"The Joseph/Hyrum Smith Funeral Sermon"
---
Richard Van Wagoner & Steven C. Walker
BYU Studies Winter 1983
Contents © 1983 by Brigham Young University
("fair use" excerpts reproduced)
As the hearse bearing the "bodies" of Joseph and Hyrum Smith (actually
sandbagged coffins) passed the Nauvoo meeting ground the afternoon
of Saturday, 29 June 1844, "William W. Phelps was preaching the funeral
sermon."
The choice of Phelps as eulogist to the Prophet and the Patriarch is strange, the content of his sermon stranger, the tone of that sermon
strangest of all.... A look at the character of the man himself may provide some understanding of the surprisingly incendiary tone of Phelps's
funeral sermon....
In 1849, Brother Phelps assisted in drafting the constitution of the "State of Deseret." Two years later, he served as "topographic engineer"
with Parley P. Pratt’s exploring expedition to the south to "study the land for the site of possible settlements and for a road toward the sea."
That same year, he was sworn into office as "Councillor and attorney at law and solicitor in chauncery," became superintendent of Meteorological
Observations of the Territory of Deseret, began furnishing the Deseret News with weather and astronomical information, and was named
Speaker of the House of Representatives of Deseret Territory.
Despite his Church prominence, W. W. Phelps was excommunicated by both Presidents Brigham Young and Joseph Smith. Prior to official
Church acceptance of plural marriage in 1852, Phelps, while in the eastern United States to obtain a printing press, "got some new ideas into
three young women [and] they consented to become his wives." Apparently he had not previously cleared these marriages with Church officials,
and by the vote of the Quorum of the Twelve on 6 December 1847 he was "cut off from the church for violating the Laws of the Priesthood in having
women that do not belong to him [and] committing adultery with them."...
When, in the Church Archives, we came upon Phelps's 1855 recollection of the funeral sermon and realized it had never before been published,
we thought it best to present it in its entirety both for its dramatization of the ambivalence of feelings in Nauvoo toward avenging the Martyrdom
and for its intrinsic interest. Whether or not this sermon he wrote in 1855 was made from a copy of his original speech or whether he rewrote it
from notes or memory is not possible to determine at this time....
(remainder not copied, due to copyright restrictions)
The Funeral Sermon
(transcription notations removed)
For the occasion of the martyrdom of Joseph Smith the prophet and
Hyrum Smith the patriarch, who were shot by a christian mob, in
Carthage Jail, June 27, 1844 -- Delivered in Nauvoo on Saturday the 29 following
by W. W. Phelps.
Revelation chap. 14, v. 13: -- (corrected from the Greek) "and I heard
a voice from heaven saying unto me, write; congratulate the dead that die in
the Lord from this time, verily says the spirit, for they can rest from their
labors, and their works shall follow them."
Saints and Sinners, thus said John on the Isle of Patmos, and thus say
I in Nauvoo. Two of the greatest and best men, who have lived on the earth, who
have lived on the earth, since the Jews crucified the Savior, have fallen victims
to the popular will of mobocracy in this boasted "Asylum of the oppressed" -- the
only far-famed realms of liberty -- or freedom, on the globe; and the sword of
justice, that ought to glitter with vengeance to repel such an insult to humanity --
and the rich boon of life, and the free pursuit of happiness, hangs in the closet;
and the stately robes of judgment that might clothe the sons of freemen with "brief"
authority to wipe off the stain of innocent blood shed by a philistine clergy and
hypocritical people, from our national escutcheon, hangs there too; and there they
will hang till Jehovah comes out [of] his hiding place and vexes the nations with
a sore vexation: -- for, righteously speaking, this people are lingering with the
consumption, like Seamen with the scurvy on board a cruiser 7 years out and the
Demagogue sharks are gliding after, in the wake, to swallow their victims, as soon
as they drop from the plank to the sea. So passes the world in wickedness.
