We are becoming a great people—that is, compared with what we have
been—not very great compared with the world; but, nevertheless, we are
increasing very rapidly; the rising generation is very numerous; and
it requires exceeding diligence and watchfulness on the part of those
who have the people in charge as shepherds to see that the means of
instruction and counsel are in proportion to the growth of the people.
If this were not the case we should soon have a generation of young
men and young women ignorant of the principles of life and salvation,
and of the policy and polity of the work of God that He has
established on the earth.
It is very necessary that as a people we should have with us the
spirit of revelation from God, and not only should we have it
ourselves, but it is also necessary that we should be taught by those
whom God has called to preside over His Church and to lead in the
affairs thereof.
Our position is in many respects critical. We are surrounded by
enemies who are constantly on the alert, and who are doing all in
their power to thwart the work of God, and to destroy its influence on
the earth. This being the case it is exceedingly necessary that every
means which God has placed within our reach for our improvement and
for the advancement of His work should be used by us.
The prophecies concerning Zion which are on record are full of
promises concerning the future growth of this people, concerning the
glory that shall rest upon Zion. But these predictions and promises
are all conditional. They will be fulfilled if we place ourselves in a
position to merit their fulfillment, or to bring them about. If Zion
fails to come up to the requirements which God has made of us, then
the fulfillment of these glorious promises will undoubtedly be
deferred. It is therefore of importance that the Latter-day Saints
should come up to the standard that God has given unto us—that
is, fulfill the requirements which He has made of us.
Now, there are many points upon which we need correction. We are
guilty of many things that are not in accordance with the mind and
will of God. There is a certain policy—if I may use that phrase; I use
it to convey the idea to your minds—connected with the building up of
Zion, a policy which God has sought to enforce upon us from the
beginning until the present time. It is to a great extent the same
policy that He urged upon and endeavored to enforce in the midst of
Israel, when He led Israel out of Egypt. When He inspired Moses to
take the steps that He did towards the emancipation of the children of
Israel from the thralldom of the Egyptians, He had a definite purpose
in view, and that was to make them a nation of His own, a people who
should acknowledge Him as their God, and He wished to make a distinct
race of them. For forty years He led them through the wilderness
teaching them, counseling them, pleading with them, training them, in
order to relieve them as far as possible from the old traditions with
which they were burdened. There was no other object in view than
this—that is, I may say this was the principle object. He wished to
separate them entirely from all the nations of the earth by whom they
had been surrounded, and to make them a peculiar people, a people who
would look upon Him as their lawgiver, and who should look to Him for
all the instructions and counsels and directions that they needed; but
because of their rebellious, and their unwillingness to be thus
submissive, He caused every man over 20 years of age who left Egypt,
to die in the wilderness except two. You remember, doubtless, the
circumstances which brought about the preservation of the lives of
these two. The rest over 20 years of age all perished in the
wilderness, they not having faith sufficient to receive the promises
and to gain the end that they started out for when they left Egypt. A
new generation grew up during the 40 years of travel in the
wilderness—a generation that had to a great extent forgotten the
traditions of Egypt, that had forgotten the idolatry of Egypt and the
evil practices of Egypt, and then when this was brought about, God led
them unto the promised land, and He made of them a nation, a peculiar
people. They became His people. He placed His name upon them, although
they failed as a generation to come up to the fullness of power that
He designed they should have. In other words, they failed to come up
to the possession and exercise of the Melchizedek Priesthood.
Now, God in like manner has designed in these days in laying the
foundation of Zion to establish a new order of things on the earth; to
gather us out from the nations of the earth; to make us a peculiar
people; to make us a holy and a pure people upon whom He could place
His name and through whom He can accomplish His great designs and
purposes on the earth; to make us a distinct people from every other
people that lives upon the face of the earth, and through us to
establish and perpetuate a new order of things on the earth which
shall be preparatory to the ushering in of the full reign of
righteousness through our Lord Jesus Christ. It is for this that the
heavens have been opened. It is for this that God the Father and Jesus
the Son have descended. It is for this that angels have come
and ministered unto men. It is for this that the Gospel has been
restored; that the Priesthood has been given to men; that the
authority to administer the ordinances of life and salvation has been
restored from the heavens. It is for this that the spirit of gathering
has been poured out upon the inhabitants of the earth who have
received the Gospel, which has impelled them to do as we have done, to
gather together as we are gathered together at this time in these
valleys, and it is for this that all that you witness connected with
this work, the power that is manifested, the deliverances that have
been wrought out—it is for this that these have all been accomplished.
