We believe that all men are bound to sustain and uphold the respective governments in which they reside, while protected in their inherent and inalienable rights by the laws of such governments.
Miscellaneous Thought on Many Subjects.
Seek to know God in your closet; call upon Him in your field.
The sacrifice required of Abraham in the offering up of Isaac shows that if a man would attain to the keys of the Kingdom of an endless life, he must sacrifice all things. When God offers a blessing or knowledge to man, and he refuses to receive it, he will be damned.
Spirits are eternal. At the first organization in heaven we were all present, and saw the Savior chosen and appointed, and the plan of salvation made, and we sanctioned it.
When you climb a ladder, you must begin at the bottom and ascend step by step until you arrive at the top; and so it is with the principles of the Gospel; you must begin with the first and go along until you have learned all the principles of exaltation.
It should be the duty of elders, when they enter into any house, to let their labors and warning voice be to the master of that house; and if he receives the Gospel, then he may extend his influence to his wife, also, that peradventure she may receive the Gospel; but if the man receive not the Gospel and give his consent that his wife may receive it, then let her receive it; but if the man forbid his wife, or his children before they are of age, to receive the Gospel, then it shall be the duty of the elder to go his way and use no influence against him; and let the responsibility be upon his head.
There is never a time when the spirit is too old to approach God.
Knowledge saves a man, and in the world of spirits no man can be exalted but by knowledge. So long as a man will not give heed to the commands, he must abide without salvation.
Here, then, is eternal life—to know the only wise and true God; and you have got to learn how to be gods yourselves, and to be kings and priests to God, the same as all Gods have done before you, namely, by going from one small degree to another, and from a small capacity to a great one; from grace to grace, from exaltation to exaltation, until you attain to the resurrection of the dead, and are able to dwell in everlasting burnings, and to sit in glory, as do those who sit enthroned in everlasting power.