[Sidenote: Joseph Smith taught that other worlds are inhabited.]
It is perhaps less surprising to find that Joseph Smith believed that there are other peopled worlds than ours. For instance, "The reckoning of God's time, angel's time, prophet's time, and man's time, is according to the planet on which they reside,"[A] which distinctly implies that other planets are inhabited. Another passage reads, "The angels do not reside on a planet like this earth, but they reside in the presence of God, on a globe like a sea of glass and fire."[B]
[Footnote A: Doctrine and Covenants, 130:4.]
[Footnote B: Loc. cit., verses 6 and 7. See also 88:61.]
While the idea that the planets and stars may be inhabited is not at all new, yet it is interesting to note that Joseph Smith taught as an absolute truth that such is the case. Probably no other philosopher has gone quite that far.
These brief quotations go to show that the doctrines of the Prophet of the Latter-day Saints are in full accord with the views that distinguish the new astronomy. It is also to be noted that in advancing the theories of universal motion among the stars, and of great stars or suns governing groups of stars, he anticipated by many years the corresponding theories of professional astronomers.
In various sermons the Prophet dealt more fully with the doctrines here set forth and showed more strongly than is done in his doctrinal writings, that he understood perfectly the far reaching nature of his astronomical teachings.
Did Joseph Smith teach these truths by chance? or, did he receive inspiration from a higher power?