--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - J. H. Evans collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 7 number: 10 published: 1904-08 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'J. H. Evans, "Seeing, They See Not," *Improvement Era* 7, no. 10 (August 1904): 753–765.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0710unse 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: improvementera0710unse start_page: 753 end_page: 765 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1904-08) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0710unse publication_year: 1904 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 1904, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Seeing, They See Not SEEING, THEY SEE NOT. BY PROFESSOR J. H. EVANS, OF THE LATTER-DAY SAINTS UNI- VERSITY, SALT LAKE CITY. I. Whenever in the past men have found it impossible to turn aside the force of a doctrine by decrying it, they have sought to cover it with odium by inventing for it a low origin. This method is legitimate enough when only the facts in the case are brought out; for a stream can rise no higher than its source: but when de- liberate falsehood and misrepresentation are resorted to, the doc- trine is in reality confirmed, on the grounds that men will not re- sort to invention when truth will answer the purpose better. Thus, when the Scribes and Pharisees of old sought to stay the progress of Christ's teachings, they affected to believe that the sneering questions, "Can any good come out of Nazareth?" and "Is not this the carpenter's son?" a sufficient answer to arguments which their greatest scholars were unable to confute. It has been so in our day. The same methods have been em- ployed to prevent the spread of "Mormonism;" and with precisely the same results. Failing to turn aside the force of the current of truth, evil men have cunningly sought to pollute the source. "Why," they ask with the utmost disdain, "did not the Lord select a family of position and respectability to do his work — a family with such antecedents and such a character as would make it im- possible for malice itself to detect any blemish? Why did he not choose as the earthly instrument of his work, a man of scholar- ship, refinement, experience, goodness? Why, above all, did he not produce a work the miraculous character of which would be so manifest to everyone that the dullest might easily recognize it? Some such outward conformity with the times is indispensable as a sign to the world. "If there were such signs, 'Mormonism,'" they declare, "would be easily known, and all men would embrace the truth." Surely such reasoning as this ignores the plainest teachings of sacred history. When, we might ask, has God ever chosen those whom the world has accounted great ones of the earth, to be his ministers of salvation? Our only source of information on this point is the records of God's dealings with the Jews. The answer is "They were the people through whom he chose to give religious light to the world." True enough, but such they were not regarded by contemporary nations. Indeed, it was just the opposite of this. They were among the most despised of the earth. So far as we have any record, among other peoples, of any sentiment enter- tained for the children of Jacob, that sentiment was almost invari- ably one of utter detestation. Their origin, if we accept the judg- ment of neighboring people, was "low and despicable." They were descended from an obscure shepherd; and the occupation of a shepherd was held, by the most civilized nation of antiquity, in the greatest contempt. For, when they were first brought into Egypt in Joseph's day, the haughty Pharaoh set them apart from his peo- ple for fear of contamination. Their austere theology seems not to have attracted any attention whatever from the cultured Greek. And in the eyes of the proud Roman, the Jewish nation appeared in the same light as any other of the thousand weak and rebellious provinces which the Roman eagles had conquered. And what has been the history of this people since the days of Christ? The same contempt and ignominy have pursued them. Even the followers of the lowly Nazarene have united in heaping upon them every shame and humiliation. No part of the earth has furnished a rest- ing-place for the soles of their weary feet! The fearful counte- nance and crouching attitude of the Jew gave rise to one of the most melancholy proverbs of the middle ages. To this very day they are literally "a hiss and a by-word" among all the civilized nations of the earth. Such were, and still are, the people through whom God chose to reveal his word to man. And what of the men whom the Lord chose out of this des- pised people to be his servants? Passing by in silence the political and social leaders, the Lord, when the people clamored for a king, selected the obscure Saul, whom, when he sinned, he replaced by SEEING, THEY SEE NOT. 755 the most unpromising son of a humble family. Amos was a herds man of Tekoa, and a dresser of sycamore trees. The sublime Isaiah was "the son of one Amos." Peter, and James, and John were un- lettered fishermen. Matthew was a man