"So sure as this is a world there _will be_ a New Jerusalem built."
I relate this little incident to show that even after they had met with
such a galling defeat how zealous even the old women were with reference
to their future success. But it is my opinion that the more often a
fanatic is kicked and abused, the stronger is his faith in his cause,
for then they would take up the Scriptures and read the sentences
expressed by Christ:
"But before all these they shall lay their hands on you and persecute
you, delivering you up to the synagogues and into prisons, being brought
before kings and rulers for my name's sake." "But take heed to
yourselves, for they shall deliver you up to councils, and in the
synagogues ye shall be beaten; and ye shall be brought before rulers and
kings for my sake for a testimony against them."
From such passages they have always drawn the greatest consolation, and
one would ask one another, "Where are the people the blessed Lord had
reference to?" Another brother, with all the sanctity and confidence
imaginable for a fanatic to feel, would answer, "Well, brother, if you
do not find them among the Latter Day Saints you can not find them upon
the face of this green earth, for we have suffered all the abuses the
blessed Lord refers to in the Scripture you have just quoted."
I have said before that the Mormons all crossed the Missouri into Clay
County, where they wintered in tents and log cabins hastily thrown
together, and lived on mast, corn, and meat that they would procure from
the citizens for whom they worked in clearing ground and splitting
rails, and other work of a like character.
In the spring they were determined to return to their homes, although
they were so badly destroyed, and claimed again as before that God would
vindicate them and put to flight their enemies. The people of Jackson
County, however, watched for their return, and gathered, at the
appointed time, in a large body, on the opposite side of the river to
where the Mormons, were expected to congregate and cross back into the
county. Their spies came to the river, and seeing camps of the citizens,
who had gathered to the number of four or five hundred strong (I being
one of the number) to prevent their crossing, then changed their
purpose and sent some of their leading men to locate in some other part
of the State, for the time being, with the full understanding, however,
that at the Lord's appointed time they would all be returned to Jackson
County, and complete their mission in building the city of the New
Jerusalem. The delegation they sent out selected Davis and Colwell
counties as the portion of the State where they would make their
temporary rally until they became strong enough for the Lord to restore
them to their former location.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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