The actual composition of the Mormon hierarchy is that of a cadre of officers to a skeleton army of saints and martyrs, which may be filled up ad infinitum. It is inferior in simplicity, and therefore in power, to that which the Jesuit organization is usually supposed to be, yet it is not deficient in the wherewithal of a higher grasp. It makes state government, especially that of Gentile communities, an excrescence upon the clerical body. The first president is the governor; the second is the lieutenant governor; the third is the secretary of state; the High Council is the Supreme Court; the bishops are justices of peace: briefly, the Church is legislative, judiciary, and executive—what more can be required? It has evidently not neglected the masonic, monotheistic, and monocratic element, as opposed to, and likely to temper the tripartite rule of Anglo-American civil government. The first president is the worshipful master of the lodge, the second and third are the senior and junior wardens, while the inferior ranks represent the several degrees of the master and apprentice. It symbolizes the leveling tendencies of Christianity and progressiveism, while its civil and ecclesiastical despotism and its sharp definition of rank are those of a disciplined army—the model upon which socialism has loved to form itself. In society, while all are brothers, there is a distinct aristocracy, called west of the Atlantic “upper crust;”“UPPER CRUST.” not of titles and lands, nor of bales and boxes, but of hierarchical position; and, contrary to what might be expected, there is as little real social fusion among Mormons as between the “sixties,” the “forties,” and the “twenties” of silly Guernsey.
Having now attempted, after the measure of my humble capacity, to show what Mormonism is, I will try to explain what Mormonism is not. The sage of Norwich (“Rel. Med.,” sect. vi.) well remarked that “every man is not a proper champion of truth, nor fit to take up the gauntlet in the cause of verity;” and that “many, from the ignorance of these maxims, have too rashly charged the troops of error, and remain as trophies to the enemies of truth.” The doctrine may fitly be illustrated by pointing out the prodigious aid lent to Mormonism by the self-inflicted defeats of anti-Mormonism.
THE JAREDITE EXODUS.The Jaredite exodus to America in dish-like “barges, whose length was the length of a tree,” and whose voyage lasted 344 days, is certainly a trial of faith. The authority of Mormonic inspiration is supposed to be weakened by its anachronisms and other errors: the mariner’s compass, for instance, is alluded to long before the fourteenth century. The Mormons, however, reply that the “Liahona” of their Holy Book is not a compass, and that if it were, nothing could be said against it: the Chinese claim the invention long before the days of Flavio, and the Moslems attribute it to one of their own saints.[213] The “reformed Egyptian” of the Golden Bible is ridiculed on the supposition that the Hebrew authors would write either in their own tongue, in the Syrian, or in the Chaldaic, at any rate in a Semitic, not in a Coptic language. But the first disciples of the Gospel Church were Jews, and yet the Evangel is now Greek. As regards the Golden Plates, it is contended that the Jews of old were in the habit of writing upon papyrus, parchment, and so on, not upon metal, and that such plates have never been found in America. But of late years Himyaritic inscriptions upon brass tablets have been forwarded from Yemen to the British Museum. Moreover, in 1843, six brass plates of a bell shape, covered with ancient glyphs, were discovered by a “respectable merchant” near Kinderhook, United States, proving that such material was not unknown to the ancient Semites and to the American aborigines. The word “Christ” often occurs (“Book of Mormon,” p. 8, etc.) long before the coming of the Savior. But the Book of Mormon was written in the “reformed Egyptian:” the proper noun in question was translated “Christ” in English by the prophet, an “unlearned young man,” according to his own understanding, and for the better comprehension of his readers. The same argument applies to such words as “synagogues,” “alpha and omega,” “steel,” “S.S.E.,” etc.; also to “elephant,” “cow,” “horse,” “ass,” “swine,” and other pachyderms and solidunguls, which were transported to America after the Columbian discovery: they are mere translations, like the fabulous unicorn of the Old Testament and the phœnix of the apocryphal New Testament (Clement I., xii., 2): elephant, for instance, manifestly means mastodon, and swine, peccary. Ptolemy’s theory of a moving earth is found anticipated. But who shall limit revelation? and has not the Mosaic Genesis, according to a multitude of modern divines, anticipated all the latest discoveries? The Lord describes America to Jared (“Book of Mormon,” p. 78) as an “isle of the sea,” and the accuracy of the geography is called in question. But in the Semitic and other Eastern tongues, insula and peninsula are synonymous. Moreover, if Dr. Kane’s open circumpolar ocean prove aught but a myth, the New World is wholly insulated even by ice from the Old. Other little contradictions and inaccuracies, which abound in the inspired books, are as easily pooh-pooh’d as objections to the conflicting genealogies, and the contradictory accounts of the Crucifixion by the professors of the elder faith.
[213] First Footsteps in East Africa, chap. i.
