Page:The Rocky Mountain Saints.djvu/28

xx and membership therein the only passport to the presence of God.

Having contributed both by tongue and pen, from the rostrum and by the press, with the best years of his life and with whatever talents he possessed, to teach the Mormon faith while he believed it, he now considers it due equally to the Mormons as to the public to exhibit what that earnest people have accomplished, and thus exemplify the ease with which a religiously-disposed community may naturally mistake the legitimate results of united faith and labour for the special mark of Divine guidance.

The change which the Author has experienced in his views of Mormonism has not been the work of a day or a year, has not resulted from any personal injury ; neither is it due to any special gifts or miraculous conversion. There are to-day thousands of persons in the Mormon communion in Utah, travelling in the same direction, without that living faith in the announced mission of their Church which they once possessed. They still cling to it with anxious solicitude, hoping for some deliverance; knowing not what to expect, yet realizing that "something must come." Hence the readiness with which many have listened to those who claim to have received new revelations and new missions among themselves.

While the tendency of the age has been to accept "revealed truths" on account of their own intrinsic value only, and not from the assumption of their authority, the Mormon Church has travelled in the very opposite direction, and has resuscitated the Jewish prophets to support the teachings of modern apostles.

In the examination of Mormonism, the student will meet the reproduction of nearly every principle, doctrine and usage to be found on record from Genesis to Revelation if not in practice, at least in acknowledgment; and where the practice