Beloved Saints—I will call the attention of this congregation while I
address you on the subject of the dead. The decease of our beloved
brother, Elder King Follett, who was crushed in a well by the falling
of a tub of rock, has more immediately led me to that subject. I have
been requested to speak by his friends and relatives; but inasmuch as
there are a great many in this congregation who live in this city, as
well as elsewhere, who have lost friends, I feel disposed to speak on
the subject in general, and offer you my ideas so far as I have
ability and so far as I shall be inspired by the Holy Spirit to dwell
on this subject.
I want your prayers and faith that I may have the instruction of
Almighty God and the gift of the Holy Ghost, so that I may set forth
things that are true and which can be easily comprehended by you, and
that the testimony may carry conviction to your hearts and minds of
the truth of what I shall say. Pray that the Lord may strengthen my
lungs, stay the winds, and let the prayers of the Saints to heaven
appear, that they may enter into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth; for
the effectual prayers of the righteous avail much. There is strength
here; and I verily believe that your prayers will be heard.
Before I enter fully into the investigation of the subject which is
lying before me, I wish to pave the way and bring up the subject from
the beginning, that you may understand it. I will make a few
preliminaries, in order that you may understand the subject when I
come to it. I do not calculate or intend to please your ears with
superfluity of words, or oratory, or with much learning; but I
calculate to edify you with the simple truths from heaven.
In the first place, I wish to go back to the beginning—to the morn of creation. There is the starting point for us to look to, in
order to understand and be fully acquainted with the mind, purposes,
and decrees of the great Eloheim, who sits in yonder heavens as he did
at the creation of this world. It is necessary for us to have an
understanding of God himself in the beginning. If we start right, it
is easy to go right all the time; but if we start wrong, we may go
wrong, and it will be a hard matter to get right.
There are but a very few beings in the world who understand rightly
the character of God. The great majority of mankind do not comprehend
anything, either that which is past or that which is to come, as
respects their relationship to God. They do not know, neither do they
understand the nature of that relationship; and, consequently, they
know but little above the brute beast, or more than to eat, drink, and
sleep. This is all man knows about God or his existence, unless it is
given by the inspiration of the Almighty.
If a man learns nothing more than to eat, drink, and sleep, and does
not comprehend any of the designs of God, the beast comprehends the
same thing. It eats, drinks, sleeps, and knows nothing more about God:
yet it knows as much as we, unless we are able to comprehend by the
inspiration of Almighty God. If men do not comprehend the character of
God, they do not comprehend themselves. I want to go back to the
beginning, and so lift your minds into a more lofty sphere and a more
exalted understanding than what the human mind generally aspires to.
I want to ask this congregation—every man, woman, and child, to answer
the question in their own heart, what kind of a being God is? Ask
yourselves; turn your thoughts into your hearts, and say if any of you
have seen, heard, or communed with him. This is a question that may
occupy your attention for a long time. I again repeat the
question—What kind of a being is God? Does any man or woman know? Have
any of you seen him, heard him, or communed with him? Here is the
question that will peradventure from this time henceforth occupy your
attention. The Scriptures inform us that, "This is life eternal, that
they might know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast
sent."
If any man does not know God, and inquires what kind of a being he
is—if he will search diligently his own heart—if the declarations of
Jesus and the Apostles be true—he will realize that he has not eternal
life; for there can be eternal life on no other principle.
My first object is to find out the character of the only wise and true
God, and what kind of a being he is; and if I am so fortunate as to be
the man to comprehend God, and explain or convey the principles to
your hearts, so that the Spirit seals them upon you, then let every
man and woman henceforth sit in silence, put their hands on their
mouths, and never lift their hands or voices or say anything against
the man of God or the servants of God again. But if I fail to do it,
it becomes my duty to renounce all further pretensions to revelations,
inspirations, or to be a Prophet; and I should be like the rest of the
world—a false teacher, be hailed as a friend, and no man would seek my
life. But if all religious teachers were honest enough to renounce
their pretensions to godliness, when their ignorance of the knowledge
of God is made manifest, they will all be as badly off as I am, at any
rate; and you might just as well take the lives of other false
teachers as that of mine, if I am false. If any man is authorized to
take away my life because he thinks and says I am a false
teacher, then, upon the same principle, we should be justified in
taking away the life of every false teacher; and where would be the
end of blood? And who would not be the sufferer?
But meddle not with any man for his religion; and all governments
ought to permit every man to enjoy his religion unmolested. No man is
authorized to take away life in consequence of difference of religion,
which all laws and governments ought to tolerate and protect, right or
wrong. Every man has a natural and, in our country, a constitutional
right to be a false prophet as well as a true prophet. If I show,
verily, that I have the truth of God, and show that ninety-nine out of
every hundred professing religious ministers are false teachers,
having no authority, while they pretend to hold the keys of God's
kingdom on earth, and was to kill them because they are false
teachers, it would deluge the whole world with blood.
I will prove that the world is wrong, by showing what God is. I am
going to inquire after God; for I want you all to know him and to be
familiar with him; and if I can bring you to a knowledge of him, all
persecutions against me ought to cease. You will then know that I am
his servant; for I speak as one having authority.
I will go back to the beginning, before the world was, to show what
kind of a being God is. What sort of a being was God in the beginning?
Open your ears and hear, all ye ends of the earth; for I am going to
prove it to you by the Bible, and to tell you the designs of God in
relation to the human race, and why he interferes with the affairs of
man.
God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted Man, and sits
enthroned in yonder heavens. That is the great secret. If the veil was
rent today, and the great God who holds this world in its orbit, and
who upholds all worlds and all things by his power, was to make
himself visible—I say, if you were to see him today, you would see
him like a man in form—like yourselves, in all the person, image, and
very form as a man; for Adam was created in the very fashion, image,
and likeness of God, and received instruction from, and walked,
talked, and conversed with him, as one man talks and communes with
another.
In order to understand the subject of the dead, for the consolation of
those who mourn for the loss of their friends, it is necessary that we
should understand the character and being of God, and how he came to
be so; for I am going to tell you how God came to be God. We have
imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity, I will
refute that idea, and will take away and do away the veil, so that you
may see.
These are incomprehensible ideas to some; but they are simple. It is
the first principle of the Gospel to know for a certainty the
character of God and to know that we may converse with him as one man
converses with another, and that he was once a man like us; yea, that
God himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus
Christ himself did; and I will show it from the Bible. I wish I was in
a suitable place to tell it, and that I had the trump of an archangel,
so that I could tell the story in such a manner that persecution would
cease forever. What did Jesus say? (Mark it, Elder Rigdon.) The
Scriptures inform us that Jesus said, "As the Father hath power in
himself, even so hath the Son power" —to do what? Why, what the Father
did. The answer is obvious—in a manner, to lay down his body and take
it up again. Jesus, what are you going to do? To lay down my life, as
my Father did, and take it up again. Do you believe it? If you do not believe it, you do not believe the Bible. The Scriptures say
it, and I defy all the learning and wisdom and all the combined powers
of earth and hell together to refute it.
Here, then, is eternal life—to know the only wise and true God; and
you have got to learn how to be Gods yourselves, and to be kings and
priests to God, the same as all Gods have done before you—namely, by
going from one small degree to another, and from a small capacity to a
great one—from grace to grace, from exaltation to exaltation, until
you attain to the resurrection of the dead, and are able to dwell in
everlasting burnings and to sit in glory, as do those who sit
enthroned in everlasting power. And I want you to know that God, in
the last days, while certain individuals are proclaiming his name, is
not trifling with you or me.
These are the first principles of consolation. How consoling to the
mourners, when they are called to part with a husband, wife, father,
mother, child, or dear relative, to know that, although the earthly
tabernacle is laid down and dissolved, they shall rise again, to dwell
in everlasting burnings in immortal glory, not to sorrow, suffer, or
die anymore; but they shall be heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus
Christ. What is it? To inherit the same power, the same glory, and the
same exaltation, until you arrive at the station of a God and ascend
the throne of eternal power, the same as those who have gone before.
