Millerism in particular was attracting great attention at that time, and so they incorporated into the "Book of Mormon" its leading tenets--viz.: that the millennium was close at hand; that the Indians were to be converted; and that America was to be the final gathering-place of the Saints, who were to assemble at the New Jerusalem, somewhere in the interior of the Continent. Perhaps, in the absence of positive proof to the contrary, it is the part of Christian charity to regard the founder of Mormonism as a strange fanatic and _religious enthusiast of the same general type as Mohammed_. But however that may be, the publication of the "Book of Mormon" created an intense excitement in Central and Western New York; for the public mind was at that time prepared for any new religious sensation. Soon after the book appeared the Mormon Church was formally organized at the house of one Peter Whitmer in Fayette, Seneca County, N. Y. The membership consisted of only six, all men--the prophet and two of his brothers, two Whitmers, and Oliver Cowdery, a school-teacher of that neighborhood. They said it was 1800 years to a day since the resurrection of Christ, and they professed to believe that their church was the "Church of Christ" once more restored to the earth, holding the keys of authority, and having the power to bind and loose and seal on earth and in heaven. Within a week or two Smith added to his reputation by performing the first great miracle of the "new dispensation," which was performed on a man whose visage and limbs were frightfully distorted by a demoniacal possession. Smith commanded the evil spirits to leave him in the name of Christ, and the man said: "I see them going right through the roof." This established the fact in the minds of certain people that Smith really had a divine mission; but at the First Mormon Conference in June, Smith found himself at the head of a visible church of only thirty members. This small number of adherents showed that converts were not to be rapidly made in that vicinity. Still, the excitement concerning the new Mormon doctrines spread through Western New York into Northern and Eastern Ohio. Members were sent West to preach and found churches wherever people would listen to them, and they made many converts. In December, 1830, Sidney Rigdon, a Campbellite preacher near Mentor, O., became a convert. He was erratic, but very eloquent; self-opinionated, but well versed in the Scriptures; and in literary culture and intellectual force was the greatest man among the early Mormons. After this the new sect strengthened and spread.