Du premier conseil des soixante-dix

[FR] of the First Council of Seventy ¶

[FR] I am very glad and happy that we as a people have passed safely over another six months period. ¶

I desire to say to you that my life is being crystallized into a very few things that are important to me. The great hope that I have is to be saved in the kingdom of God. I have a great desire to be true and faithful and devoted in my work; to be honest, frank and straightforward with the people. I know of no other way. I can see no other outlook, and I have no other desire than to sustain the priesthood of God, to uphold those whom we sustain as prophets, seers and revelators in the Église of Christ. If there is not safety in this there is no safety for the Saint des Derniers Jours people. ¶

[FR] I have never in all my travelings and teachings among the people been told what to say. I realize the importance of this occasion. I understand what time means. At the conference six months ago I was fortunate in being called upon, and I occupied three minutes. To my surprise I was complimented everywhere I went. People say it was the best sermon I ever preached. Of course, did I believe what they said to me I would close now ; but I have what I think is a message, at least I desire to call your attention to a certain matter that transpired with me this year. ¶

[FR] About the fourteenth or fifteenth of August Dr. George W. Middleton, together with Elder Levi Edgar Young and the doctor's son, (I was an invited guest), went by auto to Casper, Wyoming, 515 miles distant from Salt Lake City. The purpose of the meeting which we there attended, was to honor the pioneers. It was held under the auspices of the Oregon Trail Memorial Association. The officers of this Memorial Association are as follows : President, Howard R. Driggs; Vice-President, David G. Wylie; Secretary, Ellen Eaton; Treasurer, Guthrie Y. Barber. There are also fifteen directors. Dr. Middleton is appointed to look after the markers in Utah. ¶

[FR] I now read the parting words of Mr. Meeker: ¶

[FR] " 'I am not quite ready to go ; my work is unfinished,' were at once a benediction and a request to the Memorial Association. They reflect the inner spirit of the foundation of the Oregon Trail Memorial Association. At the same time they lay sacredly upon us the great cause for which he gave his last full measure of devotion." ¶

[FR] It is not my purpose to enlarge upon this Oregon Trail subject. Never before, strange to say, (and I was born soon after the people arrived in this valley) did I get the spirit of what it all meant. I have never understood, I have never comprehended, what it all meant to our fathers and mothers, the pioneers. But I confess to you that I have had that feeling burning within my bosom, that desire, to do honor to those great men and great women who made it possible in this day for us to enjoy all the comforts of life. ¶

[FR] I quote from Professor Driggs: ¶

[FR] "We are brought a little closer to the tragic cause of it all when we realize that fully twenty thousand lost their lives in an effort to reach the Golden West They had no means of marking the graves of the dead in those prairie stretches. Only one grave out of all of the twenty thousand, so far as we know, is surely marked. I refer here to the grave of the pioneer mother near Scott's Bluff, Nebraska. When Rebecca Winters passed away one of the company had the forethought to pick up an old wagon tire that lay along the trail. Bending it into an oval he set the tire within the grave. On the top of the tire was chiseled the mother's name and age. A party of surveyors laying out the railroad along the North Platte happened by mere chance to run their line right over the mother's grave. Then the surveyors, with a touch sympathy that is beautiful to think of, went back for twenty miles and changed the line of survey, that it might miss the mother's grave." ¶

[FR] That is the purpose of this organization, and they contemplate in the year 1930 a great gathering at Independence Rock. They desire to make that a national marker in the United States. It is a great barren rock. I have read of it many times but never saw it before. These markers will call the attention of the people to what has been accomplished by these pioneers, a thing that many people know very little about. I desire to be one among the number to honor such men and women. ¶

[FR] At Casper we held a meeting Friday evening. I think there were something like two hundred people assembled, who were among the best and choicest of the people of that community. Professor Driggs, Elder Levi Edgar Young and Dr. Middleton talked. The people were friendly, they were courteous, they were in sympathy with the Mormon pioneer people as well as the Memorial Association of the Oregon trail. ¶

[FR] There is a story — it is beautiful — I love to make an effort to tell it. The history of the West sounds like tales of the Arabian Nights; but as far as I know only parts of it have ever been told. ¶