whose occupation the Jews themselves looked upon with the utmost contempt. Nay, our Lord and Savior, coming out of the most despised province of a despised people, was himself, as has been pointed out by Christian scholars, connected with the heathen world through his genealogy, and "with the names of two, at least, whose personal guilt had been great." To Christians in general, this means only that humil- 2 are dignified, and that Christ came to ty and lowly circumstances save all. The very dullness of the apostles, in failing on so many occasions to comprehend their Master's meaning, has often served as a but of clumsy ridicule among Christian scholars who do not deny the divine calling of the Disciples. But whatever purpose there may have been in choosing the poor and unlearned to carry on the divine work, such at any rate has been the history of God's dealings with men. It is not, however, to be inferred, from this reference to the past, that we apologize for the lowly origin of "Mormonism." No apology is needed. It cannot be pointed out, except on the per- jured testimony of declared enemies, that there is any serious blem- ish on the character of any of those connected with the organiza- tion of the Church. That they were poor is conceded; but poverty is not a crime. That they were unlearned in the knowledge of the schools is also admitted; but neither is illiteracy a violation of any law. The Saints do not assert that this work originated, or that it is continued, by reason of the learning or wealth or social posi- tion of its founders or present leaders, any more than these things can be claimed for ancient Christianity. Nor do the Latter-day Saints contend that any of those who were instruments in founding the Church were without sin. They were men with mortal weak- ness, and subject, like all men, to temptation. Members of the Smith family, it is true, were religious, and "had dreams and visions." But does this destroy their character? Is it expected that God would choose a family of infidels to convey his truth to men? This is the first time that piety has been re- garded as a disqualification for a divine work, and the complaint is 756 IMPRO VEMENT ERA. the more astonishing as coming from those who claim to believe the dreams and visions recorded of the ancient Saints. With re- spect to the character of the prophet Joseph, it is sufficient to say- that any person who has been arrested forty times, at the instiga- tion of his avowed enemies, and has each time been acquitted, can well treat the charges made against him with disdain and silence. For the most inveterate foe of the Saints will hardly contend that a class of people with a reputation such as the Saints have among those not of them, would be likely to succeed in brow-beating so many judges and juries, under the circumstances that surrounded the trials of Joseph Smith, into pronouncing him innocent. As to the nature of the first vision and the revelation of the Book of Mormon, the same line of thought might be followed. That these are new to this generation is nothing in their disfavor. There is nothing in Scripture or reason from which it could plausibly be inferred that such things as revelations and visions are impossible or improbable. On the contrary, there are many things which in- dicate that these are intended as a special privilege of men. That such manifestations have not been common is the fault of the times. Visions and angelic manifestations have always character- ized the people of God. From Adam to John the Revelator, it was so. Dreams enlightened the sleeping hours of Jacob, of Joseph, of the wise men, and of the reputed father of Jesus. Angels visited Abraham, Jacob, and the Virgin. The voice of the Lord spoke to the boy Samuel, and to Saul of Tarsus. The Lord also spoke face to face with Moses and other prophets. On at least two occasions — at the baptism of Jesus and on the mount of Transfiguration were the words used, "This is my beloved Son." Why should it be thought strange that these things should occur today? The Scriptures expressly declare that in the last days such things should actually come to pass. Joel says that old men should dream dreams, and that young men should see visions. Christ, we are told elsewhere, shall come in the clouds of heaven with great power and glory. The time is to be when the miracle of the Red Sea shall be swallowed up in that greater one by which the Lord will bring the lost tribes of Israel from the land of the north. In- deed, some time in the future, miracles shall be so common that Satan will bring down fire from heaven in order to deceive the SEEING, THEY SEE NOT. 757 elect; and if there were no true miracle, at the time, the Devil could hardly succeed in deceiving any one by performing a false miracle. II. But what need is there, it is often asked, of this new revela- tion and of this new Church?Have we not Christ and the Bible? Have we not churches enough already? If this new revelation is different from the old one, it is false; if it is the same, it is super- fluous. In either event there is no excuse for its existence. To this question, the Latter-day Saints have a clear and simple an- swer. The Church finds its justification in the present apostate con- dition of Christendom. The thousand sects of modern Christianity bear no more resemblance to the ancient Church than the rags of the beggar to a new garment. The ancient Church was one, the only division being into branches, but all under the direction of one head. Modern Christianity is divided into hundreds of warring, contending factions, each governed by a separate head. Ancient Christianity could not exist without divinely inspired officers; mod- ern Christianity has no other support than mere human learning, obtained at the schools. Ancient Christianity insisted that the fruits of the spirit are revelation, visions, tongues and interpreta- tion of tongues, prophecy, healings, and other manifestations of divine goodness; modern Christianity contends that it can do with- out these, on the plea that they are not needed in this enlightened age. Ancient Christianity taught that baptism is essential to sal- vation, that it is for the remission of sin, and that it is to be ad- ministered only to those who are capable of believing in Christ and repenting; modern Christianity teaches that baptism may be performed at the option of the candidate, that the ordinance has no virtue to wash away sin, and that, if performed at all, it is to be administered according to the desire of the candidate, by sprinkling or pouring or immersion; and it is oftener administered to infants, who can neither believe nor repent. In ancient Chris- tianity, it was taught that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him; in modern Christianity, the condemned criminal, his hands red with the blood of his innocent victim, may, by confessing Christ in his dying moment, go immediately into the arms of the great Redeemer. Ancient Christianity instructed its followers to be as wise as serpents and as harmless as doves, to await in peace the coming of the Just One, and to encourage good will among men; modern Christianity, on the contrary, not only looks on passively at the increase of crime in the land, and persecutes those sects which in its opinion are wrong, but even encourages, at least by its silence, the destruction and wholesale robbery of nations that are too weak to offer resistance. There would, of course, be no objection to this condition of things, if there were any warrant for it in a revelation to those who instituted the change. But not only is there no warrant for it in new revelation, but these warring sects are united on this point of denying the necessity of any warrant through a new dispensation of God's will. For generation after generation this idea has held sway over the Christian mind. It mattered not that the Scriptures give no sanction to such a doctrine. Men went on believing and teaching it, till their minds were in such a condition that the idea of new revelation would not be very likely to suggest itself. It is not urged that this apostasy came about all at once, that men and women retired at night Christians to find themselves next morning outside the pale of the church; or even that it occurred in one generation. The change happened gradually as day fades into night. During the first three centuries after Christ, the Church was harrassed and persecuted by Jew and Gentile, and thousands were put to death. In their scattered condition, it was impossible for the leaders to exercise personal supervision over the Saints. Hence, little errors crept in here and there, which in time became a fixed part of the religion. In those perilous times the quorum of apostles was not perpetuated; and when these died, there was no supreme earthy head to teach the same inspired doc- trine to all the separate branches. And when revelation ceased, men soon began to deny its usefulness. These branches left to themselves, dwindled away from the truth, little by little, and in separate paths, till, under the "bishop" of Rome, a great many of the "churches" were brought to a reasonable harmony of doctrine, but not to the original way. Then followed those days of peace, SEEING, THEY SEE NOT. • 759 when the church suffered more from its contact with Paganism than it had during the days of persecution. The empire became "Christian," the church became popular; heathen minds received the gospel when it was gradually moulded into a form different from that which it had originally worn. Concessions were made to the heathen, in order to bring them into the fold. Doctrines were changed; worship was made more gorgeous to correspond with what the new converts had been accustomed to witness under Pagan rule. That absurd and unscriptural doctrine of trans-sub- stantiation and the elevation of the host was introduced. Immer- sion became sprinkling; the baptism of adults was succeeded by the baptism of infants; the simple and lucid idea of the Godhead became a hopeless muddle, in minds that were more accustomed to the sophisms of the Platonic philosophy; new offices, unheard of in the New Testament, Were thrust upon the church; bishops lost their standard of judging truth from error; and the whole pro- cession of pompous and glittering falsehood marched down the