What did Jesus do? Why, I do the things I saw my Father do when worlds
come rolling into existence. My Father worked out his kingdom with
fear and trembling, and I must do the same; and when I get my kingdom,
I shall present it to my Father, so that he may obtain kingdom upon
kingdom, and it will exalt him in glory. He will then take a higher
exaltation, and I will take his place, and thereby become exalted
myself. So that Jesus treads in the track of his Father, and inherits
what God did before; and God is thus glorified and exalted in the
salvation and exaltation of all his children. It is plain beyond
disputation; and you thus learn some of the first principles of the
Gospel, about which so much hath been said.
When you climb a ladder, you must begin at the bottom, and ascend step
by step until you arrive at the top; and so it is with the principles
of the Gospel: you must begin with the first, and go on until you
learn all the principles of exaltation. But it will be a great while
after you have passed through the veil before you will have learned
them. It is not all to be comprehended in this world: it will be a
great work to learn our salvation and exaltation even beyond the
grave. I suppose I am not allowed to go into an investigation of
anything that is not contained in the Bible. If I did, I think there
are so many overwise men here, that they would cry "treason" and
put
me to death. So I will go to the old Bible and turn commentator today.
I shall comment on the very first Hebrew word in the Bible. I will
make a comment on the very first sentence of the history of creation
in the Bible—Berosheit. I want to analyze the word.
Baith—in, by,
through, and everything else. Rosh—the head.
Sheit—grammatical
termination. When the inspired man wrote it, he did not put the Baith
there. An old Jew, without any authority, added the word. He thought
it too bad to begin to talk about the head! It read first, "The head
one of the Gods brought forth the Gods." That is the true meaning of
the words. Baurau signifies to bring forth. If you do not believe it,
you do not believe the learned man of God. Learned men can teach you
no more than what I have told you. Thus, the head God brought
forth the Gods in the grand council.
I will transpose and simplify it in the English language. Oh, ye
lawyers, ye doctors, and ye priests, who have persecuted me, I want to
let you know that the Holy Ghost knows something as well as you do.
The head God called together the Gods and sat in grand council to
bring forth the world. The grand counselors sat at the head in yonder
heavens, and contemplated the creation of the worlds which were
created at that time. When I say doctors and lawyers, I mean the
doctors and lawyers of the Scriptures. I have done so hitherto without
explanation, to let the lawyers flutter, and everybody laugh at them.
Some learned doctor might take a notion to say the Scriptures say thus
and so; and we must believe the Scriptures; they are not to be
altered. But I am going to show you an error in them.
I have an old edition of the New Testament in the Hebrew, Latin,
German, and Greek languages. I have been reading the German, and find
it to be the most correct translation, and to correspond nearest to
the revelations which God has given to me for the last fourteen years.
It tells about Jachoboy, the son of Zebedee. It means Jacob. In the
English New Testament it is translated James. Now, if Jacob had the
keys, you might talk about James through all eternity, and never get
the keys. In the 21st verse of the fourth chapter of Matthew, my old
German edition gives the word Jacob instead of James.
The doctors (I mean doctors of law, not of physic), say, "If you
preach anything not according to the Bible, we will cry treason." How
can we escape the damnation of hell, except God be with us and reveal
to us? Men bind us with chains. The Latin says Jachabod, which means
Jacob; the Hebrew says Jacob, the Greek says Jacob, and the German
says Jacob. Here we have the testimony of four against one. I thank
God I have got this old book; but I thank him more for the gift of the
Holy Ghost. I have got the oldest book in the world; but I have got
the oldest book in my heart, even the gift of the Holy Ghost. I have
all the four Testaments. Come here, ye learned men, and read, if you
can. I should not have introduced this testimony, were it not to back
up the word Rosh—the head, the father of the Gods. I should not have
brought it up, only to show that I am right.
In the beginning, the head of the Gods called a council of the Gods;
and they came together and concocted a plan to create the world and
people it. When we begin to learn in this way, we begin to learn the
only true God and what kind of a being we have got to worship. Having
a knowledge of God, we begin to know how to approach him and how to
ask so as to receive an answer.