Joseph Smith was the first apostle and seer that held the priesthood of
God, and promulgated the fullness of the everlasting gospel, since this
church was driven into the wilderness, after the old apostles fell asleep: and
the seed of the wicked one, schooled in corruption, and led by the spirits of
the damned, in this instance before us, has done to our brethren what Cain
did to Abel, killed the body to stop the power of the holy priesthood on
earth; showing the wise that Satan and his followers fear and dread a channel
of communication between God and men. These holy men, like Abel, like the ancient
prophets; like Jesus, have not been slain for any evil done; oh no! but because
they told the truth, chastened the ungodly in their sins, and offered salvation
free, with works meet for the kingdom of God. We can rejoice at savage affliction,
however, and congratulate our prophet and patriarch, that they have died [in]
the Lord, and the spirit says they can rest from their labors and
their works will follow them, while their persecutors, and this nation, and the
ungodly of every nation, will wax worse and worse, till their cup of iniquity
runs over, and they meet the blaze of Jehovah's zeal and melt and burn up
like pitch in the fire.
If I mistake not, Joseph Smith has been draged into courts, to answer Christian
convenience, and country custom, and satisfy the demands of the "elect" who hold a
"little brief authority," about fifty times; and he always came out of these gentile
furnaces without the smell of fire from his garments: and what is most lovely and Jesus like, he
never returned the compliment to fret the gizzard of this whole Cain-spirited race. In
fact, the priest and deacons, in Wayne county N.Y., tried their best to have him indicted
for blasphemy, when he commenced the translation of the book of Mormon, where
some of the sacerdotal highway-men actually swore that Joseph was a conjurer, and
was engaged in writing a religious Book to revive the house of Israel according to the
prophets, as it was in old times. And not a few of the order of saint Satan after a bill of
indictment was refused by the better sense of some wellwishing unbelievers in the then
Christian arts, declared publickly that Jo Smith would have to stop his calculations
about gathering Israel, that pestered the world too much in old times; and as to any
more revelation or visits from angels -- neither were needed, as the present generation
were so much enlightened, it was nonsense to suppose God would have to teach a college
bred Clergy. "False prophets were to arise: Beware"!
Well, the rule is, by their fruits ye shall know them; Do men gather grapes from
thorns; or figs from thistles? what good deeds have followed the Christian exertions over
the globe; with their bible societies, mite societies, missionary societies, and a wealthy
well divided retinue of Doctors of divinity to go with purse and [scrip] from sea to
sea, and from land to land? Judge a righteous Judgment and open the doors of refinement
in this secret of hypocrisy, debauchery and luxury, and open the curtain aside
from the heathen in their blindness, degradation and misery, and with Jehovah you may say,
from the heathen in their blindness, degradation and misery, and with you may say,
"There is none that does good; no; not one." But when this gospel, which our Elders
preach, goes, God goes with it, and the hireling clergy of the present generation, like a
"Jack o'lanterns," is only visible at a distance, hurrying or hovering over marshes and
fens in the dark. Men and women believe; obey the ordinances, speak with tongues,
gather and begin to walk by faith, waiting for a more perfect day of glory; and come
from where they may, and be they of what tongue, kindred or people that is -- they all
believe in one faith, one baptism, one god and Father; and more still, in one prophet,
one kingdom, and one union, which so wonderfully causes a part of all, both great [and] small
to seek and find; knock and the door of heaven opens, and pray and the gifts and blessing,
as they ever were, where the righteousness of the saints exceeded the false pretenses
of much religion, are showered down like the dew upon grass, and the latter day saint,
has only to raise his hands in the fulness of his eyes seeing, and heartfelt gratitude, and
exclaim -- O God thou art merciful to me, a sinner! Keep me from evil, and help me to
do thy will.
