Discourse 1880-07-03
REPORTED BY JOHN IRVINE.
I HAVE listened to the instructions
given here this afaernoon by my
brethren, as well as the remarks of
Brother Cannon, this forernoon, with
feelings of a great deal of interest.
When we talk of our duties as
Latter-day Saints I think many
times that some of us, perhaps all of
us, more or less, fall short of compre-
dending and understanding the re-
sponsibilities which we are under to
God. I believe there never was a dis-
pensation or a generation of men
in any age of the world that ever
had a greater work to perform, or
ever were under greater responsibil-
ity to God, than the Latter-day
Saints. The kingdom of God has
been put into our hands. We have
been raised up as sons and daughters
of the Lord to take this kingdom, to
lay the foundation of it, to build up-
on it, to carry it out in its various
branches until it becomes perfected
before the heavens and before the
earth as God has foreordained it
should be. And those principles
which have been referred to by the
brethren in regard to our duties we
cannot safely ignore them nor turn
aside from them. I will say as one
of the quorum of the Twelve Apos-
tles, from the time I was first ac-
quainted with its organization until
to-day we have never felt ourselves
at liberty to stay away from our
meetings unless we were sick or cir-
cumstances hindered us in some
way or other. I can say that for
myself, and I believe I can say the
same for my brethren. We have
always felt duty bound to attend our
meetings, and if we do not attend
the question might arise, what has
become of the Twelve Apostles?
Where are they that they do not at-
tend their meetings? It would be a
very proper question to ask. And
if this responsibility rests upon us in
the capacity which we occupy does
it not rest upon other men? I think
it does. I do not believe the Lord
ever required Joseph Smith or Brig-
ham Young or any of their counselors
to undertake to build up this king-
dom alone. He never required them
to build these temples alone. They
were required to perform their duties,
that is true. Joseph Smith was
called of God, inspired of God, raised
up of the Lord, ordained of God long
before he was born, to stand in the
flesh, as much as Jeremiah or any of
the ancient prophets, to lay the foun-
dation of this Church and kingdom.
He performed his work faithfully.
He labored faithfully while he taber-
nacled in the flesh, and sealed his
testimony with his blood. Other
men were called also to build upon
the foundation which he laid.
We have in days that are past
and gone been under the necessity
of going forth to preach the gospel in
the world. We have had this to do.
We have been called to do it. We
have been ordained to do it. We
have been commanded of God to do
it, and so have hundreds and thou-
sands of the elders of this Church
and kingdom. We have all some
responsibility, more or less, resting
upon us, whether as regards going
on missions or anything else. I re-
member Brother Joseph Smith vis-
ited myself, Brother Taylor, Brother
Brigham Young and several other
missionaries, when we were about to
take our mission to England. We
were sick and afflicted many of us.
At the same time we felt to go.
The Prophet blessed us as also our
wives and families; and I was read-
ing a day or two ago his instructions
from my journal. He taught us
some very important principles, some
of which I here name. Brother
Taylor, myself, George A. Smith,
John E. Page and others had been
called to fill the place of those who
had fallen away. Brother Joseph
laid before us the cause of those men
turning away from the command-
ments of God. He hoped we would
learn wisdom by what we saw with
the eye and heard with the ear, and
and that we would be able to discern
the spirits of other men without be-
ing compelled to learn by sad experi-
ence. He then remarked that any
man, any elder in this Church and
kingdom—who pursued a course
whereby he would ignore or in other
words refuse to obey any known law
or commandment or duty—when-
ever a man did this, neglected any
duty God required at his hand in at-
tending meetings, filling missions,
or obeying counsel, he laid a founda-
tion to lead him to apostasy and this
was the reason those men had fellen.
They had misused the priesthood
sealed upon their heads. They had
neglected to magnify their calling as
apostles as elders. They had used
that priesthood to attempt to build
themselves up and to perform some
other work besides the building up
of the kingdom of God. And not only
did he give us this counsel, but the
same is given in the revelation of
God to us. I have ever read with
a great deal of interest that revelation
given to Joseph Smith in answer to
his prayer in Liberty jail. I have
ever looked upon that revelations of
God to that man, considering the
few sentences it includes, as contain-
ing as much principle as any revela-
tion God ever gave to man. He gave
Joseph to understand that he held
the priesthood which priesthood was
after the order of God, after the or-
der of Melchisedec, the same priest-
hood by which God himself per-
formed all his works in the heavens
and in the earth, and any man who
bore that priesthood had the same
power. That priesthood had com-
munication with the heavens, power
to move the heavens, power to per-
from the work of the heavens, and
wherever any man magnified that
calling, God gave his angels charge
concerning him and his ministrations
were of power and force both in this
world and the world to come; but
let that man use that priesthood for
any other purpose than the building
up of the kingdom of God, for which
purpose it was given, and the heavens
withdr[a]w themselves, the power of
the priesthood departs, and he is left
to walk in darkness and not in light,
and this is the key to apostasy of all
men whether in this generation or
any other.