centuries, accumulating in kind as it went, until almost every rem- nant of Christian truth was overwhelmed in the darkness of the middle ages. Within the last three hundred years, good men, see- ing the deplorable state of their faith, have sought to reform it; but the church was long since beyond the power of the mere re- former. Without new revelation from God, they were utterly un- able to tell what was correct and what was incorrect doctrine; a fact that needs no proof, when we consider the countless divergent opinions on almost every Scriptural passage. Then, too, men had no longer any priesthood, any divine authority to administer the gospel ordinances; for the true priesthood could not be trans- mitted through unholy vessels. Hence there was needed a new opening of the heavens, a new restoration. Not only is there no justification in the Scriptures for all this change, but the Bible expressly predicts that such an apostasy would take place in consequence of wickedness. Paul tells us that the second appearing of Christ should not be "except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition." Even in his day "the mystery of iniquity" did "al- ready work," and it became necessary for the revelator to tell the only churches remaining in Asia that God would spew them out of 760 • IMPROVEMENT ERA. his mouth, unless they became something better than merely "luke- warm." Indeed, no one can thoughtfully read the letters of the apostles, to the various branches of the Saints, without perceiving in the whole tenor of them a warning against this fearful state of apostasy. Moreover, the restoration of the gospel in the last days is predicted in the Scriptures, and in such a clear manner, too, that he who runs may read. It is certainly not unreasonable to sup- pose that the second coming of Christ will be heralded by a note of warning to all the world, a trumpet call to repentance, a special dispensation of heavenly power and blessing. Nay, if we are to judge by God's dealings with men in the past, such a thing ought to be expected by every devout soul. For, the universal deluge of the earth was preceded by Noah's preaching for a hundred and twenty years, as the first advent of our Lord was announced by the Baptist. Accordingly, the Lord has promised that the baptism of our globe by fire will not come without warning. John tells us that the gospel will be restored, that it will be in the hour of God's judgment, and that it will be by an angel. Isaiah predicts the coming forth of a "book" which shall "speak out of the dust," and points out the signs that will accompany the word — "the deaf shall hear the words of the book, and the eyes of the blind shall see out of obscurity, the poor among men shall rejoice, and many shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel." It counts for nothing that men have not understood these prophecies of the apostasy and the restoration, and these tenden- cies of modern Christianity, or that they have spiritualized the Scriptures into harmony with their preconceived notions. For identically the same thing happened among the Jews before the Lord's first coming, and during the time that he dwelt in the flesh. That the children of Israel received the law through Moses; that they periodically fell into transgression during the long course of their miraculous history; that they stoned the prophets who were sent unto them; that their "wise men" perverted the plainest teachings of their sacred records, when, through wickedness, they were deprived of divine guidance; and that during Jesus' day their apostasy was complete,— these propositions there is no one today who will dispute. And yet, did not these same Jews affect to be- SEEING, THEY SEE NOT. 761 lieve that in Christ they had a perverter of the ways of God? Did they not hold up their hands in pious horror at the actions of our Savior, in healing the sick on the Sabbath, and allowing his disciples to eat corn on the sacred day? The predictions concern- ing Christ's coming in the flesh are so plain that, had the Jewish leaders not been smitten with spiritual leprosy, they could not have failed to know that Jesus was truly the Messiah. Indeed, it has been a standing wonder for nearly two thousand years that they could not see this. The time when Christ should come, the place where he should be born, the town where he should spend his days; his ancestry and lineage; a thousand details of his won- derful ministry, the manner and circumstances of his death; the religious conditions of the Jews at his coming, the strange mission and appearance of his forerunner, — all these things were to be found in the Prophets and Psalms, in the utmost plainness. Nevertheless, the Jews, especially those whose business it was to read and expound the law, refused to believe, even when these minute predictions were pointed out to them. "Look and see," exclaimed the devout Sanhedrin to Nicodemus, when he attempted to defend the Master. "Look and see, for out of Nazareth ariseth no prophet" —a statement which they must have known to be a falsehood. But they had spiritualized the words of God. They had sought deliberately to inject into these plain and sacred