"I asked a short time since for the Lord to deliver me out of the hands of the governor; and if it needs must be to accomplish it to take him away; and the next news that came pouring down from there was that Governor Reynolds had shot himself."
Speaking of the death of Judge Higbee, a just and good man, Joseph said:
"Who is there that would not give all his goods to feed the poor, and pour out his gold and silver to the four winds to go where Elias Higbee has gone?"
At Far West, Missouri, on the 4th day of July, 1838, the liberty pole was struck by lightning and shattered into splinters. Joseph walked around on the fragments, saying:
"As that pole was splinted, so shall the nations of the earth be."
Soon after the nomination of the Prophet for the Presidency of the United States, Apostle George A. Smith related that Elder Farnham heard the people in St. Louis say:
"Things have come to a strange pass if Joseph Smith is elected President, he will raise the devil with Missouri; and if he is not elected he will raise the devil anyhow."
An angry sectarian in Kirtland commanded fire to come down out of heaven to consume the Prophet and his house. Joseph smiled and said:
"You are one of Baal's prophets; your God does not hear you."
A visitor, who remarked that the people had been gathered from the four quarters of the earth, of different races and creeds, asked the Prophet: