The Autobiography of Parley Parker Pratt: One of the Twelve Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Embracing His Life, Ministry, and TravelsPratt, Parley P. (Parley Parker)
Religion
The Autobiography of Parley Parker Pratt: One of the Twelve Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Embracing His Life, Ministry, and Travels
Pratt, Parley P. (Parley Parker)
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints -- Apostles -- Biography; Pratt, Parley P. (Parley Parker), 1807-1857
Farewell, my dear Thankful, thou wife of my youth, and mother of
my first born; the beginning of my strength--farewell. Yet a few
more lingering years of sorrow, pain and toil, and I shall be with
thee, and clasp thee to my bosom, and thou shalt sit down on my
throne, as a queen and priestess unto thy lord, arrayed in white
robes of dazzling splendor and decked with precious stones and
gold, while thy queen sisters shall minister before thee and bless
thee, and thy sons and daughters innumerable shall call thee
blessed, and hold thy name in everlasting remembrance.
In the spring of 1837, soon after the death of my wife, I
returned to Canada, to visit the Saints, and to confer on the
subject of a mission to England. Several of the Saints in Canada
were English, who had friends in England. Letters had already been
sent to them with information of the rise of the Church, and of its
principles. Several of the Canadian Elders felt a desire to go on a
mission to their friends in that country.
At length, Joseph Fielding, Isaac Russell, John Goodson and John
Snider, of the Canada Elders, were selected for a mission to
England. Elders H. C. Kimball and Orson Hyde, of the quorum of the
Twelve, were selected to go at the head of the mission, and Elder
Willard Richards was appointed to accompany them.
About this time, after I had returned from Canada, there were
jarrings and discords in the Church at Kirtland, and many fell away
and became enemies and apostates. There were also envyings, lyings,
strifes and divisions, which caused much trouble and sorrow. By
such spirits I was also accused, misrepresented and abused. And at
one time, I also was overcome by the same spirit in a great
measure, and it seemed as if the very powers of darkness which war
against the Saints were let loose upon me. But the Lord knew my
faith, my zeal, my integrity of purpose, and he gave me the
victory.
I went to brother Joseph Smith in tears, and, with a broken
heart and contrite spirit, confessed wherein I had erred in spirit,
murmured, or done or said amiss. He frankly forgave me, prayed for
me and blessed me. Thus, by experience, I learned more fully to
discern and to contrast the two spirits, and to resist the one and
cleave to the other. And, being tempted in all points, even as
others, I learned how to bear with, and excuse, and succor those
who are tempted.
Late in July I arrived in the City of New York, on a mission,
took lodgings, and commenced to preach and write. My first
production in that city was a book of upwards of two hundred pages,
entitled the "Voice of Warning." The first edition of this work
consisted of four thousand copies; it has since been published and
re-published in America and Europe, till some forty or fifty
thousand copies have not been sufficient to supply the demand.
Thousands date their conversion to the fullness of the gospel to
the reading of that book.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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