Brigham Young

“ Many of their traditions are good, and many of the people possess much good moral religion; I may say, so far as morality goes, that they are just as good as people can be, but they are not taught how to govern and control themselves, they are not taught the worth of their present life. The whole drift, labor, and exertions of the priests of the day among the people are to prepare them to die. ”

“ The Lord has given extensive lines of operation to both Saint and sinner, but when he gathers his family he expects them to first master these so-called little things; he wishes us to learn to live with each other, and to surround ourselves with all the common necessaries and comforts of life. Until this is done we are unprepared to receive the greater blessings, for if we had them now we should not know what to do with them. It is our business to live, to learn how to preserve our lives, and labor to make the earth into a Garden of Eden ”

“ Do you know how to raise grain for your bread? "No." Do you know how to raise watermelons? "No." Do you know how to raise pigs for your meat? "No." Do you know how to raise chickens? "No." Do you love to eat them? "Yes." Do you know how to raise calves? "No." You may give them a cow and calf, and two years will not pass before they have neither cow nor calf. Do you know how to improve your fruit? "No." and thus they live without trying to produce for themselves these necessaries and comforts of life. Finally, what do you know? "Why, we know that we must prepare to die." ”

“ But no, my brethren, this is not what you have come here for; the Lord has called the people together expressly to teach them the things which pertain to this world and to this life, that they may know how to honor the life he has given them here.
The inhabitants of the earth are ignorant with regard to the design of their being; they are as ignorant in this respect as the wild animals that roam over the plains. They may be very religious, but the religion that is popular in the world now is entirely another thing from the ways of the Lord. ”

“ But when the people of God are gathered out to one place, they are then taught the so-called little things that pertain to every day life, which they cannot be taught while they are in a scattered condition. ”

“ I need not here rehearse the history of the children of Israel, with which the majority of this congregation are well acquainted, but I wish to say that if all instances where the power of God has been displayed through the Elders of this Church were written, we should find that as great and wonderful, miracles have been wrought among this people as have been wrought among any people in any age of the world, and yet this Church is only in its infancy. ”

“ Let us realize one fact in addition to the great miracles that have ever been exhibited among God's people. From the beginning of the world to this time, when the Lord has gathered together a people to be a chosen people to him, he has always begun to educate them by instructing them in the little things pertaining to life, which he never does when his people remain mixed with the wicked. Before the Lord, through Moses, called upon the children of Israel to leave Egypt, he had no such instructions for them as we have quoted ”

“ It is our privilege to grow and increase continually, to receive knowledge upon knowledge, and prepare to enter upon the higher duties of eternal life. We thus proceed from one step to another until we merge into immortality. We do not become another kind of beings in passing through the resurrection, but we are more refined through the application of the laws of the Gospel to our lives and passing through the grave. ”

“ I would that people knew more than they do about these important matters, but we are where we can be taught. Will the people be taught? Will they cheerfully receive instruct-tion and profit by it? I hire the best gardeners I can find, and they are ignorant of their business; they scarcely know one apple from another or one fruit tree from another. If I spend five hundred dollars to have a strawberry-bed made, I may perhaps get a quart or two of the fruit; I may safely say that I shall not receive enough fruit to half cover the outlay. ”

“ There are people who have been in this city twelve years, and have not planted in their gardens a single fruit tree. The Lord wishes us to know how to provide for ourselves all things necessary for our comfort in bread, fruit, and clothing. ”

“ There is a saying that a wife so disposed can throw out of the window with a teaspoon more than her husband can throw into the door with a shovel. I am sorry to say that this is too much the case. A good housewife disposes of her cooking utensils, dusters, towels, floorcloths, barrels, buckets, &c:, in a neat, cleanly, and labor-saving manner. A good mechanic has a place for every tool, and when he has done using a tool it is returned to its place as by magic, without any apparent effort. ”

