Next after the revelation on celestial marriage, through Joseph the prophet, the Bible of the Hebrews, and not the sacred record of the ancients of this continent, must be charged with the authority, the examples, and, consequently, the practice of polygamy in the Latter-day Church. The examples of Abraham, Jacob, Solomon, and the ancients of Israel generally, and not the examples of Nephi, Mormon, and their people, whose civilization is now extinct, have been those accepted by our modern Israel--examples of such divine potency that the women of England and America, with all their monogamic training and prejudice, have dared not reject nor make war against in woman's name. Ever and everywhere is the genius of Mormonism so strikingly in the Abrahamic likeness and image, that one could almost fancy the patriarchs of ancient Israel inspiring a modern Israel to perpetuate their name, their faith and their institutions. Who shall say that this is not the fact? Surely this patriarchal genius of the Mormons is the most extraordinary test of a modern Israel. Jerusalem, not Rome, has brought forth the Mormons and their peculiar commonwealth. And here it should be emphasized that polygamy had nought to do with the expulsions of the Mormons from Missouri and Illinois. The primitive "crime" of the Mormons was their belief in new revelation. Fifty years ago that was a monstrous crime in the eyes of sectarian Christendom. The present generation can scarcely comprehend how blasphemous the doctrine of modern revelation seemed to this very nation of America, which now boasts of ten to twelve millions of believers in revelation from some source or other. Thus wonderful has been the change in fifty years! Viewed as a cause of their persecutions in the past, next to this faith of the Mormons in Jehovah's speaking, was their rapid growth as a gathered and organized people, who bid fair to hold the balance of political power in several States. A prominent grievance with Missouri and Illinois was exactly that urged against the growth of the ancient Christians--"if we let them alone they will take away our name and nation!" Following down the record until the period of the Utah war, it is still the fact that polygamy was not the cause of the anti-Mormon crusade. It was not even the excuse of that period, as given by President Buchanan and Congress. It was merely an Israelitish trouble in the world. Soon after this, however, polygamy did become the excuse, both to Congress and the dominant political party of the country, to take action against the Mormons and their Israelitish institutions. In framing the Chicago platform, the Republican party, just rising to supremacy, made slavery one of its planks, and polygamy another. Upon these "twin relics" they rode into the administration of the government of the country.