God has chosen this people and has given unto them a mission. But I
ask myself, who of us comprehend it? Who of us rise to the full
conception of its importance, and who understand the mind and will of
God in these mighty works of which we are the witnesses and connected
with which we are actors? We have been pleaded with all the day long
by the voice of Prophets, by the voice of inspiration, I may say by
the voice of God through His servants. We have been told with the
greatest plainness, the mind and will of God concerning us and the
objects that He has had in view in gathering us out and placing us in
the position which we occupy. But, like the Israelites of old, the
flesh pots of Egypt have been sweet to us; the leeks and the onions of
Babylon we have hankered after. We have lusted after these things. We
have lusted after that which God has commanded us to forsake, and we
have not become emancipated from the love of Babylon. It has been in
our hearts. It has influenced us in our actions. It has governed us in
our policy, and it has been the great labor of the leaders of this
Church to endeavor to uproot this accursed lust that has been in the
hearts of those who are called Latter-day Saints for that which they
have been commanded to forsake. God has commanded us to forsake
Babylon. He has called us out from Babylon; but though we have come
out from Babylon we have brought to a great extent Babylon with us,
the love of Babylon, the love of that which God abhors, and which He
commands us to forsake. We have brought it with us, and to a great
extent we cherish it. And this is the great obstacle in the way of
building up Zion. At the same time I do not wish to speak
discouragingly to my brethren and sisters upon this point. I know that
there are many, very many in this Church, who have sought with all the
faith and diligence of which they are capable to love the Lord, to
love Zion, and to do everything they could to build it up in the
earth. I know this. We have constant testimonies of this in looking at
the Saints, in mingling with them, and in witnessing the spirit they
possess. But, my brethren and sisters, I sometimes feel that it is
with us as it was with our fathers whom God led out of Egypt, for we
are the descendants of that people. Like our fathers we shall have to
undergo the same ordeals—that is, ordeals that shall have for their
object the accomplishment of the same ends, and I do not believe that
He will allow a generation of people to grow up and witness the
accomplishment of all that He has spoken concerning Zion who are not
perfectly willing to do that which He requires at their hands. I
believe the old generation will pass away. I believe that like our
fathers the bodies of the Saints of God will be laid by the
wayside in the various places where they live if they do not exercise
faith to receive the blessings that God designs to bestow upon us as a
people, and that He will raise up a generation as He did in the case
of our fathers, which shall have the necessary faith, which shall be
divorced from the old order of things sufficiently to go forward and
accomplish the mind and will of God concerning Zion.
Today look over the entire field that we occupy. Examine the
condition of the Latter-day Saints from the far north to the extreme
south; examine the evils which surround us and with which we have to
contend, and that threaten the perpetuity of the institutions of Zion.
Examine our condition in its true light, in all its aspects and in all
its particulars, and what will be the conclusion that will be reached
respecting our circumstances? It will be this: that there is no evil
today that menaces Zion that we feel it difficult to cope with, that
threatens the supremacy of our rule in this land to which God has led
us, that is not traceable to ourselves and that does not have its
origin in the reluctance of the people to comprehend and to obey the
counsel which God has given through His servants ever since we came to
these valleys. I leave it to everyone of you to decide for yourselves
under the spirit of God if this statement which I make is not
abundantly true and sustained by facts. It is a sorrowful statement to
make, but it is nevertheless a true statement. We have no dangerous or
threatening evils to contend with that have not had their origin in
the disobedience of some of the Latter-day Saints to the counsel which
God has given them.
God intended when He led Israel out of Egypt, that there should be no
intermarriages between Israel and the nations which surrounded them,
and a great many of the evils that came upon Israel were due to this.
I may say, however, for the men of this Church, that there have been
but comparatively few instances (probably because there have not been
so many temptations for them) of their taking wives who were not of
the Saints. They have not married strange women as did many of the
Israelites, as did Solomon the wise king, which God gave to Israel. He
married strange wives, and through these marriages he was led away
into idolatry in his old age, and the anger of God was brought upon
him and his house because of this. Many of the evils that fell upon
Israel were due to intermarriage on their part with women who were not
of their faith, and who were from nations who did not have the same
worship that Israel had. Marriages of this nature are contrary to the
command of God. We are commanded not to marry with those who are not
of our faith, and no woman ever did it, no girl ever did it that has
not sooner or later had sorrow because of this. God is not pleased
with such marriages, and it is not in the nature of things to expect
blessings to follow such intermarriages.
I have not time to dwell upon the many points wherein we have failed.
