--- 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: 8 number: 6 published: 1905-04 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations, "Questions and Answers," *Improvement Era* 8, no. 6 (April 1905): 467–469.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0806unse 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: improvementera0806unse start_page: 467 end_page: 469 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1905-04) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0806unse publication_year: 1905 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 1905, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Questions and Answers EDITOR'S TABLE. 465 authorities who are in the direct line of our apostate's vision. Down with the priesthood! Up with unbridled license! And thus ends symptom number three. If the patient then gets the rabies, and goes out clothed with indignation and with flames bursting from his mouth, he is in the last stages of decomposition, and everybody should get out of the way. Keep out of the chamber of death and despair, unless duty calls you within. Then hang up all the disinfectants you can procure; be exceedingly careful of contagion, for the disease is said to be very catching for relatives and friends; cover up the mal-odorous remains of what was once a friend and brother, and depart as quickly as may be. Let us consign the rest to oblivion. Dost like the picture? Then avoid the disease! Susa Young Gates. TESTIMONY OF JOHN W. RIGDON. The Era has received the following interesting statement from New York City, under date of March 12, 1905: Today, at a meeting of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, held at 151 W. 125th Street, John W. Rigdon, son of Sidney Rigdon, made some remarks of which the following is an abstract: I was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when I was a boy of nine years, by Hyrum Smith, but was never confirmed a member. The baptism was witnessed by my father and Joseph Smith. I am now nearly seventy-five years old. My father and family were in Pittsburg when Joseph was killed. On hearing of it, my father went immediately to Nauvoo, claiming that he should be the leader of the Church, but the apostles did not think so, and Brigham Young was appointed to take the lead. My father was very much hurt, and felt that his labors had not been appreciated. In the early sixties, [he gave the year] I went to Idaho and thence to Salt Lake City. Eliza R. Snow and others tried to induce me to join the Church, but I did not, and came home to the 466 IMPROVEMENT ERA. east rather poorly impressed with the Utah people. I determined to ascertain from my father whether he knew anything in regard to the origin of the Book of Mormon other than had been made public, and if such were unfavorable to the Church I should make it known. My father was then in his last years, and I found him as firm as ever in declaring that he himself had nothing whatever to do in writing the book, and that Joseph Smith received it from an angel. Oil his dying bed he made the same declaration to a Methodist minister. myself well remember when Parley P. Pratt brought the book to my father's house, and presented it to him, and I also know that this was the first time that my father ever saw it. My sister, soma nine years older than I, testified to me a few months ago that she also remembers when the book was first seen by our father. My mother has also told me that father had nothing whatever to do with the writing of the book, and that she positively knew that he had never seen it until Parley P. Pratt came to our home with it. These testimonies have clung to me ever since, and I could not forget them. About five years ago, I corresponded with Joseph Smith, president of the Reorganized Church, and was well impressed with him. I knew him as a boy, and loved him. But I do know that he was not ordained to the presidency of the Church while his father was in Liberty jail, for I made the visit with him, and we did not leave each other during our stay there. The men who did ordain him later did not have the authority to do so. Men cannot confer what they themselves do not possess. Something like five years ago, I again went to Salt Lake City. One day, as I was sitting in a bank and looking up at the statue of the angel Moroni, the conviction came to me that the builders of this temple are the people of God. Again and again, with increasing conviction, this testimony came to me as I looked upon the figure of the angel. I wrote to Joseph Smith of the Reorganized Church and asked what I should do, and desired that he should enjuire of the Lord concerning it. He promised to do so, but I have not learned of the result. I read a sermon of his, a few months later, in which he declared that Brigham Young was the instigator of polygamy. This I knew to be false, from things I had EDITOR'S TABLE. 467 seen before Joseph's martyrdom. This falsehood turned me against the Reorganized Church. Elder John M. McFarlane baptized me into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints last summer, in the Hudson River, and I now bear testimony to the world that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, and that Brigham Young was his true successor. We declare that the above is a true report. Fred J. Pack, Sadie Grant Pack. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. Further Explanation of Luke 22: 35-38. Elder Carl A. Krantz, writing from Copenhagen, Denmark, says: In the answer, in the late January number, given to the scripture in Luke 22: 35-3S, it seems tome that a great opportunity is missed. I mean the opportunity to forcibly bring out a principle that is of immeasurable importance in our Church. The Lord has at times chosen to try the faith, obedience and courage of his servants, and that he has done in a very forcible manner by apparently contradicting himself. The Lord's command to Abraham about the sacrificing of his only son, after that son was given him in fulfilment of the promise that through him the seed of Abraham should be multiplied indefinitely, is certainly a climax, or an extreme point of trial, that only a true servant of the Lord could withstand. And so in the case referred to above. After having been taught to "love their enemies," and to turn the other cheek, when assailed, it must certainly have been a terrible shock to hear that they should provide themselves with swords. But in neither of these cases did the Lord intend that his servants should use the murderous implements; it was only a supreme trial of their faith. And it was no doubt a character-building ordeal that the Lord knew would be of immense value to them in after life. Now in our days we have had the "Zion's camp" movement, which I claim was an undertaking exactly on a par with that peculiar command