X LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Great Salt Lake City Plan of the Great Salt Lake (from Colonel Fremont's Survey). Emigrants going on Board The Farewell Scene between Decks New Orleans St. Louis Mormon Caravan crossing the Prairies Cave in Rock on the Ohio Mormon Gold Coin Ceremony of Confirmation (sketched by F. Piercy) Ancient Glyph Orson Pratt (from a Drawing by F. Piercy) Ceremony of Baptism (sketched by F. Piercy) PAGE 235 247 250 252 253 254 255 256 260 271 272 276 286 297 BIRTH AND PARENTAGE OF JOSEPH SMITH, THE MORMON PROPHET-HIS "REMARKABLE VISIONS"-HIS CONSECRATION TO THE PRIESTHOOD-ALLEGED APPEARANCE OF JOHN THE BAPTIST TO JOSEPH AND HIS CONFEDERATES-THE GOLDEN PLATES OF THE HILL OF CUMORAH-THE BOOK OF MORMON-THE MORMON WITNESSES OF ITS AUTHENTICITY -THE WITNESSES WHO ASSERT IT TO BE A FRAUD-STATEMENTS OF PROFESSOR ANTHON -THE SPAULDING FAMILY-MRS. DAVISON AND SIDNEY RIGDON. IN the year 1825 there lived, in a small village in the United States of America, an obscure young man-of little or no education-of no forture, and of but indifferent character. That obscure young man had meditated for five years before this time the establishment of a new religion. In 1830, being then in the twenty-fifth year of his age, he began to carry his design into effect. In the following year he became the head of a sect numbering five persons; amongst whom were included his father and three brothers. In the course of a few weeks, the number of his adherents increased to thirty. At the present time, the sect so established numbers 300,000 people; has its own Bible, and zealous missionaries to preach it in every part of the Christian world, and besides this, inhabits and possesses a fertile and beautiful territory almost as large as England, and aspires to obtain admission, on equal terms, as a free State, into the great confederation of American Republics. The name of this young man was Joseph Smith -of his new Bible, the "Book of Mormon”—of his sect, the "Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints,"—or in the parlance of those not members of it-The Mormons, or Mormonites; and of the state or territory of which they have taken possession, Utah or Deseret, in New California. The Mormons have thriven amid oppression of the most cruel and pertinacious kind; they have conquered the most astonishing difficulties; they have triumphed over the most vindictive enemies, and over the most unrelenting persecution; and from the blood of their martyrs have sprung the courage, the zeal, and the success of their survivors. They can boast not only an admirable and complete organization, but the possession of worldly wealth, influence, and power. Their progress within the last seven years has been rapid to a degree unparalleled in the history of any other sect of religionists. The remarkable career of Joseph Smith, the Prophet of the Mormons, and the story of the rise of the sect which he founded, is one of the most curious episodes in the modern history of the world. To trace that history with all its fanaticism, all its zeal, all its genuine and sincere faith, all its folly and all its virtue, and to carry it through all the touching scenes in the varied and surprising fortunes of the people who believe in Joseph Smith as the prophet of God, from the day in which the doctrine was first broached amid the hatred and the derision of a few, to the present day, when the sect is too powerful and too sincere to be derided, is the object of the following pages. To avoid the appearance of unfriendliness towards men who— whatever the character or views of their former leaders may have been, or whatever may be thought of their own fanaticism-are carrying on a great and remarkable work, but little understood, or even heard of, in this country, beyond the limits of their own body, we shall whenever it is possible to do so, present their history in the words of their own writers, appending such statements on the other side as may be necessary for the exposition of the truth. The following particulars of the origin of the Book of Mormon, of the early life of Joseph Smith, and of his first appearance in the character of a man divinely inspired-to be the new Moses, or Mahomet of his generation -are extracted from the "Remarkable Visions," of Mr. Orson Pratt. This gentleman was formerly their emigrational agent at Liverpool, |