When we understand the character of God and know how to come to him,
he begins to unfold the heavens to us and to tell us all about it.
When we are ready to come to him, he is ready to come to us.
Now, I ask all who hear me, why the learned men who are preaching
salvation say that God created the heavens and the earth out of
nothing? The reason is, that they are unlearned in the things of God
and have not the gift of the Holy Ghost. They account it blasphemy in
anyone to contradict their idea. If you tell them that God made the
world out of something, they will call you a fool. But I am learned,
and know more than all the world put together. The Holy Ghost does,
anyhow; and he is within me, and comprehends more than all the world;
and I will associate myself with him.
You ask the learned doctors why they say the world was made out
of nothing; and they will answer, "Don't the Bible say he created the
world?" And they infer, from the word create, that it must have been
made out of nothing. Now, the word create came from the word baurau,
which does not mean to create out of nothing; it means to
organize—the
same as a man would organize materials and build a ship. Hence we
infer that God had materials to organize the world out of
chaos—chaotic matter, which is element, and in which dwells all the
glory. Element had an existence from the time He had. The pure
principles of element are principles which can never be destroyed:
they may be organized and reorganized, but not destroyed. They had no
beginning, and can have no end.
I have another subject to dwell upon, which is calculated to exalt
man. But it is impossible for me to say much on this subject. I shall,
therefore, just touch upon it; for time will not permit me to say all.
It is associated with the subject of the resurrection of the
dead—namely, the soul, the mind of man, the immortal spirit. Where did
it come from? All learned men and doctors of divinity say that God
created it in the beginning. But it is not so. The very idea lessens
man in my estimation. I do not believe the doctrine. I know better.
Hear it, all ye ends of the world; for God has told me so; and if you
don't believe me, it will not make the truth without effect. I will
make a man appear a fool before I get through, if he does not believe
it. I am going to tell of things more noble.
We say that God himself is a self-existent being. Who told you so? It
is correct enough; but how did it get into your heads? Who told you
that man did not exist in like manner upon the same principle? Man
does exist upon the same principles. God made a tabernacle and put a
spirit into it, and it became a living soul. [Referred to the old
Bible.] How does it read in the Hebrew? It does not say in the Hebrew
that God created the spirit of man. It says, "God made man out of the
earth, and put into him Adam's spirit, and so became a living body."
The mind or the intelligence which man possesses is coequal with God
himself. I know that my testimony is true; hence, when I talk to these
mourners, what have they lost? Their relatives and friends are only
separated from their bodies for a short season: their spirits which
existed with God have left the tabernacle of clay only for a little
moment, as it were; and they now exist in a place where they converse
together the same as we do on the earth.
I am dwelling on the immortality of the spirit of man. Is it logical
to say that the intelligence of spirits is immortal, and yet that it
had a beginning? The intelligence of spirits had no beginning, neither
will it have an end. That is good logic. That which has a beginning
may have an end. There never was a time when there were not spirits;
for they are co-equal with our Father in heaven.
I want to reason more on the spirit of man; for I am dwelling on the
body and spirit of man—on the subject of the dead. I take my ring from
my finger and liken it unto the mind of man—the immortal part, because
it has no beginning. Suppose you cut it in two, then it has a
beginning and an end; but join it again, and it continues one eternal
round. So with the spirit of man. As the Lord liveth, if it had a
beginning it will have an end. All the fools and learned and wise men
from the beginning of creation, who say that the spirit of man had a
beginning, prove that it must have an end; and if that doctrine
is true, then the doctrine of annihilation would be true. But if I am
right, I might with boldness proclaim from the housetops that God
never had the power to create the spirit of man at all. God himself
could not create himself.
Intelligence is eternal and exists upon a self-existent principle. It
is a spirit from age to age, and there is no creation about it. All
the minds and spirits that God ever sent into the world are
susceptible of enlargement.