words meanings which they could not reasonably bear. They had con- jured up a Messiah that "should break the yoke off their necks a.king clothed in earthly splendor, and manifested in the pomp of victory and vengeance. Their minds were haunted with legendary prophecies, as to how he should stand on the shore of Joppa, and bid the sea pour out its pearls and treasures at his feet." Surely, in the face of these bold facts, no one that stops to think will ex- pect a message from God to conform to the ill-planned and erron- eous conceptions of men. Indeed, when we consider the character of the earlier mes- sage, and for the matter of that, of any message that God has ever given to man, we might expect the very opposite of that to which we had always been accustomed in our own doings; for God's ways are not like man's. Jesus declared that he came to bring not peace, but a sword. At almost every point, his doc. his earthly trines clashed with Jewish traditions; every detail of life struck with the expectation that the people entertained fire concerning the Messiah. They expected a ruler; he was the ser- vant of all. They looked for pomp and splendor, they found an obscure Galilean, poor and lowly, without where to lay his head. They anticipated political independence, but his kingdom was not of this world. To the learning of Hillel and the schools, he opposed the education he had received in silence and loneliness. John came "neither eating nor drinking;" lo! Jesus was "a glutton and a wine bibber, a friend of Publicans and sinners." Thus it was throughout his life. The accumulated traditions of a thousand years he repudiated as of no value. So it has been with "Mormonism." Instead of what might have been expected, the unusual has occurred. Not a remoulding of the materials at hand, however ancient and venerated; not a reformer with education, culture and social standing; not a com- promising attitude towards the numerous and powerful sects of the day: but, instead, a casting aside of every shred of the old cloth as too much worn for the new garment; an obscure youth without anything that men would call a qualification for the posi- tion, a bold and uncompromising front to all the world. Such is "Mormonism." It is not a patched religion, statements to the con- trary notwithstanding. The very first cry that it uttered at its birth was that all the churches had become corrupt, and that the teachings of the clergy were an abomination to the Lord. All the ceremonies and sacraments, the baptisms and ordinations, the preachings and coversion" this new religion swept aside as so much rubbish. Its genius and spirit were different from the gen- ius and spirit of these apostate sects; its work was to be accom- plished by a different method; it was uncontaminated, not having passed through unclean vessels. "Mormonism," therefore, has nothing in common with the creeds of the day. It is not of the world, therefore the world hates it. III. Some recent writers, in their effort to give a satisfactory account of "Mormonism," affect to believe that the true explana- tion of its power lies in the conditions that surrounded its birth. SEEING, THEY SEE NOT 763 "Mormonism," they say, was the child of its age and environment. And they go on to tell of the religious condition that prevailed in western New York State, in the nineteenth century. The country was new; a religious wave swept over the nation; the people were credulous as to religious things; the preachers of this neighbor- hood were especially heterodox in many ways. Then, too, the Smith family and the Macks had always been among the most relig- ious,from the first emigrant from the Old World to Joseph, in whom this religious feeling reached a climax.The faith of the early generation of Macks had, in the healing power, passed through the imaginative soul of Joseph's mother, Lucy, and fin- ally burst forth in the open visions of the youthful seer. The long course of preparation going on in these persons combined with the very favorable conditions that prevailed in the locality of New York to produce the anomaly of "Mormonism" in 1830. Such are the conclusions reached by those who have turned the search-light of modern science upon this puzzling religion. Now, much of this really plausible explanation the Latter-day Saints themselves would be willing to accept, though not exactly in the wording that their friends have given it. The leaders of the Church, from the beginning to the present, have declared their belief that the time was ripe for God to project his work. The candle of this latter-day gospel would have been snuffed out by the unwholesome power of Papacy,even if it had not been above the comprehension of the benighted and priest-ridden people of the middle ages. It required the revival of learning, the awaking of the spirit of liberty, and the reformation, to strike off the shakles, spiritual and temporal, from the hands of captive man. The fires of Smithfield, in England, and of Salem, in America, had to smoul- der into ashes, before the world could be trusted with the last mes- sage; the dove must be several times sent from the ark, to see if the waters had assuaged. Then