of theory and error they teach to the world, declaring that we cannot accept anything, only that which our reason teaches us. Therefore, if reason teaches me that baptism is not essential to salvation and it teaches you that it is, we are both right, which is a contradiction which cannot be true; and unless reason teaches us the same thing and we are agreed, both cannot have the truth and we are not in the narrow path, we are not in fellowship with God. We must walk in holiness of life in the light and in the truth with proper understanding which comes through the gift and power of the Holy Ghost which is promised to all who will believe unto repentance and receive the words of eternal life. If we are in fellowship with this Spirit then we walk in the light and have fellowship with God. He who is without the guiding light of the Spirit of God is in the midst of darkness and cannot with his reason unaided and unenlightened search and find out God.
My testimony is that Jesus is the Christ, the Redeemer of the world, that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, that he did receive ministrations of angels, and even of the Son and of the Father; that he was called to establish this work in truth and righteousness, and this message has gone forth to the world and many—even the great majority, have rejected it. However, this is my testimony and the testimony of the elders of Israel, and may it prevail, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
ELDER MELVIN J. BALLARD.
(President Northwestern States Mission.)
My heart rejoices, my brethren and sisters, in the privilege of attending this conference and listening to the testimonies that have already been given; and most earnestly do I desire to enjoy the same good spirit with which our brethren have been impressed, as they have uttered inspired words to us.
I rejoice more than I can tell you to have a name and standing in this Church, to be identified with what I consider the most wonderful movement in the world today, a movement, as suggested by one of our brethren this morning, that is only beginning its effective work; assuredly we have not reached the end for which this work was established by the Lord. When I realize the meaning of those words of the Master that we are the salt of the earth, and that the leaven which has been planted with this people should work until it reaches the uttermost ends of the earth, I feel that, this being the truth, this work being the very work of God, His precious promise having been given to it, no power can stay its progress, its growth, its development, the consummation of the end that God has decreed. If the Lord has selected these valleys of the mountains as the place where He would establish His people, He having decreed it and pronounced His blessings upon it, this will always be the place, though some of us may not be permitted to remain in. this place. This will always be the saving work that God established it to be, though some may not continue to be identified with it. The Lord having decreed these things they shall be consummated, all His promises shall be fulfilled.
The world has become impressed with some of the doctrines taught by the Prophet Joseph Smith, and although they have not acknowledged the source from which they have received their information, nevertheless great churches have been builded using as their chief corner stone some of the doctrines or principles announced by the Prophet. Others have wondered at the beauty of these doctrines, and have been almost shocked when afterwards they have heard that these were the teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith. Men have wondered why it was that if the Lord had such a beautiful system, if He had such a wonderful work to do, why He did not choose someone else besides a man who has been so much misunderstood and whose name has been held in contempt by the world generally. The one reason why the Lord did not give to the Reverend T. DeWitt Talmage, Henry Ward Beecher or others the message, the grand message that He delivered to the Prophet Joseph Smith, is because He has always elected, as Paul indicated, the weak and not those who are wise in the things of the world, not those who are mighty, not those who were learned. Not that God despises learning, education, nor those things that make men great in the eyes of their fellow men, but He does this that no flesh shall glory in His sight.
When I have witnessed the efforts of men to try to detract from the work established through Joseph Smith, rob it of its claims of divinity, by trying to find among his associates men who had learning and education and ability enough to produce the Book of Mormon, tried to give the credit to Sidney Rigdon or to Solomon Spaulding or to some one else, I have wondered what the world would have thought of the Book of Mormon if the Lord had revealed its whereabouts to Henry Ward Beecher. Would they not have given the credit to man? Would the Lord have been glorified in this? I feel that the Lord has done it just as He always has performed His work, I am impressed by those words spoken by the Savior as found in the ninth chapter of Matthew, sixteenth verse: “No man putteth a piece, of new cloth into an old garment, for that which is put in to fill it tip taketh from the garment, and the rent is made worse. Neither do men put new wine into old bottles: else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish: but they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved.” If the Lord had a new message or the old message to be re-given, it having failed to be preserved, through the inability of men to defend the truth and preserve it after the departure of the Christ and His apostles, if He had a new message of the truth to give, new wine of life to give to men, evidently, in His judgment, He could not find a vessel, an organization oil the earth that could contain this new wine. Where could He find one in which there was a belief in God the Eternal Father as He is; where, one that believed in Jesus Christ as the very Son of God, and the Savior of the world? He had to select someone whom He could reveal Himself to, one without preconceived notions and prejudices.
When the Lord sought to give Israel new promises, and lead them into the new land, He found it necessary to keep Israel in the wilderness forty years, to try to make them vessels who could contain the better things; but they could not. They all perished, who were over twenty-one years of age, except Caleb and Joshua, and only the children who were born and reared in the wilderness came into their new land. When Jesus Christ came, though there were religious organizations in the world, He could not find one suitable to receive His message, so He had to build anew again; He had to organize vessels and institutions, an organization that could contain this new wine. So in all the earth in the latter days, there was not, anywhere, vessels of organizations that could contain the new wine, the very truth of God; and so He organized new vessels, a new institution, an organization capable of receiving the full message of truth that has been given to this Church. It will, I trust, always be possible for this organization to cherish that measure of truth that has been given to it, to preserve it, to receive more as the Lord intends that it shall come; and not save it for ourselves alone, for we have been given this wonderful message for the blessing of all men. We are to treasure it with the thought, not of selfishness—“for me and my wife and my son John and his wife,” but for the whole world. I rejoice that the truth has come to our understanding, no matter what the world may say or think or feel with reference to this message. If it is the truth, as we declare it is, it will stand, it will survive.
I read some very comforting words a few days ago from an eminent author running like this:
“Had the great truths waited until the majority voted in their favor they would never have been heard of in the world. Had they not found the place from which they are proclaimed at all times as sufficiently grand, they would be silent to this hour. Unadorned and out of the way were the seats whence they were uttered as they came like zephyrs; and though slight their rustlings they uprooted oaks and threw down palaces.”
While this truth came in a humble and obscure corner of the earth, to one out of the way of the seats of those who sought adornment, nevertheless, though the rustlings were gentle when the Son of God and the Father Himself appeared in the grove, to the Prophet Joseph Smith, on that spring morning, it was the beginning of the establishment of truth that should grow and become mighty; and like fire, when once started in dead timber, it shall burn and consume all that is dead, decayed and fit for consumption. So the truth, once clearly stated, will burn and consume error and spread unto the uttermost parts of the earth.
I testify to you that this is the truth, that the wonderful message given to us is the thing of all things that can save and that will save the world. It is the power of God unto salvation; it is the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. I do bear testimony to the fact that I know, all there is to me knows, reason is satisfied, yes, in my soul, by a thousand testimonies, I know it better than I know anything else in the world that God lives, that Jesus is the Christ, the very Son of God. I know equally well that if the Lord, who does live, if He ever spoke to men, if He ever delivered a message in all the world, He did speak to Joseph Smith, He did reveal Himself, and I believe that He revealed Himself to men anciently as well as that He revealed Himself to the Prophet Joseph. I treasure the divine message that has come unto us, and I do appreciate the opportunity of bearing this message to my Father’s children.
Oh, may the Lord inspire the hearts of the youth of Israel, and the men and the women who have the great responsibilities of demonstrating to the world the virtue, the virility, the strength and the power of this Gospel, so that men may not only be impressed and inspired by our utterances but that, seeing the fruits of this Gospel in the lives of the Latter-day Saints, they may be lead to acknowledge that the thing, after all. that they have sought and have not found in the forms of religion upon which they have leaned with hope that it would solve the world’s problem, and bring peace to the earth, is here in all its power, not lose their faith in God, nor in His Christ, but, that here they shall find hope. And may we live to invite and anxiously desire all men to come and drink of these waters of everlasting life which are now extended freely to all who will receive. May the Lord bless us in these noble efforts and in this grand mission, to live up to the requirements of the Lord, I pray, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
President Smith announced another overflow meeting, to be held in the Assembly Hall at 2 p. m., to be presided over by Elder George F. Richards; and an outdoor meeting at same time, in front of the Bureau of Information, under direction of Elder Heber J. Grant.
(President Northwestern States Mission.)
My heart rejoices, my brethren and sisters, in the privilege of attending this conference and listening to the testimonies that have already been given; and most earnestly do I desire to enjoy the same good spirit with which our brethren have been impressed, as they have uttered inspired words to us.
I rejoice more than I can tell you to have a name and standing in this Church, to be identified with what I consider the most wonderful movement in the world today, a movement, as suggested by one of our brethren this morning, that is only beginning its effective work; assuredly we have not reached the end for which this work was established by the Lord. When I realize the meaning of those words of the Master that we are the salt of the earth, and that the leaven which has been planted with this people should work until it reaches the uttermost ends of the earth, I feel that, this being the truth, this work being the very work of God, His precious promise having been given to it, no power can stay its progress, its growth, its development, the consummation of the end that God has decreed. If the Lord has selected these valleys of the mountains as the place where He would establish His people, He having decreed it and pronounced His blessings upon it, this will always be the place, though some of us may not be permitted to remain in. this place. This will always be the saving work that God established it to be, though some may not continue to be identified with it. The Lord having decreed these things they shall be consummated, all His promises shall be fulfilled.
The world has become impressed with some of the doctrines taught by the Prophet Joseph Smith, and although they have not acknowledged the source from which they have received their information, nevertheless great churches have been builded using as their chief corner stone some of the doctrines or principles announced by the Prophet. Others have wondered at the beauty of these doctrines, and have been almost shocked when afterwards they have heard that these were the teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith. Men have wondered why it was that if the Lord had such a beautiful system, if He had such a wonderful work to do, why He did not choose someone else besides a man who has been so much misunderstood and whose name has been held in contempt by the world generally. The one reason why the Lord did not give to the Reverend T. DeWitt Talmage, Henry Ward Beecher or others the message, the grand message that He delivered to the Prophet Joseph Smith, is because He has always elected, as Paul indicated, the weak and not those who are wise in the things of the world, not those who are mighty, not those who were learned. Not that God despises learning, education, nor those things that make men great in the eyes of their fellow men, but He does this that no flesh shall glory in His sight.
When I have witnessed the efforts of men to try to detract from the work established through Joseph Smith, rob it of its claims of divinity, by trying to find among his associates men who had learning and education and ability enough to produce the Book of Mormon, tried to give the credit to Sidney Rigdon or to Solomon Spaulding or to some one else, I have wondered what the world would have thought of the Book of Mormon if the Lord had revealed its whereabouts to Henry Ward Beecher. Would they not have given the credit to man? Would the Lord have been glorified in this? I feel that the Lord has done it just as He always has performed His work, I am impressed by those words spoken by the Savior as found in the ninth chapter of Matthew, sixteenth verse: “No man putteth a piece, of new cloth into an old garment, for that which is put in to fill it tip taketh from the garment, and the rent is made worse. Neither do men put new wine into old bottles: else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish: but they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved.” If the Lord had a new message or the old message to be re-given, it having failed to be preserved, through the inability of men to defend the truth and preserve it after the departure of the Christ and His apostles, if He had a new message of the truth to give, new wine of life to give to men, evidently, in His judgment, He could not find a vessel, an organization oil the earth that could contain this new wine. Where could He find one in which there was a belief in God the Eternal Father as He is; where, one that believed in Jesus Christ as the very Son of God, and the Savior of the world? He had to select someone whom He could reveal Himself to, one without preconceived notions and prejudices.
When the Lord sought to give Israel new promises, and lead them into the new land, He found it necessary to keep Israel in the wilderness forty years, to try to make them vessels who could contain the better things; but they could not. They all perished, who were over twenty-one years of age, except Caleb and Joshua, and only the children who were born and reared in the wilderness came into their new land. When Jesus Christ came, though there were religious organizations in the world, He could not find one suitable to receive His message, so He had to build anew again; He had to organize vessels and institutions, an organization that could contain this new wine. So in all the earth in the latter days, there was not, anywhere, vessels of organizations that could contain the new wine, the very truth of God; and so He organized new vessels, a new institution, an organization capable of receiving the full message of truth that has been given to this Church. It will, I trust, always be possible for this organization to cherish that measure of truth that has been given to it, to preserve it, to receive more as the Lord intends that it shall come; and not save it for ourselves alone, for we have been given this wonderful message for the blessing of all men. We are to treasure it with the thought, not of selfishness—“for me and my wife and my son John and his wife,” but for the whole world. I rejoice that the truth has come to our understanding, no matter what the world may say or think or feel with reference to this message. If it is the truth, as we declare it is, it will stand, it will survive.
I read some very comforting words a few days ago from an eminent author running like this:
“Had the great truths waited until the majority voted in their favor they would never have been heard of in the world. Had they not found the place from which they are proclaimed at all times as sufficiently grand, they would be silent to this hour. Unadorned and out of the way were the seats whence they were uttered as they came like zephyrs; and though slight their rustlings they uprooted oaks and threw down palaces.”
While this truth came in a humble and obscure corner of the earth, to one out of the way of the seats of those who sought adornment, nevertheless, though the rustlings were gentle when the Son of God and the Father Himself appeared in the grove, to the Prophet Joseph Smith, on that spring morning, it was the beginning of the establishment of truth that should grow and become mighty; and like fire, when once started in dead timber, it shall burn and consume all that is dead, decayed and fit for consumption. So the truth, once clearly stated, will burn and consume error and spread unto the uttermost parts of the earth.
I testify to you that this is the truth, that the wonderful message given to us is the thing of all things that can save and that will save the world. It is the power of God unto salvation; it is the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. I do bear testimony to the fact that I know, all there is to me knows, reason is satisfied, yes, in my soul, by a thousand testimonies, I know it better than I know anything else in the world that God lives, that Jesus is the Christ, the very Son of God. I know equally well that if the Lord, who does live, if He ever spoke to men, if He ever delivered a message in all the world, He did speak to Joseph Smith, He did reveal Himself, and I believe that He revealed Himself to men anciently as well as that He revealed Himself to the Prophet Joseph. I treasure the divine message that has come unto us, and I do appreciate the opportunity of bearing this message to my Father’s children.
Oh, may the Lord inspire the hearts of the youth of Israel, and the men and the women who have the great responsibilities of demonstrating to the world the virtue, the virility, the strength and the power of this Gospel, so that men may not only be impressed and inspired by our utterances but that, seeing the fruits of this Gospel in the lives of the Latter-day Saints, they may be lead to acknowledge that the thing, after all. that they have sought and have not found in the forms of religion upon which they have leaned with hope that it would solve the world’s problem, and bring peace to the earth, is here in all its power, not lose their faith in God, nor in His Christ, but, that here they shall find hope. And may we live to invite and anxiously desire all men to come and drink of these waters of everlasting life which are now extended freely to all who will receive. May the Lord bless us in these noble efforts and in this grand mission, to live up to the requirements of the Lord, I pray, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
President Smith announced another overflow meeting, to be held in the Assembly Hall at 2 p. m., to be presided over by Elder George F. Richards; and an outdoor meeting at same time, in front of the Bureau of Information, under direction of Elder Heber J. Grant.
ELDER LEVI EDGAR YOUNG.
(Of First Council of Seventy.)
My brethren and sisters: I have been asked by President Smith to say a few words this morning concerning the organization for the World’s Peace Foundation that has been inaugurated here in the United States. Yesterday afternoon the Utah organization was perfected by the election of Hon. Wm. N. Williams as president; he with the other regularly elected officers, will take up the work of perfecting the organization throughout the State of Utah. At the head of the peace organization in the United States is Ex-President William Howard Taft. The movement has been inaugurated for the purpose of inculcating in the hearts of all American people the virtue of peace, and it is desired that such organizations be perfected in all of the states of the Union.
Utah is recognized by a great many people abroad as being loyal to the gospel of peace. It is said that we have contributed here in this state more for the suffering people of Europe than any other state of the union in comparison to the population. It is greatly desired by the peace organization that all of the people of the State become interested in this movement and contribute in spirit and in truth, to the cause, that a sentiment may be aroused in the hearts of men and women, and of the children of the public schools, that we may have a backing that will count for something, and that it may be said that our own State is not dead to this great message which Christ brought to the world over eighteen hundred years ago.
I was particularly interested in the words of Elder Orson F. Whitney. I believe every word that he uttered. I know thit the revelation that he read is true, and the glorious thing to me is that the people throughout our government is beginning to recognize the great work of the Latter-day Saints. It has been recently printed in the Alumni Review of the Harvard University, that the “Mormon” people established in the Far West the most splendid American institutions of government, and when Dr. Turner, of the Department of Western History, made that statement he did it because of his careful study. But I believe we have gone farther and established in early days in this state the most splendid types of municipal and civic government of any American people that ever lived. In the Department of Political Science of Columbia University, students are making a study of the development of the old English town government of this state. This institutional life which the pioneers established in this great country of the Far West is being recognized, and the truth of their work is destined to be known.
But the Latter-day Saints have done more than establish American institutions in the Far West. They have established not only economic institutions that are wonderful in history, but “Mormonism” calls every man, woman and child into the field of constructive social activity. I believe we have the key to the social reformation of the world, through the priesthood and the different organizations of the priesthood of God. But over and above all of these things, Zion is to be established on this continent, as has been pointed out this morning by Elder Whitney, and all people who wish the truth, and who would bow to their God and ask for truth, shall know the truth and the truth will make them free. They will come up unto Zion and be purified, and Zion will be built upon this continent, and it will be the great center of all civilization and culture. The gospel of the Christ shall grow in the hearts of all, and Christ shall reign as Lord of Lords. He shall come and the great millennium shall be ushered in, but not until the people of the world shall have bowed to His great word and recognized that Jesus is the Christ.
So here, in this State, we have every opportunity of establishing a peace society that will be effective. A part of Zion at least will be here, and Zion means the place where the pure in heart are living. This will be a veritable Zion. We will contribute a light to the world. The sorrowful, those that are placed in all kinds of terrible social conditions, because of the great war in Europe, they will look, I believe, to the United States government for succor, and in time will they kneel in prayer to God and ask for the light and truth, recognizing as they will, that the truth has been taken from the hearts of men and that they are in need of a knowledge of Jesus Christ, the Redeemer of the world. We urge that this peace movement receive your heart}’ support throughout this state, that organizations may be perfected in the respective Stakes of Zion, that it may be said that among the Latter-day Saints of the far west, not only do they preach the gospel of peace, but they are perfecting the Gospel of peace by their righteous works. I believe that we have a great opportunity, my brethren and sisters, of doing a splendid work in this State.
May Zion be built upon this continent, may we cleanse our hearts and do the great work and make the great contribution of bringing about the unfurling of the flag of peace, of helping to bring about the federation of the world in a league of peace, that there may be no more war, that peace may come and that all people shall look up to Zion and know that God is God and that He has spoken to His people. May we so direct our lives that this .message may be given to the world.
I bear you my testimony that God lives, that Jesus is the Christ, that He is the Redeemer of the world, that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, and that the great saving message of God, the Father, has been revealed unto His people no more to be taken from the earth, but to spread through the world as the great life and light of salvation and universal peace and happiness. Amen.
The anthem, “Christ is Risen,” was sung by the choir, 25 of the lady members rendering the solo parts.
The benediction was pronounced by Elder Lewis W. Shurtliff.
Conference adjourned until 2 p. m.
(Of First Council of Seventy.)
My brethren and sisters: I have been asked by President Smith to say a few words this morning concerning the organization for the World’s Peace Foundation that has been inaugurated here in the United States. Yesterday afternoon the Utah organization was perfected by the election of Hon. Wm. N. Williams as president; he with the other regularly elected officers, will take up the work of perfecting the organization throughout the State of Utah. At the head of the peace organization in the United States is Ex-President William Howard Taft. The movement has been inaugurated for the purpose of inculcating in the hearts of all American people the virtue of peace, and it is desired that such organizations be perfected in all of the states of the Union.
Utah is recognized by a great many people abroad as being loyal to the gospel of peace. It is said that we have contributed here in this state more for the suffering people of Europe than any other state of the union in comparison to the population. It is greatly desired by the peace organization that all of the people of the State become interested in this movement and contribute in spirit and in truth, to the cause, that a sentiment may be aroused in the hearts of men and women, and of the children of the public schools, that we may have a backing that will count for something, and that it may be said that our own State is not dead to this great message which Christ brought to the world over eighteen hundred years ago.
I was particularly interested in the words of Elder Orson F. Whitney. I believe every word that he uttered. I know thit the revelation that he read is true, and the glorious thing to me is that the people throughout our government is beginning to recognize the great work of the Latter-day Saints. It has been recently printed in the Alumni Review of the Harvard University, that the “Mormon” people established in the Far West the most splendid American institutions of government, and when Dr. Turner, of the Department of Western History, made that statement he did it because of his careful study. But I believe we have gone farther and established in early days in this state the most splendid types of municipal and civic government of any American people that ever lived. In the Department of Political Science of Columbia University, students are making a study of the development of the old English town government of this state. This institutional life which the pioneers established in this great country of the Far West is being recognized, and the truth of their work is destined to be known.
But the Latter-day Saints have done more than establish American institutions in the Far West. They have established not only economic institutions that are wonderful in history, but “Mormonism” calls every man, woman and child into the field of constructive social activity. I believe we have the key to the social reformation of the world, through the priesthood and the different organizations of the priesthood of God. But over and above all of these things, Zion is to be established on this continent, as has been pointed out this morning by Elder Whitney, and all people who wish the truth, and who would bow to their God and ask for truth, shall know the truth and the truth will make them free. They will come up unto Zion and be purified, and Zion will be built upon this continent, and it will be the great center of all civilization and culture. The gospel of the Christ shall grow in the hearts of all, and Christ shall reign as Lord of Lords. He shall come and the great millennium shall be ushered in, but not until the people of the world shall have bowed to His great word and recognized that Jesus is the Christ.
So here, in this State, we have every opportunity of establishing a peace society that will be effective. A part of Zion at least will be here, and Zion means the place where the pure in heart are living. This will be a veritable Zion. We will contribute a light to the world. The sorrowful, those that are placed in all kinds of terrible social conditions, because of the great war in Europe, they will look, I believe, to the United States government for succor, and in time will they kneel in prayer to God and ask for the light and truth, recognizing as they will, that the truth has been taken from the hearts of men and that they are in need of a knowledge of Jesus Christ, the Redeemer of the world. We urge that this peace movement receive your heart}’ support throughout this state, that organizations may be perfected in the respective Stakes of Zion, that it may be said that among the Latter-day Saints of the far west, not only do they preach the gospel of peace, but they are perfecting the Gospel of peace by their righteous works. I believe that we have a great opportunity, my brethren and sisters, of doing a splendid work in this State.
May Zion be built upon this continent, may we cleanse our hearts and do the great work and make the great contribution of bringing about the unfurling of the flag of peace, of helping to bring about the federation of the world in a league of peace, that there may be no more war, that peace may come and that all people shall look up to Zion and know that God is God and that He has spoken to His people. May we so direct our lives that this .message may be given to the world.
I bear you my testimony that God lives, that Jesus is the Christ, that He is the Redeemer of the world, that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, and that the great saving message of God, the Father, has been revealed unto His people no more to be taken from the earth, but to spread through the world as the great life and light of salvation and universal peace and happiness. Amen.
The anthem, “Christ is Risen,” was sung by the choir, 25 of the lady members rendering the solo parts.
The benediction was pronounced by Elder Lewis W. Shurtliff.
Conference adjourned until 2 p. m.
OVERFLOW MEETING.
An overflow session of the Conference was held in the Assembly Hall, adjoining the Tabernacle, at
10 a. m. The services were presided over by Elder George Albert Smith; and the Forest Dale. Waterloo, and Richards ward choirs, combined, furnished the music.
The hymn, “O awake! my slumb’ring minstrel," was sung by the choirs.
The opening prayer was offered by Elder George C. Lambert.
The choirs sang the hymn, “Ye simple souls who stray.”
An overflow session of the Conference was held in the Assembly Hall, adjoining the Tabernacle, at
10 a. m. The services were presided over by Elder George Albert Smith; and the Forest Dale. Waterloo, and Richards ward choirs, combined, furnished the music.
The hymn, “O awake! my slumb’ring minstrel," was sung by the choirs.
The opening prayer was offered by Elder George C. Lambert.
The choirs sang the hymn, “Ye simple souls who stray.”
ELDER GERMAN E. ELLSWORTH.
(President Northern States Mission.)
I am very grateful for the privilege I have this morning, in meeting with you to worship the Lord in our conference. I have no wisdom of my own with which to enlighten you, except I become a medium in the hands of the Lord through which His Spirit may prompt me to say something that will be good for our souls. I rejoice in the testimony I have of the Gospel, and as I listen to the testimonies of my brethren, and hear their declarations of its restoration, my whole being warms, and I rejoice that I also am found worthy to possess a testimony, and to be numbered with men and women whose hearts are set on righteousness and the salvation of our Father’s children.
The testimony of the Prophet Joseph Smith concerning the coming of the Father and the Son grows more wonderful to me all the time. Likewise the testimony concerning the visit of Moroni an'1 the great mission of the Book of Mormon. I do not know of any book that has ever come forth in the earth that has so many evidences and so many testimonies concerning its truthfulness. The Angel Moroni came and instructed the Prophet Joseph Smith concerning the whereabouts of the plates upon which the Book of Mormon was written, and the circumstances connected with its coming forth. Joseph Smith the Prophet tells us the events connected with its coming forth, and declared that he translated the writings on the plates by the gift and power of God. We have three witnesses who likewise declare that they, in the presence of an holy angel, handled the plates and heard a voice from heaven, affirming the truth of Joseph Smith’s words, that the plates had been translated by the gift and power of God, a testimony that they could never afterward deny. Eight other witnesses also signed their names in testimony concerning the plates, and their belief in the truthfulness of this book.
The first writer in the Book of Mormon, Nephi, tells us that it is a true and faithful record. The last writer in the Book of Mormon testifies, in like manner, with a promise that all who read it with a sincere heart may know of its truth, for the Father will declare it unto them by the power of His Spirit. This vast assemblage of people, together with all other Latter-day Saints, bear solemn testimony that they have received a witness in their souls concerning the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon.
My humble testimony to you and all the world is that the Book of Mormon is true. Along with the witness in my soul the Lord has blessed me with inspiration, akin to revelation, concerning the important part the Book of Mormon should play in the conversion of the world. The Bible has been scattered throughout the earth, and all nations who have received it are now called Christian nations. The Bible has been preceded, and accompanied, and followed by stories concerning the great characters named therein, and the hand dealings of God with His people. I believe the coming forth of the Book of Mormon, the depicted lives of its leading characters, and the faith-promoting incidents recorded therein, should find place in the hearts of the Latter-day Saints. I believe they should be well prepared to narrate those stories and tell them as well as the Christian missionaries tell the story of Adam and Eve, of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, of Joseph, and Daniel, and the three Hebrew children, together with the sacred history of Mary and her Divinely begotten son, Jesus, and His life ministry and miracles.
In my missionary experience I have found that people who are converted through reading the Book of Mormon, are solid in the faith, their faith seems to be planted firmly upon the rock of revelation. I was told today that in war-stricken Europe, where the people are left much alone, those who are converts to the Book of Mormon are not falling away from the faith. Within the past year numbers of families have sent for the elders to baptize them, who have read no other literature, or received no other instructions save that which they found within the lids of the Book of Mormon.
I am reminded that the missionaries who were sent out in the early years of the Church, had no other literature but the Book of Mormon, and this book, together with the burning testimony in their hearts concerning its truthfulness, and the wonderful way in which it came forth, was so powerful that it brought the honest in heart into the Church by hundreds. The character of these early converts is a strong testimony that there is no better missionary book. As years went by, smaller books and tracts were written, many hundreds of thousands distributed, but I do not believe they have had the same effect as the Book of Mormon. In the Northern States mission, we have sought, diligently, for twelve years, to distribute the Book of Mormon, exerting every effort in our power to place it in the hands of the people, that it might fulfil its mission in connection with the Bible in bringing the world to Christ. The distribution of the Bible has made Christian nations, so the distribution of the Book of Mormon amalgamates the Latter-day Saints, with such nations. There is no more powerful record written concerning Jesus the Christ, no more beautiful stories of blessings following faith in God, and no clearer explanation of the plan of salvation found than that recorded in the Book of Mormon.
I rejoice in the testimony I have received from our Heavenly Father concerning the Book of Mormon. Tn listening to the testimony of President Joseph F. Smith, at the beginning of this conference, wherein he said he felt like he stood in the presence of the Lord, my mind immediately went to the time when the Prophet Joseph Smith, in the woods of Palmyra, as a boy. stood in the presence of the Lord and His Son Jesus Christ, and how He was almost consumed as it were, with the influence of their presence. President Joseph F. Smith made the Latter-day Saints feel, during his remarks, that he was standing in the presence of God, our Father, and we all rejoiced in the power and spirit of his testimony. The early missionaries of the Church felt much the same way. Some of them had stood in the presence of angels, or in the presence of men who had. They had felt the burning influence of the Spirit that had accompanied the coming forth of the Book of Mormon and the restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
I bear witness to you that every elder who has ever come to the Northern States Mission, and has sought, with all his heart, to place the Book of Mormon in the hands of the people, has been made bigger and better than those who have delivered it doubtingly. The Christian world did not particularly want the Bible when it first came to them, neither did they sanction all the movements that were put on foot to scatter it abroad in the world. The Christian missionaries were not received with open arms; but they have persisted until the Bible can be found in almost every home in almost all nations of the earth; it can be found in hotels, upon railroad trains, in stations and everywhere that men and women are wont to congregate. I believe the Book of Mormon should follow the Bible, for in the Book of Mormon is found the more simple testimony, and a plainer explanation of the doctrines of salvation, accompanied by a spirit that finds lodgment in the hearts of the honest seekers after truth.
While we have not neglected to bear our testimony in a personal way, nor failed to seek entrance to the homes of the people, yet we have kept uppermost in our minds the distribution of the word of God as found in the inspired record called the Book of Mormon. We have encouraged our elders to read it when they are feeling blue, or homesick, or discouraged, or in doubt, for they will thereby be comforted, their faith increased, and their courage to face the world be strengthened.
My brothers and sisters, I would like to leave this admonition with you, that you go home and become better acquainted with the faith promoting stories of the Book of Mormon, with the strength of character of its prophets, and the wonderful doctrines of salvation that it teaches. Teach your children to relate the stories found therein as they hear and tell those found in the Bible. I believe that the missionaries, and all our young men and our old men: should know the stories found in the Book of Mormon that inspire faith in our hearts, as well as we know the Bible stories. They are beautiful, and faith-promoting. We ought to learn to tell them that the world may know them, for the knowledge of the world has not come to them so much by reading the Bible, as it has come to them by the stories that have been told, by the sermons that have been preached from the Bible. The knowledge of the Book of Mormon will spread in the earth the same way, if we will learn to tell the stories found therein.
We have sought to establish the Book of Mormon in the homes of people by selling or loaning it to them and pointing out to them the good things found therein. On our first visit we leave a book and point to one or two good things; then go again and turn down a few other cornets of the leaves until we have maybe 25 or more places thus marked in the book. Just as soon as we can induce the people to read two or three places in the Book of Mormon, they will not permit that book to leave their home. We hope, in time, they will learn to value it as they do the Bible, and value the Bible more than they do today.
The Book of Mormon, has, to some extent, changed the thought of the religious world. They are beginning to reverence Adam as they should, and no longer consign unbaptized infants to eternal damnation. Easter sermons have been so modified that you can follow the very language of Alma in some of the easter sermons of the Christian ministers of today. That has come about, possibly, by a few copying some of the sayings of Alma, and others repeating it without knowing its source. If we will learn to appreciate the value of the doctrines contained in the Book of Mormon, and proclaim them to the world, they will become unconsciously part of the doctrines of the world.
I rejoice in the testimony of my brethren and the spirit of civic righteousness that I feel is spreading over this state. The world had no revelation concerning the word of wisdom which condemns the use of liquor and tobacco, but they are fast driving those evil things from their midst. In one or two of the states in the Northern States Mission you do not see cigarette smoking. I have been at times in several cities of 350,000 people, and never saw a man or a boy with a cigarette. I came here and met them on every side smoking cigarettes and yet the Lord told us more than two generations ago, that it was not for man. We have states in which there are no saloons, and they are praying there will be no state with saloons. When the saloon was banished from the state of Iowa, the 1st day of January, 1916, there was a great exodus from that state. Not one of you would have followed the crowd or desired habitation where they dwell. On the other hand you would have been glad to have followed the crowd that came in when the state was freed from the influences of liquor. Every decent person desired to live in Chicago and eastern cities in the prohibition districts. The homes are better, the surroundings are better, the people are better. Sometimes we elders have to bow our heads when people say. “Why do you people in Utah, who have the balance power, permit saloons and cigarettes” When I sec states and nations leading out in these things. I am reminded of the scripture wherein it says the “children of the world are wiser in their generation than the children of light.”
May God help us to faithfully live the first principles of salvation, inspire us with the spirit of the Book of Mormon, and bring back to us the spirit of communion with angels, for they are willing to come today to all who serve the Lord, and court their influence. Many elders have had their eyes opened, and have stood in the presence of holy messengers who have been sent to help them in their ministry. I think that the Latter-day Saints of all people in the world, ought to understand that they are children of God, and live according to His ways. Follow Him, and cast out those evil things that destroy peace and happiness, and drag men down to the level of the beast.
May God help us, my brothers and sisters, to save our young men, and women, that they may believe the spirit and testimony of the angels of God, who came to the Prophet Joseph and accept the testimony of the Book of Mormon, and the doctrines that it teaches, that our light may be the light of a people set upon a hill. May we be leaders instead of followers of darkened Russia in casting out the liquor evil. May we be, as God has designed, real leaders, and a real light to the world, I pray in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
(President Northern States Mission.)
I am very grateful for the privilege I have this morning, in meeting with you to worship the Lord in our conference. I have no wisdom of my own with which to enlighten you, except I become a medium in the hands of the Lord through which His Spirit may prompt me to say something that will be good for our souls. I rejoice in the testimony I have of the Gospel, and as I listen to the testimonies of my brethren, and hear their declarations of its restoration, my whole being warms, and I rejoice that I also am found worthy to possess a testimony, and to be numbered with men and women whose hearts are set on righteousness and the salvation of our Father’s children.
The testimony of the Prophet Joseph Smith concerning the coming of the Father and the Son grows more wonderful to me all the time. Likewise the testimony concerning the visit of Moroni an'1 the great mission of the Book of Mormon. I do not know of any book that has ever come forth in the earth that has so many evidences and so many testimonies concerning its truthfulness. The Angel Moroni came and instructed the Prophet Joseph Smith concerning the whereabouts of the plates upon which the Book of Mormon was written, and the circumstances connected with its coming forth. Joseph Smith the Prophet tells us the events connected with its coming forth, and declared that he translated the writings on the plates by the gift and power of God. We have three witnesses who likewise declare that they, in the presence of an holy angel, handled the plates and heard a voice from heaven, affirming the truth of Joseph Smith’s words, that the plates had been translated by the gift and power of God, a testimony that they could never afterward deny. Eight other witnesses also signed their names in testimony concerning the plates, and their belief in the truthfulness of this book.
The first writer in the Book of Mormon, Nephi, tells us that it is a true and faithful record. The last writer in the Book of Mormon testifies, in like manner, with a promise that all who read it with a sincere heart may know of its truth, for the Father will declare it unto them by the power of His Spirit. This vast assemblage of people, together with all other Latter-day Saints, bear solemn testimony that they have received a witness in their souls concerning the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon.
My humble testimony to you and all the world is that the Book of Mormon is true. Along with the witness in my soul the Lord has blessed me with inspiration, akin to revelation, concerning the important part the Book of Mormon should play in the conversion of the world. The Bible has been scattered throughout the earth, and all nations who have received it are now called Christian nations. The Bible has been preceded, and accompanied, and followed by stories concerning the great characters named therein, and the hand dealings of God with His people. I believe the coming forth of the Book of Mormon, the depicted lives of its leading characters, and the faith-promoting incidents recorded therein, should find place in the hearts of the Latter-day Saints. I believe they should be well prepared to narrate those stories and tell them as well as the Christian missionaries tell the story of Adam and Eve, of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, of Joseph, and Daniel, and the three Hebrew children, together with the sacred history of Mary and her Divinely begotten son, Jesus, and His life ministry and miracles.
In my missionary experience I have found that people who are converted through reading the Book of Mormon, are solid in the faith, their faith seems to be planted firmly upon the rock of revelation. I was told today that in war-stricken Europe, where the people are left much alone, those who are converts to the Book of Mormon are not falling away from the faith. Within the past year numbers of families have sent for the elders to baptize them, who have read no other literature, or received no other instructions save that which they found within the lids of the Book of Mormon.
I am reminded that the missionaries who were sent out in the early years of the Church, had no other literature but the Book of Mormon, and this book, together with the burning testimony in their hearts concerning its truthfulness, and the wonderful way in which it came forth, was so powerful that it brought the honest in heart into the Church by hundreds. The character of these early converts is a strong testimony that there is no better missionary book. As years went by, smaller books and tracts were written, many hundreds of thousands distributed, but I do not believe they have had the same effect as the Book of Mormon. In the Northern States mission, we have sought, diligently, for twelve years, to distribute the Book of Mormon, exerting every effort in our power to place it in the hands of the people, that it might fulfil its mission in connection with the Bible in bringing the world to Christ. The distribution of the Bible has made Christian nations, so the distribution of the Book of Mormon amalgamates the Latter-day Saints, with such nations. There is no more powerful record written concerning Jesus the Christ, no more beautiful stories of blessings following faith in God, and no clearer explanation of the plan of salvation found than that recorded in the Book of Mormon.
I rejoice in the testimony I have received from our Heavenly Father concerning the Book of Mormon. Tn listening to the testimony of President Joseph F. Smith, at the beginning of this conference, wherein he said he felt like he stood in the presence of the Lord, my mind immediately went to the time when the Prophet Joseph Smith, in the woods of Palmyra, as a boy. stood in the presence of the Lord and His Son Jesus Christ, and how He was almost consumed as it were, with the influence of their presence. President Joseph F. Smith made the Latter-day Saints feel, during his remarks, that he was standing in the presence of God, our Father, and we all rejoiced in the power and spirit of his testimony. The early missionaries of the Church felt much the same way. Some of them had stood in the presence of angels, or in the presence of men who had. They had felt the burning influence of the Spirit that had accompanied the coming forth of the Book of Mormon and the restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
I bear witness to you that every elder who has ever come to the Northern States Mission, and has sought, with all his heart, to place the Book of Mormon in the hands of the people, has been made bigger and better than those who have delivered it doubtingly. The Christian world did not particularly want the Bible when it first came to them, neither did they sanction all the movements that were put on foot to scatter it abroad in the world. The Christian missionaries were not received with open arms; but they have persisted until the Bible can be found in almost every home in almost all nations of the earth; it can be found in hotels, upon railroad trains, in stations and everywhere that men and women are wont to congregate. I believe the Book of Mormon should follow the Bible, for in the Book of Mormon is found the more simple testimony, and a plainer explanation of the doctrines of salvation, accompanied by a spirit that finds lodgment in the hearts of the honest seekers after truth.
While we have not neglected to bear our testimony in a personal way, nor failed to seek entrance to the homes of the people, yet we have kept uppermost in our minds the distribution of the word of God as found in the inspired record called the Book of Mormon. We have encouraged our elders to read it when they are feeling blue, or homesick, or discouraged, or in doubt, for they will thereby be comforted, their faith increased, and their courage to face the world be strengthened.
My brothers and sisters, I would like to leave this admonition with you, that you go home and become better acquainted with the faith promoting stories of the Book of Mormon, with the strength of character of its prophets, and the wonderful doctrines of salvation that it teaches. Teach your children to relate the stories found therein as they hear and tell those found in the Bible. I believe that the missionaries, and all our young men and our old men: should know the stories found in the Book of Mormon that inspire faith in our hearts, as well as we know the Bible stories. They are beautiful, and faith-promoting. We ought to learn to tell them that the world may know them, for the knowledge of the world has not come to them so much by reading the Bible, as it has come to them by the stories that have been told, by the sermons that have been preached from the Bible. The knowledge of the Book of Mormon will spread in the earth the same way, if we will learn to tell the stories found therein.
We have sought to establish the Book of Mormon in the homes of people by selling or loaning it to them and pointing out to them the good things found therein. On our first visit we leave a book and point to one or two good things; then go again and turn down a few other cornets of the leaves until we have maybe 25 or more places thus marked in the book. Just as soon as we can induce the people to read two or three places in the Book of Mormon, they will not permit that book to leave their home. We hope, in time, they will learn to value it as they do the Bible, and value the Bible more than they do today.
The Book of Mormon, has, to some extent, changed the thought of the religious world. They are beginning to reverence Adam as they should, and no longer consign unbaptized infants to eternal damnation. Easter sermons have been so modified that you can follow the very language of Alma in some of the easter sermons of the Christian ministers of today. That has come about, possibly, by a few copying some of the sayings of Alma, and others repeating it without knowing its source. If we will learn to appreciate the value of the doctrines contained in the Book of Mormon, and proclaim them to the world, they will become unconsciously part of the doctrines of the world.
