Well might the Psalmist say—addressing himself to God: "What is man that thou art mindful of him? And the Son of man that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands, thou hast put all things under his feet."[[1]]
These favors granted to man by the Creator, no less than his superiority to all other creatures of earth, proclaim for him a special place in the universe; and according to the teachings of Joseph Smith, both the superiority of his endowments and the special favors that he enjoys, arise out of his relationship to the Deity.
The prophet taught that the spirits of men before they tabernacled in bodies of flesh and bone on this earth had an existence with God in another world; that God is the Father of their spirits, Jesus Christ being the firstborn.[[2]] That existence was a tangible one; it involved the realities of life in the heavenly kingdom or family. Each spirit there was as much an entity as each man is in this present life. Each spirit there had its agency as each man has it here; and was at liberty to take that course it elected to pursue.[[3]] "At the first organization in heaven," says the prophet, "we were all present, and saw the Savior chosen and appointed and the plan of salvation made, and we sanctioned it."
Some spirits went so far in the exercise of their agency as to rebell against God. Lucifer, the Son of the Morning, did so, and drew away with him one-third of the hosts of heaven, and they became the devil and his angels.[[4]] This is not only the teaching of Joseph Smith, but also of the Bible.[[5]]
One thing, however, Joseph Smith taught which, as far as I know, the Bible does not teach, viz, that these spirits in their pre-existent estate attained unto a variety of degrees of intelligence and nobility of character. In the Book of Abraham, quoted in my last chapter, it is written: "Now the Lord had shown unto me, Abraham, the intelligences that were organized before the world was: and among all these there were many of the noble and great ones; and God saw these souls that they were good, and he stood in the midst of them, and he said, These I will make my rulers, for he stood among those that were spirits, and he said unto me, Abraham, thou art one of them, thou wast chosen before thou wast born."[[6]]
How beautiful is this doctrine! how reasonable! how many problems it explains! What light it throws upon the life and character of man! Notwithstanding the great influence of parentage and environment upon character, we may understand now how it is that in spite of indifferent parentage and vicious environments some characters arise that are truly virtuous and great, and that purely by the strength of that intelligence and nobility to which their spirits had attained in the heavenly kingdom before they took bodies upon earth. Their grandeur of soul could not all be suppressed by environment in this life, however inauspicious for their development. As the sun struggles through clouds and mists that at times obscure his brightness, so these spirits, stirred by their innate nobility, breaking through all disadvantages attendant upon ignoble birth and iron fortune, rise to their native heights of true greatness.
If a wider survey be taken of mankind, and those advantages and disadvantages under which whole generations, nations and races of men have lived be taken into account; if the fact of their pre-existence be considered in connection with that other fact that the spirits of men before coming to this earth were of unequal intelligence and of every degree of nobility; if it be remembered that in that pre-existent state all spirits had a free agency, and that they there manifested all degrees of fidelity to truth and righteousness, from those who were valiant for the right to those who were utterly untrue to it and rebelled against God; if it be further remembered that doubtless in this earth-life these spirits are rewarded for their faithfulness and diligence in that pre-existent state—if all this, I say, be considered, much that has perplexed many noble minds in their effort to reconcile the varied circumstances under which men have lived with the justice and mercy of God, will disappear.
The doctrine of the pre-existence of spirits, as also their relationship to Deity, is beyond all doubt a scriptural doctrine; but it seems to have been reserved for the Prophet Joseph Smith to give clearness and force to it. The fatherhood of God, and its necessary corollary, the brotherhood of man, are trite phrases much in fashion in these modern days; but it is questionable if they have conveyed to the minds of men any definite ideas of the actual relationship of father and son existing between man and Deity. In the mouths of sectarians the phrases under discussion have always been employed to express some mystic or indefinite relationship not clearly explained or explainable. It was reserved, I repeat, for the great modern prophet to give these phrases reality. He declared the relationship to be as real as that existing between any father and son on earth; that man's spirit was actually the offspring of Deity—"A spark struck from his own eternal blaze." With him the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man were not mere abstractions more or less beautiful, but a reality. The words taught by the Savior of men to his disciples as the proper mode of address to Deity—"Our Father, who art in heaven"—are not meaningless verbiage, but express the true relationship of man and God.
Inspired by these teachings a disciple at Nauvoo, fifty years ago, composed and the Saints still sing the following invocation to the Heavenly Father and Mother:
O my Father, thou that dwellest