“ They need to be taught; yet they know as much about these matters as the children of Israel did. They also need to be taught, when their husbands bring into the house a hundred weight of flour, not to throw it out of the door; and when they make bread of it to make it light, palatable, and healthy, instead of making cakes as indigestible as a whetstone, that when your husbands come from work and your children from school they may have bread to eat that will sit easy on their stomachs. ”

“ It is my business to teach mankind how to live, how to honor their present existence, how to treat their bodies so as to live to a good old age on the earth, and have power to do good and not evil all their days, and be ready to enter into the rest prepared for the Saints. ”

“ The grave will take away every deformity from the mortal organisms of the faithful, and they will be perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect.
We have now space to prove ourselves worthy to receive the glory that God has in store for the faithful, but we have to learn the little things first. ”

“ There are potatoes to boil, bread to bake, meat to cook, and fruit in stew. Perhaps the first thing that is done is to put the tea to steeping, then fry the meat, then prepare the potatoes for boiling, and about the time the potatoes are done the bread must be mixed; while the bread is baking the tea is spoiling, the meat and potatoes are getting cold and unfit to eat; when the bread is ready, as likely as not the fruit is forgotten, and a great effort has to be made to prepare the fruit ”

“ In righteousness this people far excel the ancient Israelites; indeed, I would not wish to compare the righteousness of the children of Israel with the righteousness of the Latter-day Saints, for multitudes of the Latter-day Saints will enter into the rest of the Lord, but only two persons out of the hosts of Israel were permitted to do so. ”

“ Cleanliness and neatness of person are desirable and good to see, but this may be carried to an extreme that is both tiresome and expensive; there is a class that is more nice than wise. Nothing less than linen pocket-handkerchiefs by the dozen will answer for some of our ladies. "Husband, don't get me less than three dozen handkerchiefs, for I must have from three to half-a-dozen a-day, it is so nice to be clean." ”

“ Almost any Elder in this Church can preach the Gospel, if he is humble before God; he can tell all that the wicked would need to hear from the Old and New Testament. Many of the Elders are scholars, and when they preach we expect to hear almost a Bible and a half preached before they get through ”

“ I can instruct any man how to improve seedling fruit, and have it as good as the imported kinds. The best fruit that ever grew will deteriorate under bad management and neglect. I advise farmers and gardeners to understand their business and make it profitable ”

“ It is useless for husbands to suggest to them the expediency of taking the clothes in, for they will let them remain notwithstanding, and be worn out. Go into the kitchens of these very nice, neat wives who can nurse a pocket-handkerchief to a charm and apply it to their nasal protuberances with such refined grace, and you hear Sally asking Sue for the dishcloth. ”

“ It is our duty to learn how to govern ourselves, and how to conduct ourselves pleasingly in the sight of heaven towards our friends, families, and neighbors, building up cities and towns, opening farms, planting vineyards and orchards, and improving our country, until finally, we shall be ready to rule. ”

“ All things belong to the Lord, and we belong to the Lord, and if we are faithful until we have passed the ordeal and proved ourselves worthy before the heavens to receive our crowns, then we shall receive a deed of that which the Lord gives to us. ”

“ Almost any female can, knit a stocking, for this seems to be their employment when they sit down to rest. Children are taught to knit, but the majority never progress any further than this in the art of manufacturing. ”

“ A good farmer takes care of his implements of husbandry. Instead of leaving them scattered all over the farm, they are carefully gathered together, properly cleaned and greased to defend them from rust, and put in a safe place until they are wanted. ”

“ Seeing many such instances as these in the Bible, we cannot marvel at a man's talking about paper rags in a religious meeting, and saying that it is the word of the Lord or at least the word of wisdom that we should save our rags. ”

“ There are very few of our farmers that know how to prepare the ground and plant the seed in a way to secure a ready germination and quick growth. I told my farmers this spring how to prepare the ground for sugar-cane, and to plant the seed three-fourths of an inch deep. ”