I rejoice in the testimony of my brethren and the spirit of civic righteousness that I feel is spreading over this state. The world had no revelation concerning the word of wisdom which condemns the use of liquor and tobacco, but they are fast driving those evil things from their midst. In one or two of the states in the Northern States Mission you do not see cigarette smoking. I have been at times in several cities of 350,000 people, and never saw a man or a boy with a cigarette. I came here and met them on every side smoking cigarettes and yet the Lord told us more than two generations ago, that it was not for man. We have states in which there are no saloons, and they are praying there will be no state with saloons. When the saloon was banished from the state of Iowa, the 1st day of January, 1916, there was a great exodus from that state. Not one of you would have followed the crowd or desired habitation where they dwell. On the other hand you would have been glad to have followed the crowd that came in when the state was freed from the influences of liquor. Every decent person desired to live in Chicago and eastern cities in the prohibition districts. The homes are better, the surroundings are better, the people are better. Sometimes we elders have to bow our heads when people say. “Why do you people in Utah, who have the balance power, permit saloons and cigarettes” When I sec states and nations leading out in these things. I am reminded of the scripture wherein it says the “children of the world are wiser in their generation than the children of light.”
May God help us to faithfully live the first principles of salvation, inspire us with the spirit of the Book of Mormon, and bring back to us the spirit of communion with angels, for they are willing to come today to all who serve the Lord, and court their influence. Many elders have had their eyes opened, and have stood in the presence of holy messengers who have been sent to help them in their ministry. I think that the Latter-day Saints of all people in the world, ought to understand that they are children of God, and live according to His ways. Follow Him, and cast out those evil things that destroy peace and happiness, and drag men down to the level of the beast.
May God help us, my brothers and sisters, to save our young men, and women, that they may believe the spirit and testimony of the angels of God, who came to the Prophet Joseph and accept the testimony of the Book of Mormon, and the doctrines that it teaches, that our light may be the light of a people set upon a hill. May we be leaders instead of followers of darkened Russia in casting out the liquor evil. May we be, as God has designed, real leaders, and a real light to the world, I pray in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
ELDER WALTER P. MONSON.
(President Eastern States Mission.)
My heart was touched in listening to the testimony of our beloved President, Joseph F. Smith, in the opening session of our conference, when he made that statement, very feelingly, that we stood in the presence of God, and that the eyes of great, good men who have lived upon the earth were upon us. I thought then, and have thought since, that the spirit of this conference is turning the hearts of the Latter-day Saints toward that personage whom we worship, as our Heavenly Father, and our Gori. Jesus Christ said in His reconciliatory prayer, which was offered up in the olive garden of Gethsemane, that “This is life eternal, to know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent,” and if it is life eternal to know God as He is, then I consider it a vital question affecting the welfare of every son and daughter of God. My mind goes back to an ancient incident found in the 18th chapter of First Kings:
"And it came to pass when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him. Art thou he that troubleth Israel? And he answered, I have not troubled Israel, but thou and thy father’s house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and thou hast followed Baalim. Now, therefore, send and gather to me all Israel unto the mount Carmel, and the prophets of Baal four hundred and fifty, and the prophets of the groves four hundred, which eat at Jezabel's table. So Ahab sent unto all the children of Israel, and gathered the prophets together unto Mount Carmel. And Elijah came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? If the Lord be God, follow Him: but if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered not a word.”
Here was a time in Israel when they were following after false gods, and the prophet of God stood up in the midst of Israel and gave them a challenge, or gave a challenge rather unto the priests of Baal and the priests of the groves. He called upon Israel saying, “How long halt ye between two opinions?” There are two opinions respecting God’s character today in the world, and the message that is being sent forth by the Latter-day Saint elders to the ends of the earth is calling upon Israel to choose between the priest of baal and the true and living God. I do not refer to the Christian world with any asperity, but rather to draw the comparison in these two points. The Athenasian creed says, “There is one living and true God, without body, parts or passions.” This seems to be the prevailing idea throughout the world with respect to the character and personality of Deity. And with the Athenasian Creed agrees the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicine Creed, so that we can say that the whole Catholic and Protestant world have founded their faith upon that sort of a creature.
It is not strange to a Latter-day Saint that God has revealed Himself in our day and time, for with that prophetic announcement made by the Revelator John, when he said that
"I saw 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; and worship Him that made heaven and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.”
Now, had the Gospel been upon the earth there would have been' no necessity for an angel to restore it, and had the people been worshiping the God who made the heavens and the earth and the seas and the fountains of waters, there would have been no necessity for that prophetic announcement. In the 130th section of the Doctrine and Covenants, the description of the God of the Latter-day Saints is given, differing with the bodiless, partless, passionless god, between which a choice should be made.
“The Father has a body of flesh and bones, as tangible as man’s; the Son also, but the Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of spirit. Were it not so, the Holy Ghost could not dwell in us.” Here you have the “two opinions” stated, one that “God is a personage without body, parts or passions,” and the other that “God has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s.” Now we call upon Israel, “How long halt ye between two opinions.” We might ask with the Savior, when addressing the Pharisees: “What think ye of Christ?” Is Christ God? Is He not the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob the God of Israel, the God who made the heavens and the earth, the seas and the fountains of waters? We read the testimony of John:
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, the same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made.
* * * And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, * * * full of grace and truth.’’
Here you have the testimony of the Creator who “made the heavens and the earth and the seas and the fountains of water.” I would like to know what purpose there would be in the resurrection, which is being commemorated throughout the Christian world at the near approaching Easter? If He is God, to what purpose did He take up His body? If the unembodied state of the spirit is a higher order than the resurrected state, the embodied state, then Jesus Christ was farther advanced the three days when His body lay in the tomb than He was when He had burst the bonds of death and walked forth with His immortalized, resurrected body. Can any one ever think that Jesus took a step backward from glory? Positively no. The greatest stride that was ever made toward glory was when that inanimate form that was put into the tomb of Joseph of Aramathaea was reanimated by the Spirit, which had three days previously been commended into the hands of His Father as He expired upon the cross.
Now, the whole Christian world has been teaching the doctrine, as has already been stated in this conference, that the resurrection is something else other than the bringing up of the body. They look upon the resurrection as a sort of a spiritual resurrection, or awakening of spirit in some indescribable way. The Apostle Paul gives us a very striking testimony with respect to this question, which I would like to read. It is found in the 15th chapter of First Corinthians:
"Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen; and if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and ye are found false witnesses of God, because ye have testified of God that He raised up Christ, whom He raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ risen, and if Christ is not. raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. Then they also which, are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order; Christ the first fruits, afterward they that are Christ’s at His coming. Then cometh the end, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God even the Father, when He shall have put down all rule and all authority and power, for He must reign till He hath put all enemies under His feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.”
Therefore the greatest victory ever won by Christ was when He broke the bands of death, and when the seed of the woman crushed the head of the serpent that brought death into the world.
Why, the world is preaching Jesus Christ crucified, and they leave Him crucified, and they have a crucified and dead religion. We are proclaiming to the world the resurrection of Christ, and we get a vital religion, a live religion that enters into the lives of men and women and raises them to the lofty pedestal of sainthood. If Christ be not raised, then is our preaching vain. I thank God that we have hope as Job of old, who said: “I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth, and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God.” That is the testimony of Job of old. When people declare that God cannot be seen they are drawing into question the testimony of that righteous man, they are bringing into question also the statement of Jesus when He said, in that sermon upon the mount: “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God,” and if He is unseeable, then how can Jesus Christ’s promise be fulfilled? Some people claim that it was in the death of the cross—that the Christ was glorified. I do not speak disparagingly, nor do I wish to detract from the sacrifice that was made on Golgotha’s hill, but I want to turn your attention to the thought and to the life that has come through that sacrifice. The very fact that Jesus was crucified did not make Him the Christ. That was the infliction of Roman capital punishment. You remember the scene at the crucifixion, the malefactors upon either hand of the Master, who were also crucified. Their crucifixion did not make them Christs. The malefactors had not the power to lay down their lives and take them up again as the Master had, who became the Savior of the world, by putting under His feet that enemy, the arch enemy of God, even death.
It is not an uncommon thing to meet people who say that Jesus Christ has come for the second time. I met a very influential minister in Brooklyn who declared that Jesus Christ has made His second advent and come into the world, in 1874, and is dwelling in the hearts of the children of men. What has He done with His body? Why, Jesus Christ, who was the Word, who was with God, who was God, took upon Himself that body of flesh and bones which Thomas handled and felt in his doubting moment, and then cried, “O Lord, my God,” thus dispelling all doubt. He no longer doubted. As Christ ascended into heaven there stood upon the mount two angels also, who said: “Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing into heaven? this same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven.” Then He has not descended, in 1874, as His apostles saw Him ascend.
To show the necessity of accepting Jesus Christ as being a personage, possessed of a body of flesh, I want to bring to your attention the testimony of John, recorded in the fourth chapter of his first epistle: ‘‘Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits, whether they are of God, because many false prophets are gone out into the world.” Now a key given in the following verse: “Hereby know ye the spirit of God, every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God, and every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. And this is that spirit of anti-Christ whereof ye have heard that it should come, and even now is it already in the world.” There were people in that day who were possessed of the spirit of anti-Christ who said that Jesus Christ did not come in the flesh; and when Jesus shall make His second appearance those who have been faithful, and have become familiar with His voice in this life, will know positively that it is Jesus Christ who stands before them, and they will see the marks in His hands and in His feet and in His side. Then will He declare, “These are the wounds that I received in the house of my friends.” “How long halt ye between two opinions?” If God is God, worship Him. If this nonentity without body, parts or passions be God, then worship it. I feel like saying, with Joshua of old, when he called Israel together and said, “Chose this day whom ye will serve, but as for me and my house, we will serve God.”
May God add His blessings to us all, and sustain Israel in all His work in the earth, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
Sisters Myrtle Doelle and Mary Cornwall, and the combined choirs, sang the Easter Song, “Christ is Risen.”
(President Eastern States Mission.)
My heart was touched in listening to the testimony of our beloved President, Joseph F. Smith, in the opening session of our conference, when he made that statement, very feelingly, that we stood in the presence of God, and that the eyes of great, good men who have lived upon the earth were upon us. I thought then, and have thought since, that the spirit of this conference is turning the hearts of the Latter-day Saints toward that personage whom we worship, as our Heavenly Father, and our Gori. Jesus Christ said in His reconciliatory prayer, which was offered up in the olive garden of Gethsemane, that “This is life eternal, to know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent,” and if it is life eternal to know God as He is, then I consider it a vital question affecting the welfare of every son and daughter of God. My mind goes back to an ancient incident found in the 18th chapter of First Kings:
"And it came to pass when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him. Art thou he that troubleth Israel? And he answered, I have not troubled Israel, but thou and thy father’s house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and thou hast followed Baalim. Now, therefore, send and gather to me all Israel unto the mount Carmel, and the prophets of Baal four hundred and fifty, and the prophets of the groves four hundred, which eat at Jezabel's table. So Ahab sent unto all the children of Israel, and gathered the prophets together unto Mount Carmel. And Elijah came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? If the Lord be God, follow Him: but if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered not a word.”
Here was a time in Israel when they were following after false gods, and the prophet of God stood up in the midst of Israel and gave them a challenge, or gave a challenge rather unto the priests of Baal and the priests of the groves. He called upon Israel saying, “How long halt ye between two opinions?” There are two opinions respecting God’s character today in the world, and the message that is being sent forth by the Latter-day Saint elders to the ends of the earth is calling upon Israel to choose between the priest of baal and the true and living God. I do not refer to the Christian world with any asperity, but rather to draw the comparison in these two points. The Athenasian creed says, “There is one living and true God, without body, parts or passions.” This seems to be the prevailing idea throughout the world with respect to the character and personality of Deity. And with the Athenasian Creed agrees the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicine Creed, so that we can say that the whole Catholic and Protestant world have founded their faith upon that sort of a creature.
It is not strange to a Latter-day Saint that God has revealed Himself in our day and time, for with that prophetic announcement made by the Revelator John, when he said that
"I saw 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; and worship Him that made heaven and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters.”
Now, had the Gospel been upon the earth there would have been' no necessity for an angel to restore it, and had the people been worshiping the God who made the heavens and the earth and the seas and the fountains of waters, there would have been no necessity for that prophetic announcement. In the 130th section of the Doctrine and Covenants, the description of the God of the Latter-day Saints is given, differing with the bodiless, partless, passionless god, between which a choice should be made.
“The Father has a body of flesh and bones, as tangible as man’s; the Son also, but the Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of spirit. Were it not so, the Holy Ghost could not dwell in us.” Here you have the “two opinions” stated, one that “God is a personage without body, parts or passions,” and the other that “God has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s.” Now we call upon Israel, “How long halt ye between two opinions.” We might ask with the Savior, when addressing the Pharisees: “What think ye of Christ?” Is Christ God? Is He not the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob the God of Israel, the God who made the heavens and the earth, the seas and the fountains of waters? We read the testimony of John:
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, the same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made.
* * * And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, * * * full of grace and truth.’’
Here you have the testimony of the Creator who “made the heavens and the earth and the seas and the fountains of water.” I would like to know what purpose there would be in the resurrection, which is being commemorated throughout the Christian world at the near approaching Easter? If He is God, to what purpose did He take up His body? If the unembodied state of the spirit is a higher order than the resurrected state, the embodied state, then Jesus Christ was farther advanced the three days when His body lay in the tomb than He was when He had burst the bonds of death and walked forth with His immortalized, resurrected body. Can any one ever think that Jesus took a step backward from glory? Positively no. The greatest stride that was ever made toward glory was when that inanimate form that was put into the tomb of Joseph of Aramathaea was reanimated by the Spirit, which had three days previously been commended into the hands of His Father as He expired upon the cross.
Now, the whole Christian world has been teaching the doctrine, as has already been stated in this conference, that the resurrection is something else other than the bringing up of the body. They look upon the resurrection as a sort of a spiritual resurrection, or awakening of spirit in some indescribable way. The Apostle Paul gives us a very striking testimony with respect to this question, which I would like to read. It is found in the 15th chapter of First Corinthians:
"Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen; and if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and ye are found false witnesses of God, because ye have testified of God that He raised up Christ, whom He raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ risen, and if Christ is not. raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. Then they also which, are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order; Christ the first fruits, afterward they that are Christ’s at His coming. Then cometh the end, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God even the Father, when He shall have put down all rule and all authority and power, for He must reign till He hath put all enemies under His feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.”
Therefore the greatest victory ever won by Christ was when He broke the bands of death, and when the seed of the woman crushed the head of the serpent that brought death into the world.
Why, the world is preaching Jesus Christ crucified, and they leave Him crucified, and they have a crucified and dead religion. We are proclaiming to the world the resurrection of Christ, and we get a vital religion, a live religion that enters into the lives of men and women and raises them to the lofty pedestal of sainthood. If Christ be not raised, then is our preaching vain. I thank God that we have hope as Job of old, who said: “I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth, and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God.” That is the testimony of Job of old. When people declare that God cannot be seen they are drawing into question the testimony of that righteous man, they are bringing into question also the statement of Jesus when He said, in that sermon upon the mount: “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God,” and if He is unseeable, then how can Jesus Christ’s promise be fulfilled? Some people claim that it was in the death of the cross—that the Christ was glorified. I do not speak disparagingly, nor do I wish to detract from the sacrifice that was made on Golgotha’s hill, but I want to turn your attention to the thought and to the life that has come through that sacrifice. The very fact that Jesus was crucified did not make Him the Christ. That was the infliction of Roman capital punishment. You remember the scene at the crucifixion, the malefactors upon either hand of the Master, who were also crucified. Their crucifixion did not make them Christs. The malefactors had not the power to lay down their lives and take them up again as the Master had, who became the Savior of the world, by putting under His feet that enemy, the arch enemy of God, even death.
It is not an uncommon thing to meet people who say that Jesus Christ has come for the second time. I met a very influential minister in Brooklyn who declared that Jesus Christ has made His second advent and come into the world, in 1874, and is dwelling in the hearts of the children of men. What has He done with His body? Why, Jesus Christ, who was the Word, who was with God, who was God, took upon Himself that body of flesh and bones which Thomas handled and felt in his doubting moment, and then cried, “O Lord, my God,” thus dispelling all doubt. He no longer doubted. As Christ ascended into heaven there stood upon the mount two angels also, who said: “Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing into heaven? this same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven.” Then He has not descended, in 1874, as His apostles saw Him ascend.
To show the necessity of accepting Jesus Christ as being a personage, possessed of a body of flesh, I want to bring to your attention the testimony of John, recorded in the fourth chapter of his first epistle: ‘‘Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits, whether they are of God, because many false prophets are gone out into the world.” Now a key given in the following verse: “Hereby know ye the spirit of God, every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God, and every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. And this is that spirit of anti-Christ whereof ye have heard that it should come, and even now is it already in the world.” There were people in that day who were possessed of the spirit of anti-Christ who said that Jesus Christ did not come in the flesh; and when Jesus shall make His second appearance those who have been faithful, and have become familiar with His voice in this life, will know positively that it is Jesus Christ who stands before them, and they will see the marks in His hands and in His feet and in His side. Then will He declare, “These are the wounds that I received in the house of my friends.” “How long halt ye between two opinions?” If God is God, worship Him. If this nonentity without body, parts or passions be God, then worship it. I feel like saying, with Joshua of old, when he called Israel together and said, “Chose this day whom ye will serve, but as for me and my house, we will serve God.”
May God add His blessings to us all, and sustain Israel in all His work in the earth, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
Sisters Myrtle Doelle and Mary Cornwall, and the combined choirs, sang the Easter Song, “Christ is Risen.”
ELDER URIAH G. MILLER.
(President Cottonwood Stake.)
I am not accustomed, my brethren and sisters, to standing in the presence of such a vast congregation of people. If I contribute anything this morning to the interest of this gathering and for the welfare of those who are assembled in this meeting, it will be because my heavenly Father, in whom I have faith, will come to my assistance and bless me with a goodly portion of His Holy Spirit.
I have rejoiced thus far in the things I have heard in this conference, in the testimonies that have been borne, in the doctrines that have been enunciated and, above all, I have rejoiced exceedingly in the Spirit that has been manifest throughout the conference. I am convinced, as a member of the Church, that these conferences are extremely beneficial to the individual members of the Church. I hope that, as men and women who are assuming responsibilities of the Church at home, that we have had our hearts opened to the things that have been said, and that will be said, that they will find lodgment in our hearts, that we shall be able to carry the instructions, and the spirit of them, to the various wards and branches of the Church, and bring them to the members of the Church who are not privileged to be with us in the congregations in the various sessions of this conference.
I am beginning to recognize, I believe, more than I have ever done before in my life, that there is a great mission and responsibility resting upon the members of the Church who reside in the wards and stakes of the Church. We are blessed, and privileged, to be members of what is recognized throughout the world as one of the most perfect organizations that has ever been established among the children of men. We recognize that there is one part of the organization that is directing the affairs of the Church; and that there is another department that is carrying the message of the Gospel to the various parts of the world. We recognize that in this organization there is provided ways and means by which the powers and influence of the Gospel are brought to the hearts of the children of men.
In our own homes, the responsibility is resting upon us, who are called to labor, and who are moving within the confines of the various wards and stakes throughout the Church, to do our part just as carefully and consistently as are the Other branches of this wonderful and magnificent organization to which I have alluded. I trust that we will be mindful, to a degree, at least, of some of these responsibilities that are upon our shoulders, for we recognize the fact that, very largely, we at home become members of the Church not, as do the people in the world, through conversion. We become members of the Church through the ordinance of baptism when we are children; consequently we have a responsibility resting upon us to take into our confidence, into our care, the boys and girls of the stakes and wards of Zion, and to give them in their own homes, testimony of this work.
I thank God that He has provided in this organization efficient ways and means by which we may be able to reach the hearts of the boys and girls of the Church. As parents, we very often recognize within ourselves that we are not able to reach the hearts of all of our boys and all of our girls. It becomes necessary that the organizations that have been provided will come to our assistance, and possibly through one or another of these organizations that are so well officered we shall, under the favor of our heavenly Father, be able to reach the hearts of the boys and the girls that possibly we are not otherwise able to reach, 'and be the means of instituting within their hearts the love and the testimony of this work. Of these wonderful auxiliary organizations that have been provided, possibly the Sunday School with all of its beautiful methods, and its powers, may not be able to appeal to some of our boys and girls; it may fall to the Mutual Improvement people to reach them. It may be possible that the Mutual Improvement people may not be able to interest them, but the Primary officers or the Religion Class, or perchance it may be the Relief Society sisters who shall be able, under the spirit of their work, to reach the hearts of these boys or girls, and bring them into the fold of Christ, with a testimony of the truth in their hearts.
In the midst of all of these, there are other organizations that to me seem superior to all the organizations put together, these are the priesthood quorums of the Church, and I hope that the spirit of the brethren in this Church will be inclined to the betterment of priesthood work. In my affiliations with the work with which I am connected, I am led to observe that very largely our boys, when they leave the deacons’ quorum, are not noticed until we find them recorded, possibly, in the elders’ quorums and when found in these quorums they simply have their names upon the records, and do not have the spirit of this work in their hearts. I shall rejoice exceedingly when the time shall come in the history of this Church that the boy as he leaves the deacons’ quorum will be transferred to the teachers’ and priests’ quorums with the great spirit of this work in his heart. He then goes into the elders’ quorum because he is eligible to become an elder, and has been educated in all the affairs of the Church, in all of the other priesthood quorums that have led up to it.
May God’s blessings be with us. May we be true to our religion, and stand for that which is right; and may our lives be an example of the thing that we believe to be right and that we bear our testimony to the world is right, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
(President Cottonwood Stake.)
I am not accustomed, my brethren and sisters, to standing in the presence of such a vast congregation of people. If I contribute anything this morning to the interest of this gathering and for the welfare of those who are assembled in this meeting, it will be because my heavenly Father, in whom I have faith, will come to my assistance and bless me with a goodly portion of His Holy Spirit.
I have rejoiced thus far in the things I have heard in this conference, in the testimonies that have been borne, in the doctrines that have been enunciated and, above all, I have rejoiced exceedingly in the Spirit that has been manifest throughout the conference. I am convinced, as a member of the Church, that these conferences are extremely beneficial to the individual members of the Church. I hope that, as men and women who are assuming responsibilities of the Church at home, that we have had our hearts opened to the things that have been said, and that will be said, that they will find lodgment in our hearts, that we shall be able to carry the instructions, and the spirit of them, to the various wards and branches of the Church, and bring them to the members of the Church who are not privileged to be with us in the congregations in the various sessions of this conference.
I am beginning to recognize, I believe, more than I have ever done before in my life, that there is a great mission and responsibility resting upon the members of the Church who reside in the wards and stakes of the Church. We are blessed, and privileged, to be members of what is recognized throughout the world as one of the most perfect organizations that has ever been established among the children of men. We recognize that there is one part of the organization that is directing the affairs of the Church; and that there is another department that is carrying the message of the Gospel to the various parts of the world. We recognize that in this organization there is provided ways and means by which the powers and influence of the Gospel are brought to the hearts of the children of men.
In our own homes, the responsibility is resting upon us, who are called to labor, and who are moving within the confines of the various wards and stakes throughout the Church, to do our part just as carefully and consistently as are the Other branches of this wonderful and magnificent organization to which I have alluded. I trust that we will be mindful, to a degree, at least, of some of these responsibilities that are upon our shoulders, for we recognize the fact that, very largely, we at home become members of the Church not, as do the people in the world, through conversion. We become members of the Church through the ordinance of baptism when we are children; consequently we have a responsibility resting upon us to take into our confidence, into our care, the boys and girls of the stakes and wards of Zion, and to give them in their own homes, testimony of this work.
I thank God that He has provided in this organization efficient ways and means by which we may be able to reach the hearts of the boys and girls of the Church. As parents, we very often recognize within ourselves that we are not able to reach the hearts of all of our boys and all of our girls. It becomes necessary that the organizations that have been provided will come to our assistance, and possibly through one or another of these organizations that are so well officered we shall, under the favor of our heavenly Father, be able to reach the hearts of the boys and the girls that possibly we are not otherwise able to reach, 'and be the means of instituting within their hearts the love and the testimony of this work. Of these wonderful auxiliary organizations that have been provided, possibly the Sunday School with all of its beautiful methods, and its powers, may not be able to appeal to some of our boys and girls; it may fall to the Mutual Improvement people to reach them. It may be possible that the Mutual Improvement people may not be able to interest them, but the Primary officers or the Religion Class, or perchance it may be the Relief Society sisters who shall be able, under the spirit of their work, to reach the hearts of these boys or girls, and bring them into the fold of Christ, with a testimony of the truth in their hearts.
In the midst of all of these, there are other organizations that to me seem superior to all the organizations put together, these are the priesthood quorums of the Church, and I hope that the spirit of the brethren in this Church will be inclined to the betterment of priesthood work. In my affiliations with the work with which I am connected, I am led to observe that very largely our boys, when they leave the deacons’ quorum, are not noticed until we find them recorded, possibly, in the elders’ quorums and when found in these quorums they simply have their names upon the records, and do not have the spirit of this work in their hearts. I shall rejoice exceedingly when the time shall come in the history of this Church that the boy as he leaves the deacons’ quorum will be transferred to the teachers’ and priests’ quorums with the great spirit of this work in his heart. He then goes into the elders’ quorum because he is eligible to become an elder, and has been educated in all the affairs of the Church, in all of the other priesthood quorums that have led up to it.
May God’s blessings be with us. May we be true to our religion, and stand for that which is right; and may our lives be an example of the thing that we believe to be right and that we bear our testimony to the world is right, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
ELDER JOSEPH E. CARDON.
(Editor of Liahona The Elders’ Journal.)
I rejoice with all my soul this morning for this opportunity of again attending the annual conference of the Church. It has been my blessed privilege to attend these conferences for the last 16 or 17 years, and I have always felt in the different capacities in which I have labored, that I could not prosecute the work required at my hands unless I partook of the spirit of these conferences. I am happy to say today that this spirit is being manifested among the Latter-day Saints everywhere, so that in great numbers we are privileged, through the blessings of the Lord, to come to this place and partake of the spirit that is poured out in such rich abundance.
We do not, nor cannot, comprehend how blessed we are as a people. It is only necessary for us to go into the world and see what others have in order to appreciate the many blessings which the Lord has so abundantly bestowed upon us as His people, and I rejoice with all my heart that His work is being so generously carried among the children of men within the confines of our own beloved country.
It is a glorious privilege to know, my brethren and sisters and friends, that God lives, that Jesus is the Christ, our Redeemer, and that Joseph Smith was a humble instrument in His hands in restoring the great work of the Lord, and that we have been made partakers of these glorious and blessed privileges which came through our acceptance of the Gospel of the Son of God. The world does not know that God lives, simply because they have not been willing to comply with the requirements of our Heavenly Father. If we do His will, we shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God or whether it be of man, and it has been, in part at least, through our having done the will of the Father that we are able to testify to all the world that God lives and that Jesus is His beloved Son and our Redeemer.
The great Prophet Noah knew, through the inspiration of the Almighty, that the mission to which he was assigned was divine, and he went about under the direction of the Holy Spirit in the prosecution of the great mission which was placed upon his shoulders; and had the people of that generation believed in that message and humbled themselves as did Noah, they too would have known that the message which the prophet gave unto them was divine. The manifestations of the power of God alone are not sufficient to prove whether these truths are from God or not, but it is necessary that every human soul who can testify that he knows shall be in possession of the Holy Spirit, and that can come only through our obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel.
When the Son of God asked His disciples, “Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?” They said: “Some say that Thou art John the Baptist, some, Elias; and others Jeremias, or one of the prophets.” “But whom say ye that I am?” “And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” “Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” Notwithstanding the fact that Peter had daily ministered along with the Savior, yet it was necessary that the Lord should reveal unto him the fact that Jesus was the Redeemer of the world. And so it is with us today. It is necessary that we should be in possession of the Holy Spirit in order to testify to each other that these great truths which have come into the world are divine, and that they are binding upon the children of men. I am happy in the thought also, that men in these latter-days have seen the Father and the Son, and have witnessed the ministration of angels and holy beings, but notwithstanding these miraculous experiences, we, too, may know just as assuredly as they of these divine truths, if we comply with the requirements of our Heavenly Father. The Holy Ghost is their witness unto the children of men and unto the world, and we can gain possession of that Spirit in the same way that others have, and this influence and power will lighten the hearts and the minds of all men.
I do know that God lives, and that He is ruling the destinies of the children of men, and that He answers the supplications of His humble children, and will reveal unto them the things that are necessary in order to go back into His presence. I know that Jesus is the Christ, the Redeemer of the world, and that if we will obey Him and follow the example and the pattern which He has laid for us to follow, we will associate with Him in the eternal worlds. I also know that through the great and mighty modern Prophet, Joseph Smith, this latter-day Gospel has been restored, and is being proclaimed to the nations of the world by authorized servants of God, who are endowed with divine authority to administer in the laws and ordinances of the Gospel, and make it possible for all men who will yield obedience thereto to know for themselves whether this doctrine is of God or whether we are speaking by the spirit of man. “If any of you lack wisdom,” the Apostle James has said, “let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering.”
The inspiration of this scripture rested so mightily upon the boy prophet, that he went and supplicated the Almighty to know which of all the warring and jarring creeds was right and which he should follow, for, in his early boyhood, he knew that it was necessary to yield obedience to the requirements of his Father in heaven. Every son and daughter of God who will go humbly before Him may also know for themselves whether or not we speak of ourselves or whether we are in very deed, divinely commissioned servants of the Lord Jesus Christ. By that same spirit also we are able to testify that President Joseph F. Smith is a prophet of the true and living God, and a more humble, devoted, fearless man does not live in the world today. And those who are associated with him are men of God. There are no better in the world today: and we can, through that Holy Spirit, testify to all the world that they are prophets, seers and revelators unto the children of men.
I pray that the power and the Spirit of the Lord may permeate the hearts of those who are seeking after truth, wherever they may he, that they may come into the light and partake of the influence, power and glory that have come to us through our having yielded obedience to the laws and the ordinances of the house of the Lord.
May His peace and blessings be with the Saints everywhere, that they may follow the whisperings of the Holy Spirit, and yield obedience thereto, that upon all occasions we may know for ourselves whether or not we are following in that straight and narrow way that the Father hath laid out for us. That we may be saved and exalted with Him and His Son and the righteous who have fought the good fight and endured to the end, I humbly pray, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The choirs sang the anthem, "Daughter of Zion.”
(Editor of Liahona The Elders’ Journal.)
I rejoice with all my soul this morning for this opportunity of again attending the annual conference of the Church. It has been my blessed privilege to attend these conferences for the last 16 or 17 years, and I have always felt in the different capacities in which I have labored, that I could not prosecute the work required at my hands unless I partook of the spirit of these conferences. I am happy to say today that this spirit is being manifested among the Latter-day Saints everywhere, so that in great numbers we are privileged, through the blessings of the Lord, to come to this place and partake of the spirit that is poured out in such rich abundance.
We do not, nor cannot, comprehend how blessed we are as a people. It is only necessary for us to go into the world and see what others have in order to appreciate the many blessings which the Lord has so abundantly bestowed upon us as His people, and I rejoice with all my heart that His work is being so generously carried among the children of men within the confines of our own beloved country.
It is a glorious privilege to know, my brethren and sisters and friends, that God lives, that Jesus is the Christ, our Redeemer, and that Joseph Smith was a humble instrument in His hands in restoring the great work of the Lord, and that we have been made partakers of these glorious and blessed privileges which came through our acceptance of the Gospel of the Son of God. The world does not know that God lives, simply because they have not been willing to comply with the requirements of our Heavenly Father. If we do His will, we shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God or whether it be of man, and it has been, in part at least, through our having done the will of the Father that we are able to testify to all the world that God lives and that Jesus is His beloved Son and our Redeemer.
The great Prophet Noah knew, through the inspiration of the Almighty, that the mission to which he was assigned was divine, and he went about under the direction of the Holy Spirit in the prosecution of the great mission which was placed upon his shoulders; and had the people of that generation believed in that message and humbled themselves as did Noah, they too would have known that the message which the prophet gave unto them was divine. The manifestations of the power of God alone are not sufficient to prove whether these truths are from God or not, but it is necessary that every human soul who can testify that he knows shall be in possession of the Holy Spirit, and that can come only through our obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel.
When the Son of God asked His disciples, “Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?” They said: “Some say that Thou art John the Baptist, some, Elias; and others Jeremias, or one of the prophets.” “But whom say ye that I am?” “And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” “Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” Notwithstanding the fact that Peter had daily ministered along with the Savior, yet it was necessary that the Lord should reveal unto him the fact that Jesus was the Redeemer of the world. And so it is with us today. It is necessary that we should be in possession of the Holy Spirit in order to testify to each other that these great truths which have come into the world are divine, and that they are binding upon the children of men. I am happy in the thought also, that men in these latter-days have seen the Father and the Son, and have witnessed the ministration of angels and holy beings, but notwithstanding these miraculous experiences, we, too, may know just as assuredly as they of these divine truths, if we comply with the requirements of our Heavenly Father. The Holy Ghost is their witness unto the children of men and unto the world, and we can gain possession of that Spirit in the same way that others have, and this influence and power will lighten the hearts and the minds of all men.
I do know that God lives, and that He is ruling the destinies of the children of men, and that He answers the supplications of His humble children, and will reveal unto them the things that are necessary in order to go back into His presence. I know that Jesus is the Christ, the Redeemer of the world, and that if we will obey Him and follow the example and the pattern which He has laid for us to follow, we will associate with Him in the eternal worlds. I also know that through the great and mighty modern Prophet, Joseph Smith, this latter-day Gospel has been restored, and is being proclaimed to the nations of the world by authorized servants of God, who are endowed with divine authority to administer in the laws and ordinances of the Gospel, and make it possible for all men who will yield obedience thereto to know for themselves whether this doctrine is of God or whether we are speaking by the spirit of man. “If any of you lack wisdom,” the Apostle James has said, “let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering.”
The inspiration of this scripture rested so mightily upon the boy prophet, that he went and supplicated the Almighty to know which of all the warring and jarring creeds was right and which he should follow, for, in his early boyhood, he knew that it was necessary to yield obedience to the requirements of his Father in heaven. Every son and daughter of God who will go humbly before Him may also know for themselves whether or not we speak of ourselves or whether we are in very deed, divinely commissioned servants of the Lord Jesus Christ. By that same spirit also we are able to testify that President Joseph F. Smith is a prophet of the true and living God, and a more humble, devoted, fearless man does not live in the world today. And those who are associated with him are men of God. There are no better in the world today: and we can, through that Holy Spirit, testify to all the world that they are prophets, seers and revelators unto the children of men.
I pray that the power and the Spirit of the Lord may permeate the hearts of those who are seeking after truth, wherever they may he, that they may come into the light and partake of the influence, power and glory that have come to us through our having yielded obedience to the laws and the ordinances of the house of the Lord.
May His peace and blessings be with the Saints everywhere, that they may follow the whisperings of the Holy Spirit, and yield obedience thereto, that upon all occasions we may know for ourselves whether or not we are following in that straight and narrow way that the Father hath laid out for us. That we may be saved and exalted with Him and His Son and the righteous who have fought the good fight and endured to the end, I humbly pray, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The choirs sang the anthem, "Daughter of Zion.”
ELDER HEBER J. GRANT.
Strong condemnation of use of intoxicants and tobacco—Statistics showing splendid results of prohibition in Kansas—Dreadful disclosures of an old lawyer—Convincing quotations proving terrible evils of liquor traffic.
I realize that, in the language of the hymn, “the time is far spent, there is little remaining.” You, no doubt, are all tired, but I have something which I wish to say to this congregation, and if any of you do not care to remain and hear it, you will not offend me or hurt my feeling in the least if you get up and go out, and your doing so will not confuse me. I have preached on the streets of Liverpool and London; in Portland, Oregon, and in other parts of the United States, and have become accustomed to preaching to traveling congregations. My ideas come just as rapidly when my audience is a moving one. We did not start this overflow meeting until 20 minutes after 10 o'clock, and therefore there are just thirty minutes belonging to me and I give all fair notice of what is coming, as I propose to occupy them, and it will be all right with me if anybody goes out.
I desire to continue the remarks that I started to make in the Tabernacle day before yesterday. I talked as fast as I knew how, but did not get half through. I am going to cut out fully one-half of what I would like to say.
It is claimed that the saloon, if banished from the community, causes a financial loss. I want to give a few facts as they are told in the Anti-Saloon League Year Book for 1908, page 26. Pellman, of the University of Bonn, tells of a very notorious drunken woman who died in 1800. A scientific investigation made regarding herself and her descendants has brought forth the following astonishing facts:
“The total number of her descendants have been 834. Of that number 709 have been traced, with the result that the record shows that 7 were convicted of murder, 76 were convicted of other crimes, 142 were professional beggars. 64 lived on charity and 181 of the women descendants were prostitutes. It has been estimated that the cost to the. government of the crime and pauperism of that one line of descendants has been $1,250,000.”
How many of us would like to have saloons enrich our community by this kind of process?
I want to give you the opinions of some eminent people on the use of tobacco:
Benjamin Franklin—“I never saw a well man in the exercise of common sense who would say that tobacco did him any good.”
Thomas Jefferson—'“The culture of tobacco is a culture productive in infinite wretchedness.”
Horace Greeley—"It is a profane stench.”
Daniel Webster—“If those men must smoke, let them go to the horse shed.’
T. DeWitt Talmage—“The pathway to a drunkard’s grave and a drunkard’s hell is strewn with tobacco leaves.”
Ruskin—"Tobacco is the worst curse of modern civilization.”
E. H. Harriman [to whom we owe more for the development of this intermountain country than to any other man not a resident of Utah, and who believed implicitly in the future of our fair state]—“We might as well go to the insane asylum for our men as to employ cigarette smokers.”
I desire that every man, woman and child within the sound of my voice shall be workers to bring to our fair State prohibition, and I want to quote to you one single verse of a poem by James Russell Lowell:
“They are slaves who fear to speak
For the fallen and the weak;
They are slaves who will not choose
Hatred, scoffing and abuse,
Rather than, in silence shrink
From the truth they needs must think;
They are slaves who dare not be
In the right with two or three.”
We hear so much of the financial ruin of Kansas because of prohibition that I want to give you some statistics that were furnished me by President Henry H. Blood, of the Millers’ Association of Utah, taken from the Millers and Grain Neves, published at Kansas City, Jan. 9, 1912:
"Statistics from Kansas.
“Not only wheat, but morals, showed a high quality last year.
“Ninety-six counties out of the 105 in Kansas have no inebriates.” [Gracious, how prosperity is disappearing in Kansas!] “Six or seven along the Missouri border have them.” [Please do not forget that Missouri is wet.]
“Thirty-nine counties did not send a prisoner to jail last year.” [My, prosperity is disappearing in Kansas!]
"There were 912 prisoners in the state penitentiary last year, but only 17 per cent of this number were Kansas born.” [the 83 per cent, you see, brought prosperity to Kansas by allowing the state to support them.]
“Fifty-seven counties in Kansas have no use for poor houses, and last year did not send a member there.” JI declare, they can't even be charitable in 57 (counties in Kansas— haven’t even the poor with them.]
"Eighty-four counties last year did not report a case of insanity.” [My gracious, if there are no insane there how wonderfully they must be failing to progress financially in Kansas.]
“The death-rate in Kansas is less than in any other section in the world, seven and five-tenths per thousand of the inhabitants.” [Thus vindicating God’s promise in the Word of Wisdom.]
“There are 700 newspapers in Kansas, and only four of them carry whiskey ads.”
The Lord says in the Word of Wisdom, in the last verse, regarding those who obey it:
“And I the Lord give unto them a promise, that the destroying angel shall pass them by, as the children of Israel, and not slay them.”
I thank the Lord from the bottom of my heart, as I announced in the Tabernacle, that all over the wide world the doctrines of the Lord Jesus Christ as revealed through the Prophet Joseph Smith are being vindicated. In Kansas they have prohibition and are, therefore, partially living the Word of Wisdom and are receiving the benefits therefrom, which is shown by the fact that the death-rate there is less than in any other section of the world.
The great life insurance companies with their hundreds of millions of dollars of assets, with their medical examination for every man who applies for a policy less than $50,000, and two examinations where he applies for fifty thousand or more, have a death-rate of ten per 1,000, or more than they have in the State of Kansas. No stronger proof on earth, it seems to me, can be found of the beneficial effects of prohibition in Kansas than the fact that there are 700 newspapers in Kansas, and only four of them carry whiskey ads. in their columns. Do you think we have prosperity in Salt Lake because three of our four daily papers carry whiskey ads.”
