Propositions to be Reconciled.
Referring now to a passage previously quoted, concerning the days of Adam, when a decree went forth that the Gospel should be in the world "until the end thereof." I was once asked to reconcile that passage with the idea of a new dispensation, the question coming in this form: "If the Gospel was to be in the world from the days of Adam 'until the end', what was the need of restoring it—bringing it back again?"
There are two ways of reconciling these propositions. They do not really contradict each other. The Gospel has been in the world from the beginning by a series of dispensations, reaching through the entire range of human history. Our finite minds are prone to tangle themselves up in little details that cause endless quibbles and often give us a great deal of trouble; but God sweeps the whole universe with his infinite gaze, and what seem mountains to men are less than molehills in his sight. The gaps between the Gospel dispensations are not so wide to Deity as they are to us. The Lord has found it necessary at different times to temporarily withdraw the Gospel and the Priesthood from the midst of men; and yet, by repeated restorations, forming a continuous chain of dispensations, he has kept them in the world from the beginning down to the present, thus making good his ancient decree.