I will say a few words to those who have lately arrived.
The Spirit of the Gospel which they received in their native countries
caused them to rejoice, lighted the lamp of devotion within them, and
created in their hearts a love of truth. When people receive the Holy
Ghost, or the Gospel evidenced by the Spirit of truth, they in a
degree feel and realize the glory of Zion. The commandment has gone
forth for the Saints to gather and build up Zion. They very readily
receive the impression that the gathering place is Zion, that the
gathered are actually living in Zion, that the evil influences abroad
in the world and which afflicted them there will cease to afflict them
here, that they will enjoy the sweet communion of the holy
ones upon the earth, and that their sorrows and all that afflicts them
will have passed away.
I wish to inform you, brethren and sisters, who have just arrived in
these valleys, that all your trials hitherto are but trifling in
comparison to the trials you will now be called to meet and pass
through. How many of you will continue faithful—preserve yourselves in
your integrity and in the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ? You have
come here expressly to be assembled with the Saints; your object in
gathering was to forsake the wickedness that is in the world and to
mingle with those who serve God with an undivided heart, and you
expect to be faithful; but let me inform you that you will not all
prove faithful; some of you will apostatize. Can you tell who? You
reply, "No:" but the first you are aware, some of you will be off to
California, perhaps, with the words—"To Cache or Carson, we don't care
a d—which," on your wagon covers, as they were on the wagon covers
of some who started for Carson last spring. Some of you will be
tempted above what you will bear—will tamely submit to darkness and
its powers—to the evil influences of wicked spirits—will forsake the
faith, and the Devil will get the advantage of you.
Your troubles have just commenced; you are on the threshold of the
department wherein you will have fiery trials, such as you have never
had. Some who have been here for years will come around you and
say—"Well, brother, or sister, how do you do? Do you like the country
and people?" "I don't know. I guess I shall; I should like to have
some things a little different; but this is a good people." "Well,"
says an old brother who has been laboring in the Church for years to
save the people, "I don't know about it; I understand that A. says
thus and so. I don't know about it; a few days ago, I saw a brother,
who seems to be a good brother, talking with the President; he seems
to be in close communion with the heads of the Church, and is all the
time stealing horses. I really do not know about this." Very likely
the Lord has suffered this old "Mormon" to stay in the Church thus
long to get some of you to apostatize; and when he succeeds, you will
go to hell together. Thus you will be led step by step to deny the
faith, and to reduce the light that was in you to total darkness.
One will reflect—"I do not know about brother John; there are some
things in his character that look dark to me, and, according to the
religion I have embraced, I do not understand them; and there is
James, if his conduct corresponds with the Gospel as I have heard it
preached in my native country, I do not know about it; I will look
more narrowly into this;" and the first you know you will retire to
rest without praying in your family. And when you rise in the morning
you are meditating upon what John and James are doing—that you just
saw one of them taking a pole from his neighbor's fence, and you say,
"I don't know about this; this is rather a dark affair among the
Latter-day Saints who have assembled here from among all nations to
serve God! Well, wife, have you got your breakfast ready? Come on,
family; breakfast is ready; gather round the table." The wife's heart
sinks, for she had been accustomed to hear this man pray; but there is
no prayer this morning. A short blessing is asked, the breakfast is
eaten, and the man looks off to John, James, Dick, Harry, the Devil,
and hell; and by-and-by away he goes, another apostate.
God gathers his people to school them. While you were in
England, France, and other foreign countries, were you prepared
to receive the oracles from heaven? No. Are you prepared now? No. Are
those who have been in the Church twenty, twenty-five, or thirty years
prepared to have the visions of eternity opened to them? No. To hear
the voice of the angel Gabriel? No. How can you be prepared, if you
let little, frivolous, trifling afflictions and temptations overcome
you and turn you away? The Lord has brought you here to try every
fiber of your hearts, even as Abraham was tried in all things, to
prove whether you are friends of God. And when you see anyone do
wrong, you should say, "That is nothing to me; he is in the hands of
God, and will have to answer to Him, and I for myself." And when you
see persons about to give way to temptation, you should say to your
families, "Let us pray to the Lord to give them strength and power to
overcome the temptations of the evil ones, that they may remain here,
instead of apostatizing."
Some of you will do as I have stated; but if you will be faithful to
your covenants, you will not only be saviors to yourselves and to
your wives and children, but also to your neighbors. When you see a
neighbor begin to slip, pray for him that he may have the Spirit of
the Gospel as he once had. And if you feel this Spirit within
yourselves, pray for an increase of that light you received when you
first received the Gospel, and you will save yourself and house.
Yet, after all the labor that will be performed by the Elders of
Israel in traveling to the utmost parts of the earth, in gathering
out the people from all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people, and
gathering them home to Zion and Jerusalem, and perhaps other places
the Lord will appoint for the gathering of the people in the latter
days; and after all the preaching, faith, and toil that will be
wrought by the servants of God, when Christ comes, there will be five
foolish virgins and five wise.
My exhortation to every man, woman, and child that has named the name
of Christ—my positive command to you, which I urge upon you, and which
it is your imperative duty to hearken to and obey, is to so live every
moment that there will not be a dark spot upon your lives—that you can
say every night, "The last is the best day I have ever lived. God be
praised that I have been enabled to so live this day that I can go to
sleep with a clear conscience." In short, so live that when you wake
in the spirit world you can truthfully say, "I could not better my
mortal life, were I to live it over again." I exhort you, for the sake
of the house of Israel, for the sake of Zion which we are to build up,
to so live, from this time, henceforth, and forever, that your
characters may with pleasure be scrutinized by holy beings. Live godly
lives, which you cannot do without living moral lives.
