Orson Pratt

“ If, then, no man living, without the aid of the Spirit of God, has ever been able to detect even one of these elementary atoms or particles of matter, how great must have been the enlargement of the vision of Moses—a man still in mortality—to enable him to discern every particle of the earth, inside as well as on its surface! If a man in a state of mortality could have his vision so enlarged that he could see all these particles at once, what may be expected when we are immortal, and entirely freed from all the defects of mortality? ”

“ Now if children of mortality can so far prevail against the element of fire that it has not power even to scorch a hair of their heads, how much greater will be the power of those who are immortal! Hence, I do not believe that heat will have any tendency to dissolve, destroy, injure or to produce any unpleasant effects upon them, as it has with us here in this world. Here then will be an increase of power and capacity, so far as the body is concerned, over and above that which we have in this life. ”

“ But to be in the presence of God is it absolutely necessary that our earth should be wafted away from its present orbit in the solar system and carried off to some immense distance in space? Is this really necessary? What are we to understand by being in the presence of God? ”

“ Hence there is something more perfect in the construction of the works of the Almighty that lets man into his presence whatsoever part of the universe he may exist in—we may have the veil removed, and his presence become visible. ”

“ The beasts, fowls and fish and all living creatures are to be resurrected, and if man has had incorporated in his system in the course of his mortal life nine-tenths more matter than it needs to make a perfect resurrected body, why not let that surplus matter go where it belongs—to the beasts of the field, to the fowls of the air and the fish of the sea, that they may receive their tabernacles, and be resurrected? ”

“ Through those more perfect faculties which God will give to immortal man. It is as easy for his children when they are perfected and made like him, to converse with him at these immense distances and for their eyes to pierce all these creations as it is for their Father and God to do so.
Thus we see that man is a God in embryo, agreeing with that which the Lord has revealed to us in the vision given to Joseph—"They shall be Gods, even the Sons of God," growing up like their Father, their bodies fashioned like his glorious body. ”

“ Now how do we know but what the immortal body may be so constructed that there may be certain fluids—fluids, perhaps, with which we are not acquainted—intervening between world and world, and between one star and another,—certain thin elastic fluids, so subtle in their nature that we cannot see them with the natural eye, or perceive them by any of the sense of the mortal body, yet the immortal ear may be so constructed that this refined substance would transmit sound with the velocity of light itself. There may be such things in nature; we cannot say they do not exist. ”

“ Every species of being with which we are acquainted begets its own kind, and the young thereof, whether man, quadrupeds, fowls or fish, finally grow up and become like their parents. This is a universal law of nature, so far as we know; therefore if we are begotten sons and daughters of God, if we are his offspring, he is our Father, and why separate man from all the rest of creation, and say that he can never become like his Father? ”

“ I do not ask whether immortal beings will partake of food—that is another subject—but will it be necessary to partake of food to sustain and preserve the immortal body? We read that immortal beings have eaten food, that even our first parents, Adam and Eve, before they fell, while they were yet immortal, were permitted to enter into the Garden of Eden, and that they had food to eat of a vegetable nature, that they were permitted to eat of all the fruits of the garden except one. ”

“ God bless this Association, and we hope that it may exert a salutary influence not only over the young men of Ogden, but over the young ladies also, and over the middle-aged and old, and that they may seek every opportunity to develop the godlike qualities with which they are endowed, that in a time to come the young men here, being filled with the spirit of wisdom and understanding and the knowledge of God, may be able to bear off His kingdom victoriously, and be prepared for the time when the knowledge and glory of God shall cover the earth as the waters cover the great deep. ”

“ Placed here upon the earth among the myriads of its creatures, man seems to be prominent, in fact the masterpiece of creation, a being endowed with intelligence and reasoning powers, and with more or less power over all other beings and creatures upon the face of the earth. But still, notwithstanding his intellectual powers and faculties, man, in his present condition, is a poor, weak, frail, fallen being, subject to afflictions, pains, accident and sickness, and after a while he passes off from this stage of action. ”

“ Man is destined for all future duration—destined to act in the capacity of a celestial being. The faculties he now possesses in embryo are but little understood, yet we occasionally see them developed among holy men, as in the case of Enoch, Moses and Abraham, who had the Urim and Thummin, and who were able to behold many of those creations of which I have spoken. Among the many attributes and powers which man will possess in a future state, I will mention that of being able to comprehend more than one thing at a time. ”

“ If all other beings become like their parents, why not we attain to the same? And if our Father and God can pierce all those creations mentioned by Enoch, and his eye discern what is going on in the midst of them all, why may not his children become like him in this respect? ”

“ Now, if a man in a state of mortality can gain such power and influence with God as to prevail against and overcome the law of gravitation, which chains us down to the surface of the earth, how much more power will immortal beings have!
Again we, by the laws which surround us, are limited in our hearing. What man ever heard a sound fifty miles off? There may have been such instances, but as a general thing there are, I presume, very few men on the surface of our globe who ever heard a sound that came thirty miles through our atmosphere ”

“ There are many reasons to suppose that man will exist in a future state. Those who believe in a Supreme Being, capable of producing man and the earth upon which he dwells, might almost without the aid of revelation, naturally conclude that man, being the workmanship of the hands of that Supreme Being, was not intended to pass away and be forgotten with the termination of this brief existence, but that he was intended to live hereafter. ”

