George Q. Cannon

“ Each man and each woman can interrogate himself and herself upon this point. Each man can ask himself in the light of the Holy Ghost, how near he comes to fulfilling all the requirements which are here made, or how far he is from arriving at that perfection which these revelations demand, and each woman can do the same, and we can in this mirror of divine truth look at ourselves in our true light and see our reflection by the Spirit of God as it is revealed unto us in these revelations. ”

“ I do not expect that Satan will be bound in any other way. Of course God will bring His power to bear; He will do it. God will have the glory of it, because it cannot be done by man. Man's power is insufficient to accomplish it. It must be done by man's obedience, by man's submission to God's law, by man's continually doing that which God commands him and requires of him, and in this way alone can it be brought about. ”

“ I believe that there is a higher standard of life being sought after by the Latter-day Saints. I believe that the Priesthood themselves are seeking more diligently to carry out the counsels which God has given and to set examples unto the people that they shall imitate, and I know that the Spirit of God rests down upon His servants to make them more rigid in the enforcement of the laws that God has revealed unto us concerning the government of His church, so that there may be more purity, a higher standard of purity enforced and maintained among us than has been in the past. ”

“ Have we not as Elders proclaimed to the world that the sectarians do not have the gifts and graces of the gospel because they do not keep the word of the Lord, do not keep the commandments of God? Has not this been our testimony to the nations of the earth Yes, all of us who have gone forth to proclaim the word have thus testified time and time again. Will not that rule apply to us as a people? Certainly it will. The men who obey the laws of God most perfectly, and the women who do so, have the greatest faith, and God will bless them in proportion to their faith ”

“ I look upon the men and upon the women who have entered into the new and everlasting covenant concerning patriarchal marriage as being more advanced than their brethren and sisters who have not obeyed that law. And if a community were found who would enter upon the order of Enoch as God has revealed it and who would hold themselves and their property subject to that law, I should look upon them as still more in advance and still nearer to that perfection which God designs to bring about in Zion among the Latter-day Saints. ”

“ In the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ as God has revealed it unto us, there are laws so perfect that when this people called Latter-day Saints shall obey them they will be so far lifted up above the power of Satan that he will have but little power to tempt them. But we never shall be emancipated from the power of Satan until we do obey these laws of God. An obedience thereto will bring emancipation to us and to every human being on the face of the earth, and it is upon no other principle that emancipation can be brought. ”

“ But there is only one way in which we can remain connected with this Church, and that is by keeping step with it, by marching onward, obeying the counsel that God gives through His servants, and by being pure in all our thoughts, in all our words, and in all our actions. In no other way can any human being—however great his attainments, however great the blessings he may have received, however great the promises which have been given unto him—ever remain connected with this work. ”

“ Not that I would convey the idea that God is not going to help us, that God is not going to do it by His power; I would not convey any such idea, because I know and you know that without God's help all our efforts are powerless, and it is vain to seek to do anything in and of ourselves ”

“ This land to which God led us and in which He has planted us is still a land of liberty to us and to all those who are of our faith. To me this is a cause of profound thankfulness, for it is an evidence that God has not forgotten us, that the promises which he has made are still kept in remembrance by Him, and that as a people we have been living so as to receive the fulfillment of those promises and the benefits which flow from them. ”

“ There is one thing, however, connected with the work of God which is very gratifying, that notwithstanding the perils through which we have passed, though our liberties have been menaced, and the perpetuity of the institutions of the kingdom of God have to human appearances been endangered, we still meet together this day in this Tabernacle unembarrassed from the efforts of our enemies and free to worship our God according to the dictates of our own consciences. ”

“ If a man wants a wife he can get one among the Latter-day Saints. You organize society aright, as God contemplated in these revelations, and those evils under which we now groan—this dishonesty and this disposition to take advantage of each other—will be done away with. ”

“ It will be as well adapted to the government and organization of the people when the Church of Christ shall extend itself throughout the earth, and when the whole people will become the people of God, when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is the Christ—just as well adapted then as it is now. ”

“ The nearer we approach unto God the more perfect we live in accordance with the revelations He has given, the more faith undoubtedly we will possess, the more God will hear us, the nearer the heavens will draw to us, the more the heavens will be opened to us to hear our cries and to answer our petitions. ”

“ God has devised a plan and has revealed it, that in its operations will relieve mankind from those evils and the commission of those sins to which they are now subject. When we are organized properly theft will cease among us, for the temptation to steal will be removed. ”

“ He taught us in the first place that it was necessary to have faith in Jesus Christ, then to be baptized for the remission of sins, then to have hands laid upon us for the reception of the Holy Ghost. Then the people that were scattered were taught to gather out from the nations of the earth. Every law that they obeyed brought salvation. ”

“ He will bless their families according to their faith; the gifts of the Spirit will be manifested more in their behalf than upon those who deliberately violate or are careless concerning the word of God. ”

“ We have a Bishop in Salt Lake City who, I believe, took an account of the number of those who were sick in his Ward, and he brought a statement to the President’s office to the effect that in the families where the Word of Wisdom was strictly observed fewer deaths had occurred than in families where the Word of Wisdom was not observed. ”