Letters Exhibiting the Most Prominent Doctrines of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day SaintsSpencer, Orson
Religion
Letters Exhibiting the Most Prominent Doctrines of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints
Spencer, Orson
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints -- Doctrines; Latter Day Saint churches -- Doctrines
You kindly acknowledge that my testimony is credible; all my numerous
acquaintance must concur with you in this acknowledgement. I have told
you the truth as it is in Christ Jesus, and as I expect to meet it at
the final bar of righteous retribution. My sufferings and expatriation
for the gospel's sake, are the seal of my testimony in Christ. I have
literally sacrificed wife, and houses, and lands, for the truths which
I have inculcated in this volume. My motherless children are now in the
wilderness in their solitary cabin, surrounded with savage tribes, and
subject to privations that make a father's heart to bleed. Better men
of whom the world is not worthy have suffered even more in the same
cause. I know this to be the true gospel revealed from the heavens for
the salvation of this generation; and all those whom it does not save
through faith, it will damn through unbelief. If you have read these
truths carefully, your final destiny will hang on the decision you may
make--it is to you the voice of God, and the warning of the servant
of God. Wait not for an angel of God to speak in your ear, or for one
to come from the dead; if you hear not the servant of God, neither
will you be persuaded though one rose from the dead. Not only your
own salvation, but the interests of your family and your kindred will
probably be seriously affected by the decision you now make.
When the devout Jews, with reckless obstinacy, said, his blood be upon
us and upon our children, you know what afterward ensued down to this
day. With the knowledge which this gospel communicates, you cannot
be a neutral. The blood and sufferings not only of the Saints of the
nineteenth century, but also of all others from the days of righteous
Abel till now, will be chargeable to you if you obey not this gospel;
if you reject this gospel, your children's children, to the latest
generation, will for ever bewail the choice you may make. You stand
in some measure as the representative of your posterity, therefore
ponder well the decision you may make. I know that you are surrounded
by a knot of priests, distinguished for the wisdom of schools and
seminaries; and the obstinate creeds and usages of modern christianity
hold over you a threatening rod of proscription and slaughter; but
except you have courage to escape, and sufficient love of truth to
induce you to peril even all things for the gospel, your die is cast,
and your doom is with the lost and damned for ever.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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