Our responsibilities before the Lord
are great. We have no right to
break any law that God has given
unto us. The more we do so the less
power we have before God, before
heaven and before the earth, and
the nearer we live to God, the closer
we obey his laws and keep his com-
mandments, the more power we
will have, and the greater will be
our desire for the building up of the
kingdom of God while we dwell here
in the flesh.
We have no right to break the Sab-
bath. We have no right to neglect
our meetings to attend to our labors.
I do not believe there was any man
ever belonged to this Church and
kingdom since its organization has
ever made anything by going to at-
tend to his farm on the Sabbath; but
if your ox falls into a pit get him out;
work in that way is all just and right,
but for us to go farming to the neg-
lect of our meetings and other duties
devolving upon us is something we
have no right to do. The Spirit of
God does not like it, it withdraws
itself from us, and we make no money
by it. We should keep the Sabbath
holy. We should attend our meet-
ings.
This kingdom is advancing. It
has got to advance, and somebody
has got to build it up. Somebody
has got to labor in it. The God of
heaven has had a people prepared
before the world was made for this
dispensation. He had a people pre-
pared to stand in the flesh to take
this kingdom and bear it off, and the
very spirit of the prophets and apos-
tles who have gone before us has
been manifested in the lives of faith-
ful men and women from the organ-
ization of this Church until to-day
and will continue until the coming
of the Lord, as there are a great
many men and women who will live
their religion and carry out the pur-
poses of God on the earth.
It is our duty as apostles, as eld-
ers and as Latter-day Saints to con-
template, to reflect, to read the word
of God, and try to comprehend our
condition, our position, and our re-
sponsibility before the Lord. If our
eyes were opened, if the vail were
lifted, and we should see our con-
dition, our responsibility, if we could
comprehend the feelings of God our
heavenly Father and the heavenly
hosts and the justified spirits made
perfect in their watch-care over us,
in their anxiety about us in our lab-
ors here while we are in the flesh,
we would all feel that we have no
time to waste in folly or anything
which brings to pass no good. All
of us as elders of Israel and as Latter-
day Saints bear some portion of the
holy priesthood, either the Melchis-
edec or Aaronic. It is a kingdom of
priests, and there is work enough for
this people to magnify their calling.
The Lord has agreed to sustain us,
and to break every weapon that is
formed against us. He has promised
to sustain Zion, and when the Pro-
phet saw this Zion of God in the
mountains his soul was filled with
joy and he cried, "sing, O heavens;
and be joyful, O earth; and break
forth into singing, O mountains; for
the Lord hath comforted his people,
and will have mercy upon his af-
fl[i]cted." [Isaiah 49:13] Again the Prophet says,
"Can a woman forget her sucking
child, that she should not have com-
passion on the son of her womb,—yea
they may forget, yet will I not forget
thee." [Isaiah 49:15] Zion has been before the
face of the Lord since the creation of
the world! Our heavenly Father
has protected this people. We have
been favored from the day we set
our feet in the valleys of the moun-
tains notwithstanding the tribulation
and opposition we have had to con-
tend with. All the designs of the
wicked and ungodly to stop this
work have been thwarted. The hand
of God is over Zion. He is our com-
forter. He sustains us, and we have
every encouragement on the face of
the earth as Latter-day Saints to be
true and faithful unto him the little
time we spend in the flesh.
Our responsibilities are great, our
work is great. We not only have
the gospel to preach to the nations of
the earth, but we have to fill these
valleys, towns, cities &c., and we
have, among other important things,
to rear those temples unto the name
of the Lord before the coming of
Christ. We have got to enter into
those temples and redeem our dead—
not only the dead of our own family
but the dead of the whole spirit
world. This is part of the great
work of the Latter-day Saints. We
shall build these temples and if we
do our duty there is no power can
hinder this work, because the Lord
is with us. And certainly our aim
is high. As a people we aim at cel-
estial glory, we aim at the kingdom
of God. We have been raised up
for this purpose to warn the world,
to preach the gospel, to go to the
meek of the earth and bring them
to these valleys of the mountains, that
they may be delivered from the
power of sin and Satan. Our num-
bers are many compared with former
dispensations. Nevertheless, our nu-
mbers are few when compared with
the twelve or fourteen hundred mil-
lions of inhabitants who dwell in the
flesh. Still with the help of God,
we have power to redeem the world.
This is our work. We are obliged
to labor and to continue while we
are here, and when we have finished
our work our sons the rising genera-
tion have got to take this kingdom
and bear it off.