The first principles of man are self-existent with God. God himself,
finding he was in the midst of spirits and glory, because he was more
intelligent, saw proper to institute laws whereby the rest could have
a privilege to advance like himself. The relationship we have with God
places us in a situation to advance in knowledge. He has power to
institute laws to instruct the weaker intelligences, that they may be
exalted with himself, so that they might have one glory upon another,
and all that knowledge, power, glory, and intelligence which is
requisite in order to save them in the world of spirits.
This is good doctrine. It tastes good. I can taste the principles of
eternal life, and so can you. They are given to me by the revelations
of Jesus Christ; and I know that when I tell you these words of
eternal life as they are given to me, you taste them, and I know you
believe them. You say honey is sweet, and so do I. I can also taste
the spirit of eternal life. I know it is good; and when I tell you of
these things which were given me by inspiration of the Holy Spirit,
you are bound to receive them as sweet, and I rejoice more and more.
I want to talk more of the relation of man to God. I will open your
eyes in relation to your dead. All things whatsoever God of his
infinite wisdom has seen fit and proper to reveal to us, while we are
dwelling in mortality, in regard to our mortal bodies, are revealed to
us in the abstract and independent of affinity of this mortal
tabernacle; but are revealed to our spirits precisely as though we had
no bodies at all; and those revelations which will save our spirits
will save our bodies. God reveals them to us in view of no eternal
dissolution of the body, or tabernacle. Hence the responsibility—the
awful responsibility that rests upon us in relation to our dead; for
all the spirits who have not obeyed the Gospel in the flesh must
either obey it in the spirit or be damned. Solemn thought!—Dreadful
thought! Is there nothing to be done? No preparation—no salvation for
our fathers and friends who have died without having had the
opportunity to obey the decrees of the Son of Man? Would to God that I
had forty days and nights in which to tell you all! I would let you
know that I am not a "fallen prophet."
What promises are made in relation to the subject of the salvation of
the dead? And what kind of characters are those who can be saved,
although their bodies are moldering and decaying in the grave? When
his commandments teach us, it is in view of eternity; for we are
looked upon by God as though we were in eternity. God dwells in
eternity, and does not view things as we do.
The greatest responsibility in this world that God has laid upon us is
to seek after our dead. The Apostle says, "They without us cannot be
made perfect;" for it is necessary that the sealing power should be in
our hands to seal our children and our dead for the fulness of the
dispensation of times—a dispensation to meet the promises made by
Jesus Christ before the foundation of the world for the salvation of
man.
Now, I will speak of them. I will meet Paul half-way. I say to
you, Paul, you cannot be perfect without us. It is necessary that
those who are gone before and those who come after us should have
salvation in common with us; and thus hath God made it obligatory upon
man. Hence God said, "I will send Elijah the prophet before the coming
of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: And he shall turn the hearts
of the fathers to the children and the hearts of the children to their
fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse."
I have a declaration to make as to the provisions which God hath made
to suit the conditions of man, made from before the foundation of the
world. What has Jesus said? All sins, and all blasphemies, and every
transgression, except one, that man can be guilty of, may be forgiven;
and there is a salvation for all men, either in this world or the
world to come, who have not committed the unpardonable sin, there
being a provision, either in this world or the world of spirits. Hence
God hath made a provision that every spirit in the eternal world can
be ferreted out and saved, unless he has committed that unpardonable
sin which cannot be remitted to him either in this world or the world
of spirits. God has wrought out a salvation for all men, unless they
have committed a certain sin; and every man who has a friend in the
eternal world can save him, unless he has committed the unpardonable
sin. And so you can see how far you can be a savior.
A man cannot commit the unpardonable sin after the dissolution of the
body, and there is a way possible for escape. Knowledge saves a man;
and in the world of spirits no man can be exalted but by knowledge. So
long as a man will not give heed to the commandments, he must abide
without salvation. If a man has knowledge, he can be saved; although,
if he has been guilty of great sins, he will be punished for them. But
when he consents to obey the Gospel, whether here or in the world of
spirits, he is saved.
A man is his own tormentor and his own condemner. Hence the saying,
They shall go into the lake that burns with fire and brimstone. The
torment of disappointment in the mind of man is as exquisite as a lake
burning with fire and brimstone. I say, so is the torment of man.
