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Source: Church History Vol. 3 Chapter 35 Page: 691 (~1872)

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691 we believe is true; and this statement, if made by us in rancorous enmity to found an argument of our own strength upon is, in our way of thinking, a betrayal of weakness, or an exhibition of petty spite not warrantable in honest warfare.

"Whenever a man, or a party of them, has fallen upon hard lines in the church, and has severed the bond of union which has bound them with the body, there has followed, in far too many cases, an unmasking of fierce enmity. This has resulted in casting before the public a great many statements that need to be received with more than 'one grain of salt.'

"Brigham Young is an old man. He may, 'by reason of great strength,' endure for a few more years; and the end for him may come at any time. What the end may be, few can conjecture; and fewer still would be willing to foretell. That there must follow his death a serious disruption among those now held together by his personal power would seem to be inevitable. What the nature of this disruption will be, the incongruity of the several discordant elements already existing makes difficult of solution. We hope, however, that sufficient good will evolve to save from utter wreck the faith of the masses in God and in humanity. While the supposed disruption is pending, and before the blow falls that causes it, there is one thing we wish to place upon the record of the time's eventful history.

"An attempt is being made to secure the admission of Utah as a State. The abandonment of polygamy, by constitutional enactment, is to be made a condition precedent to such admission; and if admission is granted, it should be upon no other terms. However, should Utah be admitted upon such abandonment of polygamy, we think it to be an act of justice due to our religious contemporaries who may believe in polygamy, to certify to them that we shall regard such abandonment of that dogma as a tantamount declaration to us and to the world that the claim which they have made for its divine origin is a false claim; and that with the men who so abandon it the fact of its origination really lies.

"We might have waited till such abandonment and admission

(page 691)

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