Now, I intended to quote a great deal from a sermon which I preached in the Tabernacle at the Mutual Improvement Association Conference, June 14, 1908, but you will find the sermon in the August, 1908, number of the Improvement Era, and I shall read only a small part of the sermon, but appeal to you to get the Era and read it all. Here is something I quoted in that sermon:
“Leaves from the Diary of an Old Lawyer:
“I believe that it will require the force of the whole people, men and women, applied at the ballot box, to effectually blot out of existence the great curse to the country, ‘The laws that license and permit the sale of alcohol as a beverage.’ I deny the right of the government to sell to one citizen the privilege to tempt another to commit crime. I doubt the policy of those laws that seek to raise a revenue by the sale of that which debases the people, it is the prolific source of crime and pauperism, and costs the country annually a thousand times more than the revenue received therefrom. I deny the justice of those laws that op one page of the statute books legalize that which promotes crimes and makes criminals, and on the next, provide severe penalties to be administered to those they have tempted to transgress. This little volume [larger than our large edition of the Doctrine and Covenants] is presented to the public to promulgate those views. They may be thought radical, and perhaps are so; but they are the result of long years of experience in our criminal courts, and are but a feeble expression of my abhorrence of the vice of intemperance, and the laws that encourage and promote it.
“'Tell me if I hate the bowl--
Hate is a feeble word;
I loathe—abhor—my very soul
With strong disgust is stirred
Whene'er I see, or hear, or tell
Of the dark beverage of hell.’
My experience at the bar has satisfied me that intemperance is the direct cause of nearly all the crime that is committed in our country. I have been at the bar over thirty years, have been engaged in over four thousand criminal cases, and on mature reflection I am satisfied that over three thousand of those cases have originated from drunkenness alone, and I believe that a great proportion of the remainder could be traced either directly or indirectly to this great source of crime. In sixty-three cases of homicide forty-nine have been caused by the maddening influence of strong drink.
Think of it, my brethren and sisters, forty-nine murders out of sixty-three cases, were caused by strong drink!
“I have seen upon the counsel table of our court room the skull of an aged father who was killed by a drunken son. My brother and myself sat by his side as his counsel, and I never shall forget the look of that son when the ghastly evidence of his guilt was laid on the stand before him. That silent yet eloquent witness! It was but an arch of bone, and was handled carelessly by the jury in their investigation, yet it had once been covered by a father’s gray hairs, beneath it had throbbed a brain full of pride and affection for the son who was now on his trial for murder, and as it passed from hand to hand the fearful expression on the face of the accused plainly told the terrible feeling of remorse that filled his soul. It was a wicked and most unnatural crime, and begot feelings of loathing and horror in the breasts of all who witnessed the trial. Yet it was not in reality the son who had committed the crime, but the demon that lurks in every cup of strong drink. And that cup had been filled and placed to the lips of that son by the hand of a most respectable member of society—a man who had a license from that very court to sell that which maddened the brain and prompted the hand to murder.
“I saw upon the table the skull of young B——, who was killed by his most intimate friend in a drunken brawl at Hartstown, and the respectable proprietor at whose hotel the murder was perpetrated, and who sold the maddening spirit that prompted the deed, was witness to the trial. He said he had a license from that respectable court to sell liquor; yes, from the very court then sitting in judgment on that act, which was but the natural sequence of the license it had sold and granted.
“I have seen upon the table the skull of a little child, with the evidence upon it of a murderous blow, inflicted by the hand of a drunken mother. Yet it was not the mother who had committed the most unnatural crime. All our knowledge of the promptings of the human heart deny the charge. Who that remembers his own mother and her maternal love could believe it? No! a demoniacal spirit had violated the sanctuary of the mother’s heart and cast out the tender, loving tenant that once resided there, and that was the spirit of strong drink, sold to the woman by a man who held, a license to sell under the seal and sanction of that very court.
“I have seen upon the table the blood-stained skull of a wife, cleft from top to base by an ax in the. hand of a brutal, drunken husband, who came home from a neighboring licensed beer-shop, reeling, drunken, and maddened by drink there sold by a most respectable dealer, by a man who had a legal right to sell that poison whose effects are more terrible than the plagues confined within the fabled box of Pandora, and under v hose baneful influence
“The hand that should shield the wife from ill,
In drunken wrath is raised to kill.
"I once defended a man for killing his own brother, by whom, in a fit of drunken frenzy, he had been attacked with a dangerous weapon, thereby compelling him in his own defense, to strike s blow that had taken his brother’s life. He was tried for murder, and in his defense I called the ‘landlord’ to prove that the murdered brother was mad from the effects of the liquor he had received at the witness’ bar. He so testified, vet seemed conscious of no wrong. Why should he? He had a license from the court, and why should that brother’s blood cry to heaven for vengeance against him? Oh, no! he was a respectable citizen, possessing a good moral character, for the law grants license to none other. He had a legal right to present the maddening cup to his fellow’s lips, and no one should complain of him. He had acted in accordance with the law, and did not one of England’s greatest and best of men say that 'the law was that science whose voice was the harmony of the world, and whose' seat was the bosom of God?”
I had the privilege of being one of the several thousand that walked down Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D. C., and who stood before the Capitol and presented a human petition to our representatives in Congress to give us national prohibition by an amendment to the Constitution of the United States. I listened to a splendid speech there, a copy of which I hold in my hand, by Mr. Ernest H. Cherrington, the General Manager of the Anti-Saloon League of America. I will read only a few extracts. I wish I had time to read it all.
“The Supreme Court of the United States is authority for the declaration that ‘the statistics of every state show a greater amount of crime and misery attributable to the use of ardent spirits obtained at these retail liquor saloons than to any other source.”
Really, is it not too bad that in every prohibition state they should be losing prosperity!
“No state of the Union has given prohibition so fair a trial as has the State of Kansas. Today that State presents the unparalleled record of almost two-thirds of the counties of the state without a single prisoner serving sentence for crime, while in some of the counties a jury to try a criminal case has not been called in ten years.”
How sad they must feel in Kansas because of a lack of prosperity, in not having their share of paupers, and just think how in prohibition Kansas they are robbing the poor jurors of their fees!
“One-half of the people now living in license territory in the United States live in four states of the Union, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois and New Jersey.”
The large cities of our Union are where crime concentrates. Every district all over the fair State of Utah, where the Latter-day Saints were in the majority, with one exception, went dry when we had the privilege of voting on this question a few years ago.' Had the people of Utah not been robbed of the privilege of voting on the liquor question as county units instead of changing to precinct units by amending the existing law, we would have had a dry state years ago.
‘One-fourth of the people in this nation who live in saloon territory live in six cities, New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Boston and Cleveland. One-half of all the saloons of the United States are located in fourteen cities. There are fewer saloons south of Mason and Dixon’s line than there are in the City of Chicago. Thirty-six states of this Union have fewer saloons in the aggregate than the City of New York. These significant facts, together with the well known fact that the vices of the nation center in our cities, thus adding complications to complications, make the great moral and social problems of the city practically unsolvable so far as the city alone is concerned.”
Those of us who live in the cities appeal to you who live in the country to help us to rid Utah’s fair cities of crime.
I have here a newspaper clipping from the Spokesman Review, which shows that Russia, Germany, England and France have learned that they can not win in the great war now raging unless they first kill whiskey. It reads as follows:
It is Something More than a War Against War.
“One of the many remarkable features connected with the war of the European revolution is that it is not only for many of the combatants a holy war against war, but for the governments is a war against alcohol. It almost seems as if the world at war had declared war upon the use of intoxicating drinks by soldiers.
“No vodka for the fighter is the word in Russia, no saki for the Japanese army, no whiskey or rum for the British trooper nor any absinthe for French infantry or cavalry. Reports from Germany as to the use of drink by its armies have not appeared, but doubtless the German military staff has no more use for drink than have its opponents.
“This almost absolute elimination of alcohol from the supplies of armies in the field forms part of the modern theory as to efficiency in war. The inexorable demand for the maximum of effectiveness in the soldier insists that his condition in the field shall approximate the Sunday school standard of conduct. Tommy Atkins, Jean Crapaud, Ivan Ivanovitch and Banzai Idzumo are far from the Captain Falstaff who recognized his Corporal Bardolph through the redness of his nose.
“The German emperor early in the year declared against drinking in the army and held up abstinence as the military ideal. Kitchener, when the war began, declared for total abstinence and ordered that no gifts of liquor be forwarded to the British forces. The government of France forbade the sale of absinthe at Paris during the war. Czar Nicholas has stopped the sale of liquor throughout Russia and one of the first acts of the Russians in Prussia was to shut the saloons. The French bill of fare for the soldiery omits alcohol.”
Let me tell you one thing about Russia. One of the officers of the largest life insurance companies in the world, on his way to San Francisco, stopped off in Salt Lake City, and I had the pleasure of spending an evening with him. He told me that he had found some astounding figures in Russia, which were almost unbelievable. That notwithstanding the war, because of the banishment of liquor, the death-rate of his company had been less than before the war. He felt there must be something wrong, some mistake, and was going to investigate it further. I feel sure his additional investigation will only be one more confirmation of the Lord’s promise in the Word of Wisdom.
Here is something I must read to you, although my time is going:
“According to the Kansas City Star, Mrs. James Watson, editor and publisher of the Dearborn, Mo., Democrat, has the following suggestion to make to booze fighters: ‘To the married man who cannot get along without his drinks, we suggest the following as a means to freedom from the bondage of the habit: Start a saloon in your own house. Be the only customer. You will have no license to pay. Go to your wife and give her $2 to buy a gallon of whiskey, and remember there are sixty-nine drinks in one gallon. Buy your drinks from no one except your wife, and by the time the first gallon is gone she will have $8 to put in the bank and $2 to start business again.. Should you live ten years and continue to buy boose from her and then die with snakes in your boots, she will have money to bury you decently, educate your children, buy a house and lot and marry a decent man and quit thinking about you " [Laughter.]
"On the 3rd and 4th of this month a remarkable temperance meeting was held in Philadelphia. Those in attendance were physicians and scientists. Several notable papers were read on the increase in the number of slaves, of alcohol and drugs, the relationship between disease and drink, and the conclusion arrived at by insurance societies regarding the mortality of drinkers of intoxicants. These are questions of immense importance to all.”
“Col. Maus, surgeon in the U. S. Army, made this statement:
“During the last year (1912), 2,000,000,000 gallons of wine, beer, whiskey, brandy, gin and other intoxicants were used in this country at a cost of as many billions of dollars. The country would be electrified if called upon to appropriate this sum to suppress diseases and national epidemics. Yet this expenditure is the most important factor in the cause of our misery, poverty, suicides, robberies, murders and crimes, besides the hundreds of thousands of deaths and the intellectually dead to be found in the insane asylums, feeble minded and epileptic institutions of the country.”
“Dr. Keister declared that if the American people would quit drinking intoxicating beverages homicides would be reduced by 50 per cent, suicides by 60 per cent, and lunacy by 33 per cent. [Thus adding to our financial ruin!]
“These startling statements did not come from fanatics, but from men with exceptional opportunities to study the causes of sickness and crime, and well equipped for that study. We must accept their conclusions. And if we desire the betterment of existing conditions, the evils must be attacked at the root.”
The following is a statement of the causes of deaths in the state of Kansas for 100,000 population:
In U.S. 1913 In Kan. 1913
Nephritis (Bright’s disease) 102.9 64.5
Typhoid fever ................... 17.9 19.4
Diphtheria ........................ 18.8 7.8
Tuberculosis (all forms) .. 147.6 61.8
Cancer (all forms)............. 78.9 55.9
Diabetes 132.4 85.5
Diarrhoea and enteritis (under 2 years) 75.2 52.8
Violence (ex. suicide).... 92.5 63.6
When the United States officials in Washington received the report of the death rate—9.8 to the 1000—in Kansas they would not believe it, and so they sent a special commissioner out there to investigate, and the report was substantiated. I would like to read the whole of the Era article by Brother Edward H. Anderson, from which the above is taken, but my time is gone. The article is an additional confirmation of the promise of the Lord Almighty that the destroying angel shall pass by those who obey the Word of Wisdom and keep His commandments. I appeal to you all to read Brother Edward H. Anderson’s splendid article in the April Era, “For the Consideration of Utah Citizens.”
We listened yesterday to the testimonies at our prohibition meeting in Barratt Hall of Stephen H. Love, John L. Herrick, Melvin J. Ballard, Andrew Kimball and Joseph E. Robinson, as to the beneficial effects arising from prohibition in Colorado, Arizona, Washington, Kansas and Oregon. I wish every man, woman and child in Utah could have heard these testimonies. May God help us to keep His commandments, to live the lives of Latter-day Saints, that we may be worthy of an exaltation in His Kingdom, is my prayer and desire, and I ask it in the name of Jesus.
Amen.
“Song of the Redeemed,” was rendered by the combined choirs.
Elder Bryant S. Hinckley pronounced the benediction.
Strong condemnation of use of intoxicants and tobacco—Statistics showing splendid results of prohibition in Kansas—Dreadful disclosures of an old lawyer—Convincing quotations proving terrible evils of liquor traffic.
I realize that, in the language of the hymn, “the time is far spent, there is little remaining.” You, no doubt, are all tired, but I have something which I wish to say to this congregation, and if any of you do not care to remain and hear it, you will not offend me or hurt my feeling in the least if you get up and go out, and your doing so will not confuse me. I have preached on the streets of Liverpool and London; in Portland, Oregon, and in other parts of the United States, and have become accustomed to preaching to traveling congregations. My ideas come just as rapidly when my audience is a moving one. We did not start this overflow meeting until 20 minutes after 10 o'clock, and therefore there are just thirty minutes belonging to me and I give all fair notice of what is coming, as I propose to occupy them, and it will be all right with me if anybody goes out.
I desire to continue the remarks that I started to make in the Tabernacle day before yesterday. I talked as fast as I knew how, but did not get half through. I am going to cut out fully one-half of what I would like to say.
It is claimed that the saloon, if banished from the community, causes a financial loss. I want to give a few facts as they are told in the Anti-Saloon League Year Book for 1908, page 26. Pellman, of the University of Bonn, tells of a very notorious drunken woman who died in 1800. A scientific investigation made regarding herself and her descendants has brought forth the following astonishing facts:
“The total number of her descendants have been 834. Of that number 709 have been traced, with the result that the record shows that 7 were convicted of murder, 76 were convicted of other crimes, 142 were professional beggars. 64 lived on charity and 181 of the women descendants were prostitutes. It has been estimated that the cost to the. government of the crime and pauperism of that one line of descendants has been $1,250,000.”
How many of us would like to have saloons enrich our community by this kind of process?
I want to give you the opinions of some eminent people on the use of tobacco:
Benjamin Franklin—“I never saw a well man in the exercise of common sense who would say that tobacco did him any good.”
Thomas Jefferson—'“The culture of tobacco is a culture productive in infinite wretchedness.”
Horace Greeley—"It is a profane stench.”
Daniel Webster—“If those men must smoke, let them go to the horse shed.’
T. DeWitt Talmage—“The pathway to a drunkard’s grave and a drunkard’s hell is strewn with tobacco leaves.”
Ruskin—"Tobacco is the worst curse of modern civilization.”
E. H. Harriman [to whom we owe more for the development of this intermountain country than to any other man not a resident of Utah, and who believed implicitly in the future of our fair state]—“We might as well go to the insane asylum for our men as to employ cigarette smokers.”
I desire that every man, woman and child within the sound of my voice shall be workers to bring to our fair State prohibition, and I want to quote to you one single verse of a poem by James Russell Lowell:
“They are slaves who fear to speak
For the fallen and the weak;
They are slaves who will not choose
Hatred, scoffing and abuse,
Rather than, in silence shrink
From the truth they needs must think;
They are slaves who dare not be
In the right with two or three.”
We hear so much of the financial ruin of Kansas because of prohibition that I want to give you some statistics that were furnished me by President Henry H. Blood, of the Millers’ Association of Utah, taken from the Millers and Grain Neves, published at Kansas City, Jan. 9, 1912:
"Statistics from Kansas.
“Not only wheat, but morals, showed a high quality last year.
“Ninety-six counties out of the 105 in Kansas have no inebriates.” [Gracious, how prosperity is disappearing in Kansas!] “Six or seven along the Missouri border have them.” [Please do not forget that Missouri is wet.]
“Thirty-nine counties did not send a prisoner to jail last year.” [My, prosperity is disappearing in Kansas!]
"There were 912 prisoners in the state penitentiary last year, but only 17 per cent of this number were Kansas born.” [the 83 per cent, you see, brought prosperity to Kansas by allowing the state to support them.]
“Fifty-seven counties in Kansas have no use for poor houses, and last year did not send a member there.” JI declare, they can't even be charitable in 57 (counties in Kansas— haven’t even the poor with them.]
"Eighty-four counties last year did not report a case of insanity.” [My gracious, if there are no insane there how wonderfully they must be failing to progress financially in Kansas.]
“The death-rate in Kansas is less than in any other section in the world, seven and five-tenths per thousand of the inhabitants.” [Thus vindicating God’s promise in the Word of Wisdom.]
“There are 700 newspapers in Kansas, and only four of them carry whiskey ads.”
The Lord says in the Word of Wisdom, in the last verse, regarding those who obey it:
“And I the Lord give unto them a promise, that the destroying angel shall pass them by, as the children of Israel, and not slay them.”
I thank the Lord from the bottom of my heart, as I announced in the Tabernacle, that all over the wide world the doctrines of the Lord Jesus Christ as revealed through the Prophet Joseph Smith are being vindicated. In Kansas they have prohibition and are, therefore, partially living the Word of Wisdom and are receiving the benefits therefrom, which is shown by the fact that the death-rate there is less than in any other section of the world.
The great life insurance companies with their hundreds of millions of dollars of assets, with their medical examination for every man who applies for a policy less than $50,000, and two examinations where he applies for fifty thousand or more, have a death-rate of ten per 1,000, or more than they have in the State of Kansas. No stronger proof on earth, it seems to me, can be found of the beneficial effects of prohibition in Kansas than the fact that there are 700 newspapers in Kansas, and only four of them carry whiskey ads. in their columns. Do you think we have prosperity in Salt Lake because three of our four daily papers carry whiskey ads.”
Now, I intended to quote a great deal from a sermon which I preached in the Tabernacle at the Mutual Improvement Association Conference, June 14, 1908, but you will find the sermon in the August, 1908, number of the Improvement Era, and I shall read only a small part of the sermon, but appeal to you to get the Era and read it all. Here is something I quoted in that sermon:
“Leaves from the Diary of an Old Lawyer:
“I believe that it will require the force of the whole people, men and women, applied at the ballot box, to effectually blot out of existence the great curse to the country, ‘The laws that license and permit the sale of alcohol as a beverage.’ I deny the right of the government to sell to one citizen the privilege to tempt another to commit crime. I doubt the policy of those laws that seek to raise a revenue by the sale of that which debases the people, it is the prolific source of crime and pauperism, and costs the country annually a thousand times more than the revenue received therefrom. I deny the justice of those laws that op one page of the statute books legalize that which promotes crimes and makes criminals, and on the next, provide severe penalties to be administered to those they have tempted to transgress. This little volume [larger than our large edition of the Doctrine and Covenants] is presented to the public to promulgate those views. They may be thought radical, and perhaps are so; but they are the result of long years of experience in our criminal courts, and are but a feeble expression of my abhorrence of the vice of intemperance, and the laws that encourage and promote it.
“'Tell me if I hate the bowl--
Hate is a feeble word;
I loathe—abhor—my very soul
With strong disgust is stirred
Whene'er I see, or hear, or tell
Of the dark beverage of hell.’
My experience at the bar has satisfied me that intemperance is the direct cause of nearly all the crime that is committed in our country. I have been at the bar over thirty years, have been engaged in over four thousand criminal cases, and on mature reflection I am satisfied that over three thousand of those cases have originated from drunkenness alone, and I believe that a great proportion of the remainder could be traced either directly or indirectly to this great source of crime. In sixty-three cases of homicide forty-nine have been caused by the maddening influence of strong drink.
Think of it, my brethren and sisters, forty-nine murders out of sixty-three cases, were caused by strong drink!
“I have seen upon the counsel table of our court room the skull of an aged father who was killed by a drunken son. My brother and myself sat by his side as his counsel, and I never shall forget the look of that son when the ghastly evidence of his guilt was laid on the stand before him. That silent yet eloquent witness! It was but an arch of bone, and was handled carelessly by the jury in their investigation, yet it had once been covered by a father’s gray hairs, beneath it had throbbed a brain full of pride and affection for the son who was now on his trial for murder, and as it passed from hand to hand the fearful expression on the face of the accused plainly told the terrible feeling of remorse that filled his soul. It was a wicked and most unnatural crime, and begot feelings of loathing and horror in the breasts of all who witnessed the trial. Yet it was not in reality the son who had committed the crime, but the demon that lurks in every cup of strong drink. And that cup had been filled and placed to the lips of that son by the hand of a most respectable member of society—a man who had a license from that very court to sell that which maddened the brain and prompted the hand to murder.
“I saw upon the table the skull of young B——, who was killed by his most intimate friend in a drunken brawl at Hartstown, and the respectable proprietor at whose hotel the murder was perpetrated, and who sold the maddening spirit that prompted the deed, was witness to the trial. He said he had a license from that respectable court to sell liquor; yes, from the very court then sitting in judgment on that act, which was but the natural sequence of the license it had sold and granted.
“I have seen upon the table the skull of a little child, with the evidence upon it of a murderous blow, inflicted by the hand of a drunken mother. Yet it was not the mother who had committed the most unnatural crime. All our knowledge of the promptings of the human heart deny the charge. Who that remembers his own mother and her maternal love could believe it? No! a demoniacal spirit had violated the sanctuary of the mother’s heart and cast out the tender, loving tenant that once resided there, and that was the spirit of strong drink, sold to the woman by a man who held, a license to sell under the seal and sanction of that very court.
“I have seen upon the table the blood-stained skull of a wife, cleft from top to base by an ax in the. hand of a brutal, drunken husband, who came home from a neighboring licensed beer-shop, reeling, drunken, and maddened by drink there sold by a most respectable dealer, by a man who had a legal right to sell that poison whose effects are more terrible than the plagues confined within the fabled box of Pandora, and under v hose baneful influence
“The hand that should shield the wife from ill,
In drunken wrath is raised to kill.
"I once defended a man for killing his own brother, by whom, in a fit of drunken frenzy, he had been attacked with a dangerous weapon, thereby compelling him in his own defense, to strike s blow that had taken his brother’s life. He was tried for murder, and in his defense I called the ‘landlord’ to prove that the murdered brother was mad from the effects of the liquor he had received at the witness’ bar. He so testified, vet seemed conscious of no wrong. Why should he? He had a license from the court, and why should that brother’s blood cry to heaven for vengeance against him? Oh, no! he was a respectable citizen, possessing a good moral character, for the law grants license to none other. He had a legal right to present the maddening cup to his fellow’s lips, and no one should complain of him. He had acted in accordance with the law, and did not one of England’s greatest and best of men say that 'the law was that science whose voice was the harmony of the world, and whose' seat was the bosom of God?”
I had the privilege of being one of the several thousand that walked down Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D. C., and who stood before the Capitol and presented a human petition to our representatives in Congress to give us national prohibition by an amendment to the Constitution of the United States. I listened to a splendid speech there, a copy of which I hold in my hand, by Mr. Ernest H. Cherrington, the General Manager of the Anti-Saloon League of America. I will read only a few extracts. I wish I had time to read it all.
“The Supreme Court of the United States is authority for the declaration that ‘the statistics of every state show a greater amount of crime and misery attributable to the use of ardent spirits obtained at these retail liquor saloons than to any other source.”
Really, is it not too bad that in every prohibition state they should be losing prosperity!
“No state of the Union has given prohibition so fair a trial as has the State of Kansas. Today that State presents the unparalleled record of almost two-thirds of the counties of the state without a single prisoner serving sentence for crime, while in some of the counties a jury to try a criminal case has not been called in ten years.”
How sad they must feel in Kansas because of a lack of prosperity, in not having their share of paupers, and just think how in prohibition Kansas they are robbing the poor jurors of their fees!
“One-half of the people now living in license territory in the United States live in four states of the Union, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois and New Jersey.”
The large cities of our Union are where crime concentrates. Every district all over the fair State of Utah, where the Latter-day Saints were in the majority, with one exception, went dry when we had the privilege of voting on this question a few years ago.' Had the people of Utah not been robbed of the privilege of voting on the liquor question as county units instead of changing to precinct units by amending the existing law, we would have had a dry state years ago.
‘One-fourth of the people in this nation who live in saloon territory live in six cities, New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Boston and Cleveland. One-half of all the saloons of the United States are located in fourteen cities. There are fewer saloons south of Mason and Dixon’s line than there are in the City of Chicago. Thirty-six states of this Union have fewer saloons in the aggregate than the City of New York. These significant facts, together with the well known fact that the vices of the nation center in our cities, thus adding complications to complications, make the great moral and social problems of the city practically unsolvable so far as the city alone is concerned.”
Those of us who live in the cities appeal to you who live in the country to help us to rid Utah’s fair cities of crime.
I have here a newspaper clipping from the Spokesman Review, which shows that Russia, Germany, England and France have learned that they can not win in the great war now raging unless they first kill whiskey. It reads as follows:
It is Something More than a War Against War.
“One of the many remarkable features connected with the war of the European revolution is that it is not only for many of the combatants a holy war against war, but for the governments is a war against alcohol. It almost seems as if the world at war had declared war upon the use of intoxicating drinks by soldiers.
“No vodka for the fighter is the word in Russia, no saki for the Japanese army, no whiskey or rum for the British trooper nor any absinthe for French infantry or cavalry. Reports from Germany as to the use of drink by its armies have not appeared, but doubtless the German military staff has no more use for drink than have its opponents.
“This almost absolute elimination of alcohol from the supplies of armies in the field forms part of the modern theory as to efficiency in war. The inexorable demand for the maximum of effectiveness in the soldier insists that his condition in the field shall approximate the Sunday school standard of conduct. Tommy Atkins, Jean Crapaud, Ivan Ivanovitch and Banzai Idzumo are far from the Captain Falstaff who recognized his Corporal Bardolph through the redness of his nose.
“The German emperor early in the year declared against drinking in the army and held up abstinence as the military ideal. Kitchener, when the war began, declared for total abstinence and ordered that no gifts of liquor be forwarded to the British forces. The government of France forbade the sale of absinthe at Paris during the war. Czar Nicholas has stopped the sale of liquor throughout Russia and one of the first acts of the Russians in Prussia was to shut the saloons. The French bill of fare for the soldiery omits alcohol.”
Let me tell you one thing about Russia. One of the officers of the largest life insurance companies in the world, on his way to San Francisco, stopped off in Salt Lake City, and I had the pleasure of spending an evening with him. He told me that he had found some astounding figures in Russia, which were almost unbelievable. That notwithstanding the war, because of the banishment of liquor, the death-rate of his company had been less than before the war. He felt there must be something wrong, some mistake, and was going to investigate it further. I feel sure his additional investigation will only be one more confirmation of the Lord’s promise in the Word of Wisdom.
Here is something I must read to you, although my time is going:
“According to the Kansas City Star, Mrs. James Watson, editor and publisher of the Dearborn, Mo., Democrat, has the following suggestion to make to booze fighters: ‘To the married man who cannot get along without his drinks, we suggest the following as a means to freedom from the bondage of the habit: Start a saloon in your own house. Be the only customer. You will have no license to pay. Go to your wife and give her $2 to buy a gallon of whiskey, and remember there are sixty-nine drinks in one gallon. Buy your drinks from no one except your wife, and by the time the first gallon is gone she will have $8 to put in the bank and $2 to start business again.. Should you live ten years and continue to buy boose from her and then die with snakes in your boots, she will have money to bury you decently, educate your children, buy a house and lot and marry a decent man and quit thinking about you " [Laughter.]
"On the 3rd and 4th of this month a remarkable temperance meeting was held in Philadelphia. Those in attendance were physicians and scientists. Several notable papers were read on the increase in the number of slaves, of alcohol and drugs, the relationship between disease and drink, and the conclusion arrived at by insurance societies regarding the mortality of drinkers of intoxicants. These are questions of immense importance to all.”
“Col. Maus, surgeon in the U. S. Army, made this statement:
“During the last year (1912), 2,000,000,000 gallons of wine, beer, whiskey, brandy, gin and other intoxicants were used in this country at a cost of as many billions of dollars. The country would be electrified if called upon to appropriate this sum to suppress diseases and national epidemics. Yet this expenditure is the most important factor in the cause of our misery, poverty, suicides, robberies, murders and crimes, besides the hundreds of thousands of deaths and the intellectually dead to be found in the insane asylums, feeble minded and epileptic institutions of the country.”
“Dr. Keister declared that if the American people would quit drinking intoxicating beverages homicides would be reduced by 50 per cent, suicides by 60 per cent, and lunacy by 33 per cent. [Thus adding to our financial ruin!]
“These startling statements did not come from fanatics, but from men with exceptional opportunities to study the causes of sickness and crime, and well equipped for that study. We must accept their conclusions. And if we desire the betterment of existing conditions, the evils must be attacked at the root.”
The following is a statement of the causes of deaths in the state of Kansas for 100,000 population:
In U.S. 1913 In Kan. 1913
Nephritis (Bright’s disease) 102.9 64.5
Typhoid fever ................... 17.9 19.4
Diphtheria ........................ 18.8 7.8
Tuberculosis (all forms) .. 147.6 61.8
Cancer (all forms)............. 78.9 55.9
Diabetes 132.4 85.5
Diarrhoea and enteritis (under 2 years) 75.2 52.8
Violence (ex. suicide).... 92.5 63.6
When the United States officials in Washington received the report of the death rate—9.8 to the 1000—in Kansas they would not believe it, and so they sent a special commissioner out there to investigate, and the report was substantiated. I would like to read the whole of the Era article by Brother Edward H. Anderson, from which the above is taken, but my time is gone. The article is an additional confirmation of the promise of the Lord Almighty that the destroying angel shall pass by those who obey the Word of Wisdom and keep His commandments. I appeal to you all to read Brother Edward H. Anderson’s splendid article in the April Era, “For the Consideration of Utah Citizens.”
We listened yesterday to the testimonies at our prohibition meeting in Barratt Hall of Stephen H. Love, John L. Herrick, Melvin J. Ballard, Andrew Kimball and Joseph E. Robinson, as to the beneficial effects arising from prohibition in Colorado, Arizona, Washington, Kansas and Oregon. I wish every man, woman and child in Utah could have heard these testimonies. May God help us to keep His commandments, to live the lives of Latter-day Saints, that we may be worthy of an exaltation in His Kingdom, is my prayer and desire, and I ask it in the name of Jesus.
Amen.
“Song of the Redeemed,” was rendered by the combined choirs.
Elder Bryant S. Hinckley pronounced the benediction.
SECOND OVERFLOW MEETING.
Another meeting of the Conference was held in the Assembly Hall, at 2 p. m., at which Elder George F. Richards presided. The combined choirs of Forest Dale, Waterloo, and Richards wards again furnished the choral numbers.
The hymn, “Arise, my soul, arise,” was sung by the choirs.
Elder Samuel C. Parkinson offered the invocation.
The combined choirs sang the anthem, “Palm Branches.”
Another meeting of the Conference was held in the Assembly Hall, at 2 p. m., at which Elder George F. Richards presided. The combined choirs of Forest Dale, Waterloo, and Richards wards again furnished the choral numbers.
The hymn, “Arise, my soul, arise,” was sung by the choirs.
Elder Samuel C. Parkinson offered the invocation.
The combined choirs sang the anthem, “Palm Branches.”
ELDER JOSEPH E. ROBINSON.
(President California Mission.)
“Praise ye the Lord; blessed is he who bringeth salvation.” This is the strain that we have just listened to and the burden of the song rendered.
I want to read to you from the holy scriptures an admonition from Paul’s great epistle to his own brethren, the Hebrews, as recorded in their book, second chapter, beginning with the first verse:
"Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip, For if the word spoken by angels was steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense of reward; How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him; God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, according to his own will?”
I have thought that we may be well admonished in this day by this exhortation of Paul’s just as well as the ancient Saints, for God has borne witness in this day and age. He has revealed Himself anew to men in the flesh. His beloved Son, our elder brother, the first born among many brethren in our primeval childhood, in the pre-mortal life, born of woman in the meridian of time, crucified on Calvary’s cross, resurrected and risen from the dead, the Redeemer of mankind, hath made Himself known again, and by personal ministry reestablished His Church in this day, with divers gifts, with the visitation of angels, with tongues and interpretation of tongues, with miracles, with healings and with all the gifts and signs that followed in the wake of the ancient apostles. Therefore as these things are manifest before our eyes, how can we hope to escape if we neglect so great salvation? Shall neglect, shall indifference, shall unbelief wean us away from the covenants of our fathers and mothers, and lulling us to sleep in the sense of security, make us unmindful of the responsibility that rests upon us as children of the Most High? For in such sleep we forget God, forget our calling, and therefore lose our election and reward.
In the remarks of Elder Orson F. Whitney and Joseph F. Smith, Jr., in the tabernacle, this morning, it was fairly indicated to us that it is the unbelieving one who has shut himself away from God. Let me read the admonition of the Master, as recorded in the twentieth chapter of St. John: After He had arisen from the dead and had made Himself known to the brethren and the faithful saints upon that first Lord’s day, the Sunday that they observed by gathering together to partake of the emblems of His blood and flesh, and being afraid of the Jews, had shut themselves up into an upper room, when they were suddenly visited by the Master. We read that they were affrighted because they thought they had seen a spirit, but He said unto them, “Peace be unto you,” and admonished them that it was even He Himself, and invited them to come forward and thrust their hands into His side, and feel the prints of the nails in His hands and in His feet, which witnessed that it was even He Himself and not His spirit. They seemed fearful still, and evidently did not take advantage of His invitation. Then He asked them if they had any bread or meat there, and they brought Him a broiled fish and part of a honey comb, and He did eat in their presence. They bore witness of this to Thomas, who was not present that day but who was one of the chosen disciples. Thomas, as many men today, would not believe the testimony of his brethren. He said, I will not believe it unless I can see and feel the marks of the nails in His hands and His feet, and when they had come together upon the next Sunday, the Master again appeared before them, and these are the words that are recorded:
"And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said Peace be unto you. Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands, and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side, and be not faithless but believing."
Remember this admonition, “Be not faithless, but believing.”
"And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God.”
The Master rejoined, saying:
"Thomas, because thou hast seen me thou hast believed; blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed.”
So here again do I read this admonition, that we ought to be faithful and not faithless, that we ought to be believing and not unbelieving. And if you will recall the remarks of Elder Smith this morning, you remember how he cited the men of the world who hold the places of prominence as teachers and ministers for Christ, who do not accept the atonement of the Master, who do not accept the fact that He is the Only Begotten of the Father in the flesh, who do not believe we are created in His form, but that if we are made after Him at all it is in reason only that we resemble His personality. They question the statements of the early fathers of the ancient church, the statements of the apostles and of the patriarchs of old, because they think that in this day we have come into more learning and knowledge relative to the great course of life and the being of this world, its creations and its environment.
Let me recite a few words of Col. Robert G. Ingersoll. His brother Obed was a minister, so called, of the gospel of Christ. The colonel expected that when death overtook him his brother would see to the last sad rites, and would speak parting words of benediction over his body. But his brother died early in life, and the Colonel had the sad office to fulfill instead for his brother. In addressing the people assembled, he likened the life of his brother unto that of a beautiful ship that had set sail under most favorable circumstances, every sail in place, every rope taut, everything in order, so that a most successful voyage seems propitious, when suddenly, without a warning, the vessel, struck amidships by .a submerged rock, had broken it in two, and it drifted out upon the waves, driven and tossed by the winds, and was scattered to the four parts of the earth, never more to be brought together again. But when he had drawn this picture, his own soul within him remonstrated with the thought, and he expressed these feelings:
“This life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of _ two eternities. We strive in vain to pierce beyond the heights. We cry, and the only answer is the echo of our soul: he who lies before us, mistaking the approach of death for the return of health, murmured with his latest breath, I am better now.”
And the Colonel concludes:
“Let us hope in spite of doubt and fear, dogmas and tears, that this is so, of all the countless dead, for in the dark night of death hope sees a star and the listening ear catches the rustling of a wing.”
A complete contradiction to his former statements, and showing that within his heart, as within the soul of every man, there is something that reaches out after the infinite. He said, “We strive in vain to pierce beyond the heights: we cry, and the only answer is the echo of our wail.” Now because he was faithless; and lacked faith in God and in His work;—he believed not, and therefore he received no answer, for we are to walk by
faith and not by sight. And I take it in this scripture that I read to you. the Lord Jesus rather reproaches' Thomas than blessing him, though happily for Thomas, he did confess his Master when his eyes beheld Him and his ears heard His loved voice; but the Master said to him, “Thomas, thou hast believed because thou hast seen me. Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed.” And so with these modern men who were quoted today. So with Colonel Ingersoll. Those who are faithless and are not believing, do not have the testimony of the Christ. The Holy Ghost does not come to them as a witness for it has not been conferred upon them. They have not complied with the teachings of the Master, wherein He said, “My doctrine is not mine, but His that sent me, and if any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether I speak of God or whether I speak of myself.” And that promise is to the least of the children of our Father and to the least that shall come in the flesh, as well as to the great ones of the earth who lived with the Master in His day.
So we may not wonder at the lack of understanding upon the part of those who were regarded as wise and prudent after the knowledge of men, for God has said that He had not chosen many rulers from among the great and the wise;—but from those who were looked upon as insignificant, from the meek and the lowly of the earth He has raised up witnesses unto Him who bear with them such earnestness in their testimony that men cannot make light of the same, no matter if they stumble in their language or not. We feel it in their very presence, in the clasp of their hand. We read it in the light of their countenance, and cannot doubt the testimony of such men as these, to whom God has spoken by the voice of His spirit, or unto whom the Holy Ghost has come and borne witness of the truth, taking of the things of the Father and of the Son and revealing them to men. Not only the wise men, so called, of the world, but, sad to relate, some of our own young men, who have a little smattering of the knowledge of the world, and who have studied some of the philosophies of men, who are misinformed, and whose philosophies are not grounded on the truth, have by their specious pleading been led to believe, as was stated this morning, in evolution and in the higher criticism of the scriptures. They will tell us that the books written are not to be ascribed to those whose names follow as the authors of the works, that they are eastern allegories and fables and stories, and that they are not true histories of the dealings of Providence anciently nor in the meridian of time; but the deductions that they make and the sophistries that they teach are much more difficult to explain, to accept and believe than the plain, simple statement of the holy scriptures themselves.
An added testimony to the truth of these scriptures comes to us in the manifestos of some of the greatest living scientists, members of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, as given, I think, but about six years since, when unitedly these men declared that not only the history of the Bible and of God’s hand-dealing with His people was true, but the very miracles performed, as stated in the New Testament, the turning of water into wine, the revivifying of the dead, the healing of the leper, the unstopping of the ears of the deaf, and the opening of the eyes of the blind, not only might be demonstrated scientifically, but were true to the principles of higher science. This wisdom and knowledge is gleaned in part now by men in their blindness; and these very men feel that about us there are forces unharnessed as yet to serve men’s will,—planes upon which we do not function, and are slow to reject the testimony of men of the past and even of the present, who say that they do know because they have come in touch with this power and are witnesses of the hand-dealings of Christ and of the visitation of angels and the healing of the sick, etc.
Why, how weak, how impotent after all, despite all that man has achieved, is man himself. Our poor ears, though they have been enraptured by the melody of song this afternoon, so sweetly rendered by the combined choirs and by the instrument accompanying them,—our poor ears can only interpret and receive a very few of the vibrations that we call .sound, and between the vibrations of sound and sight there lies a wondrous field, unheard, unknown, unexperienced by mortal man, because in our weakness, our finiteness, we cannot. function in that plane. The sights that might be seen, the sounds that might be heard, are uninterpreted and unseen because we are mortal. But sometimes God quickens the ear and the eye of man, and they hear and see things unheard and unseen before.
And so the poets have declared that
‘‘Ever near us though unseen,
The dear immortal spirits tread,
And all the universe is life;
There is no dead.”
Ofttimes in rejecting so great salvation, we do it by looking back mournfully, as was stated this morning, into the past, by thinking of things that might have been, by weeping over time and conditions and .opportunities, perchance, that cannot come again, or that we lose because we look to the past and do not take heed of the present and look for the future. Ofttimes too there may be dreamers who are living in the future, who have builded up for themselves an ethereal existence that is not real, and because it is unreal is unhealthy. I have met people who think that they are so saintly that if they can retain certain divine thoughts, they shall never die, that they shall not taste of death, that they arrest the seeds of dissolution, and cannot even grow old. I have seen them not only grow decrepit and old, but die since they first announced this doctrine to me in the mission field. Such creatures and dreamers of the future—and men who look mournfully to the past, and put off the issues of the present for the future, crucify today between the thieves of yesterday and tomorrow the opportunities for salvation gained only by living godly in Christ Jesus today.
