Orson Hyde

“ But the wrath of Heaven was not upon us; it was only the wrath of man. Do you not see the difference between the wrath of Heaven and the wrath of man? If our enemies had been one with the Almighty, or if he had been one with them, we should have been obliterated long before this. But here, in us, is the evidence that the world and the Almighty do not exactly agree. They never did, and they never will agree, and hence I say the Saints will live when the ungodly shall wither and die; when the wicked are in ruin and disgrace, this people will flourish under the blessing of our Father and God. ”

“ We may fancy to ourselves that we would like to see the dead raised from their sleeping tombs; we may fancy that we would like to see the mountains broken down, the valleys exalted or the floods in their course stayed at the behest of the servants of God; we may indulge in ideas and desires similar to these, yet said I, if there be an amount of evidence addressed to your understanding, which seals conviction upon your heart with regard to the truth, how will you meet that conviction in a coming day, when we come to stand before God and the spirits of just men made perfect? ”

“ In this way we came to these valleys, and had to so live till we got something from an untried soil, not knowing whether a peck of wheat, corn or potatoes could be raised from it, but Heaven blest our labors, Providence smiled upon our exertions and we made out to continue along until the land became abundantly blessed, and now our granaries are filled with plenty If the wrath of God had been against this people to the same extent that the wrath of man was against us, where would we have been to-day? ”

“ These things, although silent, are upon the pages of history, they are still in the memories of men, but though silent they speak in language too powerful for the world to conceive their strength and weight in the balances which shall determine their future destiny. ”

“ Now, I can tell you that we are not going to do anything very wonderful nor very shocking, but if we are faithful and keep ourselves unspotted from the world, our God is going to astonish the nations; he is going to do something both wonderful and mighty, and it will be dreadful to the wicked ”

“ It is not the weather, it is not the might and power of nations that can stay the progress of Jehovah's designs. We are living, as you all know, I trust, in a momentous period of the world. I will here remark that in the course of some conversations I have recently had with certain individuals, we have had occasion to enquire somewhat into the purposes and designs of the great Creator in these days in which we live. ”

“ The field of learning is boundless, and I venture to say that the most learned man in the world is far more studious when he gets into higher branches than when he first com-menced his studies, for he can discover fields of learning which before he could not conceive of, and so it is with the works of Jehovah ”

“ We came into these valleys under the protecting care of our heavenly Father. We came with a few old crazy wagons, and many of us but very poor teams, for be it known unto you that the people who took our homes put them at their own prices, and paid out their own commodities; and if they had an old wagon which they thought would bear up till we got beyond the confines of civilization they would turn it out, considering that would be long enough for it to last us. ”

“ Notwithstanding the inclement and uncomfortable state of the weather, the wheels of time do not cease to roll and bring a few of us together on the morning of the first day of the week, to worship the King and Lord of Hosts. ”

“ He would simply have to say, such a man's house is on fire, and every one could understand that. The simple proclamation of the Gospel was just as easy to be understood. Now, if it were some difficult diplomatic negotiation which required to be entered into, it would require all the embellishments of art to secure it a passage through, but the simple message of the Gospel required no such learning, it was simply to call upon the people to repent and to inform them. that the chastising arm of Jehovah was about to fall upon the nations. ”

“ I have noticed the providences that have attended this people from their origin in the year 1830, and I have noticed this, that a prejudice has been indulged in, by those who did not choose to embrace the Gospel, against the people of the Saints. There has ever been a kind of feeling indulged in by the world that the Saints were going to do something very bad, something dreadful ”

“ The way their sails are new set indicates that they design some evil, some mischief, and they have said within themselves, Let us forestall the pending difficulty and remove the danger before we encounter it. This has been the feeling of the world, so far as my acquaintance extends in connection with the progress of events and advancement of this people. Storms have been drawn around us repeatedly, and caused us to be broken up and expelled from the land where we had made our homes ”