Erastus Snow

“ We cannot be separated; we are one. We are the Twelve Apostles, the High Priests, the Seventies, the Elders, the Priests, the Teachers, the Deacons, the Bishops. Every quorum of the Priesthood, every man in Israel, and every woman in Israel are members of the same body—branches of the same vine, and partake of the same spirit, unless they are branches that are withered and dried up. God will deal with us as a whole all the time.
How was it with Israel of old, as has been referred to by Elder Hyde? They were led by the hand of God all through the wilderness. God led Moses. ”

“ We naturally cling to our families, loving and cherishing them; so does every man that feels the weight of his responsibility—that is set over this people to administer in any department thereof: he feels his heart full of compassion, and he desires the salvation of every member thereof. So does our Father desire the salvation of every member of his family.
Many among us, in their ignorance, manifest a weakness of soul in training up their offspring. Their weakness is such that they cannot administer chastisement unto their children ”

“ He wants to teach men and women how to walk together in union and be great—to teach this people how to be bound to him and to those that he sets over them, and to teach his Saints how to reign in the house of Israel as his servants.
I do feel conscious that if the men of Israel do their duty and live their religion, reformation will go forth from them through their families, and it cannot be stayed; and every branch of every family in Israel will feel the effects of that reformation: every woman and all her children will feel it. ”

“ If any man have members in his family whom he cannot control by the principles of the Gospel, far better were it for him, if they want to go to the States or to any other country, to give them a good outfit and send them off, get them out of the way, and let them go their own way: far better this than to harbour them where they were like a viper in his bosom corrupting and corroding in the midst of his family.
The female portion of this community have to bear their share of this responsibility; and we know they are the best set of women that exist upon the earth ”

“ Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, ye mothers in Israel, and fast, and hunger and thirst after righteousness. Pray for and with your little children in your apartments. Is it enough for a father to gather together his wives and children when he is at home, and pray with them? That is his duty; and every mother should take pattern by his example, and with their own offspring follow his example and call down the blessings of heaven upon them, and they will learn from her. While they listen to her prayers, they will learn to lisp from her mouth the words of prayer and thanksgiving to God ”

“ A man said to me once, "My wife would not stand it five minutes, if I should bring a woman into my house to have a share of my company and my affections: I should have a hell upon earth, and no house that I could build would be big enough to hold my wife. ”

“ The lack is in us—in the people, and always has been, and is not in our God. He is waiting and anxious to pour out blessings, and glory, and honour, and exaltation upon his people, far more than we have ever received, and far more than we are capable of receiving ”

“ When they have discharged their duties, they are as free from responsibility as you or I. When they have done what lies in their power to do, they are exonerated before their God, although they feel as no other men on earth can feel, because there are no others placed in their condition; and it is impossible for any others to feel as they feel and have the same interest they have for the welfare of this people. ”

“ They cannot understand it, because they are governed by their passions, and not by principles; and it is the hardest thing in the world for them to be convinced that this people are governed by principle. ”

“ Where there are disobedient and rebellious children in the midst of Israel, tell me who their father and mother are, and I will point out to you disobedient, rebellious, disaffected parents; and if there is a woman in any family whose children dishonour their father, I will show you a woman that dishonours her husband and shows him disrespect, from which the children take their example. ”

“ But if the head of a family reproves iniquity and seeks to purge it from his presence—from his family, then his hands are free from stain of guilt; he is not a partaker in the transgression, and by his doings he says he will no longer hug to his bosom that individual,—he will no longer eat and drink with him or her as a member of the body of Christ,—he will no longer be held responsible for their sins. ”

“ This is my prayer all the time. Are all the families of Israel and every woman striving herself to play well her part and reverence her husband as her lord; for he is her lord. Will she ever have another? ”

“ Children grow from infancy to manhood; and whether God leads our footsteps in correct paths or not, he is only leading us to school: he is only directing our course in a round of experience by which he trains us, and makes us one, cements our hearts together, and rids our spirits of iniquity and abomination. ”

“ The trouble is not in our God, neither is it in our fellow servants—those whom he has set to be our leaders, our teachers; for God is with them, and he would be with them much more abundantly, if we as a people were more ready to listen to them, and there was place found in us for their words, and their words take effect in our hearts. ”

“ So should every man and every family rid themselves of evil and transgressors in their midst; for God deals with every family as a whole, as he deals with this people as a whole; and every man in Israel is responsible, and that responsibility he assumes when he assumes the responsibility of a family. ”

“ Every man is in his hands, to be used as he will. Whithersoever this people are led, they will be led through that channel he has intended; and whether they go to the east, west, north, or south,—whether they burn their dwellings and flee to the mountains, or remain here,—whether they fight the Gentiles, or turn their backs upon them,—whatsoever they have to do, it will be the Lord Almighty that does it; but he will do it through the channel he has appointed.
But will the responsibility of thousands be upon those men that are set over us to lead us? ”

“ Brothers Brigham, Heber, and Daniel, who are they but our fellow-servants—those that the Lord has given us to be our leaders and the mouthpieces of the Lord unto this people—the legitimate channel through which to lead, govern, and control this people? ”

“ Does every woman pray for her children and with her children? Does she teach them to reverence their father and honour him ? If she does not teach them thus to honour him in her own words and examples, her children learn disobedience from her. ”

“ Sometimes we may err by being remiss in duty—too lenient in our families, and some of us may be under condemnation by being too careless about transgressors in our families; for if we hold fellowship with transgressors and spirits that are in rebellion against God and that will not repent and humble themselves,—if we close our ears to it and go to sleep while wickedness is stalking unrebuked through our habitations, we become partakers in that transgression, and the consequences thereof will stick to us. ”

“ The history of all religious generations and dispensations is similar, and shows this fact to us, that human nature is the same in every age of the country, and among every country, and among every people,—that all men are subject to like weaknesses and have to be taught gradually. ”

“ She may tear herself loose from him and attach another, but she may have a worse one: she ought to have a worse one. If she cannot learn to honour him, the next one she gets, if she is permitted to have another, ought to be a worse one. How shall women honour their husbands? Just as we honour brother Brigham in his place, and the authorities of the Wards in their places; because upon him is laid the responsibility of that family, and he cannot get rid of it. ”

“ If a man of God lives his religion and is controlled only by the Spirit of Zion in his family, and if he has a turbulent, disobedient spirit in his family, that spirit will be subject or that individual will be separated from his family, upon the same principle that turbulent persons that repent not are severed from this Church by the vote of this people ”

“ But if this people perish for lack of knowledge at all, it is because they do not retain the word of the Lord which is delivered to them: it is not because it is not planted in our hearts, but because our ground is not properly broken up. The ground of our hearts is not prepared, that the word that is sown may bring forth fruit. ”

“ You will remember that you never got into the celestial kingdom without the aid of your husband. If you did, it was because your husband was away, and some one had to act proxy for him. No woman will get into the celestial kingdom, except her husband receives her, if she is worthy to have a husband ”

“ Men of some discretion in the Gentile world ask questions about the operations of the plurality of wives among us. "How many wives live in each house? How do they get along in their associations? Are they all the time quarrelling and fighting?" ”

“ But if I do not discharge my duties towards them, admonish them when they are out of the way, instruct them in their duties, and walk as a man of God before them, the consequences and responsibility of every individual's transgressions, even those of every wife and every child I have, and of every evil that is done in my house, shall rest upon me. ”

“ This is the trouble and the reason why we do not advance and bring forth more fruit, and grow more thrifty in the work of the Lord our God, and increase in faith, in power with God, in unison with him and with those whom he has set over us, and with one another. ”

“ We read in the Scriptures that they were so stiffnecked as to provoke the Lord, and he came out upon them in his wrath and consumed them from his presence,—sometimes by fire that came forth from his presence, at other times by causing the earth to open and swallow them up by thousands, at other times by pestilence, and at other times by fiery flying serpents which came among them and bit them that they died. ”