I admonish you Latter-day Saints to see to it that so far as you are concerned, complying with the doctrines of Christ you shall set in your hearts and in the hearts of your children such love of truth, such a testimony of the Christ, that you will not be led astray by the specious pleading of so called learned men, but in the effulgent sun of revelation you will be able to say, as did Peter, that “Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God that with one of the ancient prophets you can say, “as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” If tried, if tormented, if perplexed with griefs and fears, if there be obstacles in your pathway that you feel that you cannot surmount, if broken-hearted because loved ones have been wrested from you, or wantonly have gone astray, still be like Job, who could sit down in the ashes of his once happy home and declare, “though he slay me yet will I trust him,” “for I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter-day upon the earth; and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God, whom I shall see for myself and mine eyes shall behold, and not another, though my reins be consumed within me.” That is the faith that surmounts the doubts and the difficulties of today; that is the faith that will enable you to surmount every obstacle; that is the faith that will help you to recognize the hand of God in all of His hand-dealings, and meet meekly chastisement when it shall come from His beneficent hand. “Be not faithless, but believing, for blessed are they who have not seen and yet have believed.”
May the peace of our Father be with you, I ask in the name of Jesus. Amen.
(President California Mission.)
“Praise ye the Lord; blessed is he who bringeth salvation.” This is the strain that we have just listened to and the burden of the song rendered.
I want to read to you from the holy scriptures an admonition from Paul’s great epistle to his own brethren, the Hebrews, as recorded in their book, second chapter, beginning with the first verse:
"Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip, For if the word spoken by angels was steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense of reward; How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him; God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, according to his own will?”
I have thought that we may be well admonished in this day by this exhortation of Paul’s just as well as the ancient Saints, for God has borne witness in this day and age. He has revealed Himself anew to men in the flesh. His beloved Son, our elder brother, the first born among many brethren in our primeval childhood, in the pre-mortal life, born of woman in the meridian of time, crucified on Calvary’s cross, resurrected and risen from the dead, the Redeemer of mankind, hath made Himself known again, and by personal ministry reestablished His Church in this day, with divers gifts, with the visitation of angels, with tongues and interpretation of tongues, with miracles, with healings and with all the gifts and signs that followed in the wake of the ancient apostles. Therefore as these things are manifest before our eyes, how can we hope to escape if we neglect so great salvation? Shall neglect, shall indifference, shall unbelief wean us away from the covenants of our fathers and mothers, and lulling us to sleep in the sense of security, make us unmindful of the responsibility that rests upon us as children of the Most High? For in such sleep we forget God, forget our calling, and therefore lose our election and reward.
In the remarks of Elder Orson F. Whitney and Joseph F. Smith, Jr., in the tabernacle, this morning, it was fairly indicated to us that it is the unbelieving one who has shut himself away from God. Let me read the admonition of the Master, as recorded in the twentieth chapter of St. John: After He had arisen from the dead and had made Himself known to the brethren and the faithful saints upon that first Lord’s day, the Sunday that they observed by gathering together to partake of the emblems of His blood and flesh, and being afraid of the Jews, had shut themselves up into an upper room, when they were suddenly visited by the Master. We read that they were affrighted because they thought they had seen a spirit, but He said unto them, “Peace be unto you,” and admonished them that it was even He Himself, and invited them to come forward and thrust their hands into His side, and feel the prints of the nails in His hands and in His feet, which witnessed that it was even He Himself and not His spirit. They seemed fearful still, and evidently did not take advantage of His invitation. Then He asked them if they had any bread or meat there, and they brought Him a broiled fish and part of a honey comb, and He did eat in their presence. They bore witness of this to Thomas, who was not present that day but who was one of the chosen disciples. Thomas, as many men today, would not believe the testimony of his brethren. He said, I will not believe it unless I can see and feel the marks of the nails in His hands and His feet, and when they had come together upon the next Sunday, the Master again appeared before them, and these are the words that are recorded:
"And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said Peace be unto you. Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands, and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side, and be not faithless but believing."
Remember this admonition, “Be not faithless, but believing.”
"And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God.”
The Master rejoined, saying:
"Thomas, because thou hast seen me thou hast believed; blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed.”
So here again do I read this admonition, that we ought to be faithful and not faithless, that we ought to be believing and not unbelieving. And if you will recall the remarks of Elder Smith this morning, you remember how he cited the men of the world who hold the places of prominence as teachers and ministers for Christ, who do not accept the atonement of the Master, who do not accept the fact that He is the Only Begotten of the Father in the flesh, who do not believe we are created in His form, but that if we are made after Him at all it is in reason only that we resemble His personality. They question the statements of the early fathers of the ancient church, the statements of the apostles and of the patriarchs of old, because they think that in this day we have come into more learning and knowledge relative to the great course of life and the being of this world, its creations and its environment.
Let me recite a few words of Col. Robert G. Ingersoll. His brother Obed was a minister, so called, of the gospel of Christ. The colonel expected that when death overtook him his brother would see to the last sad rites, and would speak parting words of benediction over his body. But his brother died early in life, and the Colonel had the sad office to fulfill instead for his brother. In addressing the people assembled, he likened the life of his brother unto that of a beautiful ship that had set sail under most favorable circumstances, every sail in place, every rope taut, everything in order, so that a most successful voyage seems propitious, when suddenly, without a warning, the vessel, struck amidships by .a submerged rock, had broken it in two, and it drifted out upon the waves, driven and tossed by the winds, and was scattered to the four parts of the earth, never more to be brought together again. But when he had drawn this picture, his own soul within him remonstrated with the thought, and he expressed these feelings:
“This life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of _ two eternities. We strive in vain to pierce beyond the heights. We cry, and the only answer is the echo of our soul: he who lies before us, mistaking the approach of death for the return of health, murmured with his latest breath, I am better now.”
And the Colonel concludes:
“Let us hope in spite of doubt and fear, dogmas and tears, that this is so, of all the countless dead, for in the dark night of death hope sees a star and the listening ear catches the rustling of a wing.”
A complete contradiction to his former statements, and showing that within his heart, as within the soul of every man, there is something that reaches out after the infinite. He said, “We strive in vain to pierce beyond the heights: we cry, and the only answer is the echo of our wail.” Now because he was faithless; and lacked faith in God and in His work;—he believed not, and therefore he received no answer, for we are to walk by
faith and not by sight. And I take it in this scripture that I read to you. the Lord Jesus rather reproaches' Thomas than blessing him, though happily for Thomas, he did confess his Master when his eyes beheld Him and his ears heard His loved voice; but the Master said to him, “Thomas, thou hast believed because thou hast seen me. Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed.” And so with these modern men who were quoted today. So with Colonel Ingersoll. Those who are faithless and are not believing, do not have the testimony of the Christ. The Holy Ghost does not come to them as a witness for it has not been conferred upon them. They have not complied with the teachings of the Master, wherein He said, “My doctrine is not mine, but His that sent me, and if any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether I speak of God or whether I speak of myself.” And that promise is to the least of the children of our Father and to the least that shall come in the flesh, as well as to the great ones of the earth who lived with the Master in His day.
So we may not wonder at the lack of understanding upon the part of those who were regarded as wise and prudent after the knowledge of men, for God has said that He had not chosen many rulers from among the great and the wise;—but from those who were looked upon as insignificant, from the meek and the lowly of the earth He has raised up witnesses unto Him who bear with them such earnestness in their testimony that men cannot make light of the same, no matter if they stumble in their language or not. We feel it in their very presence, in the clasp of their hand. We read it in the light of their countenance, and cannot doubt the testimony of such men as these, to whom God has spoken by the voice of His spirit, or unto whom the Holy Ghost has come and borne witness of the truth, taking of the things of the Father and of the Son and revealing them to men. Not only the wise men, so called, of the world, but, sad to relate, some of our own young men, who have a little smattering of the knowledge of the world, and who have studied some of the philosophies of men, who are misinformed, and whose philosophies are not grounded on the truth, have by their specious pleading been led to believe, as was stated this morning, in evolution and in the higher criticism of the scriptures. They will tell us that the books written are not to be ascribed to those whose names follow as the authors of the works, that they are eastern allegories and fables and stories, and that they are not true histories of the dealings of Providence anciently nor in the meridian of time; but the deductions that they make and the sophistries that they teach are much more difficult to explain, to accept and believe than the plain, simple statement of the holy scriptures themselves.
An added testimony to the truth of these scriptures comes to us in the manifestos of some of the greatest living scientists, members of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, as given, I think, but about six years since, when unitedly these men declared that not only the history of the Bible and of God’s hand-dealing with His people was true, but the very miracles performed, as stated in the New Testament, the turning of water into wine, the revivifying of the dead, the healing of the leper, the unstopping of the ears of the deaf, and the opening of the eyes of the blind, not only might be demonstrated scientifically, but were true to the principles of higher science. This wisdom and knowledge is gleaned in part now by men in their blindness; and these very men feel that about us there are forces unharnessed as yet to serve men’s will,—planes upon which we do not function, and are slow to reject the testimony of men of the past and even of the present, who say that they do know because they have come in touch with this power and are witnesses of the hand-dealings of Christ and of the visitation of angels and the healing of the sick, etc.
Why, how weak, how impotent after all, despite all that man has achieved, is man himself. Our poor ears, though they have been enraptured by the melody of song this afternoon, so sweetly rendered by the combined choirs and by the instrument accompanying them,—our poor ears can only interpret and receive a very few of the vibrations that we call .sound, and between the vibrations of sound and sight there lies a wondrous field, unheard, unknown, unexperienced by mortal man, because in our weakness, our finiteness, we cannot. function in that plane. The sights that might be seen, the sounds that might be heard, are uninterpreted and unseen because we are mortal. But sometimes God quickens the ear and the eye of man, and they hear and see things unheard and unseen before.
And so the poets have declared that
‘‘Ever near us though unseen,
The dear immortal spirits tread,
And all the universe is life;
There is no dead.”
Ofttimes in rejecting so great salvation, we do it by looking back mournfully, as was stated this morning, into the past, by thinking of things that might have been, by weeping over time and conditions and .opportunities, perchance, that cannot come again, or that we lose because we look to the past and do not take heed of the present and look for the future. Ofttimes too there may be dreamers who are living in the future, who have builded up for themselves an ethereal existence that is not real, and because it is unreal is unhealthy. I have met people who think that they are so saintly that if they can retain certain divine thoughts, they shall never die, that they shall not taste of death, that they arrest the seeds of dissolution, and cannot even grow old. I have seen them not only grow decrepit and old, but die since they first announced this doctrine to me in the mission field. Such creatures and dreamers of the future—and men who look mournfully to the past, and put off the issues of the present for the future, crucify today between the thieves of yesterday and tomorrow the opportunities for salvation gained only by living godly in Christ Jesus today.
I admonish you Latter-day Saints to see to it that so far as you are concerned, complying with the doctrines of Christ you shall set in your hearts and in the hearts of your children such love of truth, such a testimony of the Christ, that you will not be led astray by the specious pleading of so called learned men, but in the effulgent sun of revelation you will be able to say, as did Peter, that “Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God that with one of the ancient prophets you can say, “as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” If tried, if tormented, if perplexed with griefs and fears, if there be obstacles in your pathway that you feel that you cannot surmount, if broken-hearted because loved ones have been wrested from you, or wantonly have gone astray, still be like Job, who could sit down in the ashes of his once happy home and declare, “though he slay me yet will I trust him,” “for I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter-day upon the earth; and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God, whom I shall see for myself and mine eyes shall behold, and not another, though my reins be consumed within me.” That is the faith that surmounts the doubts and the difficulties of today; that is the faith that will enable you to surmount every obstacle; that is the faith that will help you to recognize the hand of God in all of His hand-dealings, and meet meekly chastisement when it shall come from His beneficent hand. “Be not faithless, but believing, for blessed are they who have not seen and yet have believed.”
May the peace of our Father be with you, I ask in the name of Jesus. Amen.
SAMUEL O. BENNION.
(President Central States Mission.)
I am very happy, my brethren and sisters, for the opportunity of attending conference this spring. I think that the opportunity to meet here with the Latter-day Saints and mingle with them, and shake the hands of friends, of brethren and sisters, is one of the great pleasures of life, and I appreciate it very much. My experience in attending these conferences has always been a source of joy to me from the very beginning. I have learned to love my fellow men and enjoy the association of friends. I have never seen a crowd too big, or too many people, and I find happiness and great pleasure, when I can associate with men who bear the priesthood of God and who are true to life. We find this condition among the Latter-day Saints to a greater degree than it is in the world among any other body of people.
I appreciate the power of the priesthood. I have been thinking during this conference most seriously that I ought to be very careful with the testimony which I have received, and guard it as a precious gift. Above all other gifts is a testimony of this gospel, that God lives and that Jesus is the Christ, the Redeemer of the world, that Joseph Smith was a prophet sent from God to live in this dispensation, and to bear testimony unto men with such power that the Lord’s work would be firmly established. It is a precious gift to you, my brethren and sisters; it is worth more than anything else; I want to guard mine more carefully in the future than I have ever done in the past.
The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. Men who have not the testimony of Jesus do not believe in prophecy and in revelation. Hence we are not surprised at all to hear them say there is no such thing as an authorized priest in the earth, no such thing as a temple of God in the earth, no need of them any more. I attended a church in one of the Southern states a few weeks ago, between trains, when I was visiting the elders in the Central States mission. I had two or three hours to wait so I went into one of the churches. They were in session that evening, with a large number of people present. The minister made the statement that I have mentioned, that there was not a priest upon the earth, that there was no need of a temple in the earth; Christ had performed the work for all of us, and if we admitted Christ we were sure of salvation. He did not believe in revelation at all, said it was unnecessary. He did not believe in prophecy, and I was not surprised, for I knew the Apostle John had said that “the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” Men who have not the testimony of Jesus are not in a position to state or to say that there are prophets in the earth, and that revelation does exist. They have not learned that much. And so I was not surprised when I heard him make this statement; but remembered at the moment the words of Paul, when he spoke along the same line, “that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost” (1 Cor. 12:3). I remembered how the apostles preached that the Holy Ghost would be received. On the day of Pentecost, when the people, touched in their hearts, asked, “Men and brethren what shall we do?” Peter said unto them, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost” (Acts 2:37, 38). He thus followed an order that had been outlined by the Christ, who labored with Peter and those apostles. Jesus said, “My doctrine is not mine but His that sent me.” He never claimed it as His, but He claimed it as His Father’s, that He had sent Him into the world to preach the gospel and declare unto the children of men the words of life, the words that would give unto them the testimony that Job gave us, which has been so beautifully repeated here this afternoon.
There is no salvation, no eternal life, outside of the gospel. There is only one way by which men can be saved, according to Paul wherein he states, “One Lord, one faith, one baptism” (Eph. 4:5). No matter how well a man may be read in the scripture,—and that gentleman that I listened to that evening was well read; in his letters he was perfect— unless his mind is illumined by the Spirit he cannot comprehend the Truth. I remembered, as he spoke, the words of the apostle that “the letter killeth but the Spirit giveth life” (11 Cor. 3:6). He was not able to understand the gospel, for as one of the former prophets stated, according to the scripture, “Where there is no vision the people perish.” Where the visions are closed, the Lord does not reveal Himself; then the people perish in unbelief, and they do not know the Lord, they have not the testimony of Jesus, they are unable to stand up and truthfully say, “I know that God lives, I know that Jesus is the Savior of the world.” They are not in possession of that knowledge, for that comes only in one way, through revelation from God unto His servants the prophets, for it is said, that “surely the Lord God will do nothing but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7). My mind went to a revelation of the Lord here, that we are all acquainted with, recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants, 13th chapter. I should have liked to have had the opportunity of reading it to that gentleman that evening. I did not want to engage in a debate with him; I did not want to engage in anything that bordered on contention, for contention does not carry with it the Spirit of the Lord; but I should liked to have read to him the truth that the Lord has revealed from heaven, the priesthood of God, the power that our Father delegated to man upon the earth. It was revealed through John and later through Peter, James, and John. Section 13 reads as follows:
“Words of the angel, John (the Baptist), spoken to Joseph Smith, Jr., and Oliver Cowdery as he laid, his hands upon their heads and ordained them to the Aaronic priesthood, in Harmony, Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania. May 15, 1829: ‘Upon you, my fellow servants, in the name of Messiah, I confer the priesthood of Aaron, which holds the keys of the ministering of angels, and of the gospel of repentance, and of baptism by immersion for the remission of sins, and this shall never be taken from the earth until the sons of Levi do offer again an offering unto the Lord in righteousness.’ ”
Whether that minister stated that the priesthood was not in the earth or not, it makes no difference: he never knew. But it was and is in the earth, and I should like to have had the opportunity of reading the revelation of the Lord upon it. for after all there are thousands of men and women in the earth who are ready to receive the gospel. They are a little afraid of “Mormonism.” because “Mormonism” and polygamy are regarded as synonymous in the world, and they take snap judgment and are not informed. They do not understand the gospel. They do not know why we have, at one period of the Church’s history, preached polygamy. We believe in revelation from God; we believe in a restoration of the gospel, not in a “reformation,” and with the restoration there was revelated a principle which Abraham practiced and believed in — that Abraham of whom the Lord said, that through him and his seed all the nations of the earth should be blessed. That principle was restored and obeyed to a limited extent, under most trying circumstances, by men and women of great faith and integrity. The time came when it was taken away; but it had been restored, and it has left its history. No better men can be found in all the world than those who came through that lineage.
In this connection I remember the words of Jesus in the gospel of St. Luke, when he said unto the people that they should see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of God, and all the holy prophets, and they themselves should be thrust cut; there would be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. I want to tell you, if Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and those holy prophets did not forfeit their rights, neither did the Prophet Joseph Smith, and Brigham Young and others who conscientiously accepted and lived that principle. Had it not been included in “Mormon” doctrine, I suppose our opponents could have censured us for not believing in it, for they could have produced abundant evidence in its favor from the ancient scriptures. However, I allude to this matter only incidentally and without the slightest intention to advocate the doctrine now, because as you all know, its practice has ceased among us by commandment of God, in order that another law—the law of the land—might be obeyed. And that is the situation today. Nevertheless the world will yet become acquainted with the true nature of our belief and discover that did keep God's commandments; and they will learn that “Mormonism” is the biggest and the greatest thing in the world, and the testimony of it is the greatest thing that one can possibly have.
I pray that the Lord will bless you. I see the time is going, and there are a number of others to speak. I take a delight in bearing my testimony for I have one. I know that the Lord lives and rules in the earth and in the heavens above, and that He has servants to administer unto the children of men. I know that this is His work, and that He has established it never more to be given to another people, never to be re-organized, but to continue organized as it was in the days of the Prophet Joseph Smith; and it shall remain here until Christ comes to take His place upon the earth at its head. The Lord bless you. Amen.
A solo was sung by Sister Annie Woodbury.
(President Central States Mission.)
I am very happy, my brethren and sisters, for the opportunity of attending conference this spring. I think that the opportunity to meet here with the Latter-day Saints and mingle with them, and shake the hands of friends, of brethren and sisters, is one of the great pleasures of life, and I appreciate it very much. My experience in attending these conferences has always been a source of joy to me from the very beginning. I have learned to love my fellow men and enjoy the association of friends. I have never seen a crowd too big, or too many people, and I find happiness and great pleasure, when I can associate with men who bear the priesthood of God and who are true to life. We find this condition among the Latter-day Saints to a greater degree than it is in the world among any other body of people.
I appreciate the power of the priesthood. I have been thinking during this conference most seriously that I ought to be very careful with the testimony which I have received, and guard it as a precious gift. Above all other gifts is a testimony of this gospel, that God lives and that Jesus is the Christ, the Redeemer of the world, that Joseph Smith was a prophet sent from God to live in this dispensation, and to bear testimony unto men with such power that the Lord’s work would be firmly established. It is a precious gift to you, my brethren and sisters; it is worth more than anything else; I want to guard mine more carefully in the future than I have ever done in the past.
The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. Men who have not the testimony of Jesus do not believe in prophecy and in revelation. Hence we are not surprised at all to hear them say there is no such thing as an authorized priest in the earth, no such thing as a temple of God in the earth, no need of them any more. I attended a church in one of the Southern states a few weeks ago, between trains, when I was visiting the elders in the Central States mission. I had two or three hours to wait so I went into one of the churches. They were in session that evening, with a large number of people present. The minister made the statement that I have mentioned, that there was not a priest upon the earth, that there was no need of a temple in the earth; Christ had performed the work for all of us, and if we admitted Christ we were sure of salvation. He did not believe in revelation at all, said it was unnecessary. He did not believe in prophecy, and I was not surprised, for I knew the Apostle John had said that “the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” Men who have not the testimony of Jesus are not in a position to state or to say that there are prophets in the earth, and that revelation does exist. They have not learned that much. And so I was not surprised when I heard him make this statement; but remembered at the moment the words of Paul, when he spoke along the same line, “that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost” (1 Cor. 12:3). I remembered how the apostles preached that the Holy Ghost would be received. On the day of Pentecost, when the people, touched in their hearts, asked, “Men and brethren what shall we do?” Peter said unto them, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost” (Acts 2:37, 38). He thus followed an order that had been outlined by the Christ, who labored with Peter and those apostles. Jesus said, “My doctrine is not mine but His that sent me.” He never claimed it as His, but He claimed it as His Father’s, that He had sent Him into the world to preach the gospel and declare unto the children of men the words of life, the words that would give unto them the testimony that Job gave us, which has been so beautifully repeated here this afternoon.
There is no salvation, no eternal life, outside of the gospel. There is only one way by which men can be saved, according to Paul wherein he states, “One Lord, one faith, one baptism” (Eph. 4:5). No matter how well a man may be read in the scripture,—and that gentleman that I listened to that evening was well read; in his letters he was perfect— unless his mind is illumined by the Spirit he cannot comprehend the Truth. I remembered, as he spoke, the words of the apostle that “the letter killeth but the Spirit giveth life” (11 Cor. 3:6). He was not able to understand the gospel, for as one of the former prophets stated, according to the scripture, “Where there is no vision the people perish.” Where the visions are closed, the Lord does not reveal Himself; then the people perish in unbelief, and they do not know the Lord, they have not the testimony of Jesus, they are unable to stand up and truthfully say, “I know that God lives, I know that Jesus is the Savior of the world.” They are not in possession of that knowledge, for that comes only in one way, through revelation from God unto His servants the prophets, for it is said, that “surely the Lord God will do nothing but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7). My mind went to a revelation of the Lord here, that we are all acquainted with, recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants, 13th chapter. I should have liked to have had the opportunity of reading it to that gentleman that evening. I did not want to engage in a debate with him; I did not want to engage in anything that bordered on contention, for contention does not carry with it the Spirit of the Lord; but I should liked to have read to him the truth that the Lord has revealed from heaven, the priesthood of God, the power that our Father delegated to man upon the earth. It was revealed through John and later through Peter, James, and John. Section 13 reads as follows:
“Words of the angel, John (the Baptist), spoken to Joseph Smith, Jr., and Oliver Cowdery as he laid, his hands upon their heads and ordained them to the Aaronic priesthood, in Harmony, Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania. May 15, 1829: ‘Upon you, my fellow servants, in the name of Messiah, I confer the priesthood of Aaron, which holds the keys of the ministering of angels, and of the gospel of repentance, and of baptism by immersion for the remission of sins, and this shall never be taken from the earth until the sons of Levi do offer again an offering unto the Lord in righteousness.’ ”
Whether that minister stated that the priesthood was not in the earth or not, it makes no difference: he never knew. But it was and is in the earth, and I should like to have had the opportunity of reading the revelation of the Lord upon it. for after all there are thousands of men and women in the earth who are ready to receive the gospel. They are a little afraid of “Mormonism.” because “Mormonism” and polygamy are regarded as synonymous in the world, and they take snap judgment and are not informed. They do not understand the gospel. They do not know why we have, at one period of the Church’s history, preached polygamy. We believe in revelation from God; we believe in a restoration of the gospel, not in a “reformation,” and with the restoration there was revelated a principle which Abraham practiced and believed in — that Abraham of whom the Lord said, that through him and his seed all the nations of the earth should be blessed. That principle was restored and obeyed to a limited extent, under most trying circumstances, by men and women of great faith and integrity. The time came when it was taken away; but it had been restored, and it has left its history. No better men can be found in all the world than those who came through that lineage.
In this connection I remember the words of Jesus in the gospel of St. Luke, when he said unto the people that they should see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of God, and all the holy prophets, and they themselves should be thrust cut; there would be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. I want to tell you, if Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and those holy prophets did not forfeit their rights, neither did the Prophet Joseph Smith, and Brigham Young and others who conscientiously accepted and lived that principle. Had it not been included in “Mormon” doctrine, I suppose our opponents could have censured us for not believing in it, for they could have produced abundant evidence in its favor from the ancient scriptures. However, I allude to this matter only incidentally and without the slightest intention to advocate the doctrine now, because as you all know, its practice has ceased among us by commandment of God, in order that another law—the law of the land—might be obeyed. And that is the situation today. Nevertheless the world will yet become acquainted with the true nature of our belief and discover that did keep God's commandments; and they will learn that “Mormonism” is the biggest and the greatest thing in the world, and the testimony of it is the greatest thing that one can possibly have.
I pray that the Lord will bless you. I see the time is going, and there are a number of others to speak. I take a delight in bearing my testimony for I have one. I know that the Lord lives and rules in the earth and in the heavens above, and that He has servants to administer unto the children of men. I know that this is His work, and that He has established it never more to be given to another people, never to be re-organized, but to continue organized as it was in the days of the Prophet Joseph Smith; and it shall remain here until Christ comes to take His place upon the earth at its head. The Lord bless you. Amen.
A solo was sung by Sister Annie Woodbury.
ELDER JOHN L. HERRICK.
(President Western States Mission.)
A few weeks ago, Prof. Harvey A. Overstreet, of the College of the City of New York, speaking to a convention of ministers of one of the great Christian churches, at Pittsburgh, said substantially as follows:
“The time is ripe for the formulation of a new religion. Much that is peculiar of the period of today is also peculiar of the Alexandrian period, when Christianity had its birth. Today sees great cults arising. There are great social upheavals. It is a great age of ferment. I sometimes think that out of this vast social caldron will come some new thing. It seems we can believe this; that the accredited religions institutionalized as they are, have been failures. We find the attitude towards the church is rather lukewarm. The accredited religions are not the great soul-inspiring, encompassing things they ought to be. The new religion will come out of the midst of those groups which have accepted the scientific, democratic and social point of view.”
I wondered, as I read the dispatch accredited to this educator, if he had familiarized himself with all of the religions of the day before making the statement attributed to him, for it would seem that there is one rather widely .known creed which might cover the vital features demanded by the gentleman in the new religion he is looking for. That religion I do not hesitate to say is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Let us see how the Church would line up by comparison. The theology of "Mormonism” is in harmony with science, or better stated, the conclusions of some of the greatest scientific minds have been made to harmonize with much that has been set forth as "Mormon” teaching. When that religion was founded there was need, apparently, for some new thing, because there was much lacking in the confessed creeds of the various religions. For instance, most of them professed a belief that God was an incorporeal immaterial Being, without body, parts or passions. They professed also that the world was created, literally created, out of nothing, and likewise that man also was literally created, and that he was predestined to either a glorious salvation or eternal damnation, and that no act of his could change the plan of his life.
With the teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, these impossible ideas were set aside, for he testified that God and Jesus Christ were separate and distinct beings, corporeal beings, that they visited him in vision the most remarkable of modern times, or for all time perhaps of which we have record, when he talked face to face with them, and received instructions regarding the contemplated work to be established in the world for the last time, the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is also a cardinal teaching in “Mormonism” that matter is eternal, and that the object had by the Almighty in forming the world was to bring together the various forces that were already here, and that matter, while altered, could not be destroyed, i. e., annihilated. As respecting man, it is confidently asserted that he was born into the world of mortality through the plan of the Almighty, and that the intelligence of man is also eternal,— is in fact co-eternal with God. Some advanced thoughts as regards astronomy were also made known, which science has since recognized. From the standpoint of democracy in religion we can pass muster surely for a revelation was received in 1830, but three months after the organization of the Church as follows: “And all things shall be done by common consent in the Church by much prayer and faith for all things you shall receive by faith.” That rule has obtained and still maintains in the Church. Candidates for the priesthood must be approved by the voice of the people. Stake and ward authorities are presented to be voted upon and this great conference has set its seal of approval by vote upon the General Authorities, and similar action is also taken throughout the stakes at each quarterly conference.
As to the social point of view. We are given credit for having solved most satisfactorily the most important problems, by those who have impartially investigated our conditions. Thomas M. Bicknell, a former president of the National Education Association and prominent educator of New England, writes as follows:
“The ‘Mormon’ polity, on the side of social order, is recognized as the most thoroughly organized system in the world. Every intelligent man should study it for its recognition of the solution of economic health and social problems. Its details of supervision are exact, thorough-going and efficient.
“Beyond and above all in perfection
of system and in the realization of grand results, are the industry, frugality and temperance of the people. The beehive properly symbolizes the spirit and practice of the ‘Mormons.’ Go where you will, you will find no poverty, while wealth abounds in practical abundance. Homes are full of comforts and luxuries; art, music and literature are the endowments of all. The wealth of the land has attracted the ‘Mormons’ more than the wealth of the mines, and both are making wealth common and fairly distributed.
“Utah is a rich land of great possibilities. Its richest possession is its ‘Mormon’ population of honest, pure minded, sweet-hearted men, women and children who have drawn on Nature’s forces for her grateful services and returns. They have, out of the lion’s mouth, plucked the honeycomb of sweet content and honest life, and were the Master to walk the streets of Salt Lake City today, would he not say to all critics and detractors of ‘Mormonism:’ ‘Let him that is without sin cast the first stone’?’’
We are judged by the world because they know little of the teachings of professed “Mormonism.” Only last fall, while making a tour of the South, the Vice-President of the United States, Thomas R. Marshall, was quoted in the dispatches from Phoenix, Arizona, in speaking of Efficiency, as follows:
“We want to be an efficient people, but we want to be also a free people. We cannot be both. The German nation and the ‘Mormon’ Church are the two greatest organizations, in the world, but in each the individual is subservient to the organization. What we want is efficiency, but we also want freedom with it.”
I think one might well agree with him in the statement regarding the German nation, and without saying anything derogatory of them as a people it is pretty generally conceded that they have been subservient to the powers that rule them. But we do take issue with him when he undertakes to say that men and women comprising this Church are subservient to men. The strength of the “Mormon” Church lies in the individual testimony of its members, because they know the truth, and yet we honor and respect the priesthood, and the great and good men at the head of the Church. We love them, and cherish them, and would lay down our lives for them, if need be; yet we do not worship them. We worship God and Jesus Christ.
As we view the great mission of the Church, there looms before me this question, how are we individually shaping our lives to advance that great work? Are we ready to go on missions and labor to advance God's purposes in the world? Are we prepared to sacrifice when the times comes to that end? Is our example to the world such as we would have it to be, and since we are said to be one of the greatest organizations in the world today, by those who stand high in the councils of the world, then we ought to be ready to say: I will dedicate my life, or a portion of it, to-the end that God’s purposes may be magnified in the earth, and that this Church may also be magnified commensurate to the claims we make.
I call upon you returned missionaries, men and women, with all the fervor of my soul, as I called upon the missionaries of the Western States last night, in our reunion, to carry with you and keep with you as you return to your homes the spirit of the mission field; seek to be engaged in the work of the Lord, and be ready for any call that is made upon you, and endeavor to carry throughout the Church the spirit that you had in the mission field, for we at home have not all of us that inspiration; many have not the power and influence that you had in the mission field, to keep young men and young women from going astray, as well as to keep yourselves free from sin. We have much to fear, let me tell you, from the powers of the Adversary, for they are at work in Zion as well as abroad in the earth.
As I view sometimes the magnitude of this work and what I humbly hope to do, I recall the lines of a poet, when he said:
“If you could know that half of all I yearn to be to you, dear heart!
Each day that dawns I struggle to be strong and do my part,
Yet when at last the night comes softly down I humbly pray,
‘Lord, grant me still to prove my tender love just one more day!’
“Just one more day to strive to rise above small troubles, petty care,
That my cramped soul may break its earth-forged bonds, at last to dare
To face the future anti to gladly live with courage new,
Loyal and cheerful facing toward the light for truth and you.
“And yet I feel in spite of all the heights which I can never scale,
In spite of all the many tests in which I daily fail,
That my deep love, more deep and pure and strong than I can ever show.
You somehow, through my failures, doubts and fears, will come to know.
“The dreary clouds can’t hide the sun for aye; it glimmers through.
The sweet, wet violet, struggling through dead leaves, still shows its blue.
And so I trust, though oft I strike love’s chord with clumsy hand.
You’ll feel the melody I tried to play and understand.”
May God’s blessing be with us to guide and keep us in the way of life and truth, I pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.
The choir sang the hymn. “Softly beams the sacred dawning.”
(President Western States Mission.)
A few weeks ago, Prof. Harvey A. Overstreet, of the College of the City of New York, speaking to a convention of ministers of one of the great Christian churches, at Pittsburgh, said substantially as follows:
“The time is ripe for the formulation of a new religion. Much that is peculiar of the period of today is also peculiar of the Alexandrian period, when Christianity had its birth. Today sees great cults arising. There are great social upheavals. It is a great age of ferment. I sometimes think that out of this vast social caldron will come some new thing. It seems we can believe this; that the accredited religions institutionalized as they are, have been failures. We find the attitude towards the church is rather lukewarm. The accredited religions are not the great soul-inspiring, encompassing things they ought to be. The new religion will come out of the midst of those groups which have accepted the scientific, democratic and social point of view.”
I wondered, as I read the dispatch accredited to this educator, if he had familiarized himself with all of the religions of the day before making the statement attributed to him, for it would seem that there is one rather widely .known creed which might cover the vital features demanded by the gentleman in the new religion he is looking for. That religion I do not hesitate to say is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Let us see how the Church would line up by comparison. The theology of "Mormonism” is in harmony with science, or better stated, the conclusions of some of the greatest scientific minds have been made to harmonize with much that has been set forth as "Mormon” teaching. When that religion was founded there was need, apparently, for some new thing, because there was much lacking in the confessed creeds of the various religions. For instance, most of them professed a belief that God was an incorporeal immaterial Being, without body, parts or passions. They professed also that the world was created, literally created, out of nothing, and likewise that man also was literally created, and that he was predestined to either a glorious salvation or eternal damnation, and that no act of his could change the plan of his life.
With the teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, these impossible ideas were set aside, for he testified that God and Jesus Christ were separate and distinct beings, corporeal beings, that they visited him in vision the most remarkable of modern times, or for all time perhaps of which we have record, when he talked face to face with them, and received instructions regarding the contemplated work to be established in the world for the last time, the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is also a cardinal teaching in “Mormonism” that matter is eternal, and that the object had by the Almighty in forming the world was to bring together the various forces that were already here, and that matter, while altered, could not be destroyed, i. e., annihilated. As respecting man, it is confidently asserted that he was born into the world of mortality through the plan of the Almighty, and that the intelligence of man is also eternal,— is in fact co-eternal with God. Some advanced thoughts as regards astronomy were also made known, which science has since recognized. From the standpoint of democracy in religion we can pass muster surely for a revelation was received in 1830, but three months after the organization of the Church as follows: “And all things shall be done by common consent in the Church by much prayer and faith for all things you shall receive by faith.” That rule has obtained and still maintains in the Church. Candidates for the priesthood must be approved by the voice of the people. Stake and ward authorities are presented to be voted upon and this great conference has set its seal of approval by vote upon the General Authorities, and similar action is also taken throughout the stakes at each quarterly conference.
As to the social point of view. We are given credit for having solved most satisfactorily the most important problems, by those who have impartially investigated our conditions. Thomas M. Bicknell, a former president of the National Education Association and prominent educator of New England, writes as follows:
“The ‘Mormon’ polity, on the side of social order, is recognized as the most thoroughly organized system in the world. Every intelligent man should study it for its recognition of the solution of economic health and social problems. Its details of supervision are exact, thorough-going and efficient.
“Beyond and above all in perfection
of system and in the realization of grand results, are the industry, frugality and temperance of the people. The beehive properly symbolizes the spirit and practice of the ‘Mormons.’ Go where you will, you will find no poverty, while wealth abounds in practical abundance. Homes are full of comforts and luxuries; art, music and literature are the endowments of all. The wealth of the land has attracted the ‘Mormons’ more than the wealth of the mines, and both are making wealth common and fairly distributed.
“Utah is a rich land of great possibilities. Its richest possession is its ‘Mormon’ population of honest, pure minded, sweet-hearted men, women and children who have drawn on Nature’s forces for her grateful services and returns. They have, out of the lion’s mouth, plucked the honeycomb of sweet content and honest life, and were the Master to walk the streets of Salt Lake City today, would he not say to all critics and detractors of ‘Mormonism:’ ‘Let him that is without sin cast the first stone’?’’
We are judged by the world because they know little of the teachings of professed “Mormonism.” Only last fall, while making a tour of the South, the Vice-President of the United States, Thomas R. Marshall, was quoted in the dispatches from Phoenix, Arizona, in speaking of Efficiency, as follows:
“We want to be an efficient people, but we want to be also a free people. We cannot be both. The German nation and the ‘Mormon’ Church are the two greatest organizations, in the world, but in each the individual is subservient to the organization. What we want is efficiency, but we also want freedom with it.”
I think one might well agree with him in the statement regarding the German nation, and without saying anything derogatory of them as a people it is pretty generally conceded that they have been subservient to the powers that rule them. But we do take issue with him when he undertakes to say that men and women comprising this Church are subservient to men. The strength of the “Mormon” Church lies in the individual testimony of its members, because they know the truth, and yet we honor and respect the priesthood, and the great and good men at the head of the Church. We love them, and cherish them, and would lay down our lives for them, if need be; yet we do not worship them. We worship God and Jesus Christ.
As we view the great mission of the Church, there looms before me this question, how are we individually shaping our lives to advance that great work? Are we ready to go on missions and labor to advance God's purposes in the world? Are we prepared to sacrifice when the times comes to that end? Is our example to the world such as we would have it to be, and since we are said to be one of the greatest organizations in the world today, by those who stand high in the councils of the world, then we ought to be ready to say: I will dedicate my life, or a portion of it, to-the end that God’s purposes may be magnified in the earth, and that this Church may also be magnified commensurate to the claims we make.
I call upon you returned missionaries, men and women, with all the fervor of my soul, as I called upon the missionaries of the Western States last night, in our reunion, to carry with you and keep with you as you return to your homes the spirit of the mission field; seek to be engaged in the work of the Lord, and be ready for any call that is made upon you, and endeavor to carry throughout the Church the spirit that you had in the mission field, for we at home have not all of us that inspiration; many have not the power and influence that you had in the mission field, to keep young men and young women from going astray, as well as to keep yourselves free from sin. We have much to fear, let me tell you, from the powers of the Adversary, for they are at work in Zion as well as abroad in the earth.
As I view sometimes the magnitude of this work and what I humbly hope to do, I recall the lines of a poet, when he said:
“If you could know that half of all I yearn to be to you, dear heart!
Each day that dawns I struggle to be strong and do my part,
Yet when at last the night comes softly down I humbly pray,
‘Lord, grant me still to prove my tender love just one more day!’
“Just one more day to strive to rise above small troubles, petty care,
That my cramped soul may break its earth-forged bonds, at last to dare
To face the future anti to gladly live with courage new,
Loyal and cheerful facing toward the light for truth and you.
“And yet I feel in spite of all the heights which I can never scale,
In spite of all the many tests in which I daily fail,
That my deep love, more deep and pure and strong than I can ever show.
You somehow, through my failures, doubts and fears, will come to know.
“The dreary clouds can’t hide the sun for aye; it glimmers through.
The sweet, wet violet, struggling through dead leaves, still shows its blue.
And so I trust, though oft I strike love’s chord with clumsy hand.
You’ll feel the melody I tried to play and understand.”
May God’s blessing be with us to guide and keep us in the way of life and truth, I pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.
The choir sang the hymn. “Softly beams the sacred dawning.”
ELDER CHARLES A. CALLIS.
(President Southern States Mission.)
Sacred thoughts fill my heart as I face this congregation, because I know that all of you have made great sacrifices for the preaching of the gospel and the establishment of the kingdom of God in the earth. But you have embraced the truth and the faith which connects your souls with God. and you walk in the comfort of the Holy Ghost.
In the Book of Mormon is this prophecy: “And blessed are they who shall seek to bring forth my Zion at that day, for they shall have the gift and the power of the Holy Ghost.” Bearing in mind that among the choicest gifts of the Holy Ghost is the gift of prophecy, let us examine this prophecy for a moment or two and see whether it has been fulfilled. When the Prophet Joseph translated the Book of Mormon he was only 25 years old. The Church had not been organized, but God did fulfill that prophecy by the mouth of His Holy Prophets, who spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. The Prophet Joseph Smith, by the gift and power of revelation predicted the great Civil War which raged in ferocity and fearfulness for a number of years. He predicted that the war would terminate in the death and misery of many souls. When war was declared the people of the South thought that the bravery and the valor of their soldiers would end the war in a few months, and that great patriot Abraham Lincoln himself believed that a few months would terminate the struggle. One of our brethren in the South, who was appointed to a command in the Confederate army, in addressing his men before they went to war, said: “Boys, do not delude yourselves; this is going to be a long and a bloody war.” They said, “How do you know?” “Because,” said he, “T am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, and he predicted that this war would terminate in the death and the misery of many souls.” Did Joseph Smith have the gift of the power of the Holy Ghost? Consult the annals of our great republic. Shakespeare declares there are sermons in stones. The monuments erected in the North and in the South to commemorate the valor and the heroism of the boys in blue and the boys that wore the gray are eloquent sermons in stones that Joseph Smith did speak by the gift and the power of the Holy Ghost.
