Human Betterment and the Progress of the Lord's Work

I hope that my voice, which is somewhat disabled by a cold, will permit me to speak what is in my heart. ¶

It is about two thousand years, according to our accepted chronology, since the Lord Jesus Christ died on Calvary, since He commissioned twelve apostles and other seventy and sent them' forth to preach the Gospel to every creature. It is over one hundred years since the Prophet Joseph Smith came into the world to restore the Gospel, from which the world had departed. ¶

It is seventy-eight years since the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized, and Mormonism — so-called — has been preached among the nations during that time. ¶

The question uppermost in my mind today is this : Has the world been benefited by what the Lord has done ? Is it growing better or worse as a result of the efforts put forth by the God of Heaven for the salvation of mankind? I think there can be but one answer to such a question. I am a believer in the progress of the human race. I believe that the world, in spite of its wickedness, its opposition to the truth, and its hatred of the people and the cause of God, is six thousand years nearer to perfection than when Adam fell from the Garden of Eden. I believe that this Church, in spite of its derelictions, its disobedience to some of the requirements of the Gospel, its neglect of some of the principles revealed from heaven for the perfecting of the Saints and for the salvation of all people — I believe that this Church, in spite of its errors of omission and commission, is in a better condition today than it has ever been. I cannot consistently take any other view, and yet I know that there is great room for improvement. The present condition, however superior to the conditions of the past, furnishes no argument to justify stagnation and stand-still. ¶

The Apostle Paul exhorted the Church in his day to be progressive. In his epistle to the Hebrews he says : "Therefore, leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on to perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, of the doctrine of baptism, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment." Paul, of course, did not mean that any principle of the gospel should be abandoned or put upon the shelf. There never will come a time when faith will not be essential to salvation. It is one of the greatest of principles, and although it comes first, it is no small or trivial thing. There never will come a time when repentance will not be necessary, so long as men sin and depart from God. The Apostle did not mean that the Church, in its progress to perfection, should leave these principles behind, as having no further use for them; though that construction might be put upon his words, if the letter be taken without the spirit. Hence the Prophet Joseph Smith, in revising the scriptures, saw proper to insert the word "not" in that very injunction of the Apostle Paul, making it read : "Therefore, not leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on to perfection." It was a plea for progress, but not a license to lay aside as a thing that had outlived its usefulness, any principle of salvation. ¶

The work of the Lord is always progressive. There has been progress in the world from the beginning ; not in every part, not in every particular, but in the general trend of human affairs as manipulated by Divinity. God has not been thwarted in the work that He set out to perform — the redemption and eventual perfection of the world that He created. The lives and labors of the patriarchs, from Adam to Abraham; of the prophets, from Moses to Christ; and of all good men and women who have figured in history before and since that time — these have not been in vain. Noah's mis sion did not fail, though the antediluvian world went down to death for rejecting his testimony. Through Noah the truth was perpetuated and the earth repeopled after the flood. I cannot conceive that the Son of God could die to lift up fallen humanity and nothing but degeneracy and degradation result. I cannot conceive that a man like Joseph Smith could live, or that such a religion as "Mormonism" could be preached in the world for upwards of seventy years, and mankind not be benefited thereby. It is perfectly apparent to those who see aright that the doctrines taught by Joseph Smith have permeated society, have modified the religious creeds of men, and are acting as a leaven upon the world at large. ¶

I was once conversing with a Christian minister, who said that he did not understand the position taken by the Latter-day Saints toward the good works that were being done by other religious organizations and by philanthropic and progressive agencies in general. "You have an article of faith," said he, "which commits you to the admiration of and search after every thing that is virtuous and praiseworthy." The article referred to is as follows : "We believe in being honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous, and in doing good to all men; indeed, we may say that we follow the admonition of Paul; we believe all things, we hope all things; we have endured many things, and hope to be able to endure all things. If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report, or praiseworthy, we seek after these things." Said this gentleman, "That being one of your articles of faith, I cannot understand why you take no account of the good that is being done outside of your own community. Here we are, retranslating the scriptures, endeavoring to make them more perfect, more accurate, and you take no interest in it. We are uncovering buried cities and civilizations, deciphering ancient monuments and manuscripts, and you account it of little or no worth. We are founding hospitals and reformatories, sending missionaries to the ends of the earth, establishing missions and charities, pleading for justice, kindness, peace and progress — and you take no stock in what we are do tag." ¶

