--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 4 number: 6 published: 1901-04 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations, "Editor’s Table: A Sketch of President Diaz; Dr. Talmage’s Lecture in Denver; Missionary Work," *Improvement Era* 4, no. 6 (April 1901): 469–470.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0406unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera0406unse start_page: 469 end_page: 470 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1901-04) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0406unse publication_year: 1901 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1901, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Editor’s Table: A Sketch of President Diaz; Dr. Talmage’s Lecture in Denver; Missionary Work THE PHILOSOPHY OF "MORMONISM." 467 with Adam or Enoch, but was directed by the very word and voice of the God whom he represented. Moses was no mere theologian trained in the bookish chronicles of earlier times; he was not dependent for his authority or acts on what God had said to Abraham, to Isaac, or to Jacob; he -acted in accordance with instructions given from time to time, as the circumstances of his ministry required, unto him.And so on through all the line of prophets, major and minor, down to the priest of the course of Abia unto whom the angel announced the birth of John who was to be the direct fore-runner of the Messiah. When the Christ came he declared that he acted not of himself but according to instructions given him of the Father. Thus the Messiah was a revelator, receiving while in the flesh communications direct and frequent from the heavens. By such revelation he was guided in his earthly ministry: by such he instructed his disciples; unto such he taught his apostles to look for safe guidance when he would have left them. During his ministry in the flesh Christ called and ordained men to offices in The Church. We have a record of apostles particularly, numbering twelve, and beside these, seventy others who were commissioned to preach, teach, baptize and perform other ordinances of The Church. After the departure of Christ, we read of the apostles continuing their labors in the light of continued revelation unto them. By this sure guide they selected and set apart those who were to officiate in The Church. By revelation, Peter was directed to carry the gospel to the Gentiles; which expansion of the work was inaugurated by the conversion of the devout Cornelius and his household. By revelation, Saul of Tarsus became Paul the Apostle and a valiant defender of the faith. Holy men of old spake and wrote as they were moved upon by the Holy Ghost and depended not upon the precedents of ancient history nor entirely upon the law then already written. They operated under the conviction that the living Church must be in communica- tion with its living head; and that the work of God, while it was to be wrought out through the instrumentality of man, was to be directed by him whose work it was. "Mormonism" claims the same necessity to exist today. It holds that it is no more possible now than it was in the days of the 468 IMPROVEMENT ERA. ancient prophets or in the apostolic age for the Church of Christ to exist without direct and continuous revelation from God. This necessitates the existence and authorized ministrations of prophets, apostles, high "priests, seventies, elders, bishops, priests, teachers — and deacons, now as anciently not men selected by men without authority, clothed by human ceremonial alone, not men with the empty names of these and analogous offices, but men who bear the title because they possess the authority, having been called of God. Is it unreasonable, is it unphilosophical, thus to look for additional light and knowledge? Shall religion be the one department of human thought and effort in which progression is impossible? What would we say of the chemist, the astronomer, the physicist, or the geologist, who would proclaim that no further discovery or revelation of scientific truth is possible, or who would declare that the only occupation open to students of science is to con the books of by-gone times and to apply the principles long ago made known, for none others shall ever be discovered ? The chief motive impelling to research and investigation is the conviction that to knowledge and wisdom there is no end. "Mormonism" affirms that all wisdom is of God, that the halo of his glory is intelligence, and that man has not yet learned all there is to learn of him and his ways. We hold that the doctrine of continuous revelation from God is not less philosophical and scientific than scriptural. (To be concluded in next number.)