Wilford Woodruff

“ Men can go no further than they are permitted by the Lord. I have often remarked, and I repeat it, your destiny, the destiny of this nation, and the destiny of every king, prince, president, statesman and ruler under heaven are in the hands of the God of Israel. He made the world and all its inhabitants, and they can go no further than they are permitted. If we unite ourselves according to the law of God we shall have far more safety than if we turn away from the commandments of the Lord and set our hearts upon the things of this world. If we forget God we are liable to be scourged ”

“ As a people we have to meet this warfare, and the Saints of God have had to contend with it in every age of the world. Any man who undertakes to serve God has to round up his shoulders and meet it, and any man who will not trust in God and abide in his cause even unto death is not worthy of a place in the celestial kingdom. Said Jesus—"I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hate you; if you were of the world the world would love its own. ”

“ They rejected the things of the kingdom of heaven, and the spirit of God was taken from them, and that class of people, in every age of the world is the darkest of any who ever breathe the breath of life. They lose all confidence in every principle of salvation and eternal life revealed to man. ”

“ I always have said and believed, and I believe to-day, that it will pay you and me and all the sons and all the daughters of Adam to abide the celestial law, for celestial glory is worth all we possess; if it calls for every dollar we own and our lives into the bargain, if we obtain an entrance into the celestial kingdom of God it will amply repay us. The Latter-day Saints have started out for celestial glory, and if we can only manage to be faithful enough to obtain an inheritance in the kingdom, where God and Christ dwell, we shall rejoice through the endless ages of eternity. ”

“ Eternal life is worth more to a Saint of God than all things else put together, in fact it is the greatest gift God ever gave to man, or that he can give to him, and whatever the Lord requires at our hands we should be ready to do, individually and collectively.
As I have often remarked in my testimony, from my youth up I had a desire to live to see a people rise up in the earth and contend for the faith once delivered to the Saints, who would receive and teach the Gospel of Jesus Christ as it was taught in his day and generation. ”

“ I am after salvation and eternal life, and I do not want anything to stand between me and that which I am in pursuit of. It does not make any difference what we as a people may be called to pass through. ”

“ It has been promised that the New Jerusalem will be built up in our day and generation, and it will have to be done by the United Order of Zion and according to celestial law. And not only so, but we have to keep that law ourselves if we ever inherit that kingdom, for no man will receive a celestial glory unless he abides a celestial law; no man will receive a terrestrial glory unless he abides a terrestrial law, and no man will receive a telestial glory unless he abides a telestial law. ”

“ In the seventeen hundred years which are past and gone, over fifty thousand million people have gone into the spirit world who never saw the face of a Prophet or of an Apostle, and never heard the words of an inspired man, for during the whole of that time no man was called of God to build up his kingdom on the earth. ”

“ We, as a people, have had a great deal of teaching and counsel in our day and generation. Some of us have been taught in the things of this kingdom for over forty years, and, by this time, we ought to exercise faith in the promises of God. ”

“ We have looked forward to the fulfillment of the revelations which have been given in all ages and dispensations which are past and gone; and we have not only expected their fulfillment, but we have helped to fulfill a great many of them in the course of our lives. This work is the work of God, it is not the work of man. ”

“ Let us attend to the ordinances of the house of God, and unite ourselves according to his law, for Jesus will never receive the Zion of God unless its people are united according to celestial law, for all who go into the presence of God have to go there by this law. ”

“ As some of our brethren have said, there is need for us to repent and humble ourselves before the Lord our God, that we may have and enjoy more of the Holy Spirit to prepare us for that which lies before us. ”

“ The amount of it is that everything we have herein these valleys of the mountains,—this Tabernacle, this Temple, these public grounds, and all the cities and towns that have been built over six hundred miles of Territory, are the gift of God to us. The Lord knows this country was barren enough when we came here, and a faithful people were tried here with cricket and grasshopper wars, until famine stared them in the face ”

“ This is the only dispensation that God has ever established that was foreordained, before the world was made, not to be overcome by wicked men and devils. All other dispensations have been made war upon by the inhabitants of the earth, and the servants and Saints of God have been martyred. This was the case with Jesus and the Apostles in their day. ”