In that same revelation on war, it is predicted that after this war between the North and the South, then war would be poured out upon all nations. Behold the deadly war in Europe. Listen to the bursting of the bombs, the roar of the cannon, the groans of the dying, the moans from the mothers’ anguish stricken hearts, and then tell me if Joseph Smith was a prophet of God. The Latter-day Saints do not as a people pray for the victory of one wavering nation over another wavering nation. I will tell you what they pray for, they pray that the nations of the earth that are at war may lose their lust for conquest, may stifle their greed for gain; and they also pray that these nations may seek God for that choice gift which cometh from Him, even the gift of repentance. Isaiah, the prophet, declared: “When thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness,” and O may God grant that these warring nations may forsake their stubbornness of heart. We pray that they will have a change of heart, that they may pray with David: “Create in me a clean heart. O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence, and take not thy Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation, and uphold me with thy free Spirit.”
Now, my brethren and sisters, the mission of this Church is to preach the gospel, to awaken in the hearts of men and women the spirit of repentance. Indeed, so important is this, that God has said: “Say nothing but repentance unto this generation.” The gospel is “God’s last warning” to men, and your sons and your daughters are boldly, bravely and grandly proclaiming the mission to bring to pass the purposes of God.
Recently a minister said, “The description of the Millennium plainly indicates a revival of the pure faith and practice of primitive Christianity.” “It is to be remembered,” says this minister, “that the protestant reformation did not effect this. During the millennium period these will be brought back to their best estate, and become dominant, and this state of things will continue during the thousand years.” It is our testimony, which we are bearing to the nations of the earth, that this primitive gospel hath been restored to the earth, and with it has been restored the holy priesthood, which is the power and authority to minister in the things pertaining to the Almighty. Jesus said: “And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world as a witness unto all nations, and then shall the end come.” Among many nations are heard the voices of your noble sons and daughters, approved of God, choice young men and young women, crying “Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
May God grant that the nations of the earth may not be compelled much longer to learn righteousness, to learn repentance, but may they turn to their God with repentant hearts and renewed spirits, and accept the everlasting gospel, be baptized without stubbornness of heart, and with you and me rejoice in the blessings of the everlasting gospel, is my prayer in the name of Jesus. Amen.
(President Southern States Mission.)
Sacred thoughts fill my heart as I face this congregation, because I know that all of you have made great sacrifices for the preaching of the gospel and the establishment of the kingdom of God in the earth. But you have embraced the truth and the faith which connects your souls with God. and you walk in the comfort of the Holy Ghost.
In the Book of Mormon is this prophecy: “And blessed are they who shall seek to bring forth my Zion at that day, for they shall have the gift and the power of the Holy Ghost.” Bearing in mind that among the choicest gifts of the Holy Ghost is the gift of prophecy, let us examine this prophecy for a moment or two and see whether it has been fulfilled. When the Prophet Joseph translated the Book of Mormon he was only 25 years old. The Church had not been organized, but God did fulfill that prophecy by the mouth of His Holy Prophets, who spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. The Prophet Joseph Smith, by the gift and power of revelation predicted the great Civil War which raged in ferocity and fearfulness for a number of years. He predicted that the war would terminate in the death and misery of many souls. When war was declared the people of the South thought that the bravery and the valor of their soldiers would end the war in a few months, and that great patriot Abraham Lincoln himself believed that a few months would terminate the struggle. One of our brethren in the South, who was appointed to a command in the Confederate army, in addressing his men before they went to war, said: “Boys, do not delude yourselves; this is going to be a long and a bloody war.” They said, “How do you know?” “Because,” said he, “T am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, and he predicted that this war would terminate in the death and the misery of many souls.” Did Joseph Smith have the gift of the power of the Holy Ghost? Consult the annals of our great republic. Shakespeare declares there are sermons in stones. The monuments erected in the North and in the South to commemorate the valor and the heroism of the boys in blue and the boys that wore the gray are eloquent sermons in stones that Joseph Smith did speak by the gift and the power of the Holy Ghost.
In that same revelation on war, it is predicted that after this war between the North and the South, then war would be poured out upon all nations. Behold the deadly war in Europe. Listen to the bursting of the bombs, the roar of the cannon, the groans of the dying, the moans from the mothers’ anguish stricken hearts, and then tell me if Joseph Smith was a prophet of God. The Latter-day Saints do not as a people pray for the victory of one wavering nation over another wavering nation. I will tell you what they pray for, they pray that the nations of the earth that are at war may lose their lust for conquest, may stifle their greed for gain; and they also pray that these nations may seek God for that choice gift which cometh from Him, even the gift of repentance. Isaiah, the prophet, declared: “When thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness,” and O may God grant that these warring nations may forsake their stubbornness of heart. We pray that they will have a change of heart, that they may pray with David: “Create in me a clean heart. O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence, and take not thy Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation, and uphold me with thy free Spirit.”
Now, my brethren and sisters, the mission of this Church is to preach the gospel, to awaken in the hearts of men and women the spirit of repentance. Indeed, so important is this, that God has said: “Say nothing but repentance unto this generation.” The gospel is “God’s last warning” to men, and your sons and your daughters are boldly, bravely and grandly proclaiming the mission to bring to pass the purposes of God.
Recently a minister said, “The description of the Millennium plainly indicates a revival of the pure faith and practice of primitive Christianity.” “It is to be remembered,” says this minister, “that the protestant reformation did not effect this. During the millennium period these will be brought back to their best estate, and become dominant, and this state of things will continue during the thousand years.” It is our testimony, which we are bearing to the nations of the earth, that this primitive gospel hath been restored to the earth, and with it has been restored the holy priesthood, which is the power and authority to minister in the things pertaining to the Almighty. Jesus said: “And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world as a witness unto all nations, and then shall the end come.” Among many nations are heard the voices of your noble sons and daughters, approved of God, choice young men and young women, crying “Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
May God grant that the nations of the earth may not be compelled much longer to learn righteousness, to learn repentance, but may they turn to their God with repentant hearts and renewed spirits, and accept the everlasting gospel, be baptized without stubbornness of heart, and with you and me rejoice in the blessings of the everlasting gospel, is my prayer in the name of Jesus. Amen.
ELDER GEORGE F. RICHARDS.
Convincing character of testimony borne by the Saints—Man should follow Nature’s example of obedience to law.
My dear brethren and sisters, if President Joseph F. Smith were in attendance at this concluding meeting of the conference, we might reasonably expect that he would leave his benediction with us, as that is his custom, and I know that many of the Saints look forward with keen anticipation of the privilege of attending the last session of the conference, in the tabernacle, that they may hear his words and receive his blessing. Some of you, no doubt, feel very much disappointed at not having this privilege today. Therefore, as a representative of President Joseph F. Smith and of the Lord, and by the authority of the Holy Priesthood, I bless you, my brethren and sisters. May God’s choicest blessings attend you in the future as in the past, and even more abundantly, thus rewarding you for all your faithfulness and integrity in serving Him.
The testimonies to which you have listened this afternoon have been inspired by the Spirit of the Lord, those who have spoken have done so as the oracles of God. Their testimonies and instructions will be published to the world, and shall stand as a witness against those who, hearing or reading these testimonies, shall reject them. To see both the Tabernacle and Assembly Hall filled to overflowing, and at the same time great throngs of people out on the Temple grounds must impress the thoughtful of those who are not of us, with the devotion of the Latter-day Saints to their religion. I thank the Lord that I am identified with this great work, and have fellowship with you, members of His Church. The Latter-day Saints are, perhaps, more than any other religionists, convinced and sure of the correctness of their religious attitude before the world; this is evident in the strength of their testimonies. Can anyone who has heard these elders speak this afternoon doubt their sincerity or the assurance they have of the truth of their own statements?
The Latter-day Saints have unstinted faith in God; they do not undertake, in any degree, to abridge His knowledge, His power, or His authority. While we regard Him as a man perfected, we accept literally the scriptural declaration, “The Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that in them is.” All His creations are governed by laws of His own making, and, excepting man, all His creations are obedient to His laws; hence the order everywhere throughout the universe. If these inanimate creations were as disobedient to laws made for their government as is man to laws made for his government, there would be universal confusion and chaos. On the other hand, if man were as obedient in his sphere as the heavenly bodies are in theirs, there would be like harmony and order, with peace on earth and good will towards men everywhere. If man’s disobedience then is apparent, as also its baneful effects, what is the lesson we should learn by it? As for the Latter-day Saints, we know better than we do. and have need of being impressed with the necessity for doing as well as we know. The poet, Waldo Emerson, felt this same weakness and expressed it in terms as follows: “What I most need is somebody to make me do as well as I can." The Apostle James declared unto the people of his time: “Wherefore, lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls, but be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.” When the Savior was concluding His sermon upon the Mount He seemed to have in mind man’s failing and took occasion to leave this admonition as the climax of His sermon:
“Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock; and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon that house, and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock. And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: and the rains descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”
It is one thing to give intellectual assent unto the commandments of the Lord, and another to obey the same. It is the obedience that counts for righteousness and for salvation. Obedience is the lesson we need to learn. This lesson learned, as the Lord would have the Latter-day Saints to learn the lesson of obedience, and the first suggestion from the presiding authorities of the Church that we do not indulge in card playing, immodest dancing, immodest dressing, etc., would be sufficient. We sing, “We thank Thee. O God, for a Prophet to guide us in these latter days.” and then in many instances refuse to be so guided. This is displeasing to the Lord, as well as being hurtful to the individual.
Prejudice in the minds of people who have been misinformed in relation to the Latter-day Saints and their religion, is a great barrier in the way of such people receiving the message of the Gospel which we have for the world. If our lives were consistent with our profession of faith, it would go a long way toward removing this prejudice and preparing the way for effective sowing of the seeds of truth, to the honor and glory of the Lord and the salvation of His children.
May the Lord bless you, my brethren and sisters, and may His peace be upon Zion and her people, and upon all the earth, I pray in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The anthem, “Praise ye the Father,” was sung by the combined choirs.
The closing prayer was by Elder William C. Parkinson.
Convincing character of testimony borne by the Saints—Man should follow Nature’s example of obedience to law.
My dear brethren and sisters, if President Joseph F. Smith were in attendance at this concluding meeting of the conference, we might reasonably expect that he would leave his benediction with us, as that is his custom, and I know that many of the Saints look forward with keen anticipation of the privilege of attending the last session of the conference, in the tabernacle, that they may hear his words and receive his blessing. Some of you, no doubt, feel very much disappointed at not having this privilege today. Therefore, as a representative of President Joseph F. Smith and of the Lord, and by the authority of the Holy Priesthood, I bless you, my brethren and sisters. May God’s choicest blessings attend you in the future as in the past, and even more abundantly, thus rewarding you for all your faithfulness and integrity in serving Him.
The testimonies to which you have listened this afternoon have been inspired by the Spirit of the Lord, those who have spoken have done so as the oracles of God. Their testimonies and instructions will be published to the world, and shall stand as a witness against those who, hearing or reading these testimonies, shall reject them. To see both the Tabernacle and Assembly Hall filled to overflowing, and at the same time great throngs of people out on the Temple grounds must impress the thoughtful of those who are not of us, with the devotion of the Latter-day Saints to their religion. I thank the Lord that I am identified with this great work, and have fellowship with you, members of His Church. The Latter-day Saints are, perhaps, more than any other religionists, convinced and sure of the correctness of their religious attitude before the world; this is evident in the strength of their testimonies. Can anyone who has heard these elders speak this afternoon doubt their sincerity or the assurance they have of the truth of their own statements?
The Latter-day Saints have unstinted faith in God; they do not undertake, in any degree, to abridge His knowledge, His power, or His authority. While we regard Him as a man perfected, we accept literally the scriptural declaration, “The Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that in them is.” All His creations are governed by laws of His own making, and, excepting man, all His creations are obedient to His laws; hence the order everywhere throughout the universe. If these inanimate creations were as disobedient to laws made for their government as is man to laws made for his government, there would be universal confusion and chaos. On the other hand, if man were as obedient in his sphere as the heavenly bodies are in theirs, there would be like harmony and order, with peace on earth and good will towards men everywhere. If man’s disobedience then is apparent, as also its baneful effects, what is the lesson we should learn by it? As for the Latter-day Saints, we know better than we do. and have need of being impressed with the necessity for doing as well as we know. The poet, Waldo Emerson, felt this same weakness and expressed it in terms as follows: “What I most need is somebody to make me do as well as I can." The Apostle James declared unto the people of his time: “Wherefore, lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls, but be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.” When the Savior was concluding His sermon upon the Mount He seemed to have in mind man’s failing and took occasion to leave this admonition as the climax of His sermon:
“Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock; and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon that house, and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock. And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: and the rains descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”
It is one thing to give intellectual assent unto the commandments of the Lord, and another to obey the same. It is the obedience that counts for righteousness and for salvation. Obedience is the lesson we need to learn. This lesson learned, as the Lord would have the Latter-day Saints to learn the lesson of obedience, and the first suggestion from the presiding authorities of the Church that we do not indulge in card playing, immodest dancing, immodest dressing, etc., would be sufficient. We sing, “We thank Thee. O God, for a Prophet to guide us in these latter days.” and then in many instances refuse to be so guided. This is displeasing to the Lord, as well as being hurtful to the individual.
Prejudice in the minds of people who have been misinformed in relation to the Latter-day Saints and their religion, is a great barrier in the way of such people receiving the message of the Gospel which we have for the world. If our lives were consistent with our profession of faith, it would go a long way toward removing this prejudice and preparing the way for effective sowing of the seeds of truth, to the honor and glory of the Lord and the salvation of His children.
May the Lord bless you, my brethren and sisters, and may His peace be upon Zion and her people, and upon all the earth, I pray in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The anthem, “Praise ye the Father,” was sung by the combined choirs.
The closing prayer was by Elder William C. Parkinson.
OUTDOOR MEETING.
A meeting was held in front of the Bureau of Information, at 2 p. m.; Elder George Albert Smith presided, and the male choir of the Salt Lake L. D. S. U. furnished choral selections, under the leadership of B. Cecil Gates.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “How firm a foundation.”
Prayer was offered by Bishop Moses H. Pond.
The male choir sang the anthem, “O Death, where is thy sting ?”
A meeting was held in front of the Bureau of Information, at 2 p. m.; Elder George Albert Smith presided, and the male choir of the Salt Lake L. D. S. U. furnished choral selections, under the leadership of B. Cecil Gates.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “How firm a foundation.”
Prayer was offered by Bishop Moses H. Pond.
The male choir sang the anthem, “O Death, where is thy sting ?”
ELDER JOHN R. YOUNG.
(Of San Juan Stake.)
My brethren and sisters, and friends who may be present here today, I feel very weak and humble in standing before you, and I do not know whether I will be able to control my feelings so as to speak to you or not; but there is a prayer in my heart, that God will bless me, and strengthen me, that I may be able, for the few minutes that I shall stand before you, to say some things that shall be comforting, and I trust, interesting to us as Latter-day Saints.
I feel very grateful in my heart that I was born of parents who had received a testimony of the divine mission of the Prophet Joseph Smith; and I feel very thankful to my parents for the examples that they always placed before me. My father was a man who believed in prayer. My mother was a Christian woman, she always called her children about her and had them kneel in her presence, and thank God for His mercies to them, every day before they lay down to sleep. I thank my mother for these lessons.
I have had the privilege of going out into the world, away from our people. I was called when I was a boy of sixteen, to go into the mission field to proclaim the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ to the children of men. I can recall how feeble and weak I was, and I thank the Christian world for the charity that they had toward me when I was but a child, trying to labor among them. I had them often ask me why I was a Latter-day Saint. I suppose that my replies to that seemed simple and childish to them, but my statements were honest and truthful.
In the early years of my life I remember meeting the Prophet Joseph Smith. I was a sickly child; had suffered for two weeks, perhaps. with the chills and fever. I was a little skeleton, and peevish, everything would annoy me. I remember that one morning my father had led me out to give me a little sunshine, and in that walk we met the Prophet Joseph Smith, his brother Hyrum, and Sidney Rigdon. When they met my father, they shook hands with him, and the Prophet asked father if I was the little boy that father had requested the Elders to pray for. Now, the Latter-day Saints were a praying people; they had faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and that faith was strengthened in their bosoms by the testimonies of the Prophet Joseph Smith; and on that occasion, when we met them, I knew the Prophet. I had seen him in the congregations of the Saints, and I knew that he was a man that our people honored and loved; and hence I felt a thrill of pleasure pass over my little frame when he paid some little attention to me. When my father had told him that I was the child he had requested the Elders to pray for, the Prophet stepped toward me, and took my little straw hat from my head. He ran his fingers through my curly hair, and for the moment it seemed to me that he was looking far away, and then he said to father, “Brother Young, don’t you worry about this little man, he will live to grow up to manhood, and will help carry this gospel to the nations of the earth.” That is one of my strongest and earliest recollections of things that came to me in this life, and hence I have answered to those who have met me out in the world, and asked me why I was a Latter-day Saint, that from my childhood, lessons came to me that gave me faith in the prophet of the last days, the Prophet Joseph Smith.
I also recall the martyrdom of the Prophets Joseph and Hyrum. My father was away from home, in the state of Ohio, doing missionary work at the time of the martyrdom. When he returned home, he said to the family, when they were gathered around the table, “Just as long as Brother Brigham is faithful to the trust that is placed upon him, they will seek for his blood.” I wondered, though a child, why that should be, but the experiences of my life have shown me that feelings of that kind are natural to the wicked. As I matured in years, so that I could read and begin to grasp what I read, I learned that persecution was the common heritage of every man that has been called of God and given a mission to the human family.
As I have stated, I was called when a boy of sixteen, to go out and teach the gospel to the children of men. My mission was to the Pacific Islands, the Islands of Hawaii. When I reached there, I was assigned to labor on the island of Oahu. I will tell you a little of my personal experiences. I can hardly go beyond that in my talking to you. I was placed in a native family, a man by the name of Kyama, and his wife, no children in the family. They two promised to take care of me, and give me a home with them while I should study their language. About one week after my arrival there, a native woman, one of the neighbors, died. The natives indulged in considerable and extreme mourning over her. I was curious to see the manner of interment, and I went to the home. I saw them wrap the body in carpets and sew it up in mats, and carry it to the grave. At the graveyard, we met the minister of that parish, a venerable looking man, in appearance very much like our Brother Orson Pratt. I admired the man when I first saw him, on account of his resemblance to Orson Pratt, whom I loved. I went straight up to that minister of the gospel and offered him my hand, and told him who I was. I feared no man on earth at that time. I had injured no one, and felt kindly toward everybody; I wanted to do men good, that was the desire of my heart. I saw the minister draw Kyama to one side, and talk sharp to him; and when I returned to the cottage that was to be my home there was no one there. For three days and nights I stayed there, without food. I felt indignant at the treatment that was given to me, I could not tell why it was, and I turned to leave.
I took my little carpet sack, and started walking back to Honolulu, about forty miles. When I came to the creek that flows about a mile south of the village I stopped and asked myself, “What are you going to do ?”
Let me go a little further back, because there may be parents here of sons that are out in the mission field, or may be called into the mission field, and I want to bear my testimony that God never forsakes those who trust Him. Now, President Brigham Young had spoken to me, when I was called upon that mission, and I told him frankly and honestly that I did not know “Mormonism” to be true, “I know that you do not know it to be true. That is one reason we want you to go on this mission. And I will make you a promise, if you will go on this mission and live close to the Lord, and not commit sin, I promise you that when you come home you will take me by the hand and look me straight in the face, and tell me that you know ‘Mormonism’ is true. Now, will you go?” I accepted the mission.
When I stood at the bridge, I questioned myself, “What are you going to do? Go back to Honolulu and tell the President of the mission that you have not sand in your crop so that you can stand a little hunger and a little unpleasantness? And when you tell him that, perhaps he will chide you for that. Then what? I will not be chided, I have done no man wrong, and I will not be chided, I will go home.” But I thought a little, and then felt ashamed of myself, and turned aside, and went up the creek until I found a grove of timber, and I slipped into that grove and knelt down and prayed, and while I prayed, that cloud of ill feeling passed from me, and there was rather a gleam of joy that came to me, and I retraced my steps back to the bridge. As I came back to the bridge a native man came also, leading a little burro with a load of oranges on his back. The burro was overloaded, his little back bent (’own until the bundle of oranges almost touched the ground, it was almost all he could do to carry his burden. The native had a rope tied to a ring in the donkey’s nose, leading him. Across the bridge going northward there was a sharp, rocky hill, and when he reached the foot of that hill the donkey stopped there. The man held the rope in his left hand, and with his right he commenced stoning the little burro, and swearing in English at him. I set my little carpet bag down and went to the man and said, “Stop stoning that burro, that is cruel, you must not do it. And why do you swear at him?” And he said, “Don’t all white men swear when things won’t do what they want them to do?” I replied, “No, it is only bad white men that swear. I would like to see you get the burro up the hill without swearing at him and stoning him; give me the rope.” He handed me the rope, and I went to the side of the road and pulled a little grass, and wiped the blood from the burro’s head, where he had been struck with a stone, then patted him and talked to him kindly; and when I had done so, I started to walk up the hill. I did not pull the rope, I just held it in my hand, and that little burro, as if an inspiration had come to him, climbed up the hill with the load on his back. When I reached the top the man, who had followed, said, “What is your name?” I told him, and he then said, “Where is your home?” Then I broke down; that was a very tender word to me. The man then asked, “Don’t you want to go an l live with me?” That was just what I wanted, and I said I would be very pleased to go and live with him. He said. “Stay here until I come back, and you can go home with me.” lie went on down to the landing, sold his oranges, and came back, and I started to walk up the mountain with him. When he saw that I was weak, he picked me up, for he was a strong man, and set me in the saddle on the burro. I went into the orange grove where his home was, and stayed with him until I learned to talk the native language.
Afterward, when I met Kyama, who had turned me out. I asked him why he had done that, and he said. “The minister holds a paper on my little home, so he can take it away from me, and he told me you were a viper, and that if I kept you. you would sting me to death; and so I neglected tending to you, because I was fearful of the minister. When I learned that, I walked straight for that minister’s home. He had company when I came there, knocked on the door, and they bade me come in, and I told him what I came for. I asked him if it was true that he told that native man not to feed me, and to turn me from his home, he said it was perfectly correct. I said, “You a minister of the gospel? Where do you find in the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ anything that will justify you in treating me that way? I had not wronged you, there is not a being on the face of the earth that can say that I have injured them; and yet you told that man to starve me, and you told him things that were not true—you told him that I was a viper, that I would sting him to death, that I was an imposter. You told him things that you imagined, for which you had no proof, and I ask you to recall what you did, and make acknowledgment of it.”
Those are some of the things that I met with when I first went out into the world. It taught me some things; it taught me that some at least, in the Christian world have lost the spirit of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. That was the beginning of my coming against men that should be fathers to the people—bright, intelligent men who have lost the spirit that should accompany a man who is a professed servant of the living God.
By and by, I undertook to preach. I remember my first text, it was the 16th verse of the 16th chapter of Mark. It was what Christ said to His apostles when He met with them after His crucifixion: “Go ye into the world, and preach the gospel to every creature, he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.” Now, to me that is very strong and authoritative language, “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.” Then I went on to tell of the signs that should follow those that believe. Now, I had lived among the Latter-day Saints from a child up, but I had not seen manifestations that brought conviction directly to me in regard to the fulfillment of those things, and I wondered a little myself in regard to them. But they are true, my brethren and sisters. God has restored them again to the earth. I will tell you the first one that I ever witnessed, when I was out in the world. It may be good for some of our young people at home to hear it. It was in the city of San Francisco. Apostle Parley P. Pratt was presiding there. Three of us. Elders Joseph F. Smith and William W. Cluff, and myself were given the task of tracting the city of San Francisco. Brother Joseph F. Smith could not stand it—he came home in the evening and said to Brother Pratt. “I will work any place that you will put me to work—I do not care what the nature of the work is. I will do it; but I will not walk the streets of San Francisco and receive the abuse that I receive when I offer to give them a tract, I cannot stand it.” Brother Pratt consequently released him from it, and Brother Cluff was released also, but he held me to the task. I guess it was a blessing to me that I was such a little boy, because men felt ashamed to be very rough with me: and I kept at the work. One day when I returned from tracting. I came to Sister Evans’, the widow lady who was giving me a home, and she said, “Brother Young, hurry up stairs, they are having trouble up there.” I passed upstairs, and found the little room was nearly filled, there was scarcely room for any more. Not many of them were Latter-day Saints, and there was an excitement there. A woman was lying upon the bed, and when I came into the room, she sprang from that bed and tried to climb the walls of the room, but several of the sisters took hold of her. Elder William McBride, an Elder of experience, was in the room and he said to me, “Come here quick.” I was frightened but hurried to his side, and endeavored to put my hand upon the woman’s head, but she grasped my hand in one of hers, and it seemed to me like a bird’s claw; and she barked at me furiously, as a dog will bark. But we succeeded in laying our hands upon her head, and Brother McBride rebuked the evil spirit; she then became quiet and calm. The excitement caused Brother McBride to feel sick, and he withdrew. I stayed there with my hands resting upon her forehead. After a while I thought she was asleep, and I drew my hands. Just then, Parley P. Pratt came into the room and she sprang from the bed again, and with difficulty they succeeded in controlling her. Brother Pratt spoke like one who had authority. In the name of Jesus Christ he rebuked the evil spirit, and commanded it to leave the room, and we then had peace. That lady was not a member of our Church. The sisters waited upon her. and gave her a little refreshment. She talked a little while with President Pratt, and then Elder McBride and myself walked with her to a convenient place and baptized her into the Church.
I do not want to occupy more of your time. I thank my Heavenly Father that He has let me live to see this people grow as we have grown. I drove a pair of oxen hitched to a little cart, and helped haul the dirt from the foundation of this Temple, when I was a little boy. I feel to rejoice that I have lived to see this Temple completed, and to see the prosperity and the power that our Heavenly Father has given to His chosen people.
May God help you to be faithful and true to the covenants you have made. I testify to you that when I have had the privilege of going into holy places, I have only been taught lessons that have helped me be a virtuous, an honest, and a prayerful man. This is my testimony to you, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The L. D. S. U. quartette sang, “The Land far away.”
(Of San Juan Stake.)
My brethren and sisters, and friends who may be present here today, I feel very weak and humble in standing before you, and I do not know whether I will be able to control my feelings so as to speak to you or not; but there is a prayer in my heart, that God will bless me, and strengthen me, that I may be able, for the few minutes that I shall stand before you, to say some things that shall be comforting, and I trust, interesting to us as Latter-day Saints.
I feel very grateful in my heart that I was born of parents who had received a testimony of the divine mission of the Prophet Joseph Smith; and I feel very thankful to my parents for the examples that they always placed before me. My father was a man who believed in prayer. My mother was a Christian woman, she always called her children about her and had them kneel in her presence, and thank God for His mercies to them, every day before they lay down to sleep. I thank my mother for these lessons.
I have had the privilege of going out into the world, away from our people. I was called when I was a boy of sixteen, to go into the mission field to proclaim the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ to the children of men. I can recall how feeble and weak I was, and I thank the Christian world for the charity that they had toward me when I was but a child, trying to labor among them. I had them often ask me why I was a Latter-day Saint. I suppose that my replies to that seemed simple and childish to them, but my statements were honest and truthful.
In the early years of my life I remember meeting the Prophet Joseph Smith. I was a sickly child; had suffered for two weeks, perhaps. with the chills and fever. I was a little skeleton, and peevish, everything would annoy me. I remember that one morning my father had led me out to give me a little sunshine, and in that walk we met the Prophet Joseph Smith, his brother Hyrum, and Sidney Rigdon. When they met my father, they shook hands with him, and the Prophet asked father if I was the little boy that father had requested the Elders to pray for. Now, the Latter-day Saints were a praying people; they had faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and that faith was strengthened in their bosoms by the testimonies of the Prophet Joseph Smith; and on that occasion, when we met them, I knew the Prophet. I had seen him in the congregations of the Saints, and I knew that he was a man that our people honored and loved; and hence I felt a thrill of pleasure pass over my little frame when he paid some little attention to me. When my father had told him that I was the child he had requested the Elders to pray for, the Prophet stepped toward me, and took my little straw hat from my head. He ran his fingers through my curly hair, and for the moment it seemed to me that he was looking far away, and then he said to father, “Brother Young, don’t you worry about this little man, he will live to grow up to manhood, and will help carry this gospel to the nations of the earth.” That is one of my strongest and earliest recollections of things that came to me in this life, and hence I have answered to those who have met me out in the world, and asked me why I was a Latter-day Saint, that from my childhood, lessons came to me that gave me faith in the prophet of the last days, the Prophet Joseph Smith.
I also recall the martyrdom of the Prophets Joseph and Hyrum. My father was away from home, in the state of Ohio, doing missionary work at the time of the martyrdom. When he returned home, he said to the family, when they were gathered around the table, “Just as long as Brother Brigham is faithful to the trust that is placed upon him, they will seek for his blood.” I wondered, though a child, why that should be, but the experiences of my life have shown me that feelings of that kind are natural to the wicked. As I matured in years, so that I could read and begin to grasp what I read, I learned that persecution was the common heritage of every man that has been called of God and given a mission to the human family.
As I have stated, I was called when a boy of sixteen, to go out and teach the gospel to the children of men. My mission was to the Pacific Islands, the Islands of Hawaii. When I reached there, I was assigned to labor on the island of Oahu. I will tell you a little of my personal experiences. I can hardly go beyond that in my talking to you. I was placed in a native family, a man by the name of Kyama, and his wife, no children in the family. They two promised to take care of me, and give me a home with them while I should study their language. About one week after my arrival there, a native woman, one of the neighbors, died. The natives indulged in considerable and extreme mourning over her. I was curious to see the manner of interment, and I went to the home. I saw them wrap the body in carpets and sew it up in mats, and carry it to the grave. At the graveyard, we met the minister of that parish, a venerable looking man, in appearance very much like our Brother Orson Pratt. I admired the man when I first saw him, on account of his resemblance to Orson Pratt, whom I loved. I went straight up to that minister of the gospel and offered him my hand, and told him who I was. I feared no man on earth at that time. I had injured no one, and felt kindly toward everybody; I wanted to do men good, that was the desire of my heart. I saw the minister draw Kyama to one side, and talk sharp to him; and when I returned to the cottage that was to be my home there was no one there. For three days and nights I stayed there, without food. I felt indignant at the treatment that was given to me, I could not tell why it was, and I turned to leave.
I took my little carpet sack, and started walking back to Honolulu, about forty miles. When I came to the creek that flows about a mile south of the village I stopped and asked myself, “What are you going to do ?”
Let me go a little further back, because there may be parents here of sons that are out in the mission field, or may be called into the mission field, and I want to bear my testimony that God never forsakes those who trust Him. Now, President Brigham Young had spoken to me, when I was called upon that mission, and I told him frankly and honestly that I did not know “Mormonism” to be true, “I know that you do not know it to be true. That is one reason we want you to go on this mission. And I will make you a promise, if you will go on this mission and live close to the Lord, and not commit sin, I promise you that when you come home you will take me by the hand and look me straight in the face, and tell me that you know ‘Mormonism’ is true. Now, will you go?” I accepted the mission.
When I stood at the bridge, I questioned myself, “What are you going to do? Go back to Honolulu and tell the President of the mission that you have not sand in your crop so that you can stand a little hunger and a little unpleasantness? And when you tell him that, perhaps he will chide you for that. Then what? I will not be chided, I have done no man wrong, and I will not be chided, I will go home.” But I thought a little, and then felt ashamed of myself, and turned aside, and went up the creek until I found a grove of timber, and I slipped into that grove and knelt down and prayed, and while I prayed, that cloud of ill feeling passed from me, and there was rather a gleam of joy that came to me, and I retraced my steps back to the bridge. As I came back to the bridge a native man came also, leading a little burro with a load of oranges on his back. The burro was overloaded, his little back bent (’own until the bundle of oranges almost touched the ground, it was almost all he could do to carry his burden. The native had a rope tied to a ring in the donkey’s nose, leading him. Across the bridge going northward there was a sharp, rocky hill, and when he reached the foot of that hill the donkey stopped there. The man held the rope in his left hand, and with his right he commenced stoning the little burro, and swearing in English at him. I set my little carpet bag down and went to the man and said, “Stop stoning that burro, that is cruel, you must not do it. And why do you swear at him?” And he said, “Don’t all white men swear when things won’t do what they want them to do?” I replied, “No, it is only bad white men that swear. I would like to see you get the burro up the hill without swearing at him and stoning him; give me the rope.” He handed me the rope, and I went to the side of the road and pulled a little grass, and wiped the blood from the burro’s head, where he had been struck with a stone, then patted him and talked to him kindly; and when I had done so, I started to walk up the hill. I did not pull the rope, I just held it in my hand, and that little burro, as if an inspiration had come to him, climbed up the hill with the load on his back. When I reached the top the man, who had followed, said, “What is your name?” I told him, and he then said, “Where is your home?” Then I broke down; that was a very tender word to me. The man then asked, “Don’t you want to go an l live with me?” That was just what I wanted, and I said I would be very pleased to go and live with him. He said. “Stay here until I come back, and you can go home with me.” lie went on down to the landing, sold his oranges, and came back, and I started to walk up the mountain with him. When he saw that I was weak, he picked me up, for he was a strong man, and set me in the saddle on the burro. I went into the orange grove where his home was, and stayed with him until I learned to talk the native language.
Afterward, when I met Kyama, who had turned me out. I asked him why he had done that, and he said. “The minister holds a paper on my little home, so he can take it away from me, and he told me you were a viper, and that if I kept you. you would sting me to death; and so I neglected tending to you, because I was fearful of the minister. When I learned that, I walked straight for that minister’s home. He had company when I came there, knocked on the door, and they bade me come in, and I told him what I came for. I asked him if it was true that he told that native man not to feed me, and to turn me from his home, he said it was perfectly correct. I said, “You a minister of the gospel? Where do you find in the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ anything that will justify you in treating me that way? I had not wronged you, there is not a being on the face of the earth that can say that I have injured them; and yet you told that man to starve me, and you told him things that were not true—you told him that I was a viper, that I would sting him to death, that I was an imposter. You told him things that you imagined, for which you had no proof, and I ask you to recall what you did, and make acknowledgment of it.”
Those are some of the things that I met with when I first went out into the world. It taught me some things; it taught me that some at least, in the Christian world have lost the spirit of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. That was the beginning of my coming against men that should be fathers to the people—bright, intelligent men who have lost the spirit that should accompany a man who is a professed servant of the living God.
By and by, I undertook to preach. I remember my first text, it was the 16th verse of the 16th chapter of Mark. It was what Christ said to His apostles when He met with them after His crucifixion: “Go ye into the world, and preach the gospel to every creature, he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.” Now, to me that is very strong and authoritative language, “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.” Then I went on to tell of the signs that should follow those that believe. Now, I had lived among the Latter-day Saints from a child up, but I had not seen manifestations that brought conviction directly to me in regard to the fulfillment of those things, and I wondered a little myself in regard to them. But they are true, my brethren and sisters. God has restored them again to the earth. I will tell you the first one that I ever witnessed, when I was out in the world. It may be good for some of our young people at home to hear it. It was in the city of San Francisco. Apostle Parley P. Pratt was presiding there. Three of us. Elders Joseph F. Smith and William W. Cluff, and myself were given the task of tracting the city of San Francisco. Brother Joseph F. Smith could not stand it—he came home in the evening and said to Brother Pratt. “I will work any place that you will put me to work—I do not care what the nature of the work is. I will do it; but I will not walk the streets of San Francisco and receive the abuse that I receive when I offer to give them a tract, I cannot stand it.” Brother Pratt consequently released him from it, and Brother Cluff was released also, but he held me to the task. I guess it was a blessing to me that I was such a little boy, because men felt ashamed to be very rough with me: and I kept at the work. One day when I returned from tracting. I came to Sister Evans’, the widow lady who was giving me a home, and she said, “Brother Young, hurry up stairs, they are having trouble up there.” I passed upstairs, and found the little room was nearly filled, there was scarcely room for any more. Not many of them were Latter-day Saints, and there was an excitement there. A woman was lying upon the bed, and when I came into the room, she sprang from that bed and tried to climb the walls of the room, but several of the sisters took hold of her. Elder William McBride, an Elder of experience, was in the room and he said to me, “Come here quick.” I was frightened but hurried to his side, and endeavored to put my hand upon the woman’s head, but she grasped my hand in one of hers, and it seemed to me like a bird’s claw; and she barked at me furiously, as a dog will bark. But we succeeded in laying our hands upon her head, and Brother McBride rebuked the evil spirit; she then became quiet and calm. The excitement caused Brother McBride to feel sick, and he withdrew. I stayed there with my hands resting upon her forehead. After a while I thought she was asleep, and I drew my hands. Just then, Parley P. Pratt came into the room and she sprang from the bed again, and with difficulty they succeeded in controlling her. Brother Pratt spoke like one who had authority. In the name of Jesus Christ he rebuked the evil spirit, and commanded it to leave the room, and we then had peace. That lady was not a member of our Church. The sisters waited upon her. and gave her a little refreshment. She talked a little while with President Pratt, and then Elder McBride and myself walked with her to a convenient place and baptized her into the Church.
I do not want to occupy more of your time. I thank my Heavenly Father that He has let me live to see this people grow as we have grown. I drove a pair of oxen hitched to a little cart, and helped haul the dirt from the foundation of this Temple, when I was a little boy. I feel to rejoice that I have lived to see this Temple completed, and to see the prosperity and the power that our Heavenly Father has given to His chosen people.
May God help you to be faithful and true to the covenants you have made. I testify to you that when I have had the privilege of going into holy places, I have only been taught lessons that have helped me be a virtuous, an honest, and a prayerful man. This is my testimony to you, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The L. D. S. U. quartette sang, “The Land far away.”
ELDER ANDREW KIMBALL.
(President St. Joseph Stake.)
[The copy of the stenographer's transcript of Elder Andrew Kimball’s discourse having been lost in transmission by mail, Elder Kimball has written a statement covering the principal features of said discourse, and it is printed here. It would have been included in that part of the pamphlet where the other discourses appear that were delivered at the outdoor meeting, Sunday afternoon, April 9, but was received too late for insertion therein.]
What appeals to me as one of the strongest testimonies of the divine calling of Joseph Smith as a Prophet, and benefactor of his race, is that contained in the revelation known as “the Word of Wisdom” (Sec. 89, Doctrine and Covenants). It is eighty-three years since the Lord admonished the world, through His Prophet, that strong drinks and tobacco were not good for man.
Recently, while in Los Angeles, a gentleman who had been active in our state in the Anti-saloon League work, and now employed in the fight against the saloon in California, lectured before an audience at the Latter-day Saints Church, on the subject of prohibition. In the course of his remarks he traced developments from an early day in this country, showing activities of various sectarian churches in their efforts to break down the liquor traffic. When he had concluded, Elder Joseph E. Robinson, President of the California mission, read the following revelation, and showed conclusively that through the “Mormon” Prophet, God had made known the truths concerning the detrimental use of liquor and tobacco, antedating every other move made in the world. I will here read the revelation:
[The speaker read the “Word of Wisdom” in full.]
For over eighty years this people, the Latter-day Saints, have been taught, and have more or less abstained, not only from the use of intoxicating liquors, but also tea and coffee and tobacco, and the result is we have two or three generations of our people almost entirely free from the evil effects of these contaminating things.
The Lord has made no mistake in this revelation; like many other good things, He has given to the world admonitions and commandments calculated to improve His children physically, as well as spiritually. Along this line of reform, as also in many others, the “Mormon” people living in Arizona have been foremost and among the most reliable of the people residing in that State.
Saloon keepers are bluffers; they would make you believe that the abolition of the saloon would destroy all business relations, they urge that the loss of revenue would be so great you would have no means to run the government, that business would be dull; in short, it would kill the country. This is about the kind of talk they gave us in Arizona when we went into the fight and put them out of business.
In 1901 it was my good fortune to secure the passage of the “Texas” local option law while a member of the Arizona Territorial Legislature, but, my friends, “local option” will not do the work. Three counties only took advantage of the law and voted dry. They were where the Latter-day Saints were in the majority.
Later, while an effort was made to amend the law, its enemies segregated the large cities from the country districts, making it almost impossible to rid the municipalities of the saloon; so we can say from experience, that while local option is better than the saloon, it is not sweeping enough in its effects to rid the country of the liquor traffic, accordingly we insisted upon Statewide prohibition.
The Temperance Federation of Arizona, so termed, was organized, an executive committee was chosen, with representation from the various organizations, W. C. T. U. Young Men’s and Young Ladies’ Christian Associations, Labor Federation, the various sectarian churches, business and professional interests, and our “Mormon” people, women being very active in the work. We gave women their franchise and they gave us a dry state. God bless the women.
