John Taylor

“ The Scribes and Pharisees, after seeing Jesus heal the blind man, said—"Give God the glory, for we know this man is a sinner, it is true that he cast out devils, but he does it through Beelzebub, the prince of devils." Well, if they persecuted the Lord of the house, they will persecute the members of his household; if they do these things in the green tree, what will they do in the dry? The fact is, there is, and always has been, and always will be, an antagonism between truth and error, light and darkness, between the servants of God and the servants of the adversary. ”

“ The devil is called the father of lies, and he delights therein. What difference does that make to us, what do we care about it? Very little. But suppose we are oppressed. We have stood it before and we can stand it again. Suppose they should pass proscriptive laws against us. All right, if the nation can stand it we can. I will risk upholding and standing by correct principles which emanate from God. We will cleave to truth, honor, holiness, and to all the principles that God has revealed to us, and we will go on increasing in every good. ”

“ No, we interfere with the civil or religious rights of no person in this or any other city or Territory; we never did, we do not now; but we can not help being in the capacity that we occupy to-day. We form a body politic, and have necessarily become a Territory, and we could not help ourselves if we would. But we do not interfere with anybody, we observe all good and wholesome law. People will lie about us; but that makes no difference, they lied about Jesus. Our enemies say—"You are a bad people, and that is the reason we persecute you." That is what the enemies of Jesus said about him ”

“ Well, we are here in a political capacity, inhabiting a Territory, and forming an integral part of the United States. Whom do we interfere with? Nobody. Do we rob or pillage anybody, or interfere with the rights of any? ”

“ That man who has feared God in his heart, and who has not lied in his heart, that man who will swear to his own hurt and change not, a pure, virtuous, holy man who regards the rights of others as he regards his own; a man who will concede to others all that he would ask for himself, and who seeks to promote the welfare of the human family.
The Elders of this Church have been called, as the disciples of Jesus were in former times, to go and preach the Gospel without purse and script. ”

“ Terribly have they realized that invocation, for the avenging hand of the Almighty has been heavy upon them, and in every nation in which they have sojourned, they have been robbed, stripped, their property confiscated, and they have been deprived of all the rights of men. ”

“ The time will come when God's wrath will be satisfied towards them, and when they will again be his elect people and gathered to their own land, even to Jerusalem, where, as the Prophet says, "The measuring line shall go forth, and little boys and girls shall again play in the streets of that city;" ”

“ Standing in this capacity, we form a large body of people. We have lived in different places, and as the believers in the Gospel in other ages were persecuted, so have we been; and having been persecuted and driven we have come here, as Geo. ”