Eight of the quorum of the Twelve
Apostles are in the spirit world to-
day who were in the flesh when we
came here, and so they pass away one
after another, when they finished
their work. Do you suppose that in
their minds and feelings they re-
alized they had done too much? I
think not. Just so with those who
remain in the flesh. There is no
time to throw away, and I would to
God that the elders of Israel could
fully realize and compreehnd the
great work that God has put upon
their shoulders—the building up of
the kingdom.
This kingdom has continued to in-
crease and spread. When we came
here 33 years ago we found this place
a barren desert. There was no mark
of the white man here. It was a
desert indeed, hardly a green thing
to meet the eye. You can see to-day
for yourselves. The inhabitants of
Zion are a marvel and a wonder to
the world. They occupy these val-
leys of the mountains from Idaho
to Arizona. The valleys, as it were,
are filled with Latter-day Saints.
And who are these Latter-day
Saints? They are the people whom
the God of heaven has raised up in
fulfilment of promise and revelation.
He has carefully gathered them to-
gether by the power of the gospel, by
the power of revelation and placed
them here in the valleys of the
mountains. Has there ever been
any power formed against this peo-
ple that has been successful? Nay;
and this people will never see the
day when our enemies shall prevail,
for the very reason that God had de-
creed that Zion shall be built up,
the kingdom that Daniel saw shall
roll forth, until the little stone cut
out of the mountain without hands
shall fill the whole earth. The
people of God shall be prepared in
the latter-days to carry out the great
programme of the Almighty, and
all the powers of the earth and hell
combined cannot prevent them.
When I see the view that the world
take in regard to this great latter-day
work; when I hear it questioned as
to whether God has anything to do
with it; when I see the feeling of
hatred that is manifested towards
us, to me it is the strongest evidence
that this is the work of God. Why?
Because we have been chosen out of
the world and therefore the world
hate us. This is a testimony that
Jew and Gentile and the whole world
look at. Then if this is the work of
God what is the world going to do
about it? What can this nation or the
combined nations of the earth do
about it? Can any power beneath
the heavens stay the progress of the
work of God? I tell you nay, it can-
not be done. I do not boast of these
things as the work of man; it is the
work of the Almighty; it is not the
work of man. The Lord has called
men to labor in his kingdom, and I
wish the elders would look upon this
subject as it is and realize our pos-
ition before the Lord. Here we are
a handful of people chosen out of
some twelve or fourteen hundred
millions of people; and my faith in
regard to this matter is that before
we were born, before Joseph Smith
was born, before Brigham was born—
my faith is that we were chosen to
come forth in this day and genera-
tion and do the work which God
has designed should be done. That
is my view in regard to the Latter-
day Saints, and that is the reason
why the apostles and elders in the
early days of this Church had power
to go forth without purse or scrip
and preach the gospel of Christ and
bear record of his kingdom. Had it
not been for that power we could
not have performed the work. We
have had to be sustained by the
hand of God until to-day, and we
shall be sustained until we get
th[r]ough if we keep the command-
ments of God, and if we do not we
shall fall and the Lord will raise up
other men to take our place. There-
fore, I look upon it that we had a
work assigned to us before we were
born. With regard to the faithful
leaders of this Church and kingdom,
beginning with Joseph Smith, how
many times have I heard men say
in my travels—Why did God choose
Joseph Smith, why did he choose
that boy to open up this dispensation
and lay the foundation of this
Church? why didn't he choose some
great man, such as Henry Ward
Beecher? I have had but one an-
swer in my life to give to such a ques-
tion, namely, that the Lord Almigh-
ty could not do anything with them,
he could not humble them. They
were not the class of men that were
chosen for a work of this kind in any
age of the world. The Lord Al-
mighty chose the weak things of this
world. He could handle them. He
therefore chose Joseph Smith be-
cause he was weak, and he had
sense enough to know it. He had
the ministration of angels out of
heaven. He had also the ministra-
tion of the Father and the Son, and
of the holy men who once dwelt
in the flesh.
We have been obliged to acknowl-
edge the hand of God. From out of
the pit have we been dug. We have
been taken from the plough, the
bench, the various occupations of
life, having limited knowledge of
what the world calls learning. The
Lord has called this class of men as
elders, and inspired by the power of
God they have gone forth and warn-
ed the world, and those of this gen-
eration who reject the testimony of
these elders will be under condem-
nation, for the elders will rise up in
judgment and condemn them. The
building up of this kingdom rests
upon our shoulders—not upon the
shoulders of Brother Taylor and the
Twelve Apostles alone, but every
man and every woman who has
heard this gospel and gone into the
waters of baptism will be held re-
sponsible for the light and knowledge
they received.
