Defense of the Faith and the Saints (Volume 1 of 2)Roberts, B. H. (Brigham Henry)
Religion
Defense of the Faith and the Saints (Volume 1 of 2)
Roberts, B. H. (Brigham Henry)
Latter Day Saint churches
"On the other hand, there are disciples of a second sort. They are
men who have been attracted to a new doctrine by the fact that it
gave expression, in a novel way, to some large and deep interest
which had already grown up in themselves, and which had already
come, more or less independently, to their own consciousness. They
thus bring to the new teaching, from the first, their own personal
contribution. The truth that they gain is changed as it enters
their souls. The seed that the sower strews upon their fields
springs up in their soil, and bears fruit,--thirty, sixty, an
hundred fold. They return to their master his own with usury. Such,
men are the disciples that it is worth while for a master to have.
Disciples of the first sort often become, as Schopenhauer said,
mere magnifying mirrors wherein one sees enlarged, all the defects
of a doctrine. Disciples of the second sort co-operate in the works
of the Spirit; and even if they always remain rather disciples
than originators, they help to lead the thought that they accept
to a truer expression. They force it beyond its earlier and cruder
stages of development."
I believe Mormonism affords opportunity for disciples of the second
sort; nay, that its crying need is for such disciples. It calls for
thoughtful disciples who will not be content with merely repeating some
of its truths, but will develop its truths; and enlarge it by that
development. Not half--not one-hundredth part--not a thousandth part of
that which Joseph Smith revealed to the Church has yet been unfolded,
either to the Church or to the world. The work of the expounder has
scarcely begun. The Prophet planted by teaching the germ-truths of
the great dispensation of the fulness of times. The watering and the
weeding is going on, and God is giving the increase, and will give
it more abundantly in the future as more intelligent discipleship
shall obtain. The disciples of Mormonism, growing discontented with
the necessarily primitive methods which have hitherto prevailed in
sustaining the doctrine, will yet take profounder and broader views of
the great doctrines committed to the Church; and, departing from mere
repetition, will cast them in new formulas; co-operating in the works
of the Spirit, until "they help to give to the truth received a more
forceful expression, and carry it beyond the earlier and cruder stages
of its development." Another has said:
"The ultimate Truth, no doubt, is one; but Truth as it enters the
world through human lips is always involved in temporary forms,
which subsequent experience enlarges or corrects. No historic
religion, therefore, can ever claim finality; and the work of
religious founders is not so much to create systems of thought as
to impart those impulses of moral endeavor and spiritual affection
which the Christian sums up under the term "life."[A]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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