AMONG THE MORMONS IN SALT LAKE CITY.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 751, 23 July 1886, Page 8

AMONG THE MORMONS IN SALT LAKE CITY.

Eastward-Ho. To many Christian English people it is not known that Mormin missionaris®, in considerable numbers, come every year from America to Liverpool. Thence they travel over the British Islts and Europe, preaching and proselytising for Mormonisim with extraordinary vigor and success. They induce their hearers to go to Morman settlements in Amerioa, as many as from 15,000 to 30,000 thus annually immigrating to join the sect, their Transatlantic and railway passages being paid by a Morman imnrgration fund, which is raised in Utah and distributed in Liverpool. The doctrine of polygamy is the chief one of Mormonism, so that its teaching is directly contrary to Divine ordinance, and advocates the breaking of the laws of the United States and of Great Britain. Since so many English, Welsh, Scotch, Irish and European families follow these preachers of evil, it might be well to know what one who has lived for three years in the chief city of Mormon land can tell, both of the poisonous heresv of its religious and moral antidote. The distance of Utah from New York is about 2 f 500 miles, or the same a 3 the Transatlantic passage. The journey by rail from New York to Utah takes from five to six days. Utah derives its name from a tribe of indians—the Utes, who were originally settled in this region. Thsre I have often seen the descendants of these Utes tramping along in sullen single file, begging their way ; the squaws in blankets, without head-covering, tlieir long, coarse hair hanging straight down their tawny cheeks ; the monkey faced *papoo3e’ strapped on the backs in its tight swaddling clothes. The bucks (or chiefs) have stern, sad faces, with latge dark eye®, and they walk, with covered heads, before the woman and children. These Utes hate the white Bottlers, who have, they say, ursurped their land ; and they take the alms they beg on these tramping journeys as their due, returning no thanks. The history of Utah settlement is founded on

a literary theft, and the first Mormon emigrants were victims of grose deception. The ‘ Book of Mormon,’ upon which the delusion is based, is the work of an illiterate and dissipated adventurer, Joseph Smith, a native of Vermont, who, with congenial help, published the new creed in 1830 The ‘Book of

Mormon’ begins with these words: ‘ And now I, Mormon, make a record of the thit g* which I have seen, and known and call it the “ Book of MormoD,” ’ Thus originated the name of Morman for the followers of the new creed. The Mormon proselytes were at first, as now, chiefly of a low, uneducated class, who declared their church to be the only true one ; all outsiders they named * Gentiles.’ I have seen in the new tabernacle of Salt Lake City a life s?z->d painting—or, rather | daub—of ‘ Joseph Smith on Mount Moriah, receiving the gold plates of the * Book of Mormon ’ from John the Baptist in the presence of Moses,' the Mormon saint kneeling in an ecstatic attitude dres ed in a swallow tailed coat. Not till 1848 did Smith declare his new doctrine of plurality of wives to be a Divine ordinance. The Mormons in Illinois then numbered some 20DO- When, in 18S4, the brothers Smith were murdered by an enraged mob, Brigham Young, organised the first Morman emigration in Utah, and became the head of the sect. The absence of moral principle in this man, his cruelty, relentless ambition, and love of power, his avarice and duplicity, and his remarkable gifts of organisation and administration, made him the life of Mormonism. The settled Mormons were increased hy his po’iey and influence to over 175,000. Public opinion—and no*, as Young pretended, the angel Gabriel, in a vision—drove the Mormons from the east to the west of America. In 1846 Brigham Young led them along the banks of the Missouri river, where they rested a winter. In 1847 they pressed on through the Rockies, after traversing the great plains leading to Utah’s fertile valley on foot or in hand carts, their baggage in ox waggons. Mormons all over the world commemorate the emigration journey by a public holiday, thinking their guidance miraculous, whereas their cunning leader had doubtless made good use of the new map of the western valley. Many of their public buildings, their newspaper in Utah, and many of their children were named ‘Deseret’ in its honor. They arrived in the Lake Valley, July 24, 1847. On that date commemorative processional shows, parade the streets of their cities. The oldest feature in the show was, when I last saw its an open car, in which sat one man with five woman and eleven children grouped together a banner over their heads bearing the fseble inscription Look at This Happy Mobmon Family.

