HOW MORMONISM WAS BORN, Evanston, Wyoming State.
Salt Lake City does net bear that name among Mormons. It is called Zion. 'The Great Salt Lake is the Desd Sea. A little stream goes by the natio of the Jordan. A knuckle of a hill is Mount Olivet.- And the. Mormons ate of Mormons. 'They are the Latter-Day Saints. They are the Lord's' anointed, the elect. They don't argue about the matter; They are quite sure of their own salvation and your da-nation. Accordingly, they are serene.
they area. wonder tel people.-' They have gathered in Utah from all corners of the earth to await the Judgment Day. The Lord has informed them that Salt Lake City is His City, as Jerusalem was His City long times ago. When Christ judges the earth, His habitation will be the Temple that frowns over Salt Lake. It is a severe structure, grey, and heavily buttressed with sturdy towers. It is. vot beautiful. Being Gentiles, and outside the polo, we were not permitted to enter, But by all accounts Solomon's Temple was a washhouse in comparison, The interior is daze along, Near the Temple is the Tabernacle. in rather like a whale; indeed, very much Tike a whale. The roof looks just like a whale stranded. No desecration, however, was committed by our presence. We entered with our boots on, and that was a concession. On Sunday afternoon we formed part ofa congregation of 5,000. At a push the Tabernacle will hold 12,000, "At one end was the great organ—the finest in the world, sic, every part of it-made right here in Salt Lake by the Saints "—and in front was'the famous Tabernacle' choir, 300 singers, 200 of them pretty Mormon maidens, given to finery, for their 200 hats or bonnets—the mere man never knows the difference between the two—resembled in hues a tulip bed, and they were sucking candy and fanning themselves with chants; the men were ordinary men, rather uincomfortable in high starched collars.
Rauged in: tiers on rostruths- were a dozen elderly' gentlemen, three on each tier. On a table in front of each trio was a jug, white, and as large' as a washhand ower: This contained water to refresh The Twelve. The- sermon was reached by Bishop 'Whitney. He is a ig, florid man. He is growing' bald, but the defect' is hidden by hair' carefully plastered fromthe left ear over the crown, till it moste the right eat:: He has a large voice, and for a whole hour—it was a stuffy summer Sunday afternoon—he perspired freely and talked platitudes. The interesting point thrown at the Gentiles is that the world is now under a third dispensation. The first dispensation was that of Moses, the second that.of Jesus Christ, the third-that of Joe Smith. é Smith was a marvellous man, We had: heard his name ° vaguely before. But never till that Sunday did: we realise. how hopelessly we-had -beon groping in. the dark. His name "might have"besn' John, James;" or Bill Smith, and ie would have known no better. But his name was Joseph, the- lineal desfendant of Joseph who wore the mol coloured coat; and-was a past-master in giving brotherly advice. That we learnt from Bishop Whitney at: the Mormon Tabrroacle service that drowsy afternoon. There was no collection.
Reading biographies of-saints, Latter Day or Early-Time, and skimming through discourses delivered by prophets,' is not the light reading of an average cyelis: over an after-dinner cigar. But one of us takes credit that he did so that Sunday night; his appetite "for sermons was so ravenous, he devoured a score on the Monday; Monday night was devatel to the study of " reformed' Egyptian hieroglyjes and Tuesday' saw him growing pale and thin poring over the life history of Joe Smith, the Grst of the Latter-Day 8: the founder of Mormonism, the propounder of polygamy, "the sacred martyr."
The Gentile eyclist—most liberal-minded of men and respecter of religious opiriions—actually found himself gargling with langi ter. His companions declare he read the sermons and: stu@ed prophecy; not. because he was one whit devout-minded, but simply because he got fun out of them.
There is a doubt whether Joe Smith originally came out of Judea or was a gi The Judesn theory is that his father hed hooked nose. The mother, hor earned a livelihood by thieving petticunts off clothes-lines and telling fortunes. It is alleged by the wicked that in his young days he was much addicted to pilfering chickens, Then he displayed strange He became a peeper, a seer, diviner. He had visions. He conlt di cover stolen property. He knew where hi den tressure lay in great iron chests under barley-fields, With mystic rites -he led country folks in their socks across the damp grass. There was religious silence millions of money wop!d have been di-covered time and time again had not some fool of a country bumpkin spoken. That broke the spell, ud the treasure was never found. But that wasn't Joe Smith's fault.