I know the Scriptures and understand them. I said no man can commit
the unpardonable sin after the dissolution of the body, nor in this
life until he receives the Holy Ghost; but they must do it in this
world. Hence the salvation of Jesus Christ was wrought out for all men
in order to triumph over the Devil; for if it did not catch him in one
place, it would in another; for he stood up as a Savior. All will
suffer until they obey Christ himself.
The contention in heaven was—Jesus said there would be certain souls
that would not be saved; and the Devil said he could save them all,
and laid his plans before the grand council, who gave their vote in
favor of Jesus Christ. So the Devil rose up in rebellion against God,
and was cast down, with all who put up their heads for him.
All sins shall be forgiven except the sin against the Holy Ghost; for
Jesus will save all except the sons of perdition. What must a man do
to commit the unpardonable sin? He must receive the Holy Ghost, have
the heavens opened unto him, and know God, and then sin against him.
After a man has sinned against the Holy Ghost, there is no repentance
for him. He has got to say that the sun does not shine while he sees
it; he has got to deny Jesus Christ when the heavens have been opened
unto him, and to deny the plan of salvation with his eyes open
to the truth of it; and from that time he begins to be an enemy. This
is the case with many apostates of the Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints.
When a man begins to be an enemy to this work, he hunts me; he seeks
to kill me, and never ceases to thirst for my blood. He gets the
spirit of the Devil—the same spirit that they had who crucified the
Lord of Life—the same spirit that sins against the Holy Ghost. You
cannot save such persons; you cannot bring them to repentance: they
make open war like the Devil, and awful is the consequence.
I advise all of you to be careful what you do, or you may by-and-by
find out that you have been deceived. Stay yourselves; do not give
way; don't make any hasty moves: you may be be saved. If a spirit of
bitterness is in you, don't be in haste. You may say that man is a
sinner. Well, if he repents, he shall be forgiven. Be cautious: await!
When you find a spirit that wants bloodshed—murder, the same is not of
God, but is of the Devil. Out of the abundance of the heart of man the
mouth speaketh.
The best men bring forth the best works. The man who tells you words
of life is the man who can save you. I warn you against all evil
characters who sin against the Holy Ghost; for there is no redemption
for them in this world nor in the world to come.
I could go back and trace every subject of interest concerning the
relationship of man to God, if I had time. I can enter into the
mysteries; I can enter largely into the eternal worlds; for Jesus
said, "In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I
would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you." (John 14th
chap., 2nd v.) Paul says, "There is one glory of the sun, and another
glory of the moon, and ano ther glory of the stars: for one star
differeth from another star in glory. So also is the resurrection of
the dead." (1st Cor. 15th chap., 41st v.) What have we to console us
in relation to the dead? We have reason to have the greatest hope and
consolations for our dead of any people on the earth; for we have seen
them walk worthily in our midst, and seen them sink asleep in the arms
of Jesus; and those who have died in the faith are now in the
celestial kingdom of God. And hence is the glory of the sun.
You mourners have occasion to rejoice (speaking of the death of Elder
King Follett); for your husband and father is gone to wait until the
resurrection of the dead—until the perfection of the remainder; for at
the resurrection your friend will rise in perfect felicity and go to
celestial glory, while many must wait myriads of years before they can
receive the like blessings; and your expectations and hopes are far
above what man can conceive; for why has God revealed it to us?
I AM AUTHORIZED to say, by the authority of the Holy Ghost, that you
have no occasion to fear; for he is gone to the home of the just.
Don't mourn; don't weep. I know it by the testimony of the Holy Ghost
that is within me; and you may wait for your friends to come forth to
meet you in the morn of the celestial world.
Rejoice, O Israel! Your friends who have been murdered for the truth's
sake in the persecution shall triumph gloriously in the celestial
world, while their murderers shall welter for ages in torment, even
until they shall have paid the uttermost farthing. I say this for the
benefit of strangers.