Joseph has gone to his royal kindred in paradise, from whom the keys, the power, and
the mystery came, for the use and benefit of mortal and immortal beings; and remember,
beloved friends, that while he lived here upon the earth, he conferred all the keys
and blessings of the priesthood, and Endowments, upon the apostles and others, that are
needed for the gathering of Israel; for our washings and anointings, and sealings and
adoptions and for sanctification and Exaltation, or for bringing up our dead from among the
spirits in prison: so when the temple is made ready for the holy work: so we can go on from
birth to age; from life to lives; and from world to heaven; and from heaven to eternity; and from
eternity to ceaseless progression; and in the midst of all these changes; we can pass from
scene to scene; from joy to joy; from glory to glory; from wisdom to wisdom; from system
to system; from god to god, and from one perfection to another, while eternities go
and eternities come, and yet there is room for the curtains of endless progression
are stretched out still and a god is there to go ahead with improvements.
Be assured, brethren and sisters, this desperate "smite" of our foes to stop the
onward course of Mormonism, will increase its spread and rapidity an hundred fold:
The bodies of our brethren are marred, by physical force; because the flesh was weak;
and the but the priesthood remains unharmed -- that is eternal without [beginning]
of days or end of years; and the "Twelve," (mostly now absent) are clothed with it,
as well as others, and when they return, they will wear the "mantle" and step into the
"shoes" of the "prophet, priest and king" of Israel: and then with the same power, the
same God, and the same spirit that caused Joseph to move the cause of Zion with mighty
power will qualify them to roll on the work until all Israel is gathered, and the wicked
swept from the earth; The same spirit lights the saints; the same truth magnifies
the promises; the same virtue exalts the meek, and the same cases hastens the same
events for joy; so that I may say with the poet: -- Mormonism --
Warms in the sun; refreshes in the breeze;
"Glows in the stars; and blossoms in the trees;
Lives through all life; extends through all extent;
Spreads undivided, and operates unspent.
Anciently, as well as now, weak minded persons supposed that prophets and saints suffered
death or trouble for their sins. I wish to correct this notion. The righteous are
undoubtedly removed from evils to come by death; and chastened to learn the love of
their father for their eternal welfare, but with a few questions and answers, I think
friendship and punishment, and good and evil, will exhibit their own characters; so, let
me ask -- Was Joseph Smith the friend of gamblers, drunkards, robbers, fornicators,
adulterers, liars and hypocrites? No; read his life from Vermont to Carthage Jail, and
[every] line and every act, shines with virtuous principles, and words of wisdom, that
warms this heart with a god like sensation that he labored like the angels with Sodom
and Gomorrah, to save this generation from the "fire shower of rain."
Did Joseph ever grind the face of the poor, or intermingle with the wicked to
ridicule the worship of God whether it related to the highest or heathen [rites of] religion,
as practiced in America, Europe Asia, or Africa? Not he; The revelations he brought
forth are everlasting witnesses that he, like the savior, came not "to eat drink
and be marry, for tomorrow we die," but to point out the way of life, and call upon all
men, to repent and be saved.
Can the political pioneers of the day who are exploring every state, nook, river,
mountain, plain, and ravine, for the elect's sake, and (may be) for "the [loaves] and
fishs," where with all to satisfy the cravings of nature; can one of them point to the
time and place when he sought powers for political purposes -- for self aggrandizement?
Never; as Lieutenant general of the Nauvoo Legion, he was a saint in Epaulettes and
prayed as devoutly to the Captain of his salvation, as the Captain and great High priest
of this whole world prayed to his Father in the garden of Gethsemane, where he sweat
blood for the folly of Jerusalem. As mayor of Nauvoo, he magnified the law and made
it honorable for saint and sinner; he knew what was right and did it, independent of
consequences -- with a "Thus saith the Lord."