The Mayer and police of Salt Lake City, being Mormon", are conveniently lax in their duties towards delinquents of the sect, and furnish material for some good old jests. I once- heard loud laughter in the Mormon theatre on th's subject. In a popular farce an English dandy bragged about the size of our vegetables, as erting that when he was an infant, in England, his mother had one pump* kin cut into a cradle for him and bis twinbrother. * That’s nothing !’ answered the Western American ; ‘ why, in Salt Lake City half a dozen Mormon policemen sleep every night on one beet 1’ The population of the Lake City is now 25,000, of whom 20,000 are Mormons, the remainder foreign settlers — Jews or Christians, all of whom they term * Gentiles.’ It is a fact creditable to the Roman and Greek churches at home that no proselytes can ever be obtained from them by Mormon missionaries. After Congress had organised Utah fas a Territory, and Young had been Territorial Governor (until 1873, when he resigned), a great assumption of despotic power marked his rule. He arrogated to himself the titles of ‘ Prophet,’ and of ' The First Man from God.’ The ‘ second inau he allowed to be a son of the murdered Sm : tb, profanely nicknamed * The Squinting Parrot ’ by an unbelieving Gentile, in playful allusion .to well-known moral obliquity and garrulous habits. Young’s missionaries soon to bring yearly convoys of emigrants to his dominions ; but the rail from New York to Utah was not completed until 1870. His militia of 2\ooo rifles were disbanded by State suppression after the frightful Mountain Meadows massacre of 1857, when 120 non-Mormon emigrants were murdered, by his orders in cold blood—men, women, and children, on their way to California from Arkansas, the masacre being carried out by the * Avenging Angels,’ or * Danites,’ aided by Indian allies under'the Mormon Bishop Lee. The States Government caught and shot Lee for this atrocious crime, which was a fulfilment of. Young’s doctrine of Blood Atone meat, the murdered people being enemies of the sect. Tithe payments so enriched the Mormon Church, that, at its leader’s death in 1876, when he was in his eightieth year, the old tyrant was fabulously rich. A scandalous lawsuit was actually won by his Church against hie heirs for the sum of one million dollars, which he had appropriated, and the disputes caused the secession of a great number of weilthy Mormon". The Chnrch is organised with a president, twelve apostles, elders, and bishop*. A yearly conference was held from 1867 in Salt Lake City. A huge tabernacle, to seat 10,000, shaped like an egg split lengthwise, was built and a grand new one is being erected. The organ in the tabernacle is the second largest in America. The Mormon ‘ Book of Doctrines and Covenants ’ shows the low moral tone and unwholesome superstition of Mormonism, which the sermons repeated. Oae wonders how such doctrines can be tolerated by the unhappyignorant, and foolish women convert?.. I will quote a typical sentence. It is in the chapter headed ‘ Revelation on the Eternity of the Marriage Covenant, including plurality of wives : ’ — «If any man marry a woman, and desire to marry another, the first wife must give her cuißent. If he then marry a second, he is justified, for they are given unto him by the Lord. If he thus have ten wives at one time given unto him by this divine law, he is justified, for they are given unto him and they therefore belong to him. But if one of the ten wives shall wish to marry another man she shall be destroyed for ever.’ . . From thi3 same book I now quote the Tenth Commandment, as it is here parodied: * I command thee, saith the Lord, not to covet, that is, nob to covet thine own property, bnt to impart it freely to the printing of the * Book of Mormon,’ which contains troth and the word of God.