[FR] Dr. Driggs asks: "Will the warp hold? It will hold providing we can keep alive the sacred stories of the pioneer builders of this nation in the hearts of American boys and girls." ¶

[FR] Coincident with the Mormon Pioneer movement their prophet prophesied they would go to the Rocky Mountains, and, in a way, they were forced to go west. They started out not for conquest, not intent upon spoil, but to worship God, build up cities, do mighty deeds and to build for greater happiness. ¶

[FR] Had it not been for great spiritual leaders this barren wilderness could never have been peopled in so short a time, and it would not have gained much momentum had it not been for immigration. It would appear that this people threw themselves almost blindly into what would seem to the natural man, impossible, but under the leadership of inspired men they accomplished the unbelievable. ¶

[FR] We must not forget to remind the next generations of the glorious strength of faith, hope, courage and the love of God they possessed. ¶

[FR] Try to remember that the pioneer, no matter of what race, is fast disappearing. Often he is a tragic figure. History is leaving him behind. Few of us are so gifted as to be able to attract and to converse intelligently with our own children. A parent must be a genius to tell of the days of their strength, the days of their suffering, sorrows and defeats, and yet make clear how they won glorious victories. ¶

[FR] The next generation cannot feel, neither can they understand, sense or appreciate what it all means, surrounded as they are with ease, comforts and luxuries. They are unmindful, and it should be burned into their souls and memories, to respect the doting pioneer, tottering with old age, to remember their minds are stored with the richest experience and historic lore. ¶

[FR] We have no way of testing and proving the next generation, through trials, sacrifices and suffering; neither can we force these historical truths upon them, and to reason would seem fruitless. It is said: "People shape their lives largely the way we are today living." ¶

I have thought a great deal about our fathers and mothers and their great object, and I have wondered what it was that the Saint des Derniers Jours people had — the desire, the ambition, the faith and the hope — that enabled them to sacrifice, suffer and die for the Évangile of Jésus-Christ. I am made to understand what their great objective was. Something new had transpired. God the Father and Jésus-Christ the Son had appeared to that young man Joseph; and also the everlasting Évangile, a knowledge of the truth as it is in Jésus-Christ and the power of God unto salvation, had been revealed. The restoration of the Évangile, the restoring of the priesthood with all its keys and its powers and authorities were conferred upon these men ; also the eternity of the marriage covenant, including a plurality of wives. ¶

The bringing forth of the Livre de Mormon, the redemption of Zion, and the building up the City of Jerusalem, and the gathering of the Ten Tribes — these were the great objectives that were placed before our fathers and mothers. ¶

[FR] I often think of mother, and while she was a very practical woman, a woman who lived by faith, a woman who had suffered and sacrificed, a woman who had left her whole race of people and was the only one we know of who has ever been converted from her immediate family, yet mother had that great vision of the celestial glory, of becoming a queen. And surely she is a queen, because when I visited her people I brought to her over one hundred names of her ancestors, and we went into the temple at Logan and did the work for that good mother of ours. ¶

[FR] That was the dream, that was the great vision, that they had of the future; and that was why they were sustained in their suffering and in their sacrifices and in their troubles and in their tragedies. ¶

My dear frères et sœurs, what is your objective? That question has been put to me more than once. Our objective is to carry out the will of God and through the direction of his servants the prophets to fulfil every prophecy and every revelation that we find written in the Doctrine et Alliances ; for surely God will not forsake his people if they will repent of their sins. It is needless for me to say more. ¶

For the past week or so I have read the Livre de Mormon through, and I was surprised how deeply interested I became in the people who inhabited this continent. I discovered that whenever they served God and kept his commandments they prospered in the land ; and whenever they failed (and I hope we will never fail) then came their destruction, until that people became extinct. ¶

I pray God to bless you. I pray God to be with each and all of us, for I do not believe that a man can remain faithful in this Église and devoted and true to his covenants, who fails to keep the commandments and who has not a testimony that Jesus is the Christ. To this end I pray that the blessings of the Lord may rest upon us, in the name of Jésus-Christ. Amen. ¶