Like the sun in his meridian splendor, Joseph Smith shown a full man, at
home, among his friends, in the fields, on the bench, or before the world; a pattern parent;
a worthy friend; a model general; a righteous judge, and the wisest man of the age,
sustained by truth, and "God was his right hand man." Surely, as one of the holy ones
commissioned by his father among the royal seventy, when the high council of heaven
set them apart to come down and "multiply and replenish this earth," he was the "last,"
and who knows but the "greatest," for he declared -- we -- knew not who he was! So,
I may say, as the last is to be first, and the first last in eternal rotation, that Joseph Smith,
who was Gazelem in the spirit world, was, and is, and will be in the endless progress of
Eternity: -- the Prince of Light.
'Tis so, and who can dispute it? Where ever he reasoned on the old prophets, his
words lit up a sacred flame, in the heart of the saint that showed an ocean of existence, unexplored
by the vain philosophy of the world; when he poured out his eloquence, the gentile,
on the reserved rights of all fools, declared I would rather go to hell than believe that
imposter -- and who cannot but say, amen! go and when he spoke of men, he read their
history and secrets from their own hearts, without trying the patience of Job, or wasting
the life time of Methuseleh, to hunt excuses to cover their sins: what he knew came
natural; without going to Solomon to understand wisdom; or plodding through Blackstone19
to learn what constituted the first principle of right; or reading a half a world
full of [religious] novels to arrive at the purity of virtue; he quoted the finer
sentiments of morals, divinity, legislation, and laws, with strictest rules of society and
etiquette, as if he had learned them in his mother's lap; and though they were original
with him, they were always correct. He was a man of God.
Nor were these the only gems that shined from his celestialized mind; he seemed to
have been educated among the sons of God, where the "morning stars" sang together,
and could weigh or describe consequences, materiality, kingdoms, and their inhabitants, with
a familiarity as simple as a farmer's boy would describe his father's orchard: The
present light of the sun, said he, came from the "clouds of heaven," which surrounded it;
when they came away with the savior, to fulfill his second coming, the sun will be,
darkened and all flesh, that remains, will see it -- and, the [veil] which is now
spread on all nations, being removed, we, the saints, will see as we are seen, and know
as we are known; and Zion, being gathered as the best of saints from many creations,
will hold a grand jubilee, of prophets, priests and kings, with their wives, and children,
for the purpose of crowing the faithful to enter into the joys of their Lord; preparatory
to their going into eternity to multiply and replenish new worlds, -- For as Jehovah says
his name is "endless and eternal," so the increase and government of the kingdoms
have no end; Amazing thought! But who has numbered the gods, or their kingdoms?
Who has been up to the Highest to behold his perfection, improvement, and ceaseless
progression? Or who has surveyed the [cosmonam], where matter generates and space
swells into room for everything? Aye who? I will give the life time of the Almighty for
the answer to come, and time again to the prophet and patriarch who have gone to
paradise to help the Holy one, wind up the wickedness of this world.
And what shall I say of the prophet. The Prince of light, he that pointed out the
faults in the wisdom of men, and demonstrated the folly [of] the philosophy of ages? He
that cut the chain cable of Christian convenience, with the sword of the spirit, as if
it had been a silken thread in the blaze of a candle? He that cut the Gordian knot of
bastard matrimony, with its same scissors that Peter used to clip the gentile locks and
Jewish curls, that grew and flourished in families by order of Nimrod, Nebuchadnezzar,
and Caesar? He that took truth for his pruning knife, virtue for his coat of mail and God
for his guide and undertook to prune the vineyard of the Lord for the last time? What! in
this age of inventions, flying intelligence, and self shining glory, what shall I say of
Joseph the seer, whose innocent blood stains the land of freedom, stains the halls of
legislation; stains the judges' bench; stains the priests' pulpit; and stains the nation's
panoply -- yet, what shall I say of this patriot of purity? I will say he was all he was
the agent of Jehovah to call on all flesh to settle the trespass committed upon the word
of the Lord and call for satisfaction for the forcible expulsion, by the powers of "church
and state," of the holy priesthood; and to make men render an account of the deeds done in
the body -- whereby the sacred order of matrimony had been corrupted: and he came not from the
hot-beds of college arts, and university science to invent new creeds, and enlarge the breach
of division, but he came, without the "stolen thunder" of some pretty prince of this world;
to wake admiration; yes, he came self made, and fired his own earthquakes to summon the world
to judgment; he came, not in a tempest of wrath, but in the still small voice of Jehovah
with full power to restore the holy priesthood: he came not in "the whirl-wind of public opinion"
but in the simple name of Jesus Christ with love that surpasses understanding, to from a
"union" that astonishes all the "powers that be," and sets this the priesthood of Baal at
defiance. And all hell howls with "a host of hired servants" -- to "kick up" for them!
