160 years ago today - Nov 5, 1854 (Afternoon)

[Brigham Young Sermon] ... And if I was to come out and tell you in the name of Israel's God, if this people do not tithe themselves, and pay better attention to the law of tithing that the Lord God Almighty will smite the earth they occupy and smite them. And some will turn round and say I wish to scare them. I am utterly opposed to threatening any person with God Almighty, or hell fire. I always shun that path. Some of the brethren get up here; for instance when brother Hyde wants to accomplish anything on this earth, has to threaten them with God Almighty, and hell fire, if they do not do so, and so....

Now I tell you again, if I am not mistaken, if I un1erstand the mind and will of the Lord concerning this people, in the midst of these mountains, instead of your being afflicted, instead of our being afflicted with crickets, and with grasshoppers we will be afflicted with that that is a thousand times worse. ...

Stop I always do my swearing in the pulpit; if that man comes up and says I don't want to pay tithing on that, then what the devil have you with my time, I own you, I paid you a thousand dollars a year; he is my servant and slave just as much as those blacks are in the south. he is my slave and he has not a right to one minute of my time, only by my permission. I have a right to walk into his garden and take his increase. ...

[Source: Leonard J. Arrington Papers, Special Collections, Merrill-Cazier Library, Utah State University, Logan.. (A reference reading LJA 12-55-5, 10, means LJA Series 12, Box 55, Folder 5, page 10.) 12-55-7, 14; Brigham Young Collection, Archives, Church History Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah as quoted from The Complete Discourses of Brigham Young, Ed. Richard S. Van Wagoner, Smith-Pettit Foundation, Salt Lake City (2009), http://bit.ly/BY-discourses]

No comments:

Post a Comment

Please Enter your Comment: