---
title: Improvement Era
description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930.
authors:
  - Townsend, J. L.
collections:
  - periodicals
tags:
  - magazine
  - improvement-era
periodical: Improvement Era
volume: 9
number: 12
published: 1906-10
publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations
publisher_place: Salt Lake City
language: en
type: magazine
reference: 'J. L. Townsend, "John Storm, the Zealot: A Poem," *Improvement Era* 9, no. 12 (October 1906): 936.'
source:
  url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0912unse
  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: improvementera0912unse
start_page: 936
end_page: 936
rights:
  status: public-domain
  basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1906-10)
  source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0912unse
  publication_year: 1906
  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 1906, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright.
---

# John Storm, the Zealot: A Poem

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JOHN STORM, THE ZEALOT. LINES WRITTEN UPON READING "THE CHRISTIAN," BY HALL CAINE.

 {For The Improvement Era.)

I hold it true that God knows best By what illusions we forsake Why we are vertebrates on earth: Our Father's law, to blindly plod For His creations all attest Through some ascetic path we take,- That race begets its kind by birth. In cloisters seeking after God

And if from God's creative laws Man was not made to be alone We change and teach another way— His heart rebels against the worth If of our whims we build a cause Of oaths that doom him to disown Alas! from law we go astray. The very laws that gave him birth.

For God made man to fit a sphere He nearest comes to God who gives Adapted to this planet's life, In offspring that he leaves behind He made man twain in sex appear His own true worth; that ever lives Each for the other— man and wife. To bless and sanctify mankind! And thus the covenant was made That gave to Abraham his throne. Shall Israel's great glory fade? God asks no man to live alone J. L. TOWNSEND. Payson, Utahj