He came to reveal the ancient history of Ephraim and Manasseh, mixed among the
nations, the tribes of American Indian, unaccounted for by the surplus notion of
the learned, and, in their unlettered degradation, to report them as the "heirs apparent,
for the benefit of morality, and eternal lives, of that Almighty power, which the world
can neither give nor take: he came to bring the book of Mormon to light from its angel
guarded home in the hill Cumorah; and to translate it by the common sense of inspiration,
and [hurl] this boasted wisdom of the 19th century. He came in what is termed
the age of light and reason, to stamp in letters of blood the "splendid religions" of the
day, as a spiritual delusion, leaving as a frock fitted clergy, and stall-fed philosophy to
keep it from tumbling into the "slime pit," of magnetism, [masonism], socialism, and
debauchery; and he came with the keys unlock Pandora's box of free thinking and
"popular fury" -- and he's done it!
He came to give the commandments and law of the Lord, to build temples, and
teach men to improve in love and grace, that the wise among men might gather out
of spiritual Babylon, which is temporal and spiritual wickedness, untill instead
of church and state, -- that Saints might "tithe" to save themselves from being burned in the
great day of God Almighty. -- If Jesus came to die and rise, to lead captivity captive,
so did Joseph come to die and increase the power to bind Satan: that eternal lives and
eternal progression might search the eternal round with out impidement. He came to
feel after the purses and consciences of this money loving generation and to push in the
golden age, so that the wealthy may waste their millions in extravagance, while the poor
starve unnoticed, unless the[y] trust in the Lord, and flee to Zion, and there prepare for
the great day of battle and war! He came to establish our church upon earth, upon the
pure and eternal principles of Revelation, prophets and apostles, for the holy reason,
that God never acknowledges, and accepts a church upon earth, as his, without there is
a prophet in it to tell of it.
He came fully posted to meet the Devil, or any of the Clerks -- bowing as "gentlemen," --
or "fluttering" as 'ladies'; gilded to attract attention; or cloaked to escape
notice: and the devil knew it: For said he in one his great sermons, "Where ever I am
the Devil is -- to watch my progress -- but he is a gentlemen"; by this you may know the
saints from the sinner. The Mormon is a man; the Christian -- a gentleman; So the
hypocrite magnifies his neighbors faults; the Mormon minds his own business [---------]
He came to punish vice, and praise virtue; he came to darken the dungeons of lust, and light
up the mansions of love; he came to expel the errors of ages, and teach men to walk in the light
of the Lord; And he came to war against the devil and eternalize his privilege of [dripping]
vengeance, mixed with venom round the fire of the damn'd!
He is dead, but he lives; he is absent from us, but at home in heaven; he is where
he can use the treasury of snow and hail; he can now direct the lion from the thicket
to lay the gentile cities waste; and cause the young lion to go forth among the herds
and tread down and tear in pieces and none can deliver. Wo to the [drunkards] with
Ephraim! and the great whore of Babylon! for their destruction is sure, and their end
near. Pestilence, famine, fire, and the sword, will no longer lay backed up in the magazine
of plagues reserved for superior occasion, but the still small voice of mighty angels
whispers, waste on, ye scamps for the wicked, waste on, by sea and land: waste on,
touch the high and the low, the bond and the free; the rich and the poor; Waste on!
