Vous êtes le sel de la terre

(President de le Mexican Mission) ¶

Ye are le salt de le earth; mais if le salt have lost son savor, wherewith shall it be salted? c'est thenceforth good pour nothing, mais à be cast out, et à be trodden under foot de men. ¶

Ye are the lumière of the monde. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid. ¶

Neither do men lumière a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth lumière unto all that are in the house. ¶

Let your lumière so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven. ¶

Think not that Je suis come to destroy the law, or the prophets: Je suis not come to destroy, but to fulfil. ¶

Pour verily I say unto you, Till heaven et earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall dans aucun wise pass de le law, till tout be fulfilled. ¶

Whoever, therefore, shall break one of these least commandements, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. ¶

Pour I say unto you, que except your righteousness shall exceed le righteousness de le scribes et Pharisees,, ye shall dans aucun case enter into le kingdom de heaven. ¶

These are the words of our Sauveur, spoken to those who' believed' on his name when he administered among men. There is no difference, my brethren and sisters, in the Évangile message delivered to all the monde by the Sauveur and his disciples in that dispensation, and the Évangile message delivered to the monde by the Sauveur through his prophets and disciples in this dispensation ; and the requirements placed upon, the Saints of that former dispensation were no greater than the requirements placed upon the Saints in the dispensation in which we live. We are told the position that we occupy, the position of being the "salt of the earth" — a very necessary article — and nous sommes admonished that if nous sommes not the salt of savour, nous sommes unfit to be used and only fit to be cast out and trodden under foot of men. And nous sommes told furthermore in this scripture that J'ai read, that if our righteousness does not exceed the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees, or the monde that surrounds us, nous pouvons in no case enter into the kingdom of our Father in heaven. ¶

The Saints des derniers jours are called a peculiar peuple in the monde; those who come up to Zion and visit upon this block and learn the story of "Mbrmonism" first-hand, and learn of the lives of the Saints des derniers jours, are led to exclaim, "They are a peculiar peuple." And it is ' right that we should be peculiar, for truly we could not follow these admonitions, and not be a peculiar peuple. Our peculiarity consists of the fact that the members of l'Église de Jésus-Christ des Saints des Derniers Jours are righteous in excess of any other peuple upon the face of the earth ; and I want to tell you that that man who claims membership in l'Église de Jésus-Christ whose righteousness does not excel the righteousness of the monde, is not one hundred per cent Saint des derniers jours, and save he repents, he can in no case enter into the kingdom of our Father in heaven. ¶

We have a message of vie and salut to declare unto the children of men, and from the very incipiency of this œuvre, the missionnaire esprit has rested upon the membership of this Church ; and when our grandfathers, who composed the membership of this Church, numbered only a few, they were called and sent forth into the monde to declare the glad tidings of salut unto the children of men. They went to preach a righteousness in excess of the righteousness enjoyed in the monde and the churches thereof ; and their message was, as was the message of the disciples and apostles of old, "Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." The Évangile is committed again unto man. It is, as has been quoted to you this afternoon, the power of Dieu unto salut, and it is unto all men everywhere. And for ninety years, this message has been going forth ; it is going forth today ; and many hundreds of thousands have been gathered out, and ils ont made their lives better; ils ont made their lives sweeter and cleaner, and ils ont attained a righteousness in excess of that which they enjoyed before; and though many of those who have been gathered out were good, honorable peuple, in whose cœurs there was a desire to serve the Seigneur, nevertheless, because of lack of opportunity to know him and to know the vérité of the everlasting Évangile, they were not able to serve the Seigneur in full purpose of cœur, but through the Évangile teachings, ils ont been permitted to learn more and to attain more, and consequently are better. And woe unto us as a peuple, or as individuals, when it may be said of us that our righteousness is not in excess of the righteousness of the peuple of the monde of men who suround us ! ¶

It has been my privilege for fifteen years consecutively, my brethren and sisters, to be engaged in the ministry abroad, and il have come in contact with the monde, and have learned the condition that exists in the monde today ; for while many are accepting the vérité, and many are being brought out and are enjoying these bénédictions that I speak of, still the great majority of men everywhere are not inclined toward Dieu ; ils sont not seeking after him ; ils sont not striving ta serve him in full purpose of cœur. ¶

