By this time you are asking yourselves the question, I fancy, what interest have these considerations of the resources and the prosperity of America for an audience assembled upon the Sabbath day to worship God and to be instructed more especially in relation to spiritual matters? I desire as best I may to show you what connection there is between what I have said and the purpose for which you have assembled on this occasion. We are here, as was suggested in the prayer offered at the opening of our services, to have our faith in God's great latter-day work strengthened, and the chief desire I have in my heart, is to think and speak along lines that will tend to increase our faith.
The journey through the land of America just referred to, resulted in my having a higher appreciation of the land of my adoption than I have ever before entertained. Her majestic rivers, her magnificent mountain ranges, her fertile valleys, and even her desert wastes, seem dearer to me than ever before; and this not alone on account of the evidences of her prosperity which could be seen on every hand; not on account alone of contemplating her free institutions, or the patriotism of her people, and the general prevalence of peace and justice that obtain in the land—not alone for these things (though not inconsiderable in themselves) did we find our love for America increased. Part of that increased regard was occasioned by our reflections upon the destiny of America; upon the decrees of God respecting the land, and the relationship which the Latter-day Saints sustain to these western continents, their mission upon them—this had something to do with increasing our regard for America.
And now, by what, perhaps, you will consider indirect means, let me call your attention to some things which perhaps have not always been understood in their fulness even by the Latter-day Saints, in respect to this great, this choice land of America. You will easily remember, when I refer to him, that great character of the Old Testament scriptures, Joseph, the son of Jacob, one of the noblest characters of either sacred or profane history. In his boyhood the Lord by inspired dreams indicated to him a prominence in Israel. One dream pictured himself and brethren in the harvest field, setting up sheaves, and as he set his sheaf on end the sheaves of his brethren bowed in obeisance to his sheaf. He told the dream to his brethren, and they said: "Shalt thou indeed reign over us?" And they were angry with him. Again the lad dreamed, and he saw that the sun and the moon and 11 stars did obeisance to him, and he told the dream unto his father. "What," said the aged patriarch, "shall I and thy mother and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to the earth?" Notwithstanding his evident vexation the old patriarch was wise enough to observe that there was inspiration in this dream of the lad's. In course of time, as you know, Joseph was sold into bondage and was taken to Egypt, and there through a pathway of sorrow and trial the Lord led him to great eminence in the nation of Egypt, made him indeed the savior of Egypt, for by inspired dreams he was forewarned of the famine and was able to provide for it, so that while there was distress and famine in every other country, there was corn in Egypt. In due time his brothers came to purchase the corn and bowed down in the presence of Joseph, and doubtless, in part, but only in part, the dream of his boyhood days was fulfilled. In time, too, his father came into Egypt and conferred upon him a father's blessing. Jacob also blessed the sons of Joseph, Manasseh and Ephraim, conferring great and mighty blessings upon them, and claiming them as his own. And when Jacob came to bless his son, Joseph, in connection with the rest of the tribes of Israel, he gave him a blessing that excels the blessings of the other princes in the house of Israel. Listen to it:
"Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well: whose branches run over the wall: The archers have sorely grieved him and shot at him, and hated him: but his bow abode in strength and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob; even by the God of thy father, who shall help thee; and by the Almighty who shall bless thee with blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lieth under, blessings of the breasts and of the womb: the blessings of thy father have prevailed above the blessings of my progenitors unto the utmost bounds of the everlasting hills: They shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head of him that was separated from his brethren."
When Moses bestowed his blessings upon the tribes of Israel, he, too, pronounced a special blessing upon the head of Joseph. Mark it:
"Blessed of the Lord be his land, for the precious things of heaven, for the dew, and for the deep that croucheth beneath, and for the precious fruits brought forth by the sun, and for the precious things put forth by the moon, and for the chief things of the ancient mountains, and for the precious things of the lasting hills, and for the precious things of the earth, and fulness thereof, and for the good will of him that dwelt in the bush; let the blessing come upon the head of Joseph, and upon the top of the head of him that was separated from his brethren. His glory is like the firstlings of his bullock, and his horns are like the horns of the unicorns: with them he shall push the people together to the ends of the earth; and they are the ten thousands of Ephraim, and they are the thousands of Manasseh."
I have said on other occasions, and I repeat it here, that the blessing pronounced upon Joseph by both Jacob and Moses, not only exceeds the blessing of any other one of the princes of Israel, but it is greater than all the other blessings upon the princes of Israel combined. In the first place a double portion is given to him in Israel, two tribes to represent him instead of one. His two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, were made the heads of tribes, Ephraim being given the greater prominence, and receiving the rights of the first born. When Joseph saw the intent of the patriarch to confer the greater blessing upon his younger son he sought to stay it, and called the attention of his father to the fact that Manasseh was the elder son. The patriarch replied: "I know it, my son;" and referring to Manasseh, he said: "He shall also become a people, and he also shall be great, but his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his seed shall become a multitude of nations . . . . and he set Ephraim before Manasseh." Indeed Jacob that day bestowed the birthright of Israel upon Ephraim in place of Reuben, his firstborn son; and that is why subsequent prophets were wont to represent God as saying, "I am a father to Israel and Ephraim is my first born." Let me tell you how that came about. Reuben, Jacob's eldest son, defiled his father's wife Bilhah, and for that awful crime lost his station in Israel as the first born. And now the writer of First Chronicles:
"Now the sons of Reuben the firstborn of Israel, (for he was the firstborn; but, forasmuch as he defiled his father's bed, his birthright was given unto the sons of Joseph, the son of Israel: and the genealogy is not to be reckoned after the birthright (i. e. after Reuben). For Judah prevailed above his brethren, and of him came the chief ruler; but the birthright was Joseph's."
Ephraim received that birthright as already stated, and the blessings and rights thereof are his.
Now let us consider these great blessings pronounced upon the head of Joseph, and I pray you remember how particularly the extent and grandeur of the land of Joseph are described in these blessings.