Waste on, till the consumption decreed by the Supreme Court of Heaven, has made a full
end of all the actions that forget God and have pleasure in unrighteousness. And all eternity
responds, -- waste on! till great Babylon sinks like a mill stone cast into the sea, to
rise no more!
Governor Ford said, when Moses rose up in Egypt with a new religion, against what the priests
were then practicing, there was a mighty stir among the people, and all Israel had to leave;
and so when Jesus came among the Jews with a new religion, they crucified him, and can the
Mormons hope for anything less from our "higher order of society" in these "free" United States?
Can Mr. Smith with his phalanx of elders, right in the broad of face of all the wisdom, philosophy,
improvement, and morality and above all, of long established churches, where religion like education,
is liberally patronized and made popular? Can he, hope to pass the scrutiny of public opinion without
encountering the same destiny that has attended all new religions? Then whirling on his heel
observed, in a low tone to one of his aids, -- "the trial must come." and so it has.
But, Brethren and Sisters, Tom Ford is supposed to be one of those beings that
believes when a child was born, that some person has died; and that the spirit of the
dead one then enters the living child -- but unfortunately, we must come to the conclusion
from analogy, that when Tom Ford was born, no body died.
Perhaps this governor, like pharoah, had his heart hardened to test the faith of the
saints -- that Israel [might] flee from the terrible enjoyment of freedom, where the constitution
allows all men to worship God according to the dictates of conscience, if there
is no new revelation to expose the sins of this people. In case there is -- hush!
And yet the spirit whispers, what shall I say of Joseph the seer, cut off from his useful
life in the midst of his years? Why, I will say that he has done more in fifteen years,
to make the truth plain -- open the way of life; and carry glad tidings to the meek --
whereby Israel, or more properly the sons of Joseph, mixed with the gentiles, can hear
the long expected "call" -- come home my children for the day of your release is near,
than all Christendom has done in fifteen hundred years with money, press, and a hired
clergy: Joseph Smith, as the savior predicted, has sent the gospel to the poor, without
purse or [scrip]; without the Right Reverend D. D. of Yale, Oxford, Gotham, or
Nicholas of Russia, to lend a helping hand as prime minister of the church militant;
none of these lambskin sacerdotals, not even the Archbishop of Canterbury, or Pope of
Rome, have so much as nodded good luck to the boy that hunts for the lost sheep of the
house of Israel. And yet, glory to God, in the highest, the very dust has spoken; the meek
have heard; the wise have come; and the everlasting gospel is being preached to all
nations as a testimony that the last days are here and the wicked must perish.
Tell the world, and let eternity bare record, that the great name of Joseph Smith
will go down to unborn worlds and up to sanctified heavens, and gods, with all his
shining honors and endless fame as stars in his crown, while the infamy of his persecutors
can only be written in their ashes. Well may it be echoed, congratulated the dead that die
in the Lord, for in this time, verily says the spirit, for they can rest from their labors,
and their works shall follow them. All hail the [sad] triumphant deed! The souls under the
altar, that John saw, hail it as the harbinger of Jehovah's vengeance! The "little season,"
when their fellow-servants, and brethren should be slain for the truth's sake, as they had been in
past ages, has come! While the Delilah of the gentiles is kissing her paramour, and clipping
his locks, singing softly:
Hush my dear, [lie] still and slumber,
Ladies always guard thy bed;
All thy blessing, with out number,
We have taken from thy head.