A private citizen of one of our leading cities compiled statistics of the State, covering a period of but six months, and termed the compilation, “Six Months Prohibition in Arizona.” From this pamphlet I will give you a few figures. You may draw your own conclusions as to the havoc wrought in Arizona by closing the saloons. It must be remembered that when the saloons closed Dec. 31, 1914, at 12 o’clock at night, many saloon keepers retained a quantity of liquor, and scores of citizens laid in a supply, so that when the law went into effect the State was not quite dry. I here give you the wording of the prohibition amendment to the Constitution :
“Ardent soil its, ale, beer, wine or intoxicating liquor or liquors of whatever kind shall not be manufactured in or introduced into the state of Arizona under any pretense. Every person who sells, exchanges, gives, barters, or disposes of any ardent spirits, ale, beer, wine, or intoxicating liquor of any kind to any person in the state of Arizona, or who manufactures, or introduces into, or attempts, to introduce into, the state of Arizona any ardent spirits, ale, beer, wine, or intoxicating liquor of any kind, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and upon conviction shall be imprisoned for not less than ten days nor more than two years and fined not less than twenty-five dollars and costs no more than three hundred dollars and costs for each offense: provided, that nothing in this amendment shall apply to the manufacture or sale of denatured alcohol.”
The constitutional amendment made it mandatory upon the first State Legislature to enact police regulations for the enforcement of the law. This they failed to do, so that all we have accomplished has been under the mandates of the constitution.
Efficiency increased in the workingmen of the state in six months, according to these statistics, an average over the state of 25 per cent, and at the Copper Queen, the largest copper company, 31.4 per cent. Understand by this that, before prohibition, after each pay day through employees spending their wages and time in the saloon, and recovering from the consequences of drink, they would lay off two or three days each month, causing the company to lose 31.4 per cent in the efficiency of its operations. The pay rolls being $4,000,000, 25 per cent of that amount is $1,000,000 saved, for now men go to work after pay day. Eighty-four per cent reported for work before prohibition, 98 per cent since.
When men drank up their wages, their boys had to stay out of school to help support the family. There has been a great increase in attendance in the public schools, and 50 per cent increase in our state university.
There is 37.3 per cent less crime in the country, and 50 per cent less in the cities. Drunkenness has decreased 85 per cent. There has been 2880 less arrests for drunkenness in the state in six months.
Eleven out of fourteen counties went dry. Three (Mormon) counties were already dry through local option. There has been 796 less commitments in six months, a saving, by decrease in arrests, of $50,773.98, a falling off of 50 per cent in commitments.
In cities and towns of prominence there has been a decrease in arrests of 2.403, an average of 50 per cent; saving by such decrease $85,170.14. While the state has apparently sustained a loss in revenue of $100,998, but when we take into consideration the many channels through which business has increased, this loss of revenue is more than made up in business channels.
In considering the moral benefits, it is inestimable.
In Phoenix, our capital, there were 1125 less arrests in six months, 6 less police employed, $20,000 less cost in city government.
The City of Tucson had 255 less arrests for drunkenness. Such arrests had cost $12.50 each, thus making a saving of $3,000 in six months, or $6,000 annually.
Taxes have not increased in consequence of prohibition.
In Apache county, taxes have decreased 14.5 per cent, and in Graham (my county) 28.5 per cent. These counties had been dry long enough to make a showing.
There has been a great increase in savings deposits. Before prohibition, the laboring men, on pay day, would deposit their pay check in the saloon and go home with a stomach full of liquor and an empty pocket book. Now they deposit their earnings in the postal savings and in banks. There has been an increase of $387,252.00 in the postal savings, and over $3,000,000 in the banks.
Where the saloon formerly stood, you now see progressive business institutions, moving picture shows, and other taxable property. Where before prohibition, children were running the streets barefooted and hungry, and mothers humiliated and dejected; now, under prohibition, there are thousands of happy homes.
There has been a corresponding increase in public spiritedness, good roads, public improvements, better markets, and in every way there has been a livening up of affairs, greater confidence in business, and a general uplift to society.
At the annual Temperance Convention held this spring in Phoenix, and while presiding during the evening session, I presented the following figures on the birth rate and death rate of the various nations of the world, figures that may be used to prove the good effects of temperance.
A short time after this meeting, the president of the Federation wrote and asked me for a copy, saying that of all the papers and talks in the convention this had impressed him most. These figures came into my hands from a very reliable source, and you can depend upon them as being correct, at least up to a recent date.
Country Birth Rate Death Rate
Russians (Europe) 44.8 28.8
Southern Slavs .......................... 40 25
Armenians 40 24.7
Germans 29.8 16.2
Italians 31.5 22.8
Portuguese 29.7 18.8
English and Irish 28.5 16.1
United States (All) 28 14
Dutch 27.6 14.4
Australian (Whites) 27.4 10.8
Scandinavians 25.3 13.4
Belgians 23.5 15
Irish 23.3 17.1
French 18.7 19.1
Egyptians 43.4 35
Indians (U. S.) 35 32
Hindus 38.6 32.6
Japanese 33.9 21.8
Negroes (U. S.) 40 32
State of Kansas 9
Mormon (entire world) ... 49.2 8.3
Mormons of Arizona (four
stakes of Zion) average... 44 7.2
St. Joseph Stake 44 6
It will be observed from these figures that the death rate is something like one-half of the birth rate, in the United States—28 births, 14 deaths. France, you will observe, has more die than live; consequently, unless they attend more closely to family raising, they will eventually become extinct. The state of Kansas has the lowest death rate of any in the Union, which can be accounted for because of their long drawn out efforts for temperance. But what we get out of this comparison is that the Latter-day Saints lead the world in high birth-rate and low death-rate. This does not mean only its numbers residing in these healthy mountain valleys, and the offspring of “Mormon” parentage, but our people in all the world.
There has been more or less sympathy extended to our people living in Arizona, but mark from church statistics the splendid high birthrate and low death-rate. The four stakes average 44 births to the thousand, and 7.2 deaths; and the St. Joseph stake, where I have the honor to preside, leads the average of the Church, with 44 birth-rate and 6 death-rate. I am not claiming that this splendid record is because the state went dry a little over a year ago, but it is a fact that we are largely the offspring of “Mormon” parentage who. have lived temperate lives.
Another thing, the test is now on in these United States. I quote from headlines in a Cambridge, Mass., paper, under date of March 19, “Americans Not Fit for Duty. Average Man Can’t Meet Military Hardships, Says Harvard Professor.” Compare this unfortunate condition with the acknowledged fact that not to exceed 10 per cent of American boys can stand the military examination. Is it not about time we were taking notice, and as an American people, correcting our mode of living? Contrast this with the record of “Mormon” boys. I was told that 100 per cent of our boys at St. Johns, Arizona, passed muster when undergoing examination for the National Guard.
Intemperance alone is not responsible for this alarming status of our American young manhood. It was told me by an instructor in a college in Los Angeles that from 75 to 90 per cent of the male population of that city, and other large cities of our nation, were more or less affected with disease resulting from immorality. As a general rule, this is traceable to intemperance, which, of course, with all its attendant evils, mean disaster to the human family.
What is “Mormonism” doing? What are we doing, as a people, to uphold the high standards of right living? As I observed at the beginning of my remarks, the temporal salvation of this people means the perpetuation of a people whose work is not only to preach the gospel of spiritual salvation, but also the practical uplift of humanity, and observance of God’s laws by His children upon the earth. Amen.
“Lift up your head,” was sung by the male chorus.
(President St. Joseph Stake.)
[The copy of the stenographer's transcript of Elder Andrew Kimball’s discourse having been lost in transmission by mail, Elder Kimball has written a statement covering the principal features of said discourse, and it is printed here. It would have been included in that part of the pamphlet where the other discourses appear that were delivered at the outdoor meeting, Sunday afternoon, April 9, but was received too late for insertion therein.]
What appeals to me as one of the strongest testimonies of the divine calling of Joseph Smith as a Prophet, and benefactor of his race, is that contained in the revelation known as “the Word of Wisdom” (Sec. 89, Doctrine and Covenants). It is eighty-three years since the Lord admonished the world, through His Prophet, that strong drinks and tobacco were not good for man.
Recently, while in Los Angeles, a gentleman who had been active in our state in the Anti-saloon League work, and now employed in the fight against the saloon in California, lectured before an audience at the Latter-day Saints Church, on the subject of prohibition. In the course of his remarks he traced developments from an early day in this country, showing activities of various sectarian churches in their efforts to break down the liquor traffic. When he had concluded, Elder Joseph E. Robinson, President of the California mission, read the following revelation, and showed conclusively that through the “Mormon” Prophet, God had made known the truths concerning the detrimental use of liquor and tobacco, antedating every other move made in the world. I will here read the revelation:
[The speaker read the “Word of Wisdom” in full.]
For over eighty years this people, the Latter-day Saints, have been taught, and have more or less abstained, not only from the use of intoxicating liquors, but also tea and coffee and tobacco, and the result is we have two or three generations of our people almost entirely free from the evil effects of these contaminating things.
The Lord has made no mistake in this revelation; like many other good things, He has given to the world admonitions and commandments calculated to improve His children physically, as well as spiritually. Along this line of reform, as also in many others, the “Mormon” people living in Arizona have been foremost and among the most reliable of the people residing in that State.
Saloon keepers are bluffers; they would make you believe that the abolition of the saloon would destroy all business relations, they urge that the loss of revenue would be so great you would have no means to run the government, that business would be dull; in short, it would kill the country. This is about the kind of talk they gave us in Arizona when we went into the fight and put them out of business.
In 1901 it was my good fortune to secure the passage of the “Texas” local option law while a member of the Arizona Territorial Legislature, but, my friends, “local option” will not do the work. Three counties only took advantage of the law and voted dry. They were where the Latter-day Saints were in the majority.
Later, while an effort was made to amend the law, its enemies segregated the large cities from the country districts, making it almost impossible to rid the municipalities of the saloon; so we can say from experience, that while local option is better than the saloon, it is not sweeping enough in its effects to rid the country of the liquor traffic, accordingly we insisted upon Statewide prohibition.
The Temperance Federation of Arizona, so termed, was organized, an executive committee was chosen, with representation from the various organizations, W. C. T. U. Young Men’s and Young Ladies’ Christian Associations, Labor Federation, the various sectarian churches, business and professional interests, and our “Mormon” people, women being very active in the work. We gave women their franchise and they gave us a dry state. God bless the women.
A private citizen of one of our leading cities compiled statistics of the State, covering a period of but six months, and termed the compilation, “Six Months Prohibition in Arizona.” From this pamphlet I will give you a few figures. You may draw your own conclusions as to the havoc wrought in Arizona by closing the saloons. It must be remembered that when the saloons closed Dec. 31, 1914, at 12 o’clock at night, many saloon keepers retained a quantity of liquor, and scores of citizens laid in a supply, so that when the law went into effect the State was not quite dry. I here give you the wording of the prohibition amendment to the Constitution :
“Ardent soil its, ale, beer, wine or intoxicating liquor or liquors of whatever kind shall not be manufactured in or introduced into the state of Arizona under any pretense. Every person who sells, exchanges, gives, barters, or disposes of any ardent spirits, ale, beer, wine, or intoxicating liquor of any kind to any person in the state of Arizona, or who manufactures, or introduces into, or attempts, to introduce into, the state of Arizona any ardent spirits, ale, beer, wine, or intoxicating liquor of any kind, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and upon conviction shall be imprisoned for not less than ten days nor more than two years and fined not less than twenty-five dollars and costs no more than three hundred dollars and costs for each offense: provided, that nothing in this amendment shall apply to the manufacture or sale of denatured alcohol.”
The constitutional amendment made it mandatory upon the first State Legislature to enact police regulations for the enforcement of the law. This they failed to do, so that all we have accomplished has been under the mandates of the constitution.
Efficiency increased in the workingmen of the state in six months, according to these statistics, an average over the state of 25 per cent, and at the Copper Queen, the largest copper company, 31.4 per cent. Understand by this that, before prohibition, after each pay day through employees spending their wages and time in the saloon, and recovering from the consequences of drink, they would lay off two or three days each month, causing the company to lose 31.4 per cent in the efficiency of its operations. The pay rolls being $4,000,000, 25 per cent of that amount is $1,000,000 saved, for now men go to work after pay day. Eighty-four per cent reported for work before prohibition, 98 per cent since.
When men drank up their wages, their boys had to stay out of school to help support the family. There has been a great increase in attendance in the public schools, and 50 per cent increase in our state university.
There is 37.3 per cent less crime in the country, and 50 per cent less in the cities. Drunkenness has decreased 85 per cent. There has been 2880 less arrests for drunkenness in the state in six months.
Eleven out of fourteen counties went dry. Three (Mormon) counties were already dry through local option. There has been 796 less commitments in six months, a saving, by decrease in arrests, of $50,773.98, a falling off of 50 per cent in commitments.
In cities and towns of prominence there has been a decrease in arrests of 2.403, an average of 50 per cent; saving by such decrease $85,170.14. While the state has apparently sustained a loss in revenue of $100,998, but when we take into consideration the many channels through which business has increased, this loss of revenue is more than made up in business channels.
In considering the moral benefits, it is inestimable.
In Phoenix, our capital, there were 1125 less arrests in six months, 6 less police employed, $20,000 less cost in city government.
The City of Tucson had 255 less arrests for drunkenness. Such arrests had cost $12.50 each, thus making a saving of $3,000 in six months, or $6,000 annually.
Taxes have not increased in consequence of prohibition.
In Apache county, taxes have decreased 14.5 per cent, and in Graham (my county) 28.5 per cent. These counties had been dry long enough to make a showing.
There has been a great increase in savings deposits. Before prohibition, the laboring men, on pay day, would deposit their pay check in the saloon and go home with a stomach full of liquor and an empty pocket book. Now they deposit their earnings in the postal savings and in banks. There has been an increase of $387,252.00 in the postal savings, and over $3,000,000 in the banks.
Where the saloon formerly stood, you now see progressive business institutions, moving picture shows, and other taxable property. Where before prohibition, children were running the streets barefooted and hungry, and mothers humiliated and dejected; now, under prohibition, there are thousands of happy homes.
There has been a corresponding increase in public spiritedness, good roads, public improvements, better markets, and in every way there has been a livening up of affairs, greater confidence in business, and a general uplift to society.
At the annual Temperance Convention held this spring in Phoenix, and while presiding during the evening session, I presented the following figures on the birth rate and death rate of the various nations of the world, figures that may be used to prove the good effects of temperance.
A short time after this meeting, the president of the Federation wrote and asked me for a copy, saying that of all the papers and talks in the convention this had impressed him most. These figures came into my hands from a very reliable source, and you can depend upon them as being correct, at least up to a recent date.
Country Birth Rate Death Rate
Russians (Europe) 44.8 28.8
Southern Slavs .......................... 40 25
Armenians 40 24.7
Germans 29.8 16.2
Italians 31.5 22.8
Portuguese 29.7 18.8
English and Irish 28.5 16.1
United States (All) 28 14
Dutch 27.6 14.4
Australian (Whites) 27.4 10.8
Scandinavians 25.3 13.4
Belgians 23.5 15
Irish 23.3 17.1
French 18.7 19.1
Egyptians 43.4 35
Indians (U. S.) 35 32
Hindus 38.6 32.6
Japanese 33.9 21.8
Negroes (U. S.) 40 32
State of Kansas 9
Mormon (entire world) ... 49.2 8.3
Mormons of Arizona (four
stakes of Zion) average... 44 7.2
St. Joseph Stake 44 6
It will be observed from these figures that the death rate is something like one-half of the birth rate, in the United States—28 births, 14 deaths. France, you will observe, has more die than live; consequently, unless they attend more closely to family raising, they will eventually become extinct. The state of Kansas has the lowest death rate of any in the Union, which can be accounted for because of their long drawn out efforts for temperance. But what we get out of this comparison is that the Latter-day Saints lead the world in high birth-rate and low death-rate. This does not mean only its numbers residing in these healthy mountain valleys, and the offspring of “Mormon” parentage, but our people in all the world.
There has been more or less sympathy extended to our people living in Arizona, but mark from church statistics the splendid high birthrate and low death-rate. The four stakes average 44 births to the thousand, and 7.2 deaths; and the St. Joseph stake, where I have the honor to preside, leads the average of the Church, with 44 birth-rate and 6 death-rate. I am not claiming that this splendid record is because the state went dry a little over a year ago, but it is a fact that we are largely the offspring of “Mormon” parentage who. have lived temperate lives.
Another thing, the test is now on in these United States. I quote from headlines in a Cambridge, Mass., paper, under date of March 19, “Americans Not Fit for Duty. Average Man Can’t Meet Military Hardships, Says Harvard Professor.” Compare this unfortunate condition with the acknowledged fact that not to exceed 10 per cent of American boys can stand the military examination. Is it not about time we were taking notice, and as an American people, correcting our mode of living? Contrast this with the record of “Mormon” boys. I was told that 100 per cent of our boys at St. Johns, Arizona, passed muster when undergoing examination for the National Guard.
Intemperance alone is not responsible for this alarming status of our American young manhood. It was told me by an instructor in a college in Los Angeles that from 75 to 90 per cent of the male population of that city, and other large cities of our nation, were more or less affected with disease resulting from immorality. As a general rule, this is traceable to intemperance, which, of course, with all its attendant evils, mean disaster to the human family.
What is “Mormonism” doing? What are we doing, as a people, to uphold the high standards of right living? As I observed at the beginning of my remarks, the temporal salvation of this people means the perpetuation of a people whose work is not only to preach the gospel of spiritual salvation, but also the practical uplift of humanity, and observance of God’s laws by His children upon the earth. Amen.
“Lift up your head,” was sung by the male chorus.
ELDER ANDREW JENSON.
(Assistant Historian.)
The remarks made in the morning session of the conference today by Elder Orson F. Whitney, in which he referred to the testimony of the late Anson Call, and the testimonies that we have listened to from Elder John R. Young, in this meeting, have suggested to me the following paragraph contained in the Book of Mormon, written at the time that Christ was manifesting Himself in person upon this continent:
“And when Nephi had brought forth the records, and laid them before him, he cast his eyes upon them and said, “Verily I say unto you, I commanded my servant Samuel, the Lamanite, that he should testify unto this people, that at the day that the Father should glorify his name in me, that there were many saints who should arise from the dead, and should appear unto many, and should minister unto them. And he said unto them, were it not so?
“And his disciples answered him and said, Yea, Lord, Samuel did prophesy according to thy words, and they were all fulfilled.
“And Jesus said unto them, how be it that ye have not written this thing, that many saints did arise and appear unto many, and did minister unto them,
“And it came to pass that Nephi remembered that this thing had not been written.
“And it came to pass that Jesus commanded that it should be written; therefore it was written according as he commanded.” (3 Nephi 23:8-13.)
I desire, in this connection, to give expression to a thought: Brother Young is one of a few in this vast assembly who was acquainted with the Prophet Joseph Smith. The time will come, say in fifty years from now, that Saints who were acquainted with President Joseph F. Smith and his contemporaries will be as scarce as the men who were acquainted with the original Prophet, Joseph Smith, are now.
There are a great many events of modern times that have not been properly recorded. I want to draw attention to this fact, (as one of your historians), that a great number of our veterans have neglected, and are still neglecting to record such things as we have listened to with interest today. The testimony of Anson Call in regard to the Saints coming to these Rocky Mountains to become the mighty people they are today, is of great importance.
We have had just a little said about this great prophecy. We have known for many years that on the 6th of August, 1842, Joseph the Prophet made remarks of this kind, and just a few lines have been written in Church history concerning it, but as we have indeed become a mighty people in the Rocky Mountains. we want to know more about this important prediction which has been so literally and accurately fulfilled. A few lines are not sufficient to record a prophecy concerning such an event, if we can get any more. We do not want Anson Call's testimony only; we would like a hundred other witnesses, if that many were present and heard the Prophet’s words on that memorable occasion. We want the testimony of all who heard the Prophet utter this important prophecy. We want their testimonies recorded in the interest of the many millions of people who by and by will be interested in the early days of this Church as well as in our day, and in all the days and years that have elapsed since Joseph Smith first began to receive revelations from on high. I want to draw attention to this fact, brethren and sisters, and state here in your hearing that many things are not recorded that ought to be recorded concerning the history of the Latter-day Saints.
At the Historian’s Office, we have already compiled about four hundred volumes of Church history, each containing about six hundred closely typewritten pages, and we have made an estimate that if we compile and put into proper shape the historical matter which we have in sight at present we will have at least one thousand volumes (containing six hundred pages each) of Church history for the Nineteenth century alone. This compilation then will represent six hundred thousand pages of records pertaining to the history of the Latter-day Saints for that period of time. Of course a great deal of this vast amount of material may be as to details more or less important and interesting, but as works of reference for the benefit of those who shall live after us it will have incalculable value. The books are being prepared in such a way that we can add pages here and there. Hence, we can easily incorporate the testimony of Elder John R. Young who has spoken to us here today, and we can add the testimony of as many others as desire to place themselves on record in regard to any important event which they may have witnessed in their experiences in life.
I am safe in stating that there are thousands of people in the midst of the Latter-day Saints who ought to make a record of what they have seen, heard and done. They should especially bear testimony of the many blessings which they have received from the hand of the Lord through having yielded obedience to the Gospel of Jesus Christ in these the last days; and not only that which happened in the days of the Prophet Joseph, or in the earlier days of the Church, should be faithfully recorded, but that which has taken place all along since we came to these mountain valleys and that which is taking place day by day. My advice to everybody would be this: Write something concerning your experiences in life and what you have seen and witnessed in connection with the Church of Christ—to bequeath to your posterity, so that it may be said of you like that which has been recorded of Abel of old, “Though dead, he yet speaketh.”
This is the thought I would like to impress upon all who hear my voice on this occasion and upon all who may read the record made of this general conference of the Church. I would like to explain further that my advice does not apply only to our brethren and sisters who have grown old in the service of the Lord, and who may soon expect to go to the great Beyond to receive, in due time, the reward which their deeds in mortality merit at the hands of a righteous judge and a merciful God, but it applies as well to you who are middle-aged, and even those who are young men and women in our midst at the present time. The time will surely' come when your testimony will be of great importance, just as much as the testimony that we have heard today, because this Church will continue to grow, and out of it will finally come the kingdom of God. As yet we are scarcely a hand full compared to the many millions of people who inhabit our earth, but after our testimony, or the testimony of the elders of Israel, shall have been borne to every nation, kindred, tongue and people, and after these people who listen to that testimony shall have been converted and gathered to the Stake of Zion, and after such stakes shall have been organized in all parts of this great land of promise, then the experiences of those who in an early day helped to establish the Church in the midst of these Rocky Mountains will, if recorded, be read with the greatest interest by millions and millions of God-fearing men and women, who shall rejoice in the success and triumph of Zion, and who shall be members of the-Church of Christ and citizens of the Kingdom of God at the time that Christ, our Redeemer, shall reign on the earth as the King of kings and Lord of lords. When that time conies, many of the events which to us now may seem commonplace will be things of vast importance, because many of the little deeds that we now do and to which we pay but very little attention at the present time are the seeds from which, using a figure “the sturdy oak” shall grow; they may' be the little things that shall mark the beginning of great achievements hereafter.
Even the eyes of unbelievers are upon us at the present time. Thinking men and women know what a community that is doing right, people who are living moral lives— means for the future, and the adversary of our souls, the great archenemy of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, is alarmed, together with his emissaries, because of the stand we are taking in the world, and the success that has attended ns so far. They know what a God-fearing and a righteous community represented by superior men and women may mean to the rest of the world at no distant day. They know that, through transgressions of the law of God and the laws of nature, the human family are becoming weaker all the time, and that strong men and women, who comply with the laws of nature and the law of God, are bound to obtain dominion, influence and power in the midst of the earth; and this indeed is the destiny of the Latter-day Saints.
While I was filling a mission in Scandinavia, a few years ago, an old Lutheran priest who had studied our religious system, and had become acquainted with our ways of living, exclaimed, “If the Mormons continue that way they will in due course of time not only control little Denmark, but their power will be felt throughout the entire world, for they live a different life to that lived by the majority of the people in the world.” In making this statement that priest did not particularly refer to the Word of Wisdom, but to our moral life and practical religion in a general way. And the priest was right. If we Latter-day Saints, if you, the sons and daughters of Zion, will take advantage of your birthright, if you will do what is right, serve God and keep His commandments, it is only a question of time when you will rule the world. It cannot be otherwise, unless mankind generally will turn from their evil ways and become saints of the most high God.
My brethren and sisters, may God help us to fulfil our mission and our destiny on the earth. May we indeed become the redeemers of the world and saviors upon Mount Zion, and may we labor diligently, with our whole might and strength, to usher in the great millennium when peace and happiness shall abound on the earth, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
(Assistant Historian.)
The remarks made in the morning session of the conference today by Elder Orson F. Whitney, in which he referred to the testimony of the late Anson Call, and the testimonies that we have listened to from Elder John R. Young, in this meeting, have suggested to me the following paragraph contained in the Book of Mormon, written at the time that Christ was manifesting Himself in person upon this continent:
“And when Nephi had brought forth the records, and laid them before him, he cast his eyes upon them and said, “Verily I say unto you, I commanded my servant Samuel, the Lamanite, that he should testify unto this people, that at the day that the Father should glorify his name in me, that there were many saints who should arise from the dead, and should appear unto many, and should minister unto them. And he said unto them, were it not so?
“And his disciples answered him and said, Yea, Lord, Samuel did prophesy according to thy words, and they were all fulfilled.
“And Jesus said unto them, how be it that ye have not written this thing, that many saints did arise and appear unto many, and did minister unto them,
“And it came to pass that Nephi remembered that this thing had not been written.
“And it came to pass that Jesus commanded that it should be written; therefore it was written according as he commanded.” (3 Nephi 23:8-13.)
I desire, in this connection, to give expression to a thought: Brother Young is one of a few in this vast assembly who was acquainted with the Prophet Joseph Smith. The time will come, say in fifty years from now, that Saints who were acquainted with President Joseph F. Smith and his contemporaries will be as scarce as the men who were acquainted with the original Prophet, Joseph Smith, are now.
There are a great many events of modern times that have not been properly recorded. I want to draw attention to this fact, (as one of your historians), that a great number of our veterans have neglected, and are still neglecting to record such things as we have listened to with interest today. The testimony of Anson Call in regard to the Saints coming to these Rocky Mountains to become the mighty people they are today, is of great importance.
We have had just a little said about this great prophecy. We have known for many years that on the 6th of August, 1842, Joseph the Prophet made remarks of this kind, and just a few lines have been written in Church history concerning it, but as we have indeed become a mighty people in the Rocky Mountains. we want to know more about this important prediction which has been so literally and accurately fulfilled. A few lines are not sufficient to record a prophecy concerning such an event, if we can get any more. We do not want Anson Call's testimony only; we would like a hundred other witnesses, if that many were present and heard the Prophet’s words on that memorable occasion. We want the testimony of all who heard the Prophet utter this important prophecy. We want their testimonies recorded in the interest of the many millions of people who by and by will be interested in the early days of this Church as well as in our day, and in all the days and years that have elapsed since Joseph Smith first began to receive revelations from on high. I want to draw attention to this fact, brethren and sisters, and state here in your hearing that many things are not recorded that ought to be recorded concerning the history of the Latter-day Saints.
At the Historian’s Office, we have already compiled about four hundred volumes of Church history, each containing about six hundred closely typewritten pages, and we have made an estimate that if we compile and put into proper shape the historical matter which we have in sight at present we will have at least one thousand volumes (containing six hundred pages each) of Church history for the Nineteenth century alone. This compilation then will represent six hundred thousand pages of records pertaining to the history of the Latter-day Saints for that period of time. Of course a great deal of this vast amount of material may be as to details more or less important and interesting, but as works of reference for the benefit of those who shall live after us it will have incalculable value. The books are being prepared in such a way that we can add pages here and there. Hence, we can easily incorporate the testimony of Elder John R. Young who has spoken to us here today, and we can add the testimony of as many others as desire to place themselves on record in regard to any important event which they may have witnessed in their experiences in life.
I am safe in stating that there are thousands of people in the midst of the Latter-day Saints who ought to make a record of what they have seen, heard and done. They should especially bear testimony of the many blessings which they have received from the hand of the Lord through having yielded obedience to the Gospel of Jesus Christ in these the last days; and not only that which happened in the days of the Prophet Joseph, or in the earlier days of the Church, should be faithfully recorded, but that which has taken place all along since we came to these mountain valleys and that which is taking place day by day. My advice to everybody would be this: Write something concerning your experiences in life and what you have seen and witnessed in connection with the Church of Christ—to bequeath to your posterity, so that it may be said of you like that which has been recorded of Abel of old, “Though dead, he yet speaketh.”
This is the thought I would like to impress upon all who hear my voice on this occasion and upon all who may read the record made of this general conference of the Church. I would like to explain further that my advice does not apply only to our brethren and sisters who have grown old in the service of the Lord, and who may soon expect to go to the great Beyond to receive, in due time, the reward which their deeds in mortality merit at the hands of a righteous judge and a merciful God, but it applies as well to you who are middle-aged, and even those who are young men and women in our midst at the present time. The time will surely' come when your testimony will be of great importance, just as much as the testimony that we have heard today, because this Church will continue to grow, and out of it will finally come the kingdom of God. As yet we are scarcely a hand full compared to the many millions of people who inhabit our earth, but after our testimony, or the testimony of the elders of Israel, shall have been borne to every nation, kindred, tongue and people, and after these people who listen to that testimony shall have been converted and gathered to the Stake of Zion, and after such stakes shall have been organized in all parts of this great land of promise, then the experiences of those who in an early day helped to establish the Church in the midst of these Rocky Mountains will, if recorded, be read with the greatest interest by millions and millions of God-fearing men and women, who shall rejoice in the success and triumph of Zion, and who shall be members of the-Church of Christ and citizens of the Kingdom of God at the time that Christ, our Redeemer, shall reign on the earth as the King of kings and Lord of lords. When that time conies, many of the events which to us now may seem commonplace will be things of vast importance, because many of the little deeds that we now do and to which we pay but very little attention at the present time are the seeds from which, using a figure “the sturdy oak” shall grow; they may' be the little things that shall mark the beginning of great achievements hereafter.
Even the eyes of unbelievers are upon us at the present time. Thinking men and women know what a community that is doing right, people who are living moral lives— means for the future, and the adversary of our souls, the great archenemy of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, is alarmed, together with his emissaries, because of the stand we are taking in the world, and the success that has attended ns so far. They know what a God-fearing and a righteous community represented by superior men and women may mean to the rest of the world at no distant day. They know that, through transgressions of the law of God and the laws of nature, the human family are becoming weaker all the time, and that strong men and women, who comply with the laws of nature and the law of God, are bound to obtain dominion, influence and power in the midst of the earth; and this indeed is the destiny of the Latter-day Saints.
While I was filling a mission in Scandinavia, a few years ago, an old Lutheran priest who had studied our religious system, and had become acquainted with our ways of living, exclaimed, “If the Mormons continue that way they will in due course of time not only control little Denmark, but their power will be felt throughout the entire world, for they live a different life to that lived by the majority of the people in the world.” In making this statement that priest did not particularly refer to the Word of Wisdom, but to our moral life and practical religion in a general way. And the priest was right. If we Latter-day Saints, if you, the sons and daughters of Zion, will take advantage of your birthright, if you will do what is right, serve God and keep His commandments, it is only a question of time when you will rule the world. It cannot be otherwise, unless mankind generally will turn from their evil ways and become saints of the most high God.
My brethren and sisters, may God help us to fulfil our mission and our destiny on the earth. May we indeed become the redeemers of the world and saviors upon Mount Zion, and may we labor diligently, with our whole might and strength, to usher in the great millennium when peace and happiness shall abound on the earth, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
ELDER REY L. PRATT.
(Late President of Mexican Mission.)
In speaking of the signs that should precede the second coming of our Lord, He said, “And this Gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached in all the world as a witness unto every nation, and then shall the end come.”
My labors, for the past ten years, have been as a missionary in carrying the Gospel of the Kingdom to the Mexican nation; and I feel that in this unhappy hour for Mexico I would not be true to the trust that is imposed upon me if I did not tell you some of the things concerning that people that make them what they are. I wish to associate the unhappy conditions that exist in Mexico with the promises of the Lord made to that people when Father Lehi and his little colony left Jerusalem. The Lord made very plain the history of the Mexican people before Lehi ever set foot on this great continent of ours. Lehi said the following, and it is recorded in the first chapter of the Second Book of Nephi:
“Wherefore, I, Lehi, have obtained a promise, that inasmuch as those whom the Lord God shall bring out of the land of Jerusalem shall keep His commandments, they shall prosper upon the face of this land; and they shall be kept from all other nations, that they may possess this land unto themselves. And if it so be that they shall keep His commandments, they shall be blessed upon the face of this land, and there shall be none to molest them, nor to take away the land of their inheritance; and they shall dwell safely for ever.
‘But, behold, when the time cometh that they shall dwindle in unbelief, after they have received so great blessings from the hand of the Lord; having a knowledge of the creation of the earth, and all men, knowing the great and marvelous works of the Lord from the creation of the world: having power given them to do all things by faith; having all the commandments from the beginning, and having been brought by His infinite goodness into this precious land of promise; behold, I say, if the day shall come that they will reject the Holy One of Israel, the true Messiah, their Redeemer and their God, behold the judgments of Him that is just shall rest upon them;
"Yea, He will bring other nations unto them, and He will give unto them power, and He will take away from them the lands of their possessions; and He will cause them to be scattered and smitten.”
Now, my brethren and sisters, as students of the Book of Mormon and history of that people who are descendants of Lehi, we know that they have not kept sacred the covenants that men make when they enter into covenant with God in the Gospel of His Son Jesus Christ, and we know that no sooner did that colony set foot on this land than there was a factional division, and they became two great peoples, the Nephites and the Lamanites, and that, at times, the Nephite faction was obedient to the commandments of the Lord and the Gospel as given to them, and, at rare intervals, so were the Lamanites. But there came a time when all apostatized, and when all came under the condemnation herein spoken of, and the Lord caused the Nephite faction to be utterly destroyed at the hands of their brethren, the Lamanites, and the Lamanites went forth upon the face of the land in scattered bands, warring among themselves, as they had overcome their hereditary enemy, the Nephites, and having in their blood the spirit of war and strife they satisfied it by fighting one with another.
But the time came when the promises of the Lord were fulfilled in behalf of this people. In the year 1519, a little band of Spaniards, only a few, about 600, under the leadership of Hernan Cortez, set foot upon the shores of Mexico, and that man and his followers overcame a nation of 30,000,000 of people. It is a pitiful history to read, how they were “scattered and smitten,” and how every inch of the land of their inheritance, that they had received of the Lord, was taken away from them. Now, brethren and sisters, we have in this the basic cause of all the strife that has existed in the land of Mexico for 400 years in that that stricken people have bowed their heads under the tyrannical rule of the Spanish people who came in among them. From a nation of 30,000,000, they have been reduced until today they are scarce 15,000,000. And the best statistics given out on the matter, state that of the 15,000,000 of inhabitants in the land of Mexico, only 2,000,000 are property holders. The others have nothing but their poverty and degradation, and we have in that the cause for the present strife.
Now, I wish to associate the strife in Mexico also with the promises of the Lord, for if we do not have the promises of the Lord to comfort us in these things, I fear, brothers and sisters, that my faith would not be sufficiently strong to enable me to go forth and continue to preach the Gospel unto that people, as I love to do and always shall, as long as the servant of the Lord asks me to continue my labors in their behalf.
It seems that if their decrease should continue very long, as it has been going on, they would be utterly wiped off the continent; and the history of the Mexican people is only a counterpart of the history of the Indian races that inhabit North and South America, for they have indeed been reduced to a remnant, they have become scattered and smitten; and I defy anybody to point to me a tribe of the aborigines of this country that owns legitimately any of their own country in their tribal condition as they owned it primitively. It has been absolutely taken away from them by the nations that the Lord permitted to come in, and that in fulfillment of His words to them should they disobey the Gospel of His Son that should be given them. But thanks to the Lord, we know that they are His covenant people. We know that in their veins, flows the blood of Israel, and God has made promise not only of their bringing down, but of their coming up; and in that, we get faith and inspiration to go on and preach to them the Gospel, for their redemption; for the Lord said this to Nephi, when He had shown him the same things that He had shown to his father, Lehi:
"Nevertheless thou beholdest that the Gentiles who have gone forth out of captivity, and have been lifted up by the power of God above all other nations upon the face of the land, which is choice above all other lands which is the land that the Lord God hath covenanted with thy father, that His seed should have for the land of their inheritance, wherefore thou seest that the Lord God will not suffer that the Gentiles will utterly destroy the mixture of thy seed which are among thy brethren. Neither will He suffer that the Gentiles shall destroy the seed of thy brethren.” (I Nephi 13, 30-31.)
Now, brethren and sisters. in this we see that the Lord has not destined that this people should be utterly destroyed from off the face of the land. And I wish to call the youth of Israel to prepare themselves for the mighty work that lies before us, for the Lord said, “This Gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached as a witness unto all nations, and unto every people before the end shall come,” and we have lying before us, the millions of Mexico who know nothing of the Gospel, we have the millions of Central America, and the millions of South America. They are absolutely ignorant of the great plan of salvation that has been restored for the redemption of all people in the age in which we live.
The Prophet Nephi said, (II Nephi 30:3-6):
“And now, I would prophesy somewhat more concerning the Jews and the Gentiles. For after the book of which I have spoken shall come forth, and be written unto the Gentiles, and sealed up again unto the Lord, there shall be many which shall believe the words which are written; and they shall carry them forth unto the remnant of our seed.
"And then shall the remnant of our seed know concerning us, how that we came out from Jerusalem, and that they are descendants of the Jews.
“And the Gospel of Jesus Christ shall be declared among them; wherefore, they shall be restored unto the knowledge of their fathers, and also to the knowledge of Jesus Christ, which was had among their fathers.
“And then shall they rejoice; for they shall know that it is a blessing unto them from the hand of God; and their scales of darkness shall begin to fall from their eyes; and many generations shall not pass away among them, save they shall be a white and delightsome people.”
Brethren and sisters, do we, as a people, believe in the words of the book that has been written? I testify unto you that the Book of Mormon came forth in the world by the power and inspiration of God Almighty, and we have it as a new witness for Him in the world; and in that book we find the testimony that we among the gentiles who should receive that book and believe in the words of it, should carry it back again to the remnant of those people—and they are the Mexicans, the Central Americans, the South Americans, and the Indian remnants, that cover our own dear land here. God is no respecter of persons, but of whatever nation, he that will serve Him and work righteousness is accepted of Him. What we want is to teach the Gospel in simplicity unto that people, as unto every other people, that they may find in the Gospel, in very deed, the power of God, that will lift them out of their degraded condition, that it may be unto them the power of God unto their salvation.
We are opening up work among the Mexican people in the United States, and it may be a revelation to some of you to know that down in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, California, and Texas, there are hundreds of thousands of people of Mexican blood, that are citizens of the United States, and they are only waiting for someone to open the doors of the Gospel to them. And the crying need today is for elders who are willing to sacrifice their own desires, and to humble themselves before the Lord and carry in humility the word of the Lord back to that people.
I am thankful for the integrity of our missionary boys that go out, but I am sorry that there is a feeling among some few, when the)' enter the field, of disappointment, and they feel that there is nothing coming back to them, and they ask the question, “What good will this all be to me?” Brethren and sisters, that is a false conception of the spirit of missionary work: the spirit of our missionary work should be, What good can I be to my fellowmen, what good can I be to God’s children, and to sacrifice our own desires, our own ambitions and wishes to the betterment of those who sit in darkness.
May the Lord help us to perform well our missions in the world, and extend the light of the Gospel unto all men, for God Himself is no respecter of persons, and we should not be. I maintain that this Gospel of ours is destined sometime to wipe out racial feelings and to bring to us a universal brotherhood of man.
God bless us to appreciate our blessings, I pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.
(Late President of Mexican Mission.)
In speaking of the signs that should precede the second coming of our Lord, He said, “And this Gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached in all the world as a witness unto every nation, and then shall the end come.”
My labors, for the past ten years, have been as a missionary in carrying the Gospel of the Kingdom to the Mexican nation; and I feel that in this unhappy hour for Mexico I would not be true to the trust that is imposed upon me if I did not tell you some of the things concerning that people that make them what they are. I wish to associate the unhappy conditions that exist in Mexico with the promises of the Lord made to that people when Father Lehi and his little colony left Jerusalem. The Lord made very plain the history of the Mexican people before Lehi ever set foot on this great continent of ours. Lehi said the following, and it is recorded in the first chapter of the Second Book of Nephi:
“Wherefore, I, Lehi, have obtained a promise, that inasmuch as those whom the Lord God shall bring out of the land of Jerusalem shall keep His commandments, they shall prosper upon the face of this land; and they shall be kept from all other nations, that they may possess this land unto themselves. And if it so be that they shall keep His commandments, they shall be blessed upon the face of this land, and there shall be none to molest them, nor to take away the land of their inheritance; and they shall dwell safely for ever.