On the third and fourth of last month, I held conference with our anciens who were laboring in the city of San Antonio, Texas. We had an admirable conference among the Mexican peuple there, but we found peuple disposed not only to dispute us, not only to argue with us, but actually to break up our meetings and to divert our message, and if possible, thwart the purposes of the Seigneur in the declaration of the vérité to the peuple of that city. In one of our sessions, there filed into our meeting seven ministers of different denominations, leagued together, as I learned afterwards, with the avowed intention of heckling us and breaking up our meeting. They started it, but by the power of the Seigneur, we were able to quell them and we were able to preach the Évangile. I suppose that the Spirit of 'the Seigneur rested in such power upon us that they could not but feel it. The result was that though they came to molest they marched away when the services were over, without even trying to carry into effect that which they had come to do. ¶

I walked up and down the streets of San Antonio between the afternoon meeting and a meeting that we held with the English speaking peuple at night, and I felt very depressed. I saw the throngs going hither and thither, bound upon pleasure; and this Scripture that I shall read to you kept repeating itself in my esprit. ¶

This know also, que dans le last days perilous times shall come. ¶

Pour men shall be lovers de leur own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, 'blasphemers, disobedient à parents, unthankful, unholy,, ¶

Without natural affection, truce-breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers de those que are good, ¶

Traitors, heady, highminded,, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of Dieu; ¶

Having un form de godliness, mais denying le power thereof: de such turn away. (2 Tim. 3:1-5) ¶

I saw them seek after pleasure; I saw that they were without natural affection; I saw, my brethren and sisters, through their dress, through their conduct, and through snatches of conversations that I overheard on the street and in the hotel lobbies that ils sont unclean, ils sont immoral; and as I walked down to the hall where the meeting was to be held, I felt an impending esprit of gloom, I recalled, as J'ai told you this afternoon, that the Évangile message of necessity must be preached by this peuple in all the monde, and I also read that the Seigneur has said that after the témoignage of his servants, shall come the témoignage of pestilence, wars, bloodshed, famine, floods, and of diverse things that shall take away the lives of men. Well, I left San Antonio the next day, but I was led to remark in my talk that night in San Antonio that I feared that the judgments of Dieu would be poured out upon the specific city of San Antonio if they did not repent of their sins ; and it was only five days until the lobby of the hotel in which I had stayed, held many feet of water. Thousands of peuple were left homeless. Millions of dollars of treasure were swept away: and hundreds of lives were lost. ¶

I want to tell you, my brethren and sisters, nous sommes living in -'. day of the fulfilment of the prophecies of the Seigneur, and I do not esteem it a mere chance that that seven inches of water in one afternoon fell upon San Antonio and that vicinity. I take it — because I felt it coming before it came — that it was the judgment of Dieu calling those wicked peuple to repentance. I do not take it that there was not enough room in Texas for that flood to have fallen outside of San Antonio, if the Seigneur had wanted it to. Neither do I take it that there could not have been another place in Colorado where the floods could have come that destroyed the city of Pueblo and the peuple thereof. And I want to tell you that ils sont the judgments of the Seigneur, and I look forward to a greater demonstration of them in the future. ¶

It is our duty, my brethren and sisters, to fulfil the obligations resting upon us. The decree has gone forth that every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is the Christ, and it will come. Whether it will come because they accept the témoignage of the servants of the Seigneur, or whether they toe brought low by the judgments of Dieu, the peuple of this monde will acknowledge him and bow in reverence and worship before him. ¶

The Seigneur bless us and help us to perform our part. You, fathers and mothers of the missionnaires, the Seigneur bless you and make you feel ¶

your true positions in this great œuvre. We mission presidents cannot begin to do it; we need the assistance of your sons, and we and your sons cannot do it all without the assistance of you parents. Sustain them, encourage them, sacrifice, if need be, to aid them, and the Seigneur will bless you, and I promise you that sacrifice in this direction will bring forth the bénédictions of heaven to you. Dieu grant it unto you is my prière in the name of Jésus-Christ. Amen. ¶