OBJECTIONS TO MORMONISM.The “vulgarity” of Mormonism is a favorite theme with the anti-Mormon. The low origin and “plebbishness” of the apostles’ names and of their institutions (e. g., the “Twelve,” the “Seventies”), the snuffling Puritanic style which the learned Gibbon hated, and execrable grammar (e. g., in the first page, “Nephi’s brethren rebelleth against him”), and the various Yankeeisms of the New Scriptures, are cited as palpable proofs of fraud. But the primitive apostles of Christianity were of inferior social rank and attainments to the first Mormon converts, and of the reformers of Luther’s age it may be asked, “Where was then the gentleman?” The Syriac-Greek of the New Testament, with its manifold flaws of idiom and diction, must have produced upon the polite philosophers and grammarians of Greece and Rome an effect even more painful than that which the Americanisms of the Book of Mormon exercise upon English nerves. These things are palpably stumbling-blocks disposed sleeper-wise upon the railroad of faith, lest Mr. Christian’s progress should become a mere excursion. Gentiles naturally feel disposed to smile when they find in the nineteenth century prophets, apostles, saints; but the Church only gains by the restoration and reformation of her primitive discipline. The supernatural action of the Holy Spirit believed in by the Mormons as by the Seekers (1645), the Camisards (1688), the Leeites and Wilkinsonians (1776), is the best answer to that atheistic school which holds that God who once lived is now dead to man. As of the Ayat of El Islam, so of the revelations with which Mr. Joseph Smith was favored, it is remarked that their exceeding opportuneness excites suspicion. But of what use are such messages from Heaven unless they arrive à propos? Mr. O. Hyde contends, after the fashion of wiser men, that ambiguity, and, if I may use the word, a certain achronology, characterize inspired prophecy: it is evident that only a little more inspiration is wanted to render it entirely unambiguous.
The other sentimental objections to Mormonism may briefly be answered as follows:
“That the holiest of words is profanely applied to man.” But as Moses (Ex., iv., 16) was “instead of God to Aaron” (Ex., vii., 1), and was “made a god” to Pharaoh, and as the Savior declared that “he called them gods unto whom the word of God came” (John, xi., 35), the Mormons evidently use the word in its old and scriptural sense. Thus they assert that Mr. Joseph Smith is the god of this generation, Jesus is his god, Michael or Adam is the god of Jesus, Jehovah is the god of Adam, and Eloheim is the god of Jehovah.
“That credible persons have testified to the bad character of Mr. Joseph Smith, junior, as a money-digger, a cheat, a liar, a vulgar impostor, or, at best, a sincere and ignorant fanatic.” The Mormons reply that such has been the history of every prophet. They point with triumph and yearning love to the story of their martyr’s life, to his intense affection for his family, and to their devotion to him. They boast of his invincible boldness, energy, enthusiasm, and moral courage; that he never flinched from his allotted tasks, from the duties which he was commissioned to perform; that he was fifty times dragged by his enemies before the tribunals, and was as often acquitted; that he never hesitated for a moment, when such act was necessary, to cut off from the Church those who, like Oliver Cowdery, had been the depositaries of his intimate secrets; that his career was one long Bartholomew’s Day, and that his end was as glorious as his life was beautiful. In America Mr. Joseph Smith has by the general suffrage of anti-Mormons been pronounced to be a knave, while his successor, Mr. Brigham Young, has been declared by the same high authority—vox diaboli, the Mormons term it—to be a self-deluded but true man. I can scarcely persuade myself that great events are brought about by mere imposture, whose very nature is feebleness: zeal, enthusiasm, fanaticism, which are of their nature strong and aggressive, better explain the abnormal action of man on man. On the other hand, it is impossible to ignore the dear delights of fraud and deception, the hourly pleasure taken by some minds in finessing through life, in concealing their real selves from the eyes of others, and in playing a part till by habit it becomes a nature. In the estimation of unprejudiced persons Mr. Joseph Smith is a man of rude genius, of high courage, of invincible perseverance, fired by zeal, of great tact, of religious fervor, of extraordinary firmness, and of remarkable talent in governing men. It is conceded that, had he not possessed “strong and invincible faith in his own high pretensions and divine mission,” he would probably have renounced the unprofitable task of prophet, and sought refuge from persecution and misery in private life and honorable industry. Be that as it may, he has certainly taken a place among the notabilities of the world—he has left a footprint upon the sands of time.
“That Mr. Joseph Smith prophesied lies,” and that “through greed of gain he robbed the public by appropriating the moneys of the Kirtland Bank.” The Mormons reply that many predictions of undoubted truth undeniably passed their prophet’s lips, and that some—e. g., those referring to the Mormon Zion and to the end of the world—may still prove true. With reference to the fact that Martin Harris was induced by the seer to pay for the publication of the Book of Mormon, it is pleaded that the Christian apostles (Acts, iv., 35) also received money from their disciples. The failure of the Kirtland Bank (A.D. 1837) is thus explained: During the Prophet’s absence upon a visit to the Saints at Toronto, the cashier, Warren Parrish, flooded the district with worthless paper, and, fearing discovery on his master’s return, decamped with $25,000, thereby causing a suspension of payment. Regarding other peccadilloes, the Mormons remark that no prophet was ever perfect or infallible. Moses, for instance, was not suffered for his sins to enter the Promised Land, and Saul lost by his misconduct the lasting reign over Israel.
“That the three original witnesses to the ‘Book of Mormon’ apostatized and denied its truth.” To this the Mormons add, that after a season those apostates duly repented and were rebaptized; one has died; the second, Martin Harris, is now a Saint in Kirtland, Ohio; and the third, Sidney Rigdon, to whom the faith owed so much, left the community after the Prophet’s martyrdom, saying that it had chosen the wrong path, but never rejecting Mormonism nor accusing it of fraud. The witnesses to those modern tables of the law (the Golden Plates) were but eleven in toto, and formed only three families interested in the success of the scheme. The same paucity, or rather absence of any testimony which would be valid in a modern court of justice, marks the birth of every new faith, not excluding the Christian. And, finally, wickedness proved against the witnesses does not invalidate the value of their depositions. The disorders in the conduct of David and Solomon, for instance, do not affect the inspiration of the Psalms and Canticles.