A man can commit sin, and return to the Lord and receive forgiveness;
but who has the assurance that he will have power to repent? Who has
the right and privilege granted unto him to swear, or to take that
which is not his own and make use of it for himself? I know of no such
right. Who has a right to commit adultery? If anyone has such a
permit from the Almighty, bring it forth and let us read it to the
congregation, that we may know it. Who has a right to bear false
witness? Who has a right to defile himself by getting drunk? If you
have this right, let us see it. If you have a right to disgrace your
wives and children in the eyes of the people, and God says it is just
and true, bring out your authority and let us see it. I know of no
person who has a right to sin.
"Brother Brigham, don't you sometimes sin?" If I do, it is none of
your business; and the whole of you are not smart enough to catch me
in a wrong. Look back at my life since I have been preaching the
Gospel, and point out, if you can, the iniquity I have committed.
"Have you not taken the name of God in vain?" Not the first time have
I ever used the name of my Savior, or the name of a holy angel, or
the name of the mother of Jesus, or the name of our Father in heaven
with trifling feelings. "Have you not taken that which was not your
own?" No; and I have not been able to get half of what is my own. I am
going to have much more than I now have—not twice or thrice, but a
hundredfold more. I never yet felt that I had license to commit a sin;
and if I have not, who has?
Some may imagine that I am boasting: you may call it what you please.
God has preserved my feet and tongue, and I am here today, though not
so good as I ought to be; and you are not so good as you ought to be:
there is a chance for us all to be much better. Where is there a boy
in this community who has the right to disgrace his father by sin?
Where is the daughter who has the right to disgrace her mother by
defiling herself? Have you such a license, young women? Have you such
a license, young men? If you cannot show your license to commit sin,
we shall consider you impostors, and that you have no right and do not
belong to our society. We will disfellowship all such men and women,
whether old or young: they are already disfellowshipped in my
feelings.
You newcomers are here expressly to mingle your faith with the
faithful, and your acts with those who perform the acts of
righteousness—to bring together to Zion, from every nation, kingdom,
tongue, and people, the good, and the strength, power, and wisdom of
God that has been dispensed to the nations—to take hold with us who
have been trying to purify ourselves and the people. It is your duty
to take hold with us with your might to exalt righteousness. Look to
God for grace to purify yourselves, instead of looking at your
brethren. You who wish to be numbered with the wise virgins, keep your
vessels full of oil; do not let it burn out, and lie down and sleep,
thinking that you can get a supply of oil when you wake. Be careful
that you are not caught with your vessels empty: keep them full, and
your hearts full of the Holy Spirit. Cease not to do good. By so doing
you will be numbered with the wise virgins.
This is the best country in the world for raising Saints, though many
things will cause it to appear strange to you for a time. People here
procure livelihoods differently, in many respects, from what you have
been accustomed to in your native lands. Many of you have been used to
receiving your wages at the end of the week—then only barely
sufficient to provide for your wants during the coming week. How did
you manage in cases of sickness, when you could not work? I presume
some of you nearly starved. Here there as yet has been no starving.
Some do not know what they will do here: you cannot starve to death,
as many do in countries you have come from.
Find shelter for your families, and do not be in a panic, nor fret;
and when a person meets you and says, "Brother, I want to hire a
little help," perhaps you are a collier and never worked above ground,
or a silk weaver and never worked at anything else, and you ask what
he wants done. When he tells you, you may not know how to do it, but
you can learn. If a person wants the silk weaver to take the
spade and dig a ditch, let the weaver say, "I don't know how, but I
can learn; fetch on your spade." Take the first job of work offered,
and earn a bushel of wheat or a bushel of potatoes; and when that job
is done, another will be ready. Do not be anxious to get great wages.
Go to work and say nothing about wages, but feel that "this is Zion;
and what can I do to build it up, without asking any man to pay me one
dollar?" Let that be your chief joy and delight, and you will never
lack for work, food, or raiment. The Lord has all these things for
those willing characters.
"But," says one, "some are very poor." That is because they are
not
liberal enough in their feelings. I remember a question being asked of
Aaron Lake, in Canada. He went into a house, and by way of
introduction was asked, "Can a man rise by falling, or gain by
losing?" He thought a moment, and replied, "Yes." You say,
"There are
some here who are poor and destitute." That is because they refuse to
fall that they may rise, to become poor that they may become rich, or
to humble themselves that they may receive the righteousness of God in
their hearts to dictate them day by day. Do you think that the Lord
will suffer his people to be hungry and starve to death, to go naked
and freeze to death, or to go houseless, if they serve him with an
undivided heart? He never will—never, no, never.
This people have been driven from place to place, to give them
expanded hearts to receive the blessings of the Lord, and that the
wicked might fill the cup of their iniquity and receive their reward,
and the right was theirs. So soon as we are prepared to receive his
blessings, the warfare is over; but that will not be just yet. We yet
have to contend for every inch of ground, for the Devil has power and
possession on the earth, and he does not mean to give it up. But, God,
angels, and good men being my helpers, I will never cease to contend,
inch by inch, until we gain the ground and possess the kingdom. That
is my feeling and faith, and we will accomplish it. I will prophesy,
in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that we will possess the kingdom
of God upon the whole earth, and possess the earth. Do you believe it?
[Many voices: "Yes."] That is as true as it is that the sun now
shines.
God bless you! Amen.