Joseph has escaped through blood to bliss to fire the indignation of the holy ones
who wrote the destinies of men! And he is an angel now, and if ever there was a time
when the "vials of wrath," ought to be poured out upon the wicked -- it is now and
hence! and who can do it better then Joseph? The earth is ripening and hell is merry with
misery, so, rejoice ye saints, for the triumph of the wicked is short; they can kill the
body, as we have in this sample, but mormonism is a celestial medicine, and must be
applied as the sovereign remedy for all sin: After the lawyers, and judges, and juries,
and doctors, and priests, and statesmen, and people have spent their judgment upon the case,
and squandered their means and mites, to cover up crime, and set the murderers free,
then, yes my friends, then the union of players, the long suffering of patience, the
quellings of virtue, the diligence of sincerity, the widow's mourn and the orphan's tears,
will most certainly move Jehovah to vex this nation, and all nations, that have rejected,
and slain his prophets and apostles: Then comes the day of calamity: then passes this
bitter cup: then, brethren and sisters, we can laugh at their distress and trouble; and mock when
their fear comes; to witness how severely easy the Lord can sprinkle the "hot drops" of
heaven upon the gentiles to consume their proud flesh, and fit their impure souls for an
apprenticeship in hell, "where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched."
Our God you know has parts and passions, and when he enters into judgment
with our persecutors and has sufficiently troubled them on earth, I mean such pseudo
gentlemen, as Cain, Nimrod, Korah, Judas, Herod, Boggs, Ford and their associates,
I have an idea, that the resurrected saints, who have come up through great tribulations,
will give them, in return, for their practiced science of satan, a turn or two of even
handed justice, when they bind them in fetters of brass and iron; and bid them an everlasting
farewell and faithful execution of the judgment written, for his honor have all
the saints. Praise ye the Lord!
The prophet and patriarch have gone to paradise to bear testimony of the wickedness
of the world, and help hasten the deliverance of the saints. Joseph goes back among
his old associates of the [other] world, who have waded through like scenes of affliction
in the several ages past, and being beyond the power of death, as he was mighty for
life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, among good men, to raise and exalt them
for eternal lives; how much more almighty will he be with the spirits of just men made
perfect, and the Holy ones, to prune the vineyard; remove the bitter branches; and give
room for the speedy fulfillment of his great and last revelation? And how long, as Daniel
said, to the end of these wonders? How long till the children of Israel, gathered from the
four quarters of the earth, will begin to multiply according to the promises made to
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and endorsed by the Savior with an hundred fold of wives
and children? Verily, how long till the Israel of God becomes as numerous as the
sands upon the sea shore; as the stars of the heaven for numbers; and death and the
devil have no power to trouble the saints upon the earth? And the Spirits echo -- How long?
To close, I will say, the blood of all the prophets, shed from Abel to Joseph must
be atoned for; the debts must be paid, whether in blood for blood, or life for life, matters
not; when man takes what he cannot restore; let him die the second death, when
"there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth," and learn our perfect rule of right,
that no murderer inherit eternal life: It is all one to us what the mob does with their
work hands; the great day is at hand; the master trump sounds; wake the world for the
conflict of power; let the spirits of the damned enter their comrades as the legion did
the swine; bring out the foes of all good, from Cain to the flood; from Ham to Babel;
from Nimrod to Sodom; from Abimelech to Egypt; from Pharoah to the 184,000 spirits that
met the angels of war; and all apostate vagabonds, from the angel of war's glorious night
till now, and let them help their fellow sinners soar away: a few more daring deeds, a
few more desperate cases; and fate will call home his little [----] of sin, while the trumps
sound that unexpected sentence: it is finished! it is finished! The saints are free; Jehovah's
won the victory, and not a righteous man is lost!
|
PHELPS, William Wines, Mormon elder, born in Hanover, Morris County, New Jersey, 17 February, 1792;
died in Salt Lake City, Utah, 7 March, 1872. He was self-educated, but acquired a large amount of miscellaneous information, and became a good
oriental scholar. He edited the "Ontario Phenix" in Canandaigua, New York, in 1820, and, removing to Missouri, established the first morning paper at
Independence, Missouri, in 1832. He adopted the Mormon religion, emigrated to Utah, and became an active member of that sect. He was in the Utah
legislature in 1850-'7, speaker of the house for several terms, and a justice of the peace. He became "Astronomer, astrologist, and almanac-maker" for
his sect, and was the author of the forty signs of the "Deseret Alphabet." He also wrote some of the most popular hymns in the Mormon hymn-book.
