Mormonism

It is true that the effrontery which has characterized Mormonism from the start has been most daring. Its founder a lad of low birth, very limited education, and uncertain morals; its beginnings so near burlesque that they drew down upon its originators the scoff of their neighbors, - the organization increased its membership as it was driven from one state to another, building up at last in an untried wilderness a population that has steadily augmented its wealth and numbers; doggedly defending its right to practice its peculiar beliefs and obey only the officers of the church, even when its course in this respect has brought it in conflict with the government of the United States.

Nor has man changed in his mental susceptibilities as the centuries have advanced. It is a failure to recognize this fact which leads observers like Ferris to find it so marvelous that a belief like Mormonism should succeed in the nineteenth century. Draper's studies of man's intellectual development led him to declare that "man has ever been the same in his modes of thought and motives of action," and to assert his purpose to "judge past occurrences in the same way as those of our own time." So Macaulay refused to accept the doctrine that "the world is constantly becoming more and more enlightened," asserting that "the human mind, instead of marching, merely marks time." Nothing offers stronger confirmation of the correctness of these views than the history of religious beliefs, and the teachings connected therewith since the death of Christ.

The "real miracle" in Mormonism, then, - the wonderful feature of its success, - is to be sought, not in the fact that it has been able to attract believers in a new prophet, and to find them at this date and in this country, but in its success in establishing and keeping together in a republic like ours a membership who acknowledge its supreme authority in politics as well as in religion) and who form a distinct organization which does not conceal its purpose to rule over the whole nation. Had Mormonism confined itself to its religious teachings, and been preached only to those who sought its instruction, instead of beating up the world for recruits and conveying them to its home, the Mormon church would probably to-day be attracting as little attention as do the Harmonists of Pennsylvania.

Elder John Hyde, Jr., was well within the truth when he wrote: "The compiling genius of Mormonism was Sidney Rigdon. Smith had boisterous impetuosity but no foresight. Polygamy was not the result of his policy but of his passions. Sidney gave point, direction, and apparent consistency to the Mormon system of theology. He invented its forms and the manner of its arguments. . . . Had it not been for the accession of these two men [Rigdon and Parley P. Pratt] Smith would have been lost, and his schemes frustrated and abandoned."

The announcement of Rigdon's conversation gave Mormonism an advertisement and a support that had a wide effect, and it alarmed the orthodox of that part of the country as' they had never been alarmed before. Referring to it, Hayden says, "The force of this shock was like an earthquake when Symonds Ryder, Ezra Booth, and many others submitted to the 'New Dispensation.'" Largely through his influence, the Mormon church at Kirtland soon numbered more than one hundred members.

After a brief study of the new book, Rigdon announced that he, too, had had a "revelation," declaring to him that Mormonism was to be believed. He saw in a vision all the orders of professing Christians pass before him, and all were "as corrupt as corruption itself," while the heart of the man who brought him the book was "as pure as an angel."