This is my testimony to you to-
day. You have got the kingdom of
God here. It has grown and in-
creased, and will continue to grow
and increase. I look at this building;
I look at the tabernacle here; I look
at the temples that are being built;
I see what is going on in the moun-
tains of Israel, and I ask what is it?
It is the work of God. I acknowledge
his hand in it. This is the reason
why we are inspired to build these
temples. Why we labor to build
them is because the day has come
when they are needed. Joseph
Smith went into the spirit world to
unlock the prison doors in this dis-
pensation or generation. He stayed
here long enough to lay the founda-
tion of this kingdom and obtain the
keys belonging to it. The last time
he ever met with the quorum of the
Twelve was when he gave them
their endowments, and when they
left him he had a presentiment that
it was the last time they would ever
meet. He had something to do the
other side of the vail. He had a
thousand to preach to there where
you and I have one in the flesh.
And this is the great work of the
last dispensation—the redemption
of the living and the dead.
We ought not, as elders of Israel, to
treat lightly the blessings we enjoy.
We ought not to treat lightly the
holy priesthood, or attempt to use it
for any other purpose under the
whole heavens other than to build
up the Zion of God. The counsel
that has been given this forenoon
upon this matter we should lay to
heart. The eyes of all the heavenly
hosts are over this people. They
are watching us with the deepest
anxiety. They understand things
better than we do, for our vail is our
bodies, and when our spirits leave
them we will not have a great way
to get into the spirit world. They
know the warfare we have with
wicked spirits and with a wicked
world, but what encouragement we
have when we read the revelations!
We live in a generation when the
Lord has decreed that his kingdom
shall be preserved. The prophets of
every other dispensation have been
called to seal their testimony with
their blood. My faith is that those
of this dispensation will not be called
to do this. Joseph and Hyrum, it
is true, were called to lay down their
lives. Why? I believe myself it
was necessary to seal a dispensation
of this almighty magnitude with
the blood of the testator for one
thing, and for another thing the
people were worthy that put him to
death, and will have the bill to pay
as the Jews had to pay for the blood
of the Messiah; but as far as the
leaders of this people and the people
generally are concerned, I think the
Lord intends we should live at peace.
With regards to Brigham Young, we
all know the disposition there was
on the part of his enemies to take
his life. I never believed, however,
that he would die a violent death.
Neither do I believe that we shall
be required to go forth and stain our
swords in the blood of our fellow
men in our defense. It has been
decreed that the wicked shall slay
the wicked. Now, I give you my
views regarding these things. I
speak the sentiments of my own
heart and what I believe. The judg-
ments of our God will be poured
forth, but the elders of Israel will
not be called upon to slay the wicked.
The wicked will slay the wicked.
When I read the Bible, the Book of
Mormon and the Book of Doctrine
and Covenants, I feel that it is with
us as with the generation that lived
in the days of Ezekiel. In those
days the Lord told the prophet to
tell the people that what he said he
meant to fulfil. And so it is in the
day and age in which we live. All
things will be fulfilled. The judg-
ments of Almighty God will be
poured out upon the wicked. The
harvest is ripe, and I know the
farmer has got to cut his crops when
they are ripe, otherwise they will go
back into the ground and rot.
When I see the wickedness and
abomination that prevail in Babylon,
covering the earth, as it were, like a
mighty sea—when I see these things
I feel to ask myself the question,
how long can these sins rise up in
the sight of heaven and not have
their reward? In my own mind I
can see a change at our door. In
the face of the revelations I cannot
see how it can be otherwise. The
signs of heaven and earth all indi-
cate the near coming of the Son of
Man. You read the 9th, 10th and
11th chapters of the last Book of
Nephi, and see what the Lord has
said will take place in this genera-
tion, when the gospel of Christ has
again been offered to the inhabitants
of the earth. The Lord did not re-
veal the day of the coming of the
Son of Man, but he revealed the
generation. [Doctrine and Covenants 63:53] That generation is upon
us. The signs of heaven and earth
predict the fulfilment of these things,
and they will come to pass.
Therefore, let us try to live our re-
ligion. We have the kingdom of
God. There is no question about
this. There was none with Joseph
Smith when the angels of God min-
istered unto him, and we had a liv-
ing testimony of this work from that
day to this. What is the greatest
testimony any man or woman can
have as to this being the work of
God? I will tell you what is the
greatest testimony I have ever had,
the most sure testimony, that is the
testimony of the Holy Ghost, the
testimony of the Father and the
Son. We may have the ministration
of angels; we may be wrapt in the
visions of heaven—these things as
testimonies are very good, but when
you receive the Holy Ghost, when
you receive the testimony of the
Father and the Son, it is a true prin-
ciple to every man on earth, it de-
ceives no man, and by that princi-
