CHAPTER X.
MORMONISM IN ENGLAND—PREPARING TO EMIGRATE.
It was fortunate for the Swiss mission that the new converts in general could not read any language but their own, and thus were ignorant of the deceptions which the American Elders had practised upon the people.
Monsieur Petitpierre, the Protestant minister who thought that the Revelation ought to be “prayerfully considered,” was the only one who understood English, and his knowledge was very limited. His wife did not at all coincide with him about the prayerful consideration of polygamy; she disposed of the subject without any prayer at all; and it is to be regretted that in this respect the whole body of the Mormon women did not follow her example.
What arguments she used I do not know; but that they were very much to the point no one can doubt, for they banished for ever all thoughts of polygamy from her husband’s mind. It was said among the Saints that she was very energetic in her private discussions with her husband. But however this might be, it is certain that Monsieur Petitpierre resisted as long as he could, for the Revelation quite fascinated the childless old man; and it is possible that he might have held fast to the faith, but unfortunately, just then certain documents and publications of the apostles, and a very large amount of evidence respecting them and their doings, attracted his attention. He was in the main a good and truthful man, although of small mental calibre, and the deceptions and contradictions which he discovered quite disgusted him. His wife’s strong personal arguments gave the finishing blow to his faith, and the spell was broken. The vision of a modern Hagar and a little Ishmael vanished from his mind; he apostatised—and Mr. Stenhouse lost the services of a very useful translator.
When I heard that he had left the church, how I wished that I could have followed in his footsteps! But apostasy from Mormonism is only possible to two classes—the young disciple, who has embraced the faith more from enthusiasm than from conviction, whose experience is limited; and the old disciple, who has entirely outgrown it, and has become disgusted with it all.
I was neither of these. My faith was too firmly grounded to admit of my giving it up. Though I hated polygamy, I did not dare to question the divinity of its origin. I only pitied myself and my sex for the burden which God had seen fit to place upon us. I never for a moment supposed that any man would have been so wicked as to fabricate a “Revelation,” or so blasphemous as to palm it off in the name of the Lord.
Oh yes, I hated polygamy in my heart. And my efforts in teaching it only increased my hatred; for when I was gravely told by the Elders that woman had been cursed in the garden of Eden, and that polygamy was one of the results of that curse—“her desire shall be unto her husband, and he shall rule over her!”—I must confess that my heart within me was rebellious. From my earliest childhood I had thought of God as a father and a friend, to whom I might go and tell all my griefs and cares; but now He was presented to me as a hard taskmaster, not as a father or a friend.
I met with much kindness, but I did not meet with much sympathy from the brethren. They could not understand that opposition to polygamy was anything else than selfishness on the part of the sisters; they did not comprehend the feelings of a woman’s heart—its craving for some object upon which to devote its whole wealth of love. They were taught that theirs was a nobler position than that of the sisters, and that women might consider themselves sufficiently honoured in being allowed to become the mothers of their children, and to help in building up their “kingdom.”
Of my missionary work in Switzerland subsequent to the introduction of polygamy I will say but little, except that it was too successful. The same sorrow and indignation which Madame Balif had so forcibly expressed, were shown by almost every new convert, and I had to bear the blame of teaching such a doctrine. The sisters became unhappy, and wished that they had died in ignorance of Mormonism; and I felt humbled to the dust to think that I should be the innocent cause of so much misery to others. I looked anxiously for a change; but the only change which seemed probable was that we might be permitted to emigrate to Utah—and there was no comfort for me in that prospect.