CHAPTER LXXV
TH E MORMONS
(Founded 1830)
Soon after the establishment of Mormonism its founder, Joseph Smith, conceived the idea of establishing a Masonic super rite. In M. R. Werner's book Brigham Young (page 62) the following remark makes this evident. " Masonry was always popular with the Mormons until Joseph Smith claimed that an angel of the Lord had brought him the lost key-words of several degrees, enabling him to progress further than the highest Masons. The charter of the Mormon lodge was then taken away by the Grand Lodge ". Joseph Smith, applying his powers of mediumship towards the realization of the ambitious project nurtured by General Pepe, Mazzini and others for the establishment of a super rite, was not necessarily acceptable to the Masonic leaders of his time. Thus as a Mason he failed but as the founder of a Masonic sect he succeeded. So much has already been written about the sect of the Mormons that we confine ourselves here to a short sketch of opinion and descriptions given by various authors. The following is extracted from The Encyclopaedia Britannica, 9th Edition " This is a religious non-Christian sect, founded by Joseph Smith at Manchester, New York, in 1830, now settled in Salt Lake City, Territory of Utah, United States... Smith was born Dec. 23rd, 1805, at Sharon, Windsor County, Vermont, from which place ten years later his parents, a poor, ignorant, thriftless, and not too honest couple, removed to New York, where they settled on a small farm near Palmyra, Wayne County (then Ontario). Four years later, in 1809, they removed to Manchester, some six miles off; and it was at the latter place when fifteen years old that Joseph began to have his alleged visions, in one of which on the night of 21st Sept., 1823, the angel Moroni appeared to him three times, and told him that the Bible of the Western Continent, the supplement to the New Testament, was buried in a certain spot near Manchester. Thither, four years later and after due disciplinary probation, Smith went, and had delivered into his charge by an angel of the Lord a stone box, in which was a volume, 6 inches thick, made of thin gold plates 8 inches by 7, and fastened together by three gold rings. The plates were covered with small writing in the ' reformed Egyptian ' tongue, and were accompanied by a pair of supernatural spectacles, consisting of two crystals set in a silver bow, and called ' Urim and Thummim '; by aid of these, the mystic characters could be read. Being himself unable to read or write fluently, Smith employed as amanuensis one Oliver Cowdery, to whom from behind a curtain, he dictated a translation, which, with the aid of a farmer, Martin Harris, 1 who had more money than wit, was printed and published in 1830 under the title of The Book of Mormon and accompanied by the sworn statement of Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Martin Harris, that an angel of God had shown them the plates of which the bock was a translation.
1. Harris married as one of his many wives the widow of the murdered Mason, William Morgan.
This testimony all three, on renouncing Mormonism some years later, denounced as false ; but meanwhile it helped Smith to impose on the credulous, particularly in the absence of the gold plates themselves which suddenly and mysteriously disappeared. " Blanchard draws a parallel between this story of the gold plates and that of the legend of the 14th degree of Scottish Rites Masonry, that of Grand Elect Perfect and Sublime Mason, according to which " the real name of God was lost, till it was found by Masons, engraved on a three-cornered gold plate, in " the ruins of Enoch. "2 In reality, this book " was written in 1812 as an historical romance by one Solomon Spalding, a crackbrained preacher; and the MS. falling into the hands of an unscrupulous compositor, Sidney Rigdon, was copied by him, and subsequently given to Joseph Smith. Armed with this book and with self-assumed divine authority, the latter soon began to attract followers. " 3 Joseph Smith was a Mason. The Gold Plate trick, having worked so successfully once, was tried again in 1843 when six plates were found by Robert Wiley, a merchant of Kinderhook, Illinois. " The true story of the plates was disclosed " so Stuart Martin writes in The Mystery of Mormonism (page 69), in an affidavit made by W. Fulgate, of Mount Station, Brown County, Ill. on June 30th, 1879, when he swore before J. Brown, Justice of the Peace, that the " plates were humbug, gotten up by Robert Wiley, Bridge Whitton, and myself.
