George Q. Cannon

“ If plural marriage be divine, as the Latter-day Saints say it is, no power on earth can suppress it, unless you crush and destroy the entire people. But supposing it is not divine, as many people say it is not, supposing that it is not of God, do you not think the forty millions can afford to let it alone? If their position be true do you not think they are safe to do more among the 200,000 people who believe, and a portion of them practice it, by moral force than by persecution and violence? ”

“ They were Latter-day Saints gathering up from various lands, some from Switzerland, from France, from Great Britain, and from the various nations of Europe, all coming together, singing the songs of Zion in their own languages, bearing testimony that God had revealed to them in their own language the truth of this, the everlasting Gospel. With such a spirit they come to these mountains, they scatter among the people already here, they become homogeneous. ”

“ Even if they were all honest, patriotic, fair and just men, their selection without our voice is an injustice; but which no people can bear better than we. We are, however, learning lessons which will be of immense importance to us in days to come; for as sure as the sun shines, as sure as God lives, so sure will this people called Latter-day Saints become a governing people. It is an inevitable consequence in the very nature of things. We possess all the elements to make a strong, mighty, governing people. ”

“ As Latter-day Saints, we have been accused of every crime. It has been told of us that we were ready to commit murder at any time, in order to serve our own ends, that we were ready to shed the blood of the innocent, and that this feeling to destroy life existed among us, when at the same time, throughout these wild mountains and secluded valleys life has been more safe, property more secure, than in the streets of the best managed cities in the Union. ”

“ One of the greatest crimes, the greatest, with the exception of the shedding of innocent blood—and it is a doctrine that is taught by the Latter-day Saints, and should be taught by every man in his house-hold—that can be committed, is the seduction or defilement of the weaker sex. There can be no greater crime committed, except the shedding of innocent blood, and people thus taught, what will they be? Why, if they observe such teachings, they will be strong, vigorous and mighty. Can you repress such a people? ”

“ Not to one man, not to three men, not to apostles, not to bishops, not to high priests, not to seventies, not to elders alone, but to every humble soul who in sincerity, and with a broken heart and contrite spirit, bows himself or herself in secret before the throne of the great Eternal, and in humility asks, in the name of Jesus, for a knowledge to be imparted to him or to her whether it is the truth he or she has heard. ”

“ But is there not evidence sufficient before the eyes of this generation of what has been done in the past, in the persecution of righteous and holy men, in the killing of them, in the shedding of their blood, that men cannot learn that there is such a thing as a man being a good man, a virtuous man, a pure man, and yet be maligned by the enemies of purity and virtue, as in the days of Christ? ”

“ Of what value, of what special value, would these revelations be to those to whom they were imparted through the medium of these men, unless they had some means of testing their truthfulness? What a terrible condition we should be in if God, in his providence, were to confine his knowledge in that way—if we were required, as some imagine mankind are required, to submit to the teachings of their fellow-men and to accept and practise them because those men say they are from God! ”

“ Why, could there be any greater evidence given of the divine character of this mission than is witnessed in the effects of this Gospel upon the people who embrace it? We are led to expect that heaven is a place of unity, a place of love; that there is no quarreling, no litigation, no strife in heaven; no man warring against his fellow-men, no man exalting his creed and his ideas as superior to the creed and the ideas of his neighbor ”

“ They are unpopular. Still if we are men we will be prepared to endure all the consequences, whatever they may be, and make no fuss about them. But I am trespassing on your time. May the Lord bless you, fill you with the Holy Ghost, and keep you a holy people, and enable you to overcome all evil, is my prayer in the name of Jesus Christ. ”

“ There are people in this country who fear us. The very fact that they do fear us by their refusing us our rights, not only shows that they do not understand us, but it is a recognition on their part of our power ”

“ The nation of which we form a part looks with more interest upon us as a people than upon any other part of the United States. There is no people, no community, within the confines of our Republic concerning which there is so much interest felt as the Latter-day Saints. ”

“ A man that enters this Church ought to be able to die for its principles if necessary, and certainly should be able to go to prison for them without crying about the matter. If you are sentenced to prison for marrying more wives than one, round up your shoulders and bear it like men and no murmuring about it; prepare yourselves to take the consequences. We know that for the Gospel in ancient days many laid down their lives with joy, that the great Captain of our salvation was crucified, and that nearly all the prophets perished by violence. ”

“ This is the reason that illiterate men, going forth bearing testimony of these things, have been so successful throughout all the nations of the earth where they have been, and it is this that draws them, as we have been told this afternoon by Brother Staines, by thousands from foreign lands and causes them to come to this land and to assimilate with those already here; until we have in this Territory of ours, throughout these valleys running north and south, east and west, a people unexampled, and, in many respects, unlike every other people that we know anything about. ”

“ There never was a day, when the Latter-day Saints lived alone in these valleys, that a woman would be insulted either by word or by gesture, night or day, whether an old lady or a young lady, in traveling from one end of our Territory to the other. ”

“ Will the entering of a suit against the executors of the estate of the late President Young, or the Trustee-in-trust of this Church destroy this work? Why, the men who say so have failed to read history. They do not understand anything connected with human progress and with human powers, if they flatter themselves with such opinions as these. All these things intensify the people, they add to our strength. ”

“ I have remarked this in Congress myself, that whenever I want to accomplish anything in connection with our Territory, I always find men who have been here and who have seen for themselves and formed their opinions accordingly, ready to do anything in reason that I ask. ”

“ If we expect, then, to be one with them, and inherit the same glory that they do we should be prepared to endure the consequence of adhesion to, and our advocacy of the truth; and so we should in regard to every doctrine we have embraced. ”

“ Now we will see which is the best policy. I do not believe in being defiant. Men that marry more wives than one should be able to bear the penalty of it if there be any attached thereto, or they should not take them. ”

“ Men's eyes are directed towards us. I believe we are becoming better understood. The completion of this railroad, which was supposed to be the death-knell to Mormonism, the discovery of these, mines, which we ourselves rather disliked, those things that many supposed would be the means of destroying this people, have now been in operation for years, and with what result? With this result, so far as my observation extends—a better knowledge concerning this people, and the circumstances which surround us ”