"When I got to Kirtland," says Elder Kimball, "the brethren were engaged in building the House of the Lord. The commandment to build the House and also the pattern of it, were given in a revelation to Joseph Smith, jun., Sidney Rigdon, and Frederick G. Williams, and it was to be erected by a stated time. The Church was in a state of poverty and distress, in consequence of which it appeared almost impossible that the commandment could be fulfilled. Soon after our arrival, there was a contribution called for to finish the school-house and printing office; I contributed the glass for the house, and I gave Brother Hyrum Smith two hundred dollars for the building of the temple."
The newly arrived pilgrims had fallen on perilous times. Mobocracy was rife and rampant; persecution was raging against the Church, both in Ohio and in Missouri. The infernal regions seemed stirred to their depths at the prospect of a temple, whose walls, now climbing heavenward, gave promise of salvation and deliverance for the living and the dead; the unlocking of prison doors, the bursting of spirit dungeons, the smiting off of fetters from the limbs of the slave of sin, and the ushering forth of the penitent captive into the life and light of gospel liberty. Keys were about to be restored whereby the heavens would be brought nearer to the earth, the prophets of the past would minister in holy places to the prophets of the present, and the cause of human redemption receive such an impetus as would shake the throne of Satan to its foundations. No wonder the dominions of Sheol were agitated.
"Our enemies," says Heber, "were raging and threatening destruction upon us. We had to guard night after night, and for weeks were not permitted to take off our clothes, and were obliged to lie with our fire-locks in our arms, to preserve Brother Joseph's life and our own. Joseph was sued before a magistrate's court in Painesville, on a vexatious suit. I carried him from Kirtland to Painesville, with four or five others, in my wagon, every morning for five days, and brought them back in the evening. We were often waylaid, but managed to elude our enemies by rapid driving and taking different roads. Esquire Bissell defended the Prophet and he came off victorious.
"At this time our brethren in Jackson County, Missouri, were also suffering great persecution; about twelve hundred were driven, plundered and robbed, their houses burned, and some of the brethren were killed.
"Mobs were organized around Kirtland, who were enraged against us, ready to destroy us."
Such was the state of affairs with the Church of the living God, at the close of the year 1833. Such was the nature of the action upon which the hero of this history had entered. But he was of the gold, not the dross of the earth, and passed through the fire, purified, yet not consumed.
CHAPTER VI.
THE GATHERING OF THE TITANS—HEBER'S TESTIMONY OF JOSEPH AND THE TWELVE—THEIR MIGHTY MISSION—THE TEST OF FAITH—ZION'S CAMP.
Joseph, Brigham and Heber together in Kirtland! By what strange fatality were these mighty lives thus interwoven? We have seen how Brigham and Heber came together, and how, from thenceforth, the currents of their lives and fortunes ran parallel. Now they were joined with Joseph, their prophet chief, like streams that swell a river.
Interesting is it also, if only as a coincidence, that so many of the leading spirits of the latter-day work should have been natives of Vermont—a diadem for thee, proud State, and one which thou wilt prize in coming time!—from whence scattered, ere acquaintance with the Gospel or with each other began, to meet as co-laborers in the same great cause, among the hills and dales of Northern Ohio. As though the heavens had decreed their lives should thus commingle.