‘But, behold, when the time cometh that they shall dwindle in unbelief, after they have received so great blessings from the hand of the Lord; having a knowledge of the creation of the earth, and all men, knowing the great and marvelous works of the Lord from the creation of the world: having power given them to do all things by faith; having all the commandments from the beginning, and having been brought by His infinite goodness into this precious land of promise; behold, I say, if the day shall come that they will reject the Holy One of Israel, the true Messiah, their Redeemer and their God, behold the judgments of Him that is just shall rest upon them;
"Yea, He will bring other nations unto them, and He will give unto them power, and He will take away from them the lands of their possessions; and He will cause them to be scattered and smitten.”
Now, my brethren and sisters, as students of the Book of Mormon and history of that people who are descendants of Lehi, we know that they have not kept sacred the covenants that men make when they enter into covenant with God in the Gospel of His Son Jesus Christ, and we know that no sooner did that colony set foot on this land than there was a factional division, and they became two great peoples, the Nephites and the Lamanites, and that, at times, the Nephite faction was obedient to the commandments of the Lord and the Gospel as given to them, and, at rare intervals, so were the Lamanites. But there came a time when all apostatized, and when all came under the condemnation herein spoken of, and the Lord caused the Nephite faction to be utterly destroyed at the hands of their brethren, the Lamanites, and the Lamanites went forth upon the face of the land in scattered bands, warring among themselves, as they had overcome their hereditary enemy, the Nephites, and having in their blood the spirit of war and strife they satisfied it by fighting one with another.
But the time came when the promises of the Lord were fulfilled in behalf of this people. In the year 1519, a little band of Spaniards, only a few, about 600, under the leadership of Hernan Cortez, set foot upon the shores of Mexico, and that man and his followers overcame a nation of 30,000,000 of people. It is a pitiful history to read, how they were “scattered and smitten,” and how every inch of the land of their inheritance, that they had received of the Lord, was taken away from them. Now, brethren and sisters, we have in this the basic cause of all the strife that has existed in the land of Mexico for 400 years in that that stricken people have bowed their heads under the tyrannical rule of the Spanish people who came in among them. From a nation of 30,000,000, they have been reduced until today they are scarce 15,000,000. And the best statistics given out on the matter, state that of the 15,000,000 of inhabitants in the land of Mexico, only 2,000,000 are property holders. The others have nothing but their poverty and degradation, and we have in that the cause for the present strife.
Now, I wish to associate the strife in Mexico also with the promises of the Lord, for if we do not have the promises of the Lord to comfort us in these things, I fear, brothers and sisters, that my faith would not be sufficiently strong to enable me to go forth and continue to preach the Gospel unto that people, as I love to do and always shall, as long as the servant of the Lord asks me to continue my labors in their behalf.
It seems that if their decrease should continue very long, as it has been going on, they would be utterly wiped off the continent; and the history of the Mexican people is only a counterpart of the history of the Indian races that inhabit North and South America, for they have indeed been reduced to a remnant, they have become scattered and smitten; and I defy anybody to point to me a tribe of the aborigines of this country that owns legitimately any of their own country in their tribal condition as they owned it primitively. It has been absolutely taken away from them by the nations that the Lord permitted to come in, and that in fulfillment of His words to them should they disobey the Gospel of His Son that should be given them. But thanks to the Lord, we know that they are His covenant people. We know that in their veins, flows the blood of Israel, and God has made promise not only of their bringing down, but of their coming up; and in that, we get faith and inspiration to go on and preach to them the Gospel, for their redemption; for the Lord said this to Nephi, when He had shown him the same things that He had shown to his father, Lehi:
"Nevertheless thou beholdest that the Gentiles who have gone forth out of captivity, and have been lifted up by the power of God above all other nations upon the face of the land, which is choice above all other lands which is the land that the Lord God hath covenanted with thy father, that His seed should have for the land of their inheritance, wherefore thou seest that the Lord God will not suffer that the Gentiles will utterly destroy the mixture of thy seed which are among thy brethren. Neither will He suffer that the Gentiles shall destroy the seed of thy brethren.” (I Nephi 13, 30-31.)
Now, brethren and sisters. in this we see that the Lord has not destined that this people should be utterly destroyed from off the face of the land. And I wish to call the youth of Israel to prepare themselves for the mighty work that lies before us, for the Lord said, “This Gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached as a witness unto all nations, and unto every people before the end shall come,” and we have lying before us, the millions of Mexico who know nothing of the Gospel, we have the millions of Central America, and the millions of South America. They are absolutely ignorant of the great plan of salvation that has been restored for the redemption of all people in the age in which we live.
The Prophet Nephi said, (II Nephi 30:3-6):
“And now, I would prophesy somewhat more concerning the Jews and the Gentiles. For after the book of which I have spoken shall come forth, and be written unto the Gentiles, and sealed up again unto the Lord, there shall be many which shall believe the words which are written; and they shall carry them forth unto the remnant of our seed.
"And then shall the remnant of our seed know concerning us, how that we came out from Jerusalem, and that they are descendants of the Jews.
“And the Gospel of Jesus Christ shall be declared among them; wherefore, they shall be restored unto the knowledge of their fathers, and also to the knowledge of Jesus Christ, which was had among their fathers.
“And then shall they rejoice; for they shall know that it is a blessing unto them from the hand of God; and their scales of darkness shall begin to fall from their eyes; and many generations shall not pass away among them, save they shall be a white and delightsome people.”
Brethren and sisters, do we, as a people, believe in the words of the book that has been written? I testify unto you that the Book of Mormon came forth in the world by the power and inspiration of God Almighty, and we have it as a new witness for Him in the world; and in that book we find the testimony that we among the gentiles who should receive that book and believe in the words of it, should carry it back again to the remnant of those people—and they are the Mexicans, the Central Americans, the South Americans, and the Indian remnants, that cover our own dear land here. God is no respecter of persons, but of whatever nation, he that will serve Him and work righteousness is accepted of Him. What we want is to teach the Gospel in simplicity unto that people, as unto every other people, that they may find in the Gospel, in very deed, the power of God, that will lift them out of their degraded condition, that it may be unto them the power of God unto their salvation.
We are opening up work among the Mexican people in the United States, and it may be a revelation to some of you to know that down in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, California, and Texas, there are hundreds of thousands of people of Mexican blood, that are citizens of the United States, and they are only waiting for someone to open the doors of the Gospel to them. And the crying need today is for elders who are willing to sacrifice their own desires, and to humble themselves before the Lord and carry in humility the word of the Lord back to that people.
I am thankful for the integrity of our missionary boys that go out, but I am sorry that there is a feeling among some few, when the)' enter the field, of disappointment, and they feel that there is nothing coming back to them, and they ask the question, “What good will this all be to me?” Brethren and sisters, that is a false conception of the spirit of missionary work: the spirit of our missionary work should be, What good can I be to my fellowmen, what good can I be to God’s children, and to sacrifice our own desires, our own ambitions and wishes to the betterment of those who sit in darkness.
May the Lord help us to perform well our missions in the world, and extend the light of the Gospel unto all men, for God Himself is no respecter of persons, and we should not be. I maintain that this Gospel of ours is destined sometime to wipe out racial feelings and to bring to us a universal brotherhood of man.
God bless us to appreciate our blessings, I pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.
ELDER GEO. ALBERT SMITH.
Similarity of missions of Parley P. Pratt and his grandson, Rey L. Pratt—Prayer for success of missionary work.
I am sure, my brethren and sisters, that the eyes of many of this congregation have been moistened while listening to the pathetic discourse of President Rey L. Pratt with reference to our Lamanite brethren and sisters. He comes naturally by his love for the Indian. His father and grandfather both were missionaries to the dark-skinned natives of America. He is a grandson of Parley P. Pratt, who was called by revelation, and his was the first name called by the Lord in our day to take the Gospel to the Lamanites, as I will read to you from the 23rd Section of the Doctrine and Covenants:
“And now concerning my servant, Parley P. Pratt, behold, I say unto him, that as I live I will that he shall declare my gospel and learn of me, and be meek and lowly of heart;
“And that which I have appointed unto him is that he shall go with my servants Oliver Cowdery and Peter Whitmer, jun., into the wilderness among the Lamanites.’’
I think it is a beautiful thing that today his grandson is permitted to stand in our midst and testify of the hope that he has of the fulfilment of the promise of our Father to our Indian brethren and sisters who are dear to him, who live in this and the adjacent nation. I am sure you have been glad to hear from Brother Pratt and that the mission still goes on notwithstanding the difficulty they are having in that unhappy land.
Let us each pray to the Lord that His promises may be fulfilled in the interests of these our brethren and sisters, let each of us live so that if we should be called, that the Lord may be able to work through us for the amelioration of the condition of millions of His children who know not the Gospel of our Lord as we have received it. Let us go to our homes each with the determination that, the Lord helping us, we will serve Him and keep His commandments and fulfil the obligations resulting from receiving His word.
May you, my brethren and sisters, carry the spirit of this great gathering to your homes. May you have the desire to disseminate the truth taught among your associates, that your experience here may thereby be more profitable. May this conference be treasured in your memories as a time of refreshing from the Lord. And that each of us may magnify our opportunities and be worthy of the blessings of our Father in heaven, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “We thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet.”
Elder Benjamin Goddard offered the closing prayer.
Similarity of missions of Parley P. Pratt and his grandson, Rey L. Pratt—Prayer for success of missionary work.
I am sure, my brethren and sisters, that the eyes of many of this congregation have been moistened while listening to the pathetic discourse of President Rey L. Pratt with reference to our Lamanite brethren and sisters. He comes naturally by his love for the Indian. His father and grandfather both were missionaries to the dark-skinned natives of America. He is a grandson of Parley P. Pratt, who was called by revelation, and his was the first name called by the Lord in our day to take the Gospel to the Lamanites, as I will read to you from the 23rd Section of the Doctrine and Covenants:
“And now concerning my servant, Parley P. Pratt, behold, I say unto him, that as I live I will that he shall declare my gospel and learn of me, and be meek and lowly of heart;
“And that which I have appointed unto him is that he shall go with my servants Oliver Cowdery and Peter Whitmer, jun., into the wilderness among the Lamanites.’’
I think it is a beautiful thing that today his grandson is permitted to stand in our midst and testify of the hope that he has of the fulfilment of the promise of our Father to our Indian brethren and sisters who are dear to him, who live in this and the adjacent nation. I am sure you have been glad to hear from Brother Pratt and that the mission still goes on notwithstanding the difficulty they are having in that unhappy land.
Let us each pray to the Lord that His promises may be fulfilled in the interests of these our brethren and sisters, let each of us live so that if we should be called, that the Lord may be able to work through us for the amelioration of the condition of millions of His children who know not the Gospel of our Lord as we have received it. Let us go to our homes each with the determination that, the Lord helping us, we will serve Him and keep His commandments and fulfil the obligations resulting from receiving His word.
May you, my brethren and sisters, carry the spirit of this great gathering to your homes. May you have the desire to disseminate the truth taught among your associates, that your experience here may thereby be more profitable. May this conference be treasured in your memories as a time of refreshing from the Lord. And that each of us may magnify our opportunities and be worthy of the blessings of our Father in heaven, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
The choir and congregation sang the hymn, “We thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet.”
Elder Benjamin Goddard offered the closing prayer.
CLOSING SESSION.
In the Tabernacle, at 2 p. m.
President Joseph F. Smith called the meeting to order.
The choir sang Evan Stephens’ hymn, “Loyal to the True and the Right.”
The invocation was offered by Elder Brigham F. Grant.
A chorus, entitled “The Snow," was rendered by the choir.
In the Tabernacle, at 2 p. m.
President Joseph F. Smith called the meeting to order.
The choir sang Evan Stephens’ hymn, “Loyal to the True and the Right.”
The invocation was offered by Elder Brigham F. Grant.
A chorus, entitled “The Snow," was rendered by the choir.
ELDER JAMES E. TALMAGE.
A marvelous work and a wonder— The “Mormon Church”—Characteristic, teachings of the Church concerning Jesus the Christ—The Lord’s second advent—Near at hand—Today and tomorrow—The Church and the Kingdom.
The presence of these multitudes at each recurring conference of the Church, and particularly the spirit of. earnestness and devotion which the people manifest, appeal to me as striking evidences of the marvelous work and the wonder which the God of Israel has accomplished and is accomplishing in these, the last days. That great work, of which the prophets in the ages past have predicted to be characteristic of the day toward which they looked with anxious and eager anticipation, is the establishment of the Church and the development and growth thereof in the dispensation of fulness.
The kingdom of God has been set up upon the earth. In ancient writ, scriptural and otherwise, the expressions “Kingdom of God” and “Kingdom of Heaven” were often used interchangeably; or at least our modern translation of those writings present to us interchangeable usages of these names and titles of the great institutions; but in this, as in many other instances, we find the light of modern revelation illuming and making plain what may otherwise be dark and in part unintelligible. Through the revelations given in this day and age, we recognize the fact that there is a distinction between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Heaven. The Church established in the present age, embodying the restored Gospel, is the Kingdom of God, it is the Church of Jesus Christ.
The members of that Church are often spoken of as “Mormons,” and the Church has come to be known more generally as the “Mormon Church” than by its proper name and distinguishing title, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We as a people do not maintain any strong protest against the application of the term “Mormon” and its several derivatives; though we deplore the fact that misunderstanding may arise in the minds of inquirers and investigators respecting the significance of that name, which originally was used as a nickname in its application to the Church. You may call us Mormons if you will; remember, however, as you must— must, if you will have respect unto the truth—that this is not the church of Mormon. Mormon was a man, a very worthy man and a very great man in his day when he lived in the flesh, and a very great personage since that time; but he was a man among men, and while his name is very properly applied to the abridgement of certain early records, which abridgement he made and supplemented by many writings of his own, now published under the name of the Book of Mormon, the Church is not his church, nor is it the church of Peter or James or John, nor is it the church of Joseph Smith, nor of Brigham Young, nor of Joseph F. Smith, nor the church of the present authorities of the body. It is the Church of Jesus Christ and it is the only Church upon the face of the earth affirming divine authorization for the use of the name of the Savior of mankind as part of its distinctive designation.
It is very proper that we inquire as to what particular message the Church thus distinguished has to give to the world respecting its Master, its divine Head, the Son of the living God, in vindication of its claims to so honorable a title as that which it bears. In the first place, it reiterates all the truth that has been given in former ages and earlier dispensations regarding Jesus Christ and His ministry, and it sets forth in plainness, together with other matters of the greatest worth, knowledge beyond all price, which has been given unto the Church as new revelation in the day and age in which we live. Among the distinguishing features of the teachings of the Church concerning the Savior and Redeemer of the race are these:
First, the Church affirms the unity and continuity of the mission of the Christ in all ages. This, of necessity, involves the actuality, the verity, of His pre-existence and preordination or foreordination in the spirit state.
Second, the fact of His antemortal Godship.
Third, the actuality of His birth in the flesh as the natural issue of divine and mortal parentage.
Fourth, the reality of His death and physical resurrection, as a result of which the power of death over mankind shall be eventually overcome.
Fifth, the literalness of the atonement wrought by Him, and the absolute requirement of individual compliance with the laws and requirements of His Gospel as the only means by which salvation maybe attained.
Sixth, the restoration of His Priesthood and the re-establishment of His Church in the current age, which is verily the dispensation of the fulness of times.
Seventh, the certainty of His return to earth in the near future with power and great glory to reign in person and in bodily presence as Lord and King.
In the interest of conciseness I have read these several specifications as they have been summarized and will appear in the forthcoming edition of a work now published by the Church to its members and to the world respecting the life and mission of Jesus the Christ. I invite your attention to the last of these specified points, the certainty of the return of Jesus Christ to earth in the near future, to reign upon the earth in person by bodily presence as the rightful King of earth. You have read, I am sure, of the wondrous incidents connected with the association of the resurrected Christ with the apostles and others between the time of His resurrection and that of His ascension from Mount Olivet, and when, on that eventful day, He led the Eleven who were still faithful to Him, and whom He had ordained to the holy apostleship, out toward Bethany. As He was conversing with them and giving them final instruction and doubtless encouragement, He rose from their midst and they saw Him ascend until He was hidden from their sight. In worshipful wonder they became aware of the presence of personages other than themselves—white-robed messengers from heaven who, remarking their wonder and astonishment, addressed them in these words: “Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.’’ From that day the apostles preached the return of the Christ to earth, even as prophets before their time had predicted the great event. By the second advent of Christ we do not mean His manifestation to chosen prophets, to individuals or to a few, such as His ministrations to Saul of Tarsus or His appearance to Joseph Smith in 1820 and again in the Kirtland temple after the organization of the Church, but a return in glory of which all the world shall know. His coming shall be like unto the lightning that flashes from the east to the west, to be seen of all men.
This Church proclaims the doctrine of the impending return of the Christ to earth in literal simplicity, without mental or other reservation in our interpretation of the scriptural predictions. He will come with the body of flesh and bones in which His Spirit was tabernacled when He ascended from Mount Olivet. One of the characteristic features of the Church concerning that great, and in the language of the scripture, both glorious and terrible event, is its nearness. It is close at hand. The mission of the Church is to prepare the earth for the coming of its Lord. Biblical prophecies are numerous; the Book of Mormon prophecies are abundant, respecting the return of the Christ. His own words, both before and after His crucifixion and resurrection are unambiguous, definite, convincing, and convicting unto those who do not close their ears wilfully against the truth. Referring to Himself the Savior said: “For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.’’ Read the context in the 16th chapter of Matthew. The prophets who lived before the meridian of time said comparatively little, though their testimony is abundant and all sufficient, concerning the return of the Christ; for they were devoted to the teaching of the doctrine of His first coming in the flesh, to live among men, to suffer and to die and to be resurrected from the dead. But after His resurrection and ascension the words of inspired teachers were definite in fore-telling the certainty of His return; and in this day and age of the world He has spoken with His own voice unto His prophets, impressing upon them the fact that the time of His coming in judgment is near at hand. Thus, within a few months after the Church was organized, in the year 1830, as recorded in the 29th section of the Doctrine and Covenants, the Lord Jesus Christ said unto His Prophet Joseph Smith:
“For the hour is nigh and the day soon at hand when the earth is ripe; and all the proud and they that do wickedly shall be as stubble, and I will burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that wickedness shall not be upon the earth;
“For the hour is nigh, and that which was spoken by mine apostles must be fulfilled; for as they spoke so shall it come to pass;
"For I will reveal myself from heaven with power and great glory, with all the hosts thereof and dwell in righteousness with men on earth a thousand years, and the wicked shall not stand.”
A month later, or at least in the month following, He spake again admonishing His servants to diligence:
“Wherefore,” said He, “be faithful, praying always, having your lamps trimmed and burning, and oil with you, that you may be ready at the coming of the Bridegroom; for behold, verily, verily, I say unto you, that I come quickly. Even so. Amen.”
Referring to the teachings of the apostles of old, and particularly to His own instructions unto them, and employing the same figure by which He had made plain unto them that men may know of the imminence of His coming, by the signs which He specified, He said in March, 1831, again speaking through His Prophet Joseph:
“Ye look and behold the fig trees and ye see them with your eyes and ye say that when they begin to shoot forth and their leaves are yet tender that summer is now nigh at hand.
“Even so it shall be in that day when they shall see all these things, then shall they know that the hour is nigh.
“And it shall come to pass that he that feareth me shall be looking forth for the great day of the Lord to come, even for the signs of the coming of the Son of man:
“And they shall see signs and wonders, for they shall be shown forth in the heavens above, and in the earth beneath;
“And they shall behold blood, and fire, and vapors of smoke;
“And before the day of the Lord shall come, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon be turned into blood, and stars fall from heaven;
“And the remnant shall be gathered unto this place.
''And then they shall look for me, and, behold, I will come; and they shall see me in the clouds of heaven, clothed with power and great glory, with all the holy angels; and he that watches not for me shall be cut off.”
Still further impressing upon the Church in the early days of its history the fact that there was no time to be lost in preparation, for the time was all too short, He made plain the fact that His coming was so near that the intervening time is properly to be spoken of as today. “Behold, now it is called today,” said He, “until the coming of the Son of man; and verily it is a day of sacrifice and a day for the tithing of my people; for he that is tithed shall not be burned at his coming, for after today cometh the burning. This is speaking after the manner of the Lord; for verily I say, tomorrow all the proud and they that do wickedly shall be as stubble; and I will bum them up, for I am the Lord of hosts; and I will not spare any that remain in Babylon. Wherefore, if ye believe me, ye will labor while it is called today.”
The scriptures abound in declarations and reiterations, in repeated and solemn affirmations of the great fact that the day of the Lord’s coming will be a day of glory and a day of terror—of glory and recompense unto those who are living righteously, and a day of terror unto the proud and unto all who do wickedly. Now, many have asked, do we interpret that scripture as meaning that in the day of the Lord’s coming, all who are not members of the Church shall be burned, or otherwise destroyed, and only this little body of men and women, very small compared with the uncounted hosts of men now living, shall be spared the burning and shall escape destruction? I think not so. I do not think we are justified in putting that interpretation upon the Lord’s word, for He recognizes every man according to the integrity of his heart, and men who have not been able to understand the Gospel or who have not had opportunity of learning it and knowing of it will not be counted as the willfully sinful who are fit only to be burned as stubble; but the proud, who lift themselves in the pride of their hearts and rise above the word of God and become a law unto themselves and who willfully and with knowledge deny the saving virtues of the atonement of Christ, and who are seeking to lead others away from the truth will be dealt with by Him according to both justice and mercy.
A word concerning the distinction between the Kingdom and the Church. As already stated, the expression “Kingdom of God” is used synonymously with the term “Church of Christ”; but the Lord had made plain that He sometimes used the term “Kingdom of Heaven” in a distinctive sense. In 1832 He called attention to that in these words, addressing Himself to the elders of the Church-:
“Hearken, and lo, a voice as of one from on high, who is mighty and powerful, whose going forth is unto the ends of the earth, yea, whose voice is unto men—Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
“The keys of the kingdom of God are committed unto man on the earth, and from thence shall the Gospel roll forth unto the ends of the earth, as the stone which is cut out of the mountain without hands shall roll forth until it has filled the whole earth;
“Yea, a voice crying—Prepare ye the way of the Lord, prepare ye the supper of the Lamb, make ready for the bridegroom;
"Pray unto the Lord, call upon his holy name, make known his wonderful works among the people; _
“Call upon the Lord, that his kingdom may go forth upon the earth, that the inhabitants thereof may receive it, and be prepared for the days to come, in the which the Son of man shall come down in heaven, clothed in the brightness of his glory, to meet the kingdom of God which is set up on the earth;
“Wherefore may the kingdom of God go forth, that the kingdom of heaven may come, that Thou, O God, mayest be glorified in heaven, so on earth, that thy enemies may be subdued, for Thine is the honor, power and glory, forever and ever. Amen.”
Such was the prayer, such is the prayer, prescribed for this people to pray, not to utter in words only, not to say only, but to pray—that the Kingdom of God may roll forth in the earth to prepare the. earth for the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven. That provision in the Lord’s prayer, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven” has not been abrogated. We are praying for the Kingdom of Heaven to come, and are endeavoring to prepare the earth for its coming. The Kingdom of God, already set up upon the earth, does not aspire to temporal domination among the nations. It seeks not to overthrow any existing forms of government; it does not profess to exercise control in matters that pertain to the governments of the earth, except by teaching correct principles and trying to get men to live according to the principles of true government, before the Kingdom of Heaven shall come and be established upon the earth with a King at the head. But when He comes, He shall rule and reign, for it is His right.
Many of us are prone to think that the day of His coming, the day of the setting up of the Kingdom of Heaven in its power and glory is yet far distant. I take it that that assumption is based, perhaps, upon our wish, none the less real, because we hesitate to frame it in words. How would you feel if authoritative proclamation were made here today that on the literal morrow, when the sun shall rise again in the east, the Lord would appear in His glory to take vengeance upon the wicked, and to establish His Kingdom upon the earth? Who amongst you would rejoice? The pure in heart would, the righteous in soul would, but many of us would wish to have the event put off. We are very much in the frame of mind, or we may allow ourselves to fall in the frame of mind of the rule bound Pharisees and the casuistical Sadducees in the days of the Christ in the flesh. They were intent upon keeping the people’s interest alive in a future Messiah, in a Christ who was to come, but not one who was amongst them. We are very loath to accept and believe that which we do not want to believe, and the world today does not wish to believe that the coming of the Christ is near at hand, and consequently all kinds of subterfuges are invented for explaining away the plain words of scripture. We rejoice in simplicity. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is wonderfully simple. We as a people value, I believe, scholastic attainments at their full worth. While we foster and encourage the training and development of the mind, I was about to say to the full limit, certainly almost to the limit, of our material ability, as witness the unceasing effort and continuous expenditure of vast sums in the maintenance of church schools, and the willingness with which the Latter-day Saints as members of the community impose upon themselves, in common with their fellow citizens, taxes for the support of schools under state control and direction, we nevertheless hold that scholastic attainments are not essential to a full understanding of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We do not believe that a diploma from a theological seminary is an essential part of the credentials of a teacher or preacher of the word of God. Nevertheless we endeavor to encourage and aid in a material way the training of the mind and the development of all the faculties that shall be conducive to educational advancement in the truest sense of the term, but we hold the Gospel is simple that all may understand it who will. It is the proud and they who do wickedly who close their eyes and their ears and their hearts to the signs of the times, to the word of the Gospel and to the testimony of the Christ. It has long been a favorite excuse of men who were not ready for the advent of the Lord, to say, “The Lord delayeth His coming.” Don’t attach too much importance to the fact that He has thus far delayed His coming, for He has repeatedly told us that the day of His coming is very, very near, even at our doors. There is a tendency among men to explain away what they don’t wish to understand in literal simplicity, and we, as Latter-day Saints are not entirely free from the taint of that tendency. Prophecies that have not yet been fulfilled are by many of us made the subjects of hypothesis and theory and strained interpretation. We read that one of the characteristic signs to precede the second advent of Christ shall be the bringing forth of the tribes that have been lost to history, led away where men have not yet found them, and we are told that they shall be brought forth with a strong hand by the power of God and shall come unto Zion and receive their blessings at the hands of Ephraim. But some people say that prediction is to be explained in this way: A gathering is in progress, and has been in progress from the early days of this Church; and thus the “Lost Tribes” are now being gathered; but that we are not to look for the return of any body of people now unknown as to their whereabouts. True, the gathering is in progress, this is a gathering dispensation; but the prophecy stands that the tribes shall be brought forth from their hiding place bringing their scriptures with them, which scriptures shall become one with the scriptures of the Jews, the holy Bible, and with the scriptures of the Nephites, the Book of Mormon, and with the scriptures of the Latter-day Saints as embodied in the volumes of modern revelation.
The Lord has said it. I am just simple-minded enough, my brethren and sisters, to stand upon the rock of assurance that not one jot or tittle of the word of the Lord shall fail. Do not allow yourselves to think that the coming of the Christ means merely the spread of different or more advanced ideas among men, or simply the progress and advancement of society as an institution. These shall be but incidents of the great consummation, the consummation of this particular stage or epoch of the Lord’s work. The Lord Jesus Christ shall come in the clouds of heaven, accompanied by the heavenly hosts, and His advent shall be marked by a great extension of the resurrection of the just, which has been in progress since that resurrection Sunday on which He came forth from the tomb and took up the wounded, pierced body which He had laid down; and those who are not able to bear the glory of His coming because of their wickedness, their foulness, and willful state of sin, shall, by natural means, perish. A strong current of electricity passes safely through a pure conductor, but where resistance is encountered it becomes a destructive power. It was necessary that the work for the dead be undertaken by the living, that temples be reared and this vicarious labor be performed, that the hearts of the departed fathers might be turned toward their yet mortal descendants, and the hearts of mortal children be turned to their dead ancestors, lest the earth be smitten with a curse at the time of the Lord’s coming.
The Bible is very simple to those who read it with earnest and honest intent, as are all the scriptures, but it is very puzzling to the theologians, very puzzling, sometimes to Biblical scholars and interpreters who seek to apply to it only those tests that are common among men. I rejoice in the testimony of the Savior that He is verily the Christ and we proclaim Him as such. Great interest is manifest at this time in the work and ministry of Jesus Christ, not only among the Latter-day Saints but in the world in general; and He has been analyzed and measured and written about from many points of view, and as viewed from many different angles. There are volumes of recent publication dealing with the Christ of literature, the Christ of history, the Christ of reason, the Christ of experience. Never lived a man of whom more has been said or sung; and there is none to whom is devoted a greater share of the world’s literature. But the tendency is to view Him from this angle or that and not to look with direct vision. I am thankful that the Church to which I belong preaches Christ and Him crucified, and resurrected, the Christ that ascended into heaven, the Christ that shall come again, the Christ that was the offspring in the flesh, as well as in the spirit, of the very Eternal Father, the Christ who is the Savior and Redeemer of mankind, beside whom there is none, beside whose name there is no name under heaven, whereby mankind may be saved. May His Spirit be ever with us, and may we be prepared for His coming, I humbly ask, in His name. Amen.
“A Temple in Hawaii,” words by Ruth May Fox, and music by Orson Clark, was sung by Ethelyn Walker, Hazel B. Neilson, James H. Neilson, and Almy C. Clayton.
A marvelous work and a wonder— The “Mormon Church”—Characteristic, teachings of the Church concerning Jesus the Christ—The Lord’s second advent—Near at hand—Today and tomorrow—The Church and the Kingdom.
The presence of these multitudes at each recurring conference of the Church, and particularly the spirit of. earnestness and devotion which the people manifest, appeal to me as striking evidences of the marvelous work and the wonder which the God of Israel has accomplished and is accomplishing in these, the last days. That great work, of which the prophets in the ages past have predicted to be characteristic of the day toward which they looked with anxious and eager anticipation, is the establishment of the Church and the development and growth thereof in the dispensation of fulness.
The kingdom of God has been set up upon the earth. In ancient writ, scriptural and otherwise, the expressions “Kingdom of God” and “Kingdom of Heaven” were often used interchangeably; or at least our modern translation of those writings present to us interchangeable usages of these names and titles of the great institutions; but in this, as in many other instances, we find the light of modern revelation illuming and making plain what may otherwise be dark and in part unintelligible. Through the revelations given in this day and age, we recognize the fact that there is a distinction between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Heaven. The Church established in the present age, embodying the restored Gospel, is the Kingdom of God, it is the Church of Jesus Christ.
The members of that Church are often spoken of as “Mormons,” and the Church has come to be known more generally as the “Mormon Church” than by its proper name and distinguishing title, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We as a people do not maintain any strong protest against the application of the term “Mormon” and its several derivatives; though we deplore the fact that misunderstanding may arise in the minds of inquirers and investigators respecting the significance of that name, which originally was used as a nickname in its application to the Church. You may call us Mormons if you will; remember, however, as you must— must, if you will have respect unto the truth—that this is not the church of Mormon. Mormon was a man, a very worthy man and a very great man in his day when he lived in the flesh, and a very great personage since that time; but he was a man among men, and while his name is very properly applied to the abridgement of certain early records, which abridgement he made and supplemented by many writings of his own, now published under the name of the Book of Mormon, the Church is not his church, nor is it the church of Peter or James or John, nor is it the church of Joseph Smith, nor of Brigham Young, nor of Joseph F. Smith, nor the church of the present authorities of the body. It is the Church of Jesus Christ and it is the only Church upon the face of the earth affirming divine authorization for the use of the name of the Savior of mankind as part of its distinctive designation.
It is very proper that we inquire as to what particular message the Church thus distinguished has to give to the world respecting its Master, its divine Head, the Son of the living God, in vindication of its claims to so honorable a title as that which it bears. In the first place, it reiterates all the truth that has been given in former ages and earlier dispensations regarding Jesus Christ and His ministry, and it sets forth in plainness, together with other matters of the greatest worth, knowledge beyond all price, which has been given unto the Church as new revelation in the day and age in which we live. Among the distinguishing features of the teachings of the Church concerning the Savior and Redeemer of the race are these:
First, the Church affirms the unity and continuity of the mission of the Christ in all ages. This, of necessity, involves the actuality, the verity, of His pre-existence and preordination or foreordination in the spirit state.
Second, the fact of His antemortal Godship.
Third, the actuality of His birth in the flesh as the natural issue of divine and mortal parentage.
Fourth, the reality of His death and physical resurrection, as a result of which the power of death over mankind shall be eventually overcome.
Fifth, the literalness of the atonement wrought by Him, and the absolute requirement of individual compliance with the laws and requirements of His Gospel as the only means by which salvation maybe attained.
Sixth, the restoration of His Priesthood and the re-establishment of His Church in the current age, which is verily the dispensation of the fulness of times.
Seventh, the certainty of His return to earth in the near future with power and great glory to reign in person and in bodily presence as Lord and King.
In the interest of conciseness I have read these several specifications as they have been summarized and will appear in the forthcoming edition of a work now published by the Church to its members and to the world respecting the life and mission of Jesus the Christ. I invite your attention to the last of these specified points, the certainty of the return of Jesus Christ to earth in the near future, to reign upon the earth in person by bodily presence as the rightful King of earth. You have read, I am sure, of the wondrous incidents connected with the association of the resurrected Christ with the apostles and others between the time of His resurrection and that of His ascension from Mount Olivet, and when, on that eventful day, He led the Eleven who were still faithful to Him, and whom He had ordained to the holy apostleship, out toward Bethany. As He was conversing with them and giving them final instruction and doubtless encouragement, He rose from their midst and they saw Him ascend until He was hidden from their sight. In worshipful wonder they became aware of the presence of personages other than themselves—white-robed messengers from heaven who, remarking their wonder and astonishment, addressed them in these words: “Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.’’ From that day the apostles preached the return of the Christ to earth, even as prophets before their time had predicted the great event. By the second advent of Christ we do not mean His manifestation to chosen prophets, to individuals or to a few, such as His ministrations to Saul of Tarsus or His appearance to Joseph Smith in 1820 and again in the Kirtland temple after the organization of the Church, but a return in glory of which all the world shall know. His coming shall be like unto the lightning that flashes from the east to the west, to be seen of all men.
This Church proclaims the doctrine of the impending return of the Christ to earth in literal simplicity, without mental or other reservation in our interpretation of the scriptural predictions. He will come with the body of flesh and bones in which His Spirit was tabernacled when He ascended from Mount Olivet. One of the characteristic features of the Church concerning that great, and in the language of the scripture, both glorious and terrible event, is its nearness. It is close at hand. The mission of the Church is to prepare the earth for the coming of its Lord. Biblical prophecies are numerous; the Book of Mormon prophecies are abundant, respecting the return of the Christ. His own words, both before and after His crucifixion and resurrection are unambiguous, definite, convincing, and convicting unto those who do not close their ears wilfully against the truth. Referring to Himself the Savior said: “For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.’’ Read the context in the 16th chapter of Matthew. The prophets who lived before the meridian of time said comparatively little, though their testimony is abundant and all sufficient, concerning the return of the Christ; for they were devoted to the teaching of the doctrine of His first coming in the flesh, to live among men, to suffer and to die and to be resurrected from the dead. But after His resurrection and ascension the words of inspired teachers were definite in fore-telling the certainty of His return; and in this day and age of the world He has spoken with His own voice unto His prophets, impressing upon them the fact that the time of His coming in judgment is near at hand. Thus, within a few months after the Church was organized, in the year 1830, as recorded in the 29th section of the Doctrine and Covenants, the Lord Jesus Christ said unto His Prophet Joseph Smith:
“For the hour is nigh and the day soon at hand when the earth is ripe; and all the proud and they that do wickedly shall be as stubble, and I will burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that wickedness shall not be upon the earth;
“For the hour is nigh, and that which was spoken by mine apostles must be fulfilled; for as they spoke so shall it come to pass;
"For I will reveal myself from heaven with power and great glory, with all the hosts thereof and dwell in righteousness with men on earth a thousand years, and the wicked shall not stand.”
A month later, or at least in the month following, He spake again admonishing His servants to diligence:
“Wherefore,” said He, “be faithful, praying always, having your lamps trimmed and burning, and oil with you, that you may be ready at the coming of the Bridegroom; for behold, verily, verily, I say unto you, that I come quickly. Even so. Amen.”
Referring to the teachings of the apostles of old, and particularly to His own instructions unto them, and employing the same figure by which He had made plain unto them that men may know of the imminence of His coming, by the signs which He specified, He said in March, 1831, again speaking through His Prophet Joseph:
“Ye look and behold the fig trees and ye see them with your eyes and ye say that when they begin to shoot forth and their leaves are yet tender that summer is now nigh at hand.
“Even so it shall be in that day when they shall see all these things, then shall they know that the hour is nigh.
“And it shall come to pass that he that feareth me shall be looking forth for the great day of the Lord to come, even for the signs of the coming of the Son of man:
“And they shall see signs and wonders, for they shall be shown forth in the heavens above, and in the earth beneath;
“And they shall behold blood, and fire, and vapors of smoke;
“And before the day of the Lord shall come, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon be turned into blood, and stars fall from heaven;
“And the remnant shall be gathered unto this place.
''And then they shall look for me, and, behold, I will come; and they shall see me in the clouds of heaven, clothed with power and great glory, with all the holy angels; and he that watches not for me shall be cut off.”
Still further impressing upon the Church in the early days of its history the fact that there was no time to be lost in preparation, for the time was all too short, He made plain the fact that His coming was so near that the intervening time is properly to be spoken of as today. “Behold, now it is called today,” said He, “until the coming of the Son of man; and verily it is a day of sacrifice and a day for the tithing of my people; for he that is tithed shall not be burned at his coming, for after today cometh the burning. This is speaking after the manner of the Lord; for verily I say, tomorrow all the proud and they that do wickedly shall be as stubble; and I will bum them up, for I am the Lord of hosts; and I will not spare any that remain in Babylon. Wherefore, if ye believe me, ye will labor while it is called today.”
The scriptures abound in declarations and reiterations, in repeated and solemn affirmations of the great fact that the day of the Lord’s coming will be a day of glory and a day of terror—of glory and recompense unto those who are living righteously, and a day of terror unto the proud and unto all who do wickedly. Now, many have asked, do we interpret that scripture as meaning that in the day of the Lord’s coming, all who are not members of the Church shall be burned, or otherwise destroyed, and only this little body of men and women, very small compared with the uncounted hosts of men now living, shall be spared the burning and shall escape destruction? I think not so. I do not think we are justified in putting that interpretation upon the Lord’s word, for He recognizes every man according to the integrity of his heart, and men who have not been able to understand the Gospel or who have not had opportunity of learning it and knowing of it will not be counted as the willfully sinful who are fit only to be burned as stubble; but the proud, who lift themselves in the pride of their hearts and rise above the word of God and become a law unto themselves and who willfully and with knowledge deny the saving virtues of the atonement of Christ, and who are seeking to lead others away from the truth will be dealt with by Him according to both justice and mercy.
A word concerning the distinction between the Kingdom and the Church. As already stated, the expression “Kingdom of God” is used synonymously with the term “Church of Christ”; but the Lord had made plain that He sometimes used the term “Kingdom of Heaven” in a distinctive sense. In 1832 He called attention to that in these words, addressing Himself to the elders of the Church-:
“Hearken, and lo, a voice as of one from on high, who is mighty and powerful, whose going forth is unto the ends of the earth, yea, whose voice is unto men—Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
“The keys of the kingdom of God are committed unto man on the earth, and from thence shall the Gospel roll forth unto the ends of the earth, as the stone which is cut out of the mountain without hands shall roll forth until it has filled the whole earth;
“Yea, a voice crying—Prepare ye the way of the Lord, prepare ye the supper of the Lamb, make ready for the bridegroom;
"Pray unto the Lord, call upon his holy name, make known his wonderful works among the people; _
“Call upon the Lord, that his kingdom may go forth upon the earth, that the inhabitants thereof may receive it, and be prepared for the days to come, in the which the Son of man shall come down in heaven, clothed in the brightness of his glory, to meet the kingdom of God which is set up on the earth;
“Wherefore may the kingdom of God go forth, that the kingdom of heaven may come, that Thou, O God, mayest be glorified in heaven, so on earth, that thy enemies may be subdued, for Thine is the honor, power and glory, forever and ever. Amen.”
Such was the prayer, such is the prayer, prescribed for this people to pray, not to utter in words only, not to say only, but to pray—that the Kingdom of God may roll forth in the earth to prepare the. earth for the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven. That provision in the Lord’s prayer, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven” has not been abrogated. We are praying for the Kingdom of Heaven to come, and are endeavoring to prepare the earth for its coming. The Kingdom of God, already set up upon the earth, does not aspire to temporal domination among the nations. It seeks not to overthrow any existing forms of government; it does not profess to exercise control in matters that pertain to the governments of the earth, except by teaching correct principles and trying to get men to live according to the principles of true government, before the Kingdom of Heaven shall come and be established upon the earth with a King at the head. But when He comes, He shall rule and reign, for it is His right.