His reputation spread." As it wa: his'mother told him that before his birth an angel informed her he was to be a prophet. So he turned prophet. On April 6th, 1830, ut Fayette, near New York, he laid before six. followers the Book' of Mormon:'- It" was' a revelation thst had come direct from ven' through the prophet Mormon. Six hundred years before Christ thedescendants of the tribe of Joseph came as colonists from Palestine across the Bering Straits 10 America, They became two great nati the'Nephites and Lamanites. The Nephites were cultivated; they could read the Sunday papers. The Lamanites were bar-bar bus; they wore the progenitors of the Red Indians. The Nephites were favoured of the Lord; -angels called upon them inspired prophets dropped in frequently to discuss the Monroe doctrine.. Tae greatest of these prophets was Mormon. With a nail he wrote on- golden plates the history of God's dealings with his forefathers. They were entrusted-to his son Moroni.
For long hundreds of years they lay unnoticed. In September, 1827, however, an singd fluttered into the presence of Joe Smith and told him the secret. Joe went t" the spot indicated, dug 'a hole, and found a box. That box contained the golden plates, together with the Urim and! Thumnmim, which was '"a_ curious instrument, which consisted of two transparent stones set la the rim of a box, fastened toa breast-plate." With the usa of these celestial goggles, Smith became an inspired translator, and read the record on the plates, which was in " Reformed Egyptian hieroglyphics." Joo didn't read the' plates exactly.in the presence of people. That woald have been desecration, lated fluently." So*the "Book "of Mormon was given to the world, and the Lotte. Day Saints hold it as much io" veneration asa Calvi does! the Old Testament. Doubt its literal accuracy, and' most assuredly' you're danined to eternity. _The wicked, doubting, unbelieving Gentiles began to investigate. The plates, instead of gold, were of brass. The reformed Egyptian hieroglyphics" were'a clumsy fraud. They were all kinds of crooked figures with Greek and Hebrew letters, crosses, und flourishes—the whole thing palpably Jone by an ignorant man. Bat, thes, what about the Bool: of Mormon? was written by the Reverend Solomon Spalding, wha, being. fond of historic cal study and archaeology, went it as a romance, embodying the' theory' that America was peopled by a colony of ancient Israelites. He'was never able to get it printed, but dozen of people reak it'in manuscript. No doubt it was stolen by "a backsliding clergyman of the Baptist persuasion " called Sidney 'Rigden, and he remodelled it into' the Book of Mormon for Smith's use. So when''Joseph, the Latter-Day Ssint, was standing behind a sheet preteniling to read the " reformed quoting from Spalding's novel.
Egyptian hie roxlyphics," he was really But hint this to a Mormon, and he looks upon you as a. wan without faith, sceptical and ungodly.
The Book of Mormon was swallowed, nevertheless, hocus-poes, by thousands. Mormonism spread like a wave, and great was Joseph the Prophet.
At Kinderhook, Dinois, on the 23rd April, 1843, there were unearthed six plates of brass, of a bell shape, entirely covered with strange characters, and near by were a few burnt bones. Learned mon could say nothing about the scraps of bones. As to the characters on the bell-shaped plates, neither head nor tail could be made of them. Then came along Joo Smith. The few bones he converted into theskeleton of a man who must have stood nine feet high. the grace of God" he was able to read the mystifying characters. "*T have translated: a portion of them, and find they contain the history of the person with whom they were found.. He was descendant of fam, through the loins of Pharaoh, King of Egypt, "ud that he received his kingdom from the Ruler of Heaven and Earth Oh, Munchausen-Smith One of the finders of these plates, Mr. Falgate, swore that, along with a friend, he manufactured. the hieroglyphics ith' beeswax and acid, asa practical joke on the Mormon elders. Tt was trap, and the prophet fell headlong into it. But the wave of Mormonism still spreads over the land.
On July 3rd, 1835, there came to Kitk-Jand—where the "Kingdom" was established—a man named Michsel H. Chan. dier, exhibiting four Egyptian' mummies, also some Egyptian papyrus, and the foo of admission to an enlightened public was 25: contsahend.: Glorious visit of the mummy" exhibitor! "Writes Joseph the prophet in the Mlennial Star (Yok. x¥, pp. 296-7) "Some of the Saints purchased the mummies and papyra+, and I, with: W. W. Phelps and ©. Cowdery as scribes, commenced the translation of some of the characters or hieroglyphics, and much to our joy found that one of the rolls: contained the Writing: of Abraham, another the Writings of Joseph of Egypt, etc.—n-more full account of which will appear their place, as I proceed to examine or unfold them. Tru'y can we say:—The Lord is beginning to reveal the abundance of ace and trath." But though the joy of the Prophet was great, what was it to the joy of his old gipsy' mother? She made a discovery on her own account. One of the-mummies was Pharaoh's daughter, the lady that found Moses among the bulrushes-1
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.