| 656 TIMES AND SEASONS.
"Truth will prevail."
Vol. V. No. 18.] CITY OF NAUVOO, ILL Oct. 1, 1844. [Whole No. 102.
HISTORY OF JOSEPH SMITH.
(Continued)
The August number of the Star contained the following:
THE CHOLERA.
This desolating sickness is spreading steadily over the United States. The account of its ravages, in many places, we cannot give: The whole number of cases in New York, to July 31st, is-3731. Deaths-1520.
No man can stop the work of the Lord, for God rules the pestilence, and the pestilence rules men. Oceans, sentinels, and forts, may hinder men or money may bribe, but when the pestilence rides on the wings of the wind, the ocean is no barrier; the sentinel has no power; the fort is no obstacle, and money has no value; the destroying angel goes, waving the banner of death over all; and who shall escape his pointed arrow? Not he that could brave death at the cannon's mouth, but shrink at the sound of the cholera; not he that worshipped his god in some stately chapel, every sabbath till the cholera comes, and then flees for his life; no; none but him that trusts in God, shall be able to stand when a thousand shall fall at his side, and ten thousand at his right hand, by the noisome pestilence.
TO THE HONORABLE MEN OF THE WORLD.
To the honorable searchers for truth, we in a spirit of candor and meekness, are bound by every tie that makes man the friend of man. By every endowment of heaven, that renders intelligent beings seekers of happiness, to show you the way to salvation. In fact, we are not only bound to do thus for those that seek the riches of eternity, but, to walk in the tracks of our Savior, we must love our enemies; bless them that curse us; do good to them that hate us, and pray for them that dispitefully [despitefully] use us, and persecute us, or you and the world may know, that we are not the children of God.-Therefore to be obedient to the precepts of our divine master, we say unto you, search the scriptures-search the revelations which we publish and ask your heavenly Father, in the name of his son Jesus Christ, to manifest the truth unto you, and if you do it with an eye single to his glory, nothing doubting, he will answer you by the power of his holy Spirit: You will then know for yourselves and not for another: You will not then be dependent on man for the knowledge of God; nor will there be any room for speculation. No: for when men receive their instruction from him that made them, they know now he will save them. Then again we say search the scriptures, search the prophets, and learn what portion of them belongs to you, and the people of the nineteenth century. You, no doubt, will agree with us, and say that you have no right to claim the promises of the inhabitants before the flood; that you cannot found your hopes of salvation upon the obedience of the children of Israel when journeying in the wilderness; nor can you expect that the blessings which the apostles pronounced upon the churches of Christ, eighteen hundred years ago, were intended for you: Again, if others' blessings are not your blessings, others' curses are not your curses; you stand then in these last days, as all have stood before you, agents unto yourselves, to be judged according to your works.
Every man lives for himself. Adam was made to open the ways of the world, and for dressing the garden. Noah was born to save the seed of every thing, when the earth was washed of its wickedness by the flood; and the Son of God came into the world to redeem it from the fall. But except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God. This eternal truth settles the question of all men's religion. A man may be saved, after the judgment, in the Terrestrial kingdom, or in the Telestial kingdom, but he can never see the Celestial kingdom of God, without being born of the water and the Spirit. He may receive a glory like unto the moon, or a star, but he can never come unto mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels; to the general assembly of the church of the first born, which are written in heaven, and to God of the judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, unless he becomes as a little child, and is taught by the Spirit of God. Wherefore we again say, search the revelations of God: study the prophesies, and rejoice that God grants unto the world seers and prophets: they are they who saw the mysteries of godliness; they saw the flood before it came; they saw angels ascending and descending upon a ladder that reached from earth to heaven; they saw the stone cut out of the mountain, which filled the whole earth; they saw the Son of God come from the regions of bliss and dwell on earth; they saw the
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