there seems to have been a uni- versal feeling after God, a desire for more spiritual light, an eager- ness for something more stable than could be found in any of the sects of the day. The Wesley an movement had shown the univer- sality of this feeling. No time, therefore, according to the Saints' own belief, could have been more favorable. So far we may con- cede the terms of this explanation. But what have we gained by admitting all this, or even as much as our friends would have us admit? Are we any nearer an explanation? Do we understand any better the forces that under- lie the workings of this faith? Here is a seed dropped in the earth. It shoots forth into a plant, and springs up into a giant oak, under whose branches the fowl of heaven and the beasts of the earth find grateful shade and protection. How does this all happen? The botanist may tell us about the conditions under which this growth has been produced, he may explain the moisture and warmth of the earth, the nour- ishing properties of the rain and the sun; he may even tell us that in the seed he has seen the great oak in miniature, and that the tree is only the tiny plant grown large. But are we in the slight- est degree any nearer an understanding of the mysterious forces shut up in the seed that shape the material into a thing of beauty and usefulness? Here, again, is an obscure lad growing up on the banks of the Avon. Born of only ordinary parents, he has barely the com- mon advantages of education and society. There is nothing to distinguish him from other boys of his neighborhood, else the irate Lucy would not have permitted herself to punish some of his boy- ish pranks. Yet out of this boy grew "the myriad-minded" Shake- speare, a man whose name today stands at the head of letters in the world, and whose works are studied as the product of a trans- cendent genius. How is this? Shakespearian scholars inform us concerning the great natural beauties of the country in which the man was born and reared; they tell us of the outburst of feeling in England during the days of his manhood, and of the marvelous breadth and depth and height of this feeling at the time; they further explain that the most unprecedented encouragement was given to dramatic talent during the Elizabethan period. And a thousand other things we are told of the man, his associates, his times, and his works. But is it any clearer, after all this, how it is that the country-bred son of a Warwickshire trader should have possessed the supreme literary gift? Shakespeare was a mighty genius, and there an end; he cannot be "accounted for." Once more, here is a man "born of a nation which had been scattered and peeled —without a king, without liberty, and without SEEING, THEY SEE NOT. 765 a voice; a nation suspected, discredited, hated." Born of a peas- ant woman, he was brought up a carpenter, and was poor all his days. His own people, as soon as he was known to them, perse- cuted him, and put him to death as a wicked man. His entire life was spent in an obscure and despised Roman province, the bound- aries of which he was careful not to over pass. He never wrote a word during his entire ministry; he was without standing, social or political. And yet this man threw an influence over the minds of men that has continued increasingly for nearly two thousand years, and that has absolutely changed the current of human life, individual and national. His name still causes the wicked to trem- ble, and fills the good with courage and hope. Not a question of life or of death can leave out Christ. Every human soul has been uplifted by the doctrines of Jesus. Here, indeed, do we confront the greatest of all mysteries. Nevertheless the shallow-minded have sought to "explain" this insoluble riddle, by looking into the conditions under which our Savior was born and in which he lived. Was he not, they ask, triumph- antly the fruit of his age? The fulness of time had come. The sceptre had departed from Judah. The age had lost the faith. There was universal peace. All eyes, even of those not of the Jewish race, were turned towards something, none knew what. Expecta- tion was on tiptoe. Religion, such as it was, prevailed everywhere in Palestine. Surely conditions favored the rise of a prophet. And the antecedents of our Lord? Were not they religious? Was not the Jewish nation a city set upon a hill, a candle put on a candle- stick. And w ere they not eminently visionary? r Not to go any further back than Joseph and Mary, did not the Virgin see a vision in which she was told that Jesus should be born? And did not an angel appear to Joseph? This nation is the only one of which we have any record that was visionary. All religious "credulity" else fades by comparison. And yet this nation produced the one Man of the race. All these things are eagerly conceded by Christians, and yet none will be so foolish or rash as to conclude that he has "accounted for" Christ: That a single life, and that to all appear- ances youthful, obscure, and unobtrusive, should so cast its spell over a stretch of two thousand years of time, as to influence to the highest possible degree the individual lives of untold millions,