Whoso keepefch not this comnandmenfc shall 1 have smitiags with. the rod of My mouth, and with My wrath and anger. Yea, if they. keep nob this law, their sufferings shall be sore—how sore they know not, how exquisite they know not. I, God, through Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, thus command you. Endless is My name, because endless are My punishments.’ . . . Young kept up for a time his illegal Mormon coinage, on which he engraved his motto, ‘ Holiness to the Lord.’ He forbade not only intoxi- ' cUiug drinks, but even the use of tea and coffee to his subjects, and ordered them to call each other Brother and Sister. Thehandsome ‘ Amelia Palace, 5 in the city, built for his favorite wife, is now the presidential residence of his successor, Taylor, who has four wives, whilst Young ii reported to have had twenty-seven, not counting ‘spiritual’" wive 3. Priestcraft permeates Mormon doctrines, and has a baneful influence on the women, teaching the divinity of polygamy. X. have heard two Mormon apostles, Q. L. - Cannon and Orson Pratt preach. One sermon ended thus: ‘The Mormon Church is by divine revelation of John Baptist and Moses to Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. Our Church is true, and all others are false, and shall perish. We latter day saints shall be saved and shall reign over the Gentiles of the earth. Our wives are given unto us by the Lord, and we will keep them in His name.. though the States laws do their worst to take them from us. Be brave and wary in defence of your wives, and no States Government can hurt you.’ As I sat taking notes of this sermon, whose immorality and disloyalty breathed the real spiric of Mormonism, a sudden rustle of movement susprised me. The seventy elders had, in a body, at the sermon’s conclusion, left their semicircle of seats on the platform under the huge organ. They walked down either side of the tabernacle, handing to each row of the seated congregation baskets of thick bread and cans of water. This rough and careless picnic was the Mormon sacra--menfc, and it fitly completed the irreverent” farce of the service. Rich Mormons have separate houses for each wife. Poor ones had in old days, only separate front doors. Tfce~ military protective camp, Fort Douglas, overlooks the city from an elevation of 70J feet,. whence its cinnoii could sweep the streets in the event of a Mormon rising. Disintegration and disaffection began to undermine Brigham Young’s rule long ere his death.. The railroad, the military camp, desertion of his nearest relatives, the influx into Utah of mining foreigners, the Churco’s law-suit, all these crises in Mormonism were its enemies. The Christian Churches—Methodist, Presbyterian, Baptist, and Roman Catholic—established throughout Utah during the last twenty years, may be considered of the best kind of anti-Mormon agencies. The American Episcopal Church Mission in Salt Lake City must be chosen as the most distinguished and efficient of such agencies, having a special educational mission amongst the children, drawing them from the wretchedly illiterate and backward Mormon schools. But for Mormoni m, Utah might have a future as a manufacturing country, though some think its mining resources are on the wane ; for its water supply is good, its timber excellent, aud stone and ore deposits fairly rich. But the anti--progressive spirit of Mormonism outweighs such practical emigration advantages. Mormons neglect sanitary science and hygienic-, laws in their cities. The bad drainage of Salt Like City—-pile of a natural slope to the Jordan—makes it a mo t unhealthy place, the mortality amongst children there being apalling ; epidemics rag'ng through all Mormon cities during summer and autumn months.. In conversations with bigoted Mormons, I was struck with their wilful and stupid perversion of Bible quotations. I will report one with a naturalised Dane, who had three wives in the city, and a‘spiritual wife,’ old and blind, in another Territory, whom he had never seen. This man told nae that ‘ Paul spoke up for polygamy in the words, “Let a bishop be tbeblameless husband of one wife,’ 1 ’ which he explained, meant that ha should have at least one wife. I asked ho w he excused his breaking the States law. He answered— * t believethe Mormon divine laws to be above all Stateslawß.’ I finally asked if he could excuse, from Scripture, his desertion of his poor wife and family in Denmark, and he triumphantly shouted—‘Yes! for it is written * Whoso leaveth wife and children for the Gospel’s sake shall be rewarded, 1 and that’s what I havedone !’ Before I left Utah I was glad to know this able exponent of the Gospel was in. the States penitentiary for a cruel case of wife-beating. I hope he liked his foretaste of * reward.’ Only by evidence of wives against their husbands can Mormons be thus punished for State offence, hence the infrequency of their convictions. I once rode the six miles from the city to inspect the penitentiary. Its governor was then an old general who, in the Cuban insurrection, had slain seventeen rebels* with his own hand, and this post was given him for his loyalty. On the platform round the square solid prison marched armed sentries. Another interesting excursion wae to Rockwood Farm, fifteen miles out of tbecity, built on a beautiful trout stream, where not less than 40,000 fi*b, chub and trout, are yearly hatched. The owner, a Danish Mormon elder, had three wives; one only lived here, for he was a rich man, having separate city houses for each of the others. The first wife's grown son, Niehle, worked on the farm.. She had been a convert over twenty years, owing to her husband's preaching as a missionary in Denmark, where she had first met and heard him. Whilst the rest of our party fished, I eat at the farm dobr talking with Mrs Petersen on Mormonism. She told me she at first found polygamy a terrible stumbling-block to faith, and had long rebelled against it, but a bishop of her church had convinced her at last that the law was of the highest order of divine revelation, and now she was a firm believer, and very happy. As she said the last words her face clouded, and a look in her large ssd eyes belied her brave words. She rose from her seat to welcome her husband and his other two wives, who, at the moment, drove up in an open mule waggon. Nielils sullenly greeted his two * aunts,’ so-called by Mormon regulation, and lifted out a boy of ten, the son of the second American wife. The third wife was a freßhfaced, simple looking Scotch lass, with a baby in her arms They were all taken to see the new red cow on the farm, which, at this critical moment, broke up awkwardness, by

•suddenly choking itself with a huge turnip wallowed whole. I last saw those three wives standing amicably round the afflicted animal, uniting in cramming a broomstick, wrapped in a wet rag, down its throat, utterin" various exclamations of grief and symj athy 'in their varied foreign accents. The elder ran ‘off to fetch a veterinary, swearing audibly. Blanche Medhorst.