The Mormon considers activity a duty. Co-operation implies for him not only solidarity of labour but union of will, and these principles are applied in all phases of his public or private life—in politics, education, social conditions of every kind, and even amusements. He holds it obligatory under all circumstances to contribute personal help or money according to his means, knowing that his brothers and sisters will do likewise, and that he can rely upon them with absolute certainty.
Nevertheless, dissension does occasionally arise in the heart of this close-knit brotherhood. The authority of the President, or that of the apostles and bishops may be the cause of rivalries and jealousies, as in the case of Joseph Morris, Brigham Young's confidant, who wished to supplant his chief. He and his partisans were assaulted and put to death by Young's adherents. A spirit of discord also manifests itself at times in the national elections, and there are plottings and intrigues, especially when there seems to be hope of supremacy in Congress, or when one of the twelve apostles offers himself as candidate for the Senate without first consulting the Mormon Church.
Such shadows are inseparable from all human communities. What it is important to study in the Church of the Latter-Day Saints is the evolution of a communism which has more than half a century of activity to its credit, and which, in contrast to so many other fruitless attempts, has given marked proofs of a vitality that shows no sign of diminishing.
CHAPTER II
THE RELIGION OF BUSINESS
Joe Smith was, to speak plainly, nothing but an adventurer. Having tried more than twenty avocations, ending up with that of a gold-digger, he found himself at last at the end of his resources, and decided, in truly American fashion, that he would now make his fortune. He thereupon announced that he was in close communication with Moses, and that he had in his possession the two mosaic talismans, Urim and Thummim, and the manuscript of the Biblical prophet, Mormon—the latter having as a matter of fact been obtained from Solomon Spaulding, pastor of New Salem, Ohio, in 1812.
It was different with John Alexander Dowie, who with remarkable wisdom seized the psychological moment to appear in the United States as a Barnum and a Pierpont Morgan of religion combined. By what was an indisputable stroke of genius, he incorporated into his religion the most outstanding features of American life—commerce, industry, and finance, the tripod upon which the Union rests. What could be more up-to-date than a commercial and industrial prophet, business man, stock-jobber, and organiser of enterprises paying fabulous dividends? And—surely the crowning point of the "new spirit!"—the man who now declared himself to be the most direct representative of God upon earth was accepted as such because people saw in him, not only the Messianic power that he claimed, but an extraordinary knowledge of the value of stocks and shares side by side with his knowledge of the value of souls!
He was of Scottish origin, and had reached his thirtieth year before his name became known. As a child he was disinclined to take religion seriously, and had a habit of whistling the hymns in church instead of singing them. Later he was distinguished by a timidity and reserve which seemed to suggest that he would never rise above the environment into which he had been born. His studies and his beliefs—which for long showed no sign of deviating from the hereditary Scottish faith—were under the direction of a rigidly severe father. At the age of thirteen his parents, attracted by the Australian mirage of those days, took him with them to Adelaide, and he became under-clerk in a business house there, serving an apprenticeship which was to prove useful later on. At twenty he returned to Edinburgh, desiring to enter the ministry, as he believed he had a religious vocation, and plunged into the study of theology with a deep hostility to everything that was outside a strictly literal interpretation of the Scriptures. Full of devotion and self-abnegation in his desperate struggle with the powers of evil, he read the Holy Book with avidity, and was constant in his attendance at theological conferences. Thus, nourished on the marrow of the Scotch theologians, he returned to Australia and was ordained to the priesthood at Alma. Soon afterwards he was appointed minister to the Congregational Church in Sydney, where his profound learning was highly appreciated.
He who desires to attract and instruct the masses must have two gifts, without which success is impossible—eloquence and charm. Dowie had both. As an orator he was always master of himself, yet full of emotion, passionate in his gestures, and easily moved to tears.
We must admit that he did not, like so many others, owe his influence to his environment. In New South Wales, where he made his début as a preacher at Sydney, his eloquence and his learning made so great an impression—especially after he had emerged victorious from a controversy with the Anglican bishop, Vaughan, brother to the Cardinal—that the governor of the province, Sir Henry Parkes, offered him an important Government position. He refused to accept it, desiring, as he said, to consecrate his life to the work of God. Persuaded—or wishing to persuade others—that he had been personally chosen by God to fulfil the prophecy of St. Mark xvi. 17, 18, he took up the practice of the laying-on of hands, claiming that in this way, with the help of prayer, the sick could be cured. On these words of the evangelist his whole doctrine was based. Through assiduous reading he familiarised himself with medical science, as well as with hypnotism, telepathy and suggestion, his aim being to organise and direct a crusade against medicine as practised by the faculty. He gathered together materials for a declaration of war against the medicos, attacking them in their, apparently, most impregnable positions, and showing up, often through their own observations, the fatal inanity—in his eyes—of their therapeutics. At the same time he managed to acquire experience of commerce, finance and administration, and, thus equipped, he opened his campaign. Thaumaturgy, science, occultism, eloquence, knowledge of men and of the world—all these he brought into play. The prestige he gained was remarkable, and of course the unimpeachable truth of Bible prophecy was sufficient to establish the fact of his identity with the expected Elias!