Let me say to the brethren who are, and who contemplate connecting themselves actively and entirely with this holy order, that the Priesthood was bestowed upon you, as upon the Son of God, for no other purpose than that through sacrifice you might be proven, that, peradventure, at the last day, you might stand approved before God, and before perfect and holy beings, and that in order to merit this divine approval, it may be necessary to forget self and individual aggrandizement and seek the interest of your brethren. If you are ready and willing to do this, and if your every-day life and conduct and the spirit within you testify the fact, you will establish confidence in the hearts of those who know you, and with whom you are more immediately associated in temporal matters. Confidence is ofttimes referred to by our brethren, especially when speaking on the subject of the United Order. It is spoken of and written on by the religious, the political and the financial world, and the present condition of the whole is such as to force itself upon our serious attention. We may confidently anticipate that, as history shall chronicle the developments of this, our progressive world, we shall witness more and more the necessity of it. For as palpable, and what may be termed legitimate, fraud increases, and the whole world ripens in iniquity generally, confidence will lessen and become more priceless and precious. This is quite obvious to all men in whose hearts dwells a spark of that Spirit by which the Prophets foretold the destiny of the nations. Confidence can be acquired only on the principle of righteousness, whether it be applied to the monarch or the peasant, the religionist or the non-religionist; merit alone commands it. Then let us live the lives of Latter-day Saints, that we may first beget confidence in ourselves, then we shall begin to have confidence in each other--in God and His promises. A people in this condition of progress would know no failures; everything would prosper that they put their hands to; they would grow in faith and in good works. I tell you in the name of the Lord God, that the time is coming when there will be no safety only in the principles of union, for therein lies the secret of our temporal and spiritual salvation. We have been enabled to establish settlements, towns and villages, and we have been abundantly blessed with the necessaries and conveniences of life, notwithstanding we have been slow to hearken to and obey the commands of Jehovah.