In the present instance, however, though I deem it necessary to tell again such a well known story as the rise of The Church, I shall attempt no embellishment of it; nor shall I deal with the religious condition of the world at the time of the origin of The Church with any view to establish the probability of the story; nor stop to call attention to the reasonableness and strength of it; nor the evidences of its truth, or necessity, although the temptation to do this is always strong whenever the facts of that story are passed before me in review. I shall content myself on this occasion with a mere statement of the facts, such as an annalist might make, without any further consideration of them whatsoever; and this because such a statement will serve my present purpose. Joseph Smith, the man who, under the direction of God, was the founder of The Church, was born at the little village of Sharon, Windsor County, in the State of Vermont, on the 23rd of December, in the year of our Lord 1805. When he was ten years of age the Smith family moved from Vermont to the State of New York, settling in Palmyra, Wayne County. Four years later the family moved a few miles south to the town of Manchester, Ontario County. Here, in the spring of 1820, a great religious revival agitated the community, and Joseph Smith was much affected by it. In the course of this religious excitement he was much perplexed over the discussion and strifes of the different Christian sects, and often wondered how it was that the Church of Christ could be so divided into contending factions. "I found," he said some years later when writing his recollections of those early days of his religious experience--"I found that there was a great clash in religious sentiment; if I went to one society they referred me to one plan, and another to another--each one pointing to his own particular creed as the _summum bonum_ of perfection. Considering that all could not be right, and that God could not be the author of so much confusion, I determined to investigate the subject more fully, believing that if God had a Church it would not be split up into factions, and that if he taught one society to worship one way and administer in one set of ordinances, he would not teach another principles which were diametrically opposed." [B] [Footnote B: From a letter to Mr. John Wentworth, written in 1842. Mr. Wentworth at the time was the editor of the _Chicago Democrat_.] In the midst of these perplexities Joseph's attention was called to the first chapter of the epistle of James, where it is written: "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and unbraideth not; and it shall be given him." This instruction the youth determined to follow, and accordingly repaired to a secret place in the woods near his father's house, where he called upon God for wisdom.