“ If each world should roll into his presence successively, and then give place to others, we should be out of his presence almost continually, for all those worlds I have named are not a beginning, not even a beginning to the number of his creations, and yet if they had to come along and be successively rolled into his presence, so as to be near him personally, if each one stayed there only five minutes, there is no man who could calculate or realize anything about the almost infinite duration that would have to elapse before they could come round a second time into his presence. ”

“ The attributes and faculties with which man is endowed in a mortal state are Godlike in their nature, but they are weakened and incapable of any very great expansion by being shut up in this frail mortal body; but when we are freed from mortality we have the promise that we shall become like him, and if he can grasp in his comprehension and vision all these numberless creations, so will those who are made like him be able to do the same. ”

“ Now if he has taken Zion to his own bosom from all these numberless creations, can they all be concentrated in a little spot of a few rods in diameter in order to get into his presence? Why no. If each Zion did not occupy any more space than one particle of our globe, yet inasmuch as the worlds are more numberless than the particles of millions of earths like this, how could they all get into so small a space as to get near to the person of the Lord? ”

“ We read there that when the first angel among the seven shall sound his trump, all nations and kindreds and tongues of the earth shall hear it. Will it be so much louder than any sound we now hear, that it will go to all the nations and tongues of the earth and all men hear it? "Every ear," the revelation says, shall hear the sound of that trump; it will be something that all the kindreds, peoples, tongues and nations upon the face of the whole earth will be able to perceive and understand. Now, there must be some medium through which this sound is transferred, different from our atmosphere ”

“ No, we are told in Scripture, upon which we found our arguments, that when the new heavens and the new earth are made, God will make all things new, and there shall be no more sorrow nor pain, neither shall there be any more death, but pain, sorrow, weeping and death will be done away; consequently the immortal body will be free from all those evils that have come by the fall. Let us examine another thing in regard to the immortal body. ”

“ Here we are chained down to one thing at a time, and while a man is attending to and trying to comprehend one thing he almost loses sight of everything else, except it be some few things that are very familiar to him. ”

“ Oh no, death is a consequence of the imperfections introduced by the Fall; it was not in the body when our first parents were placed in the Garden of Eden. Man brought death upon himself, and it and other evils introduced by that event will be done away, and hence in a future state will not exist. Sleep refreshes us here in this life, and we spend about one-third part of our time in that condition, and it is absolutely necessary to our existence in mortality ”

“ They have gone back to meet with familiar acquaintances, and their memories will be so increased and perfected after they leave this body that the things of their former state and condition will be fresh to them, and they will look upon this little speck called time, in which they have dwelt seventy, eighty or ninety years, as but a dream or night vision during which the things of former ages were shut from their memories ”

“ Now the fact that the particles which compose our bodies undergo so many transmutations after we leave this mortal existence, entering into the flesh of animals, then helping to build up the bodies of human beings would almost seem, especially to the minds of infidels in opposition to the idea of a resurrection; and I do not believe that every particle that is ever incorporated in the systems of human creatures will be resurrected with them, I have no such idea. ”

“ In those days, while Adam and Eve were immortal, the beasts, fowls and fish did not destroy each other, which would indicate immortality. If in those days the lion would eat the lamb, the wolf, the kid, and ravenous beasts would devour their fellow beasts, it would have been an indication that mortality existed then in the earth; but there was no such thing as mortality when man was first placed in the Garden of Eden. ”

“ When we examine divine revelation upon the subject of the resurrection, we find that every part of this mortal tabernacle that is laid down in the grave, so far as needful to constitute a perfect body, will be resurrected. ”

“ We are now laboring under the imperfections of the fall, and because of that fall a vail shuts us from his presence; but let the effects of the fall be removed and mankind be able to again look upon the face of their Father and Creator, and they will be in his presence.
Will the spirits of men, before they receive their resurrected body, return into the presence of God? Yes. Read what Alma said to his son Corianton on this subject, describing the state of the spirit between the time of death and the resurrection. ”

“ The idea that every particle that ever entered into the composition of our mortal bodies will be resurrected is inconsistent [inconsistent] ; for who does not know that a man often changes in weight? For instance, when he is an infant he weighs but a few pounds; he continues to increase in flesh through the food that he partakes of, and not only in flesh but also in the size of his bones until he attains perhaps a hundred and ninety pounds in addition to the ten or twelve pounds that he weighed in infancy. ”

“ But can immortal beings live without food? Yes, even the children of mortality can live without food when the Lord sees proper. For instance, Moses, on two different occasions, when he went up into the mount, was there forty days and forty nights, and the Scripture says, expressly, that he neither ate nor drank during that time. Now, if a person in mortality could be sustained forty days and forty nights, on two occasions, as Moses was, why would it be necessary for an immortal personage to eat to preserve life. ”

“ He says—"It has been made known to me by an angel that the spirits of all men, as soon as they are dead, whether wicked or righteous, shall return home to that God who gave them life;" that is, they go back into his presence. The wicked, however, are again cast out into outer darkness, the light of the countenance of their Lord is again withdrawn from them, a vail is let down between them and their Father and God. ”