Many of us are prone to think that the day of His coming, the day of the setting up of the Kingdom of Heaven in its power and glory is yet far distant. I take it that that assumption is based, perhaps, upon our wish, none the less real, because we hesitate to frame it in words. How would you feel if authoritative proclamation were made here today that on the literal morrow, when the sun shall rise again in the east, the Lord would appear in His glory to take vengeance upon the wicked, and to establish His Kingdom upon the earth? Who amongst you would rejoice? The pure in heart would, the righteous in soul would, but many of us would wish to have the event put off. We are very much in the frame of mind, or we may allow ourselves to fall in the frame of mind of the rule bound Pharisees and the casuistical Sadducees in the days of the Christ in the flesh. They were intent upon keeping the people’s interest alive in a future Messiah, in a Christ who was to come, but not one who was amongst them. We are very loath to accept and believe that which we do not want to believe, and the world today does not wish to believe that the coming of the Christ is near at hand, and consequently all kinds of subterfuges are invented for explaining away the plain words of scripture. We rejoice in simplicity. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is wonderfully simple. We as a people value, I believe, scholastic attainments at their full worth. While we foster and encourage the training and development of the mind, I was about to say to the full limit, certainly almost to the limit, of our material ability, as witness the unceasing effort and continuous expenditure of vast sums in the maintenance of church schools, and the willingness with which the Latter-day Saints as members of the community impose upon themselves, in common with their fellow citizens, taxes for the support of schools under state control and direction, we nevertheless hold that scholastic attainments are not essential to a full understanding of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We do not believe that a diploma from a theological seminary is an essential part of the credentials of a teacher or preacher of the word of God. Nevertheless we endeavor to encourage and aid in a material way the training of the mind and the development of all the faculties that shall be conducive to educational advancement in the truest sense of the term, but we hold the Gospel is simple that all may understand it who will. It is the proud and they who do wickedly who close their eyes and their ears and their hearts to the signs of the times, to the word of the Gospel and to the testimony of the Christ. It has long been a favorite excuse of men who were not ready for the advent of the Lord, to say, “The Lord delayeth His coming.” Don’t attach too much importance to the fact that He has thus far delayed His coming, for He has repeatedly told us that the day of His coming is very, very near, even at our doors. There is a tendency among men to explain away what they don’t wish to understand in literal simplicity, and we, as Latter-day Saints are not entirely free from the taint of that tendency. Prophecies that have not yet been fulfilled are by many of us made the subjects of hypothesis and theory and strained interpretation. We read that one of the characteristic signs to precede the second advent of Christ shall be the bringing forth of the tribes that have been lost to history, led away where men have not yet found them, and we are told that they shall be brought forth with a strong hand by the power of God and shall come unto Zion and receive their blessings at the hands of Ephraim. But some people say that prediction is to be explained in this way: A gathering is in progress, and has been in progress from the early days of this Church; and thus the “Lost Tribes” are now being gathered; but that we are not to look for the return of any body of people now unknown as to their whereabouts. True, the gathering is in progress, this is a gathering dispensation; but the prophecy stands that the tribes shall be brought forth from their hiding place bringing their scriptures with them, which scriptures shall become one with the scriptures of the Jews, the holy Bible, and with the scriptures of the Nephites, the Book of Mormon, and with the scriptures of the Latter-day Saints as embodied in the volumes of modern revelation.
The Lord has said it. I am just simple-minded enough, my brethren and sisters, to stand upon the rock of assurance that not one jot or tittle of the word of the Lord shall fail. Do not allow yourselves to think that the coming of the Christ means merely the spread of different or more advanced ideas among men, or simply the progress and advancement of society as an institution. These shall be but incidents of the great consummation, the consummation of this particular stage or epoch of the Lord’s work. The Lord Jesus Christ shall come in the clouds of heaven, accompanied by the heavenly hosts, and His advent shall be marked by a great extension of the resurrection of the just, which has been in progress since that resurrection Sunday on which He came forth from the tomb and took up the wounded, pierced body which He had laid down; and those who are not able to bear the glory of His coming because of their wickedness, their foulness, and willful state of sin, shall, by natural means, perish. A strong current of electricity passes safely through a pure conductor, but where resistance is encountered it becomes a destructive power. It was necessary that the work for the dead be undertaken by the living, that temples be reared and this vicarious labor be performed, that the hearts of the departed fathers might be turned toward their yet mortal descendants, and the hearts of mortal children be turned to their dead ancestors, lest the earth be smitten with a curse at the time of the Lord’s coming.
The Bible is very simple to those who read it with earnest and honest intent, as are all the scriptures, but it is very puzzling to the theologians, very puzzling, sometimes to Biblical scholars and interpreters who seek to apply to it only those tests that are common among men. I rejoice in the testimony of the Savior that He is verily the Christ and we proclaim Him as such. Great interest is manifest at this time in the work and ministry of Jesus Christ, not only among the Latter-day Saints but in the world in general; and He has been analyzed and measured and written about from many points of view, and as viewed from many different angles. There are volumes of recent publication dealing with the Christ of literature, the Christ of history, the Christ of reason, the Christ of experience. Never lived a man of whom more has been said or sung; and there is none to whom is devoted a greater share of the world’s literature. But the tendency is to view Him from this angle or that and not to look with direct vision. I am thankful that the Church to which I belong preaches Christ and Him crucified, and resurrected, the Christ that ascended into heaven, the Christ that shall come again, the Christ that was the offspring in the flesh, as well as in the spirit, of the very Eternal Father, the Christ who is the Savior and Redeemer of mankind, beside whom there is none, beside whose name there is no name under heaven, whereby mankind may be saved. May His Spirit be ever with us, and may we be prepared for His coming, I humbly ask, in His name. Amen.
“A Temple in Hawaii,” words by Ruth May Fox, and music by Orson Clark, was sung by Ethelyn Walker, Hazel B. Neilson, James H. Neilson, and Almy C. Clayton.
BISHOP CHARLES W. NIBLEY.
Loyalty, a doctrine of the L. D. S. Church—God the only King on this land of Liberty—“Mormonism” makes "good citizenship”—No "hyphenated” Americans in "Mormon” Church, all are true Americans—Admirable characteristics in people of other countries.
It comes as a surprise to me, my brethren and sisters, to be asked to occupy this position this afternoon. I respond cheerfully, however, and even gladly, to testify to you of my faith and confidence in this work of the Lord and of the blessing that it has in store for mankind, to all who believe and obey.
While the first song was being sung this afternoon, “Loyal to the true and the right,” I thought in that line was composed the whole duty of man, for if I am loyal to the truth and to the right in all things; then I must be at all points acceptable to God, my Heavenly Father. We are taught in the revelations of the Almighty to this Church the doctrine of loyalty. If we believe really and truly in the doctrines of the Church, and believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, then that very belief must of necessity make us better citizens than those who do not so believe. Why? Because I believe that God -Almighty raised up men to lay the foundations of this great government. I believe in the Book of Mormon, which declares that there should be no king upon this land, but that God would be our King. By a singular co-incidence, the writer of one of our national songs seems to have hit upon this very thought, when he declares in the last verse of the hymn, “My Country, ’Tis of Thee”:
"Our fathers’ God, to Thee,
Author of Liberty,
To Thee we sing;
Long may our land be bright
With freedom’s holy light;
Protect us by Thy might,
Great God, our King.”
The same inspiration that gave to Joseph Smith the understanding that there should be no king, but that the Lord would be our King upon this land, gave to the author of the song, our national anthem (who, by the way, is a Smith also) the same inspiration, that the Lord our God should be King over this land. Believing so, and understanding that the Lord has had a hand in the establishment of this freedom and liberty that we enjoy, I say that if I really believe it, and live by it, that citizenship which I have must of necessity be more sacred to me, and will make me a better citizen than the man who does pot believe that God raised up the founders of this land, and that He declared that there should be no king, only that He should be King, and that we should have Him and look to Him as King and Ruler of all.
So, “Mormonism” makes for good citizenship, don’t you see— the best, the very best that there is. I do not say but what there are millions of excellent citizens—I know there are—in our land here who are loyal to what they believe to be right, but I want to impress upon you, and if my words could only go out to the world who do not understand us, this further fact that my religion impels me, constrains me, nay, I may say compels me, if I will listen to its advice, to be a better citizen in consequence of the belief in that religion, than I could be without it. And so we desire, as said in Brother Stephens’ song, to be “loyal to the true and the right.” There is no hyphen with “Mormonism.” We have in this Church no Scotch-Americans or Danish Americans, or German-Americans, not one; we are all Americans. Why? Because God is our King. No King George of England or King Wilhelm of Germany or no other do we acknowledge here, only the great God Almighty, He is our Ruler, He is our King, Him we will serve. And so right on that, a question is settled that which has to a certain extent perplexed this nation at this time, the hyphenated American, as they call him, who owes, as he thinks, some allegiance to some other country than his own, whether it be England or Germany or what it be. In England they are singing, today, as they sing always, “God save our gracious king, Long live our noble king, God save the king,” but in this country we are singing, “Great God, our King,” and the hyphenated citizen cannot exist in “Mormonism.” There is a problem that is solved by our religion which may trouble the people, and which has troubled some of the leaders of this nation, and is troubling them at the present time, and I would like the word to go out that by the very fact that a man is a Latter-day Saint, a member of the “Mormon’ Church, if you please, that by that fact it is impossible for him to be a hyphenated citizen or to have any hyphen between his native country and his home here in the mountains. His religion teaches him loyalty-teaches him that he must absolve himself from all emperors, from all potentates, from all countries; and that this is the land of Zion, and that he must abide here and revere the King of this land, who is God Almighty Himself.
Now I am not saying that there are not good people in different lands who take different views on this question. I admire the peoples, many of them, who are at war at this present time. The German nation as a people—there is no better people in all the world than the German people; they have proved it, too, before this war began, in efficiency, in every man who could work being at work, work provided for him in some way, and more or less every man contented and comparatively happy. They had given all the nations of the world a lesson in this respect; they had even given us a lesson, but there are those who hold, and I am one of them, that the very system which has grown up there is to some extent subversive of liberty; the system, not the people; the people, I repeat, are of the very best and choicest in the’ world. Our German brethren and sisters, who have come from that land, and are settled with us here in this land of Zion, there are no better people among us; you cannot produce them anywhere. But I wish those German brothers and sisters, and English and Scotch and French, to remember this—I must repeat it again, and my time is up, I see— that there is no hyphen connected with the loyalty of citizenship when once you are a “Mormon.”
I use that word “Mormon” as applied to a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, so that it may be more widely known, if possible, that this Church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, makes for the best citizenship in all the world. The very teaching of my Church, my religion, the counsel of those who are over me, the revelations of Jesus Christ to me, impel me to the best citizenship, to be “loyal to the true and the right,” and that there shall be no hyphen connected with the “Mormonism” and citizenship of any one who is connected with it.
God bless you, bless Israel, bless those who give guidance and direction to this organization; the Lord does that through His servants. The Lord bless those servants that we may listen to them, and if we do we will never go far wrong. The Lord bless Zion, multiply and increase the people of Zion; that we may be kind to the poor, that we may see that the poor do not suffer—that is a principle of our religion and we must live it—the poor shall not want and suffer while there is abundance in the Church. The Lord bless us and help us to understand our duties and do them, and be “loyal to the true and the right,” through Jesus Christ, Amen.
Mabel Poulton Kirk and the choir sang the hymn, “Beautiful Zion for me.”
Loyalty, a doctrine of the L. D. S. Church—God the only King on this land of Liberty—“Mormonism” makes "good citizenship”—No "hyphenated” Americans in "Mormon” Church, all are true Americans—Admirable characteristics in people of other countries.
It comes as a surprise to me, my brethren and sisters, to be asked to occupy this position this afternoon. I respond cheerfully, however, and even gladly, to testify to you of my faith and confidence in this work of the Lord and of the blessing that it has in store for mankind, to all who believe and obey.
While the first song was being sung this afternoon, “Loyal to the true and the right,” I thought in that line was composed the whole duty of man, for if I am loyal to the truth and to the right in all things; then I must be at all points acceptable to God, my Heavenly Father. We are taught in the revelations of the Almighty to this Church the doctrine of loyalty. If we believe really and truly in the doctrines of the Church, and believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, then that very belief must of necessity make us better citizens than those who do not so believe. Why? Because I believe that God -Almighty raised up men to lay the foundations of this great government. I believe in the Book of Mormon, which declares that there should be no king upon this land, but that God would be our King. By a singular co-incidence, the writer of one of our national songs seems to have hit upon this very thought, when he declares in the last verse of the hymn, “My Country, ’Tis of Thee”:
"Our fathers’ God, to Thee,
Author of Liberty,
To Thee we sing;
Long may our land be bright
With freedom’s holy light;
Protect us by Thy might,
Great God, our King.”
The same inspiration that gave to Joseph Smith the understanding that there should be no king, but that the Lord would be our King upon this land, gave to the author of the song, our national anthem (who, by the way, is a Smith also) the same inspiration, that the Lord our God should be King over this land. Believing so, and understanding that the Lord has had a hand in the establishment of this freedom and liberty that we enjoy, I say that if I really believe it, and live by it, that citizenship which I have must of necessity be more sacred to me, and will make me a better citizen than the man who does pot believe that God raised up the founders of this land, and that He declared that there should be no king, only that He should be King, and that we should have Him and look to Him as King and Ruler of all.
So, “Mormonism” makes for good citizenship, don’t you see— the best, the very best that there is. I do not say but what there are millions of excellent citizens—I know there are—in our land here who are loyal to what they believe to be right, but I want to impress upon you, and if my words could only go out to the world who do not understand us, this further fact that my religion impels me, constrains me, nay, I may say compels me, if I will listen to its advice, to be a better citizen in consequence of the belief in that religion, than I could be without it. And so we desire, as said in Brother Stephens’ song, to be “loyal to the true and the right.” There is no hyphen with “Mormonism.” We have in this Church no Scotch-Americans or Danish Americans, or German-Americans, not one; we are all Americans. Why? Because God is our King. No King George of England or King Wilhelm of Germany or no other do we acknowledge here, only the great God Almighty, He is our Ruler, He is our King, Him we will serve. And so right on that, a question is settled that which has to a certain extent perplexed this nation at this time, the hyphenated American, as they call him, who owes, as he thinks, some allegiance to some other country than his own, whether it be England or Germany or what it be. In England they are singing, today, as they sing always, “God save our gracious king, Long live our noble king, God save the king,” but in this country we are singing, “Great God, our King,” and the hyphenated citizen cannot exist in “Mormonism.” There is a problem that is solved by our religion which may trouble the people, and which has troubled some of the leaders of this nation, and is troubling them at the present time, and I would like the word to go out that by the very fact that a man is a Latter-day Saint, a member of the “Mormon’ Church, if you please, that by that fact it is impossible for him to be a hyphenated citizen or to have any hyphen between his native country and his home here in the mountains. His religion teaches him loyalty-teaches him that he must absolve himself from all emperors, from all potentates, from all countries; and that this is the land of Zion, and that he must abide here and revere the King of this land, who is God Almighty Himself.
Now I am not saying that there are not good people in different lands who take different views on this question. I admire the peoples, many of them, who are at war at this present time. The German nation as a people—there is no better people in all the world than the German people; they have proved it, too, before this war began, in efficiency, in every man who could work being at work, work provided for him in some way, and more or less every man contented and comparatively happy. They had given all the nations of the world a lesson in this respect; they had even given us a lesson, but there are those who hold, and I am one of them, that the very system which has grown up there is to some extent subversive of liberty; the system, not the people; the people, I repeat, are of the very best and choicest in the’ world. Our German brethren and sisters, who have come from that land, and are settled with us here in this land of Zion, there are no better people among us; you cannot produce them anywhere. But I wish those German brothers and sisters, and English and Scotch and French, to remember this—I must repeat it again, and my time is up, I see— that there is no hyphen connected with the loyalty of citizenship when once you are a “Mormon.”
I use that word “Mormon” as applied to a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, so that it may be more widely known, if possible, that this Church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, makes for the best citizenship in all the world. The very teaching of my Church, my religion, the counsel of those who are over me, the revelations of Jesus Christ to me, impel me to the best citizenship, to be “loyal to the true and the right,” and that there shall be no hyphen connected with the “Mormonism” and citizenship of any one who is connected with it.
God bless you, bless Israel, bless those who give guidance and direction to this organization; the Lord does that through His servants. The Lord bless those servants that we may listen to them, and if we do we will never go far wrong. The Lord bless Zion, multiply and increase the people of Zion; that we may be kind to the poor, that we may see that the poor do not suffer—that is a principle of our religion and we must live it—the poor shall not want and suffer while there is abundance in the Church. The Lord bless us and help us to understand our duties and do them, and be “loyal to the true and the right,” through Jesus Christ, Amen.
Mabel Poulton Kirk and the choir sang the hymn, “Beautiful Zion for me.”
ELDER BRIGHAM H. ROBERTS.
(Of the First Council of Seventy.)
I hold in my hand an excerpt from a recent number of the Outlook, of which Mr. Lyman Abbott, a religious teacher of great fame is the editor and also the publisher. In it he has a department in which he answers questions from those whom he calls "unknown friends,” and this question appears in that column:
“Have there been any prophets since Christ who add to the great prophecies which are of value to those who wish to know the truth; or is it sufficient to know the old prophets and the teachings of Christ?’’
To this question Mr. Abbott makes the following answer:
“The prophets, we are told, spoke as they were moved, inspired, guided by the spirit of God. There is no reason to suppose that God has ceased to move upon the spirits of men and to inspire and guide them. Certainly there is nothing in the New Testament to warrant any such opinion.
Peter expressly declares that the promise of the Holy Spirit is to all who will receive it, and Paul bids us pray that we may be filled with all fulness of God.”
To the second part of the question he answers:
“On the other hand there is no reason to suppose that anything has been added to the substantial truths respecting God and His relations to His children, which are taught in the Old and New Testaments. Their teachings that God loves and serves and sacrifices Himself in love for His children leaves nothing beyond to be desired or even to be conceived. The prophets since that revelation are guided, not to add new truths, but to show' how the truth of love, the love of God to man, and the love of man to God and to each other, is to be applied in all the changing situations and conditions of human life.”
I thought I would like to read that passage to this great multitude, because in some respects it does mark a forward movement in the conceptions of this religious teacher, at least, in regard to the principle of revelation. In the early history of our Church, the great novelty associated with it, and the wonder of its message, seemed to be that God had again spoken from the heavens; that angels had visited servants of God to restore the Gospel. This was the point at which our message was met by the religious teachers of those times with the claim that the volume of scripture was completed, and forever closed; that the awful voice of prophecy would no more be heard, that the last word of revelation had been spoken. In that controversy the early elders of the Church obtained an easy victory over their opponents; because it was so easy for them to do just what Mr. Lyman Abbott here does, namely, point to the fact that prophecy came not in olden times by the will of man, but holy men of God spake as they were moved upon by the Holy Ghost, and wherever that spirit is possessed there is the spirit of prophecy; and it was an inconsistency on the part of the Christian world to claim that they were in possession of the Holy Ghost and yet without the gift of prophecy and of revelation. Consequently, I say, the victory of God’s servants on that point was easily obtained. Mr. Abbott concedes the reasonableness of that argument, because he himself here uses it. But the astonishing thing in connection with this answer of his to the question submitted to him is, in the second part of it, viz., that while admitting that the spirit of prophecy may still be upon the children of men, and there may be prophets among Christians, who possess that spirit, yet they may add nothing new to what has been revealed! It would be extremely interesting to point out to Mr. Abbott and those who think with him how great necessity there is for divine wisdom to be manifested in, and divine instructions given upon, every many vital religious questions. One might call his attention, for instance, to the fact that in the matter of the very ordinance by which men may be admitted into the Church of Christ—baptism—the formula to be used and the proper subjects of baptism, and the purpose of baptism—in respect of all this the Christian world seems not able to come to a unity of the faith. Evidently they constitute problems that may not be solved by the scholarship of the world, applied to the interpretation of the scriptures, either in the original language in which they were written or in the translations; for Christendom is hopelessly divided upon these subjects, and the world stands in need of the word of God to settle their disputes. I am happy to know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which proclaims the reopening of the heavens and the restoration of the Gospel, with divine authority to administer its ordinances, has a message to the world from God upon this subject of baptism; and that when the Lord restored that part of the Gospel, He fittingly did so by sending him who was known in earth-life pre-eminently as The Baptist, and he restored the authority to baptize, and he supervised the first baptisms in this dispensation of the fulness of times. That is one added truth that has been revealed by the Lord in this dispensation.
I might also call the attention of Mr. Abbott and those who think with him that in the important matter of administering the holy sacrament — the Lord’s Supper — the means that God has established in his Church for the perpetuation— Latter-day Saints, mark it!—for the perpetuation of the spiritual life that he brings into existence through acceptance of the Gospel, they are—the Christian world— they are without the formula by which the emblems of our Lord’s Supper may be fittingly and effectively consecrated to this great spiritual purpose. They know not how to administer the holy sacrament of the Lord’s supper, for the perpetuation of the spiritual life of man. Through the Book of Mormon and in the Doctrine and Covenants, by the revelations we there have, something more is added to the religious truths by which men may be guided, viz., the prayer for consecration of the holy sacrament.
It is not, however, for the purpose of referring to these matters, and many more that could be enumerated, did time permit, that I presented the answer of Mr. Abbott to the questions that I have read to you. I did not have baptism and the sacrament in mind, but this: He tells us that no added truth to that which is contained in the Old and New Testaments in respect of God may be looked for, notwithstanding the admitted presence of the spirit of revelation among men; and I wanted to place this man’s statement in contrast with the great truths that have been announced in this conference, by President Smith and President Penrose, as proof that a world of added knowledge, of intelligence, and understanding respecting God has been brought forth by the revelations of God to the great prophet of this new dispensation, Joseph Smith. Two things confuse the world today in respect to their knowledge of God—the duty that some feel, on the one hand, to regard God as a personality; and on the other hand to regard Him as universal spirit, as everywhere present, and everywhere present with power. Reconciliation of the two conceptions is puzzling the theologians and the philosophers. Dean Mansel, in his great lecture, which amounts to a book, on the subject of “Limitations of Religious Thought,” writes this as his conclusion: “It is our duty to think of God as personal, and it is our duty to believe that He is infinite;” although he confesses that there is something inconsistent with the two views. Herbert Spencer seizing upon this inconsistency of the dean’s and commenting upon the conclusions, remarks: “Let those who can believe there is eternal war between our intellectual faculties and our moral obligations. I for one, admit no such radical vice in the constitution of things.” Of course, when you speak of God as a person, especially if you regard Him as a person in the sense that He is an individual, of whom Jesus the Christ, as a resurrected, immortal, and all-glorious personage was the full and complete manifestation— if you thus regard personality, then to think of God as everywhere present, diffused as a presence and a power through all His creations, there does appear a contradiction; because form means limitation in space, and the simplest philosophy teaches that a body, an object of form, bounded as it must be by certain lines, cannot at the same instant be present in two different places; that cannot be.
The scriptures do teach, however, these two things—about God, viz., that God is a person of whom Jesus Christ is “the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person;” and they also teach the omnipresence, or everywhere-ness of God. David said when he contemplated perhaps—I know not—but perhaps, the desirability of getting away from the presence of God, because of his great sins; but in any event he was led to remark—and it is scripture, and it presents the truth:
“Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit, or whither shall I flee from Thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there. If I make my bed in hell, behold Thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from Thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to Thee.”
Yet Mr. Gladstone, the great English statesman, like Dean Mansel, felt the need of holding to the conception of the personality of God. Indeed, he regarded it as the need of the world, and the hope of the future. Speaking of those questions to his friend, Mr. Stead, who asked him, a short time before his death, what his greatest hope for the future of humanity was, the great statesman replied:
"I should say we must look for that to the maintenance of the faith in the invisible. That is the great hope of the future. It is the mainstay of civilization; and by that I mean a living faith in a personal God. I do not hold with streams of tendency; after sixty years of public life, I hold more strongly than ever to this conviction, deepened and strengthened by long experience, of the reality, and nearness, and personality of God.”
But you observe that among these great minds there is a marked diversity of opinion concerning this great question, the necessity of holding to the faith of a personal God, and at the same time other men equally intellectual doubting the possibility of holding in consciousness and in faith the personality of God and at the same time His everywhere-ness. What a blessing that Prophet would be to his generation who should have his mind moved upon by the holy spirit, or who, by direct revelation and face to face communion with God, could come to the world with a word from the inner fact of things, and settle this question. Mr. Abbott needs it settled for him, as also other people need it settled for them. No human wisdom could find that word, but the inspired prophet of this new dispensation comes with a message that will settle it; a message that appeals to the understanding as well as to the emotions and the desires of men in their thirst for knowledge of God; and I may so far trespass upon your time as to read that brief message in which both great truths—the personality of God and the universality of His presence are maintained. Listen to this sweetest—no, I may not say that it is the sweetest message, as it is difficult to tell which is the sweetest out of the many messages that God is sending forth to the world in this new dispensation; so perhaps I am not warranted in characterizing one as sweeter than another, but listen to this splendid message that our Church has for the world. Speaking of the Son of God, this revelation says:
“He that ascended up on high, as also He descended below all things; in that He comprehended all things, that He might be in all and through all things, the light of truth.” That is, the power by which the truth is manifested. “Which truth shineth.” That is, it is apparent, not hidden; it is before your vision. “Which truth shineth. This is the light of Christ.” I pray you remember that phrase. “As also He” this light of Christ, “is in the sun, and the light of the sun, and the power thereof by which it was made.
“As also the light of the stars, and the power thereof by which they were made.
“And the earth also, and the power thereof; even the earth upon which you stand.
"And the light which now shineth, which giveth you light, is through Him who enlighteneth your eyes, which is the same light that quickeneth your understandings.”
The Apostle John speaks of it as “the light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world.” Job must have had it in mind when he said: “There is a spirit in man, and the inspiration of God giveth him understanding.” But to continue with the revelation in the Doctrine and Covenants:
“Which is the same light that quickeneth your understanding;” and now the message, “which light,” the creative power, worldsustaining power, intelligence-inspiring power—“which light proceedeth forth from the presence of God to fill the immensity of space.
“The light which is in all things; which giveth life”—and therefore the vital force in the universe— “which giveth life to all things; which is the law by which all things are governed: even the power of God who sitteth upon his throne, who is in the bosom of eternity, who is in the midst of all things.”
Now, my beloved brethren, with this great truth before you, it is easy to comprehend the great mystery that confuses the world, namely, how to hold in your consciousness, in your faith, the belief that God is a personality in the sense that He is a glorified individual such as the Christ was after His resurrection, and now is—an immortal personage. We know not, perhaps, on what bright sphere, as a personality He makes His home, but wherever He is, as a personality, the Christ, is as He left the earth—after His resurrection—He is as He will return to the earth, as set forth in the remarks of Elder Talmage at this conference. It is also possible at the same time to regard Him as a universal presence and power—which men rightly call God—proceeding forth from the personal presence of the Christ, also from the presence of God the Father, and from the presence of the Holy Spirit—there goes forth into the space depths, the Spirit which emanating from these Holy Personages fills the immensity of space with the very presence land power of God. That presence and power is constantly maintained, too, and is actual presence of God in all consciousness, in seeing, hearing, feeling, knowing, and loving. I say this presence called in the revelation I have read from “the light of Christ”—because it is of His nature, and strongly bears forth into space his attributes—this Spirit is actual presence of God; for as the ray of light is not separate from its source, so this Spirit and Power which proceeds from the presence of God is not separated from the personages of the Godhead whence He proceeds to fill the immensity of space. In this manner God in-dwells in his worlds, and those worlds in which God in-dwells shall fulfill and accomplish the purposes of God.
This is the immanent Deity of which men in our day have so much to say; and for our enlightenment— that we might know God—even the Spirit of God—though proceeding from the several Divine personages of the Godhead—is called "the Light of Christ,’’ for the reason already given, and, further, that the Christ might be in very deed and in all respects the manifestation, or revelation of God to man.
I thought I would like to present this truth that attention might be called to the world’s problem regarding the doctrine of God; and that the sermons of President Smith and President Penrose might stand as an answer to the sophistry and vain philosophy of the times about nothing being added by revelation to the world’s knowledge of God. The Lord bless you. Amen.
To demonstrate the sweetness of tones of the remodeled great organ, Prof. John J. McClellan played variations of the music, now usually sung to the hymn, “O, my Father.”
The choir sang the anthem, “The Heavens are telling the glory of God.”
Elder Walter P. Monson pronounced the benediction.
Conference adjourned for six months.
As the vast congregation left the building the organist played, and the people sang, “We thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet.”
Prof. Evan Stephens conducted the singing of the choir and congregation at the Conference meetings in the Tabernacle, and Prof. John J. McClellan played the accompaniments, interludes, etc., on the great organ, assisted by Edward P. Kimball and Tracy Y. Cannon.
The stenographic reports of the discourses were taken by Elders Franklin W. Otterstrom, Frederick E. Barker, and Fred G. Barker.
Duncan M. McAllister,
Clerk of Conference.
(Of the First Council of Seventy.)
I hold in my hand an excerpt from a recent number of the Outlook, of which Mr. Lyman Abbott, a religious teacher of great fame is the editor and also the publisher. In it he has a department in which he answers questions from those whom he calls "unknown friends,” and this question appears in that column:
“Have there been any prophets since Christ who add to the great prophecies which are of value to those who wish to know the truth; or is it sufficient to know the old prophets and the teachings of Christ?’’
To this question Mr. Abbott makes the following answer:
“The prophets, we are told, spoke as they were moved, inspired, guided by the spirit of God. There is no reason to suppose that God has ceased to move upon the spirits of men and to inspire and guide them. Certainly there is nothing in the New Testament to warrant any such opinion.
Peter expressly declares that the promise of the Holy Spirit is to all who will receive it, and Paul bids us pray that we may be filled with all fulness of God.”
To the second part of the question he answers:
“On the other hand there is no reason to suppose that anything has been added to the substantial truths respecting God and His relations to His children, which are taught in the Old and New Testaments. Their teachings that God loves and serves and sacrifices Himself in love for His children leaves nothing beyond to be desired or even to be conceived. The prophets since that revelation are guided, not to add new truths, but to show' how the truth of love, the love of God to man, and the love of man to God and to each other, is to be applied in all the changing situations and conditions of human life.”
I thought I would like to read that passage to this great multitude, because in some respects it does mark a forward movement in the conceptions of this religious teacher, at least, in regard to the principle of revelation. In the early history of our Church, the great novelty associated with it, and the wonder of its message, seemed to be that God had again spoken from the heavens; that angels had visited servants of God to restore the Gospel. This was the point at which our message was met by the religious teachers of those times with the claim that the volume of scripture was completed, and forever closed; that the awful voice of prophecy would no more be heard, that the last word of revelation had been spoken. In that controversy the early elders of the Church obtained an easy victory over their opponents; because it was so easy for them to do just what Mr. Lyman Abbott here does, namely, point to the fact that prophecy came not in olden times by the will of man, but holy men of God spake as they were moved upon by the Holy Ghost, and wherever that spirit is possessed there is the spirit of prophecy; and it was an inconsistency on the part of the Christian world to claim that they were in possession of the Holy Ghost and yet without the gift of prophecy and of revelation. Consequently, I say, the victory of God’s servants on that point was easily obtained. Mr. Abbott concedes the reasonableness of that argument, because he himself here uses it. But the astonishing thing in connection with this answer of his to the question submitted to him is, in the second part of it, viz., that while admitting that the spirit of prophecy may still be upon the children of men, and there may be prophets among Christians, who possess that spirit, yet they may add nothing new to what has been revealed! It would be extremely interesting to point out to Mr. Abbott and those who think with him how great necessity there is for divine wisdom to be manifested in, and divine instructions given upon, every many vital religious questions. One might call his attention, for instance, to the fact that in the matter of the very ordinance by which men may be admitted into the Church of Christ—baptism—the formula to be used and the proper subjects of baptism, and the purpose of baptism—in respect of all this the Christian world seems not able to come to a unity of the faith. Evidently they constitute problems that may not be solved by the scholarship of the world, applied to the interpretation of the scriptures, either in the original language in which they were written or in the translations; for Christendom is hopelessly divided upon these subjects, and the world stands in need of the word of God to settle their disputes. I am happy to know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which proclaims the reopening of the heavens and the restoration of the Gospel, with divine authority to administer its ordinances, has a message to the world from God upon this subject of baptism; and that when the Lord restored that part of the Gospel, He fittingly did so by sending him who was known in earth-life pre-eminently as The Baptist, and he restored the authority to baptize, and he supervised the first baptisms in this dispensation of the fulness of times. That is one added truth that has been revealed by the Lord in this dispensation.
I might also call the attention of Mr. Abbott and those who think with him that in the important matter of administering the holy sacrament — the Lord’s Supper — the means that God has established in his Church for the perpetuation— Latter-day Saints, mark it!—for the perpetuation of the spiritual life that he brings into existence through acceptance of the Gospel, they are—the Christian world— they are without the formula by which the emblems of our Lord’s Supper may be fittingly and effectively consecrated to this great spiritual purpose. They know not how to administer the holy sacrament of the Lord’s supper, for the perpetuation of the spiritual life of man. Through the Book of Mormon and in the Doctrine and Covenants, by the revelations we there have, something more is added to the religious truths by which men may be guided, viz., the prayer for consecration of the holy sacrament.
It is not, however, for the purpose of referring to these matters, and many more that could be enumerated, did time permit, that I presented the answer of Mr. Abbott to the questions that I have read to you. I did not have baptism and the sacrament in mind, but this: He tells us that no added truth to that which is contained in the Old and New Testaments in respect of God may be looked for, notwithstanding the admitted presence of the spirit of revelation among men; and I wanted to place this man’s statement in contrast with the great truths that have been announced in this conference, by President Smith and President Penrose, as proof that a world of added knowledge, of intelligence, and understanding respecting God has been brought forth by the revelations of God to the great prophet of this new dispensation, Joseph Smith. Two things confuse the world today in respect to their knowledge of God—the duty that some feel, on the one hand, to regard God as a personality; and on the other hand to regard Him as universal spirit, as everywhere present, and everywhere present with power. Reconciliation of the two conceptions is puzzling the theologians and the philosophers. Dean Mansel, in his great lecture, which amounts to a book, on the subject of “Limitations of Religious Thought,” writes this as his conclusion: “It is our duty to think of God as personal, and it is our duty to believe that He is infinite;” although he confesses that there is something inconsistent with the two views. Herbert Spencer seizing upon this inconsistency of the dean’s and commenting upon the conclusions, remarks: “Let those who can believe there is eternal war between our intellectual faculties and our moral obligations. I for one, admit no such radical vice in the constitution of things.” Of course, when you speak of God as a person, especially if you regard Him as a person in the sense that He is an individual, of whom Jesus the Christ, as a resurrected, immortal, and all-glorious personage was the full and complete manifestation— if you thus regard personality, then to think of God as everywhere present, diffused as a presence and a power through all His creations, there does appear a contradiction; because form means limitation in space, and the simplest philosophy teaches that a body, an object of form, bounded as it must be by certain lines, cannot at the same instant be present in two different places; that cannot be.
The scriptures do teach, however, these two things—about God, viz., that God is a person of whom Jesus Christ is “the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person;” and they also teach the omnipresence, or everywhere-ness of God. David said when he contemplated perhaps—I know not—but perhaps, the desirability of getting away from the presence of God, because of his great sins; but in any event he was led to remark—and it is scripture, and it presents the truth:
“Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit, or whither shall I flee from Thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there. If I make my bed in hell, behold Thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from Thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to Thee.”
Yet Mr. Gladstone, the great English statesman, like Dean Mansel, felt the need of holding to the conception of the personality of God. Indeed, he regarded it as the need of the world, and the hope of the future. Speaking of those questions to his friend, Mr. Stead, who asked him, a short time before his death, what his greatest hope for the future of humanity was, the great statesman replied:
"I should say we must look for that to the maintenance of the faith in the invisible. That is the great hope of the future. It is the mainstay of civilization; and by that I mean a living faith in a personal God. I do not hold with streams of tendency; after sixty years of public life, I hold more strongly than ever to this conviction, deepened and strengthened by long experience, of the reality, and nearness, and personality of God.”
But you observe that among these great minds there is a marked diversity of opinion concerning this great question, the necessity of holding to the faith of a personal God, and at the same time other men equally intellectual doubting the possibility of holding in consciousness and in faith the personality of God and at the same time His everywhere-ness. What a blessing that Prophet would be to his generation who should have his mind moved upon by the holy spirit, or who, by direct revelation and face to face communion with God, could come to the world with a word from the inner fact of things, and settle this question. Mr. Abbott needs it settled for him, as also other people need it settled for them. No human wisdom could find that word, but the inspired prophet of this new dispensation comes with a message that will settle it; a message that appeals to the understanding as well as to the emotions and the desires of men in their thirst for knowledge of God; and I may so far trespass upon your time as to read that brief message in which both great truths—the personality of God and the universality of His presence are maintained. Listen to this sweetest—no, I may not say that it is the sweetest message, as it is difficult to tell which is the sweetest out of the many messages that God is sending forth to the world in this new dispensation; so perhaps I am not warranted in characterizing one as sweeter than another, but listen to this splendid message that our Church has for the world. Speaking of the Son of God, this revelation says:
“He that ascended up on high, as also He descended below all things; in that He comprehended all things, that He might be in all and through all things, the light of truth.” That is, the power by which the truth is manifested. “Which truth shineth.” That is, it is apparent, not hidden; it is before your vision. “Which truth shineth. This is the light of Christ.” I pray you remember that phrase. “As also He” this light of Christ, “is in the sun, and the light of the sun, and the power thereof by which it was made.
“As also the light of the stars, and the power thereof by which they were made.
“And the earth also, and the power thereof; even the earth upon which you stand.
"And the light which now shineth, which giveth you light, is through Him who enlighteneth your eyes, which is the same light that quickeneth your understandings.”
The Apostle John speaks of it as “the light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world.” Job must have had it in mind when he said: “There is a spirit in man, and the inspiration of God giveth him understanding.” But to continue with the revelation in the Doctrine and Covenants:
“Which is the same light that quickeneth your understanding;” and now the message, “which light,” the creative power, worldsustaining power, intelligence-inspiring power—“which light proceedeth forth from the presence of God to fill the immensity of space.
“The light which is in all things; which giveth life”—and therefore the vital force in the universe— “which giveth life to all things; which is the law by which all things are governed: even the power of God who sitteth upon his throne, who is in the bosom of eternity, who is in the midst of all things.”
Now, my beloved brethren, with this great truth before you, it is easy to comprehend the great mystery that confuses the world, namely, how to hold in your consciousness, in your faith, the belief that God is a personality in the sense that He is a glorified individual such as the Christ was after His resurrection, and now is—an immortal personage. We know not, perhaps, on what bright sphere, as a personality He makes His home, but wherever He is, as a personality, the Christ, is as He left the earth—after His resurrection—He is as He will return to the earth, as set forth in the remarks of Elder Talmage at this conference. It is also possible at the same time to regard Him as a universal presence and power—which men rightly call God—proceeding forth from the personal presence of the Christ, also from the presence of God the Father, and from the presence of the Holy Spirit—there goes forth into the space depths, the Spirit which emanating from these Holy Personages fills the immensity of space with the very presence land power of God. That presence and power is constantly maintained, too, and is actual presence of God in all consciousness, in seeing, hearing, feeling, knowing, and loving. I say this presence called in the revelation I have read from “the light of Christ”—because it is of His nature, and strongly bears forth into space his attributes—this Spirit is actual presence of God; for as the ray of light is not separate from its source, so this Spirit and Power which proceeds from the presence of God is not separated from the personages of the Godhead whence He proceeds to fill the immensity of space. In this manner God in-dwells in his worlds, and those worlds in which God in-dwells shall fulfill and accomplish the purposes of God.
This is the immanent Deity of which men in our day have so much to say; and for our enlightenment— that we might know God—even the Spirit of God—though proceeding from the several Divine personages of the Godhead—is called "the Light of Christ,’’ for the reason already given, and, further, that the Christ might be in very deed and in all respects the manifestation, or revelation of God to man.
I thought I would like to present this truth that attention might be called to the world’s problem regarding the doctrine of God; and that the sermons of President Smith and President Penrose might stand as an answer to the sophistry and vain philosophy of the times about nothing being added by revelation to the world’s knowledge of God. The Lord bless you. Amen.
To demonstrate the sweetness of tones of the remodeled great organ, Prof. John J. McClellan played variations of the music, now usually sung to the hymn, “O, my Father.”
The choir sang the anthem, “The Heavens are telling the glory of God.”
Elder Walter P. Monson pronounced the benediction.
Conference adjourned for six months.
As the vast congregation left the building the organist played, and the people sang, “We thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet.”
Prof. Evan Stephens conducted the singing of the choir and congregation at the Conference meetings in the Tabernacle, and Prof. John J. McClellan played the accompaniments, interludes, etc., on the great organ, assisted by Edward P. Kimball and Tracy Y. Cannon.
The stenographic reports of the discourses were taken by Elders Franklin W. Otterstrom, Frederick E. Barker, and Fred G. Barker.
Duncan M. McAllister,
Clerk of Conference.