2. Blanchard, Scottish Rite Masonry, vol. I, p. 380.
3. Enc. Brit., Art. Mormons.
Whitton, who was a blacksmith, cut the plates out of pieces of copper. Wiley and I made the hieroglyphics by making impressions of beeswax and filling them with acid. " He describes the burial and the finding of the plates, and states that among the spectators at the " discovery " were two Mormon Elders, Marsh and Sharp. Smith and his followers founded the city of Nauvoo and " such were the powers granted them by this charter as to render the city practically independent of the State Government, and to give Smith all but unlimited civil power. He organized a military body called the Nauvoo legion, of which he constituted himself commander with the title of lieutenant-general, while he was also president of the church and mayor of the city. On April 6th, 1841, the foundations of the new temple were laid, and the city continued to grow rapidly in prosperity and size. " Smith's career of treason, profligacy, dishonesty, polygamy, spiritism and humbug, came to an abrupt end when the gaol in which he was imprisoned by order of the Governor of the State was broken into by a mob who shot him and his fellow prisoner, his brother Hyram. As head of the Mormons he was succeeded by Brigham Young (1801-1877). In 1846, the repeal by the legislature of the charter of Nauvoo resulted in the Mormons being driven from the city. In March 1849, they held a convention at Salt Lake City, and a State was organized under the name of " Deseret ". " A legislature was elected and a constitution framed, which was sent on to Washington. This, Congress refused to recognize, and by way of compromise for declining to admit the proposed new State into the Union, President Fillmore in 1850 organized the country occupied by the Mormons into the Territory of Utah, with Brigham Young as governor. " Adopting Smith's policy of aggressive military action, Brigham Young, like his predecessor, defied the Federal Government. He died on August 29, 1877, leaving 17 wives and 56 children. 4 The following description of a Mormon ceremony was printed in the Rosicrucian in an article entitled " Ancient and Modern Mysteries " by M. W. Frater Robert Wentworth Little (page 169). " The converts are then required to purchase white linen garments, which are furnished by the ' high deacon '. They are then conducted to the temple, ushered into a private room, and commanded to undress for the inspection of the presiding elder '. This official, after a minute examination, clothes the neophytes in the linen robes or garments of endowment and conducts them into a large room which is divided by white screens into many small compartments. Each neophyte enters one of the compartments, and is ordered to take off the ' endowment robe ' and to step into a long coffinshaped tin bath. The elder then pours water upon the naked victim — blessing each member of the body as the water touches it — ' the brain to be clear and strong — the eyes to be bright and sharp — the ears to be quick to hear ', and so on down to the feet — this ceremony being performed upon all, without distinction of sex. A new name is then given to each convert by the elder, who commands them to ' arise and follow me '. A magnificent garden, full of exquisite fruittrees, is the scene of the next ceremony. The candidates are still in a state of nudity, which represents primeval innocence, and the Temptation of our First Parents is the subject of the next drama.
4. Enc. Brit., 9th Ed. Art. Mormonism.
The women are directed by an elder personating Satan to pluck an apple from a certain tree, and after they have tasted, to hand it to the men. Brigham Young then appears, and drives them out of the garden with a flaming sword. They return to the temple, implore forgiveness on their knees for all trespasses and transgressions and the ceremony concludes with a benediction upon the new Saints, pronounced by the lips of this polygamous president. " Such is a brief outline of the ' Rite of Endowment' the details of the scene being, as may readily be conceived, of too obscene a character to be explained at greater length. " Brigham Young was succeeded by John Taylor, an Englishman and a Freemason. His apostolic successors were Wilford Woodruff, Lorenzo Snow, Joseph Fielding Smith (eldest son of the founder of the order) who died Nov. 19th, 1918, and Heber J. Grant.5 About Mormonism and Masonry, Blanchard makes the following remark : " The two institutions are morally and legally the same. " 6 The Mormon dogma is universality, materialism and pantheism. It blends Judaism and Christianity, aiming at a progressive universal religion while seeking to unite in itself all faiths and the cults of every people on earth. The Mormon state is a theocratic community at the head of which is a grand priest-president assisted by two others and a travelling council of twelve. Its mysteries are those of spiritism and the seance room.
5. Stuart Martin, The Mystery of Mormonism.
6. Blanchard 33°, op. cit., vol. II, p. 373.
For root of this movement see Chapter XLVII.
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