| 298 upon their pretensions! Let this be remembered."
We wonder if the Baptist church can? The Mormons do not profess any such thing. Do we ever read of any of the servants of God taking up rattlesnakes or copperheads, for the sake of making infidels believe? or in any presumptious [presumptuous] manner? We do not, but we read of some of the ancient Freewill Baptist's coming to our Savior, and wanting to see a sign, and he called them a wicked and adulterous generation for so doing. Herod must have belonged to the Baptist church, for he sent for our Savior, desiring to see some miracle performed by him. And we read of another personage of high note, who came to our Savior and took him to a pinnacle of the temple, and with all the bombast of any of our modern sign-seeking Baptists, told him to cast himself down from thence, for it is written, "he will give his angels charge concerning thee," &c. Our Savior answered, "it is written, thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." We would remind our modern Baptist friend that it is so written; and if our Savior dared not to tempt the Lord his God, the Mormons dare not.
"4. They cannot drink any deadly thing with impunity."
"When Zeenab was asked why she put poison into a roasted lamb, which she had provided for Mohammed's dinner, it is said she replied to this effect, 'I said in my heart, if he be a king, we shall be freed from his tyranny;-and if he be a prophet, he will easily perceive it, and consequently receive no injury.' Several Mohammedan historians state that he died from the effect of the poison, about two years after he took it. This, as Dr. Clarke observed, is a complete and everlasting refutation of his pretensions to the prophetic spirit and mission; for the language of Christ implies that those who believed on him in the sense of the text, should not die by poison. Notwithstanding Christ's assurance that those who were endowed with miraculous gifts, should not lose their lievs [lives] in this way, it is presumed that J. Smith, the prophet and apostle of Mormonism, with all his pretensions to the Divine favor, would not dare to drink a cup of tea if he feared that it possibly contained arsenic. Nor would his best friends dare to test his pretentions [pretensions] to the power to work miracless [miracles], by putting poison into his food."
They cannot drink any deadly thing with impunity. Our answer to his last fact, must be sufficient for this. Query: Can the Freewill Baptists? They profess to believe the Bible.-Relative to his statements about Mahomed, we know nothing; and we presume our great exposee [exposé] known as little. We have always found it is difficult to obtain a correct statement of facts concerning Mahomedanism, as we do concerning Mormonism, from some of our dealers in facts. Christ has given no assurance that those who were endowed with miraculous gifts should not lose their lives in this way; but Christ has said that these signs should follow those that believe. If the Baptists believe, they will follow them. If the Mormons believe, they will follow them; and if they follow neither of them, they are neither of them believers.
Joe (Joseph) Smith would not drink arsenic knowingly if offered to him. Again we ask, dare our Baptist friend, who is no much better than he?
"5. They cannot heal the sick. That they may occasionally arouse a hypocondriac [hypochondriac], is not denied; but they can no more cure the fever, the palsey [palsy], or consumption, than they can arrest the mighty current of the majestic Niagara."
This we must let pass with the rest. If the Mormons cannot, the Lord can; and perhaps they can do it in the 'name of Christ.' If they 'lay hands on the sick, and annoint [anoint] them with oil in the name of the Lord,' they live up to what they believe more than the Baptists do, who do not attempt to fulfil [fulfill] the ordinances of God: and if the sick are not healed, they fulfil [fulfill] their part-they come nearer the mark than the Freewill Baptists do, who neither believe nor practice.
"6. The apostolic miracles were performed in such a manner, that the most intelligent and powerful enemies of the gospel were obliged to confess that notable miracles were wrought. See Acts 4:16. The Mormonites [Mormons] have done nothing like this. They cannot imitate the Apostles in curing the lame and healing the sick, half so well as Pharaoh's magician's imitated the miracles performed by Moses. But, as the deluded will not be convinced by arguments of this kind, and as the discerning and candid do not need them, I will draw this article to a close. It is probable that many of the followers of J. Smith, really believe that miracles are wrought by this modern Mohammed [Mahommed] and his minions. But there is no more proof that they have ever done so, than there is that the pretended miraculous image of the Virgin Mary, in Ancona, opened and shut its eyes supernaturally; or that withered lillies [lilies] placed before that image, boomed anew the night after they were put there. None but credulous, superstitious Catholics believed that such miracles were really performed; yet the first of these prodigies 'was attested by more than 80,000 ocular witnesses, and by legal inquiries.' much more evidence than the Mormonites [Mormons] will ever be able to furnish to prove that they have performed miracles. The Catholic Archbishop Martini asserted, for selfish purposes, that the pretended miracles just named, with others equally absurd, did in reality; occur in Italy, about the time it was conquered by Bonaparte; and there is every reason to believe that the motives of the Mormon leaders, in pretending to work miracles, are no better than those of the worldly minded Archbishop. It may be expected, however, that, while the 'Latter Day' deceivers are impudent and impious enough to pretend that they can work miracles, they will find many silly enough to believe their blasphemous pretensions.
ELIAS HUTCHINS."
(page 298) |