I have a father, brothers, children, and friends who have gone to a
world of spirits. They are only absent for a moment. They are in the
spirit, and we shall soon meet again. The time will soon arrive when
the trumpet shall sound. When we depart, we shall hail our
mothers, fathers, friends, and all whom we love who have fallen asleep
in Jesus. There will be no fear of mobs, persecutions, or malicious
lawsuits and arrests; but it will be an eternity of felicity.
A question may be asked—"Will mothers have their children in
eternity?" Yes! Yes! Mothers, you shall have your children; for they
shall have eternal life; for their debt is paid. There is no damnation
awaits them, for they are in the spirit. But as the child dies, so
shall it rise from the dead, and be forever living in the learning of
God. It will never grow: it will still be the child, in the same
precise form as it appeared before it died out of its mother's arms,
but possessing all the intelligence of a God. Children dwell in the
mansions of glory and exercise power, but appear in the same form as
when on earth. Eternity is full of thrones, upon which dwell thousands
of children reigning on thrones of glory, with not one cubit added to
their stature.
I will leave this subject here, and make a few remarks on the subject
of baptism. The baptism of water, without the baptism of fire and the
Holy Ghost attending it, is of no use: they are necessary and
inseparably connected. An individual must be born of water and the
spirit in order to get into the kingdom of God. In the German, the
text bears me out the same as the revelations which I have given and
taught for the last fourteen years on that subject. I have the
testimony to put in their teeth. My testimony has been true all the
time. You will find it in the declaration of John the Baptist. [Reads
from the German.] John says, "I baptize you with water; but when Jesus
comes, who has the power (or keys), he shall administer the baptism of
fire and the Holy Ghost." Great God! Where is now all the sectarian
world? And if this testimony is true, they are all damned as clearly
as anathema can do it. I know the text is true. I call upon all you
Germans who know that it is true to say aye. (Loud shouts of aye.)
Alexander Campbell, how are you going to save people with water alone?
For John said his baptism was good for nothing without the baptism of
Jesus Christ. "Therefore, not leaving the principles of the doctrine
of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the
foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, Of
the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of
resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. And this will we
do, if God permit." (Heb. 6th chap., 1st to 3rd v.),
There is one God, one Father, one Jesus, one hope of our calling, one
baptism. All these three baptisms only make one. Many talk of baptism
not being essential to salvation: but this kind of teaching would lay
the foundation of their damnation. I have the truth, and am at the
defiance of the world to contradict me if they can.
I have now preached a little Latin, a little Hebrew, Greek, and
German; and I have fulfilled all. I am not so big a fool as many have
taken me to be. The Germans know that I read the German correctly.
Hear it, all ye ends of the earth—all ye priests, all ye sinners, and
all men. Repent! Repent! Obey the Gospel. Turn to God; for your
religion won't save you, and you will be damned. I do not say how
long. There have been remarks made concerning all men being redeemed
from hell; but I say that those who sin against the Holy Ghost cannot
be forgiven in this world or in the world to come: they shall die the
second death. Those who commit the unpardonable sin are doomed to
Gnolom, to dwell in hell, worlds without end. As they concoct
scenes of bloodshed in this world, so they shall rise to that
resurrection which is as the lake of fire and brimstone. Some shall
rise to the everlasting burning of God; for God dwells in everlasting
burnings; and some shall rise to the damnation of their own
filthiness, which is as exquisite a torment as the lake of fire and
brimstone.
I have intended my remarks for all, both rich and poor, bond and free,
great and small, I have no enmity against any man. I love you all; but
I hate some of your deeds. I am your best friend; and if persons miss
their mark, it is their own fault. If I reprove a man and he hates me,
he is a fool; for I love all men, especially these my brethren and
sisters.
I rejoice in hearing the testimony of my aged friends. You don't know
me: you never knew my heart. No man knows my history. I cannot tell
it: I shall never undertake it. I don't blame anyone for not
believing my history. If I had not experienced what I have, I could
not have believed it myself. I never did harm any man since I was born
into the world. My voice is always for peace.
I cannot lie down until all my work is finished. I never think any
evil, nor do anything to the harm of my fellow man. When I am called
by the trump of the archangel and weighed in the balance, you will all
know me then. I add no more. God bless you all. Amen.