To build up Zion should be the thought of every heart—to labor to
establish the cause of God in the earth, to be a compact people. But
we have violated this counsel, until today, in some places, it is
questionable who shall rule—the Latter-day Saints or those opposed to
them. Now, you all know that the policy of this organization which God has given us is not one that is hostile to strangers. I would
not be understood in making the remarks that I do on this occasion as
having any disposition to excite hostility in the minds of my brethren
and sisters against those who are not of us. We never have had that
feeling. No man who has any of the spirit of God within him, and
comprehends the nature of God's work, will have that spirit. But there
is a great difference, remember, between hostility to those who are
not of our faith, and our sustaining and upholding and taking them in
our arms and caressing them and bestowing favors upon them that should
only be bestowed upon the household of faith. For instance, if there
were two stores in this town, one occupied by a man who is not of our
faith, and another occupied by a man who is of our faith, a man whose
whole interests were identified with Zion, whose whole thought was to
build up Zion and to advance the cause thereof on the earth, would I
be an enemy of the man not of us because I did not patronize him, but
patronized and sustained the man who is of us? Certainly not; it would
be no mark of enmity on my part to him. I might have and would have a
preference for my brother, for the man who was identified with me and
who was laboring for the same end; and this is the spirit we should
have. There are a great many Latter-day Saints who have not been able
to discriminate sufficiently between these two spirits. They have
imagined that because we are not hostile we must therefore be very
loving, and they do not see the line of demarcation which God has
drawn and which He wishes us to observe. There is a line and that line
ought to be observed by us. Joseph said in the beginning that it was
the duty of the Elders of this Church to labor constantly to build up
Zion and not to build up that which is opposed to Zion. That embodies
in these few words the policy that we should observe. It is not my
business; God has not required it of me that I should build up
anything that is opposed to Zion, but on the contrary that I should
always keep in my thoughts and be influenced by it in my actions that
which will advance the cause of Zion, and that which will not retard
it or operate against it in any manner. We have erred in this
direction in the past. There is a class of people among us who have
thought more of money than they have about Zion. They have gone where
they could get the best bargains regardless of the effect it would
have on the public weal. They only looked to their individual benefit
and aggrandizement. There are many such among us throughout our
settlements, and particularly in Salt Lake City. They have bought and
sold, they have traded, they have done that which seemed right in
their eyes, that would promote their own personal benefits regardless
of the effect it would have upon the public, and I believe that that
is a sin in the sight of God with the light and knowledge that we
have. I believe that the man who does that grieves the spirit of God,
whether he does it on a large scale or on a small scale. I believe
that such a man, unless he repents, will not live to reap the
blessings and benefits that God will bestow upon those who labor for
the building up of Zion. I believe he will perish just as our fathers
perished in the wilderness, and will not live to enjoy the blessings
God has in store for the faithful. I would rather my brethren and
sisters, stand before you clothed as these Indians are who wander through our settlements; I would rather be clothed in
deerskins or in goatskins; I would rather be destitute of those things
that men place so high a value upon and be sure that I had the
blessing of my God, be sure that I would secure, by continuing
faithful, exaltation in His kingdom, than to have all the wealth that
this world can furnish. I would rather have the peace of God in my
heart; I would rather have the blessing of God and His Holy Spirit
resting upon me than to have a thousand things, however grand they
might be, bestowed upon me and be destitute of the favor of our God.
That is the feeling I have. I know it is pleasant to have good things;
I know it is pleasant to have beautiful surroundings; I know it is a
sweet thing for us to be able to supply our families' wants, and when
they ask to have it in our power to give; but there is something
higher, something nobler, something better than this, and that is the
favor of our God. We should labor so as to have this, and at the same
time if we do, we may rest assured that all the rest will be added to
us. He will not leave us destitute. He will not deprive us of the
blessings of the earth. On the contrary he will impart those blessings
to us, and not only to us but to our children after us. For we live
not for ourselves alone, but we live for our posterity. We hope to be
faithful so as to gain the favor of God, that our posterity after us
will be remembered in the days of trial and in the days of tribulation
and of calamity that are to come upon the earth, a desire that every
faithful man connected with this Church must have if he understands
the promises and blessings of God. His desire must be that, so long as
the earth shall stand, so long as time shall endure, he will never be
destitute in any generation of a man who will bear the Holy
Priesthood; that he will have a representative in all the generations
to come, the generations from now until time shall cease. In order to
obtain this promise and this blessing men must be faithful unto God;
men must labor and struggle as our fathers did through whose
faithfulness we have received those promises, and through whose
faithfulness, also, we have received the Holy Ghost that we now enjoy
this day; that we, like them, shall gain the favor of God so
effectually that he will confirm upon us and our posterity after us
the blessings he confirmed upon Abraham our father, those blessings
that shall be felt throughout all the generations to come as long as
time shall endure. That is our privilege as Latter-day Saints, and we
should live for it, and God will help us to obtain it, if we are
faithful, if we do that which is right before Him.
In conclusion, my brethren and sisters, I entreat you as a servant of
God, in the name of our Lord and Master, to love Zion with all your
hearts, and not allow any other love to enter therein. Love this work.
Devote yourselves to it. Love our God. Love Him supremely and He will
never desert you. Keep His commandments, no matter what the sacrifice
may be. Keep every commandment of God, and stand before the Lord
blameless, so that you will not be condemned, and if you will do so He
will lead you and all of us back into His celestial presence and crown
us with glory, immortality and endless lives, which I pray may be our
happy lot, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
- George Q. Cannon