I answered that he was very much in error in his supposition. And I think that the gentleman would have modified his opinion had he been present here yesterday when President Joseph F. Smith, during his splendid discourse upon the Word of Wisdom, gave a most hearty endorsement to the great temperance movement that is rolling like a mighty billow over the land; when Heber J. Grant, one of the apostles of the Church, presented a resolution, which was unanimously and enthusiastically adopted, pledging this great people to an effort to secure legislation for the closing of saloons and the discouragement of the liquor traffic ; when the president of the apostles, Elder Francis M. Lyman, feelingly commended the good work that is being done by enterprising and benevolent men in all countries. Had my ministerial friend been present this morning, he would have heard another apostle, John Henry Smith, fresh from the National Irrigation Congress at Albuquerque, New Mexico, utter similar sentiments, reminding us that we are one in sympathy and friendship with all agencies that have as their object the betterment of mankind, whether in the redemption of these arid wastes, the success of the great temperance cause, the safeguarding of morality, or the correction of evil in any form. The gentleman would have found that the Latter-day Saints stand by their articles of faith, and that Mormonism befriends every good cause, every high enterprise started by any people in any part of the world. And why not? Many of these movements are the fruits of the preaching of "Mormonism" among the nations, while others are the fruits of Christianity, which, in its purity, from our point of view, was only the "Mormonism" of an earlier day. ¶

Let me now present a few paragraphs from an article by a scholarly and learned divine, Dr. Henry Van Dyke, who, in his admirable essay, "Is the World Growing Better ?" says : ¶

"No man knows of a certainty the answer to this question. If it were an inquiry into the condition of the world's pocket book, or farm, or garden, or machine-house, or library, or school-room, the answer would be easy. Six million more spindles whirling in the world's workshop in 1903 than in 1900; eight hundred million more bushels of wheat in the world's grain-fields than in 1897 : an average school attendance gaining 145 per cent, between 1840 and 1888, while the population of Europe increased only 33 per cent. So the figures run in every department. No doubt the world is busier, richer, better fed, and probably it knows more than ever before. * * * But is it growing better? That is another question, and a far more important one * * * I asked John Friendly, the other day, 'Do you think the world is growing better? 'Certainly,' said he, with a smile like sunrise on his honest face, 'I haven't the slightest doubt of it.' But what makes you so sure of it? 'Why, it must be so ! Look at all the work that is being done today to educate people and help them into better ways of living. All this effort must count for something. The wagon must move with so many horses pulling at it. The world can't help growing better !" ¶

Then he left me to go down to a meeting of his 'Citizens' Committee for the Application of the Social Boycott to Political Offenders' (which frequently adjourns without a quorum). Immediately afterwards, I passed the door of the 'Michael T. Moriarty Republicratic Club' — wide open and crowded. On my way up the avenue I saw a liquor saloon on every block — and all busy. The news-stands were full of placards announcing articles in the magazines — ■ "Graft in Chicago," "The Criminal Calendar of Millionaires," "St. Louis, the Bribers' Paradise," "The Plunder of Philadelphia." Headlines in the yellow journals told of "Immense Slaughter in Manchuria," "Russia Ripe for Revolution," "The Black Hand Terror in the Bronx," "Gilded Gambling Dens of the Four Hundred," "Diamonds and Divorce." ¶

"John Friendly's cheerful a priori confidence in the betterment of the world seemed to need reinforcement. Some of the horses are pulling his way, no doubt, but a good many appear to be pulling the other way. Under such conditions the wagon might stick fast or go backward; possibly it might be pulled to pieces. Who can measure, in the abstract, the comparative strength of the good and evil forces? Who can tell, beforehand, which way the tug of war will go ?" ¶

Dr. Van Dyke then goes on to show that there are three main points of goodness — justice, kindness, and self-restraint. A man is said to be growing better when he is becoming more just, and careful to do the right thing; more kind, and ready to do the helpful thing; more self-controlled, and willing to sacrifice his personal will to the general welfare. The doctor declares his belief that the modern world, in two of these important directions, manifests a great improvement over the ancient world. He reminds us that in order to arrive at anything approaching a correct conclusion in the premises, we must be willing to take a long view and a wide view. "What we have to look at is not the local exception, nor the temporary reaction, but the broad field as far as we can see it, the general movement as far as we can trace it;" and taking that view, it seems to him that the world is really growing better; "not in every eddy, but in the main current of its life ; not in a straight line, but with a winding course; not in every respect, but in at least two of the three main points of goodness." ¶

To illustrate the growth of justice, he cites the fact that in Shakespeare's time a woman was looked upon as a mere piece of property. She belonged to her husband ; he could beat her with impunity; he could deprive her of the guardianship of her children ; the very presents that he gave her were still his property, for she could hold nothing in her own right. But all that has been changed; woman today is a person in the light of the law; she can hold property for herself, and can share equally with her husband in the guardianship of her children. The wife-beater is now punished as a criminal. "Surely," says our author, "it is an immense gain in justice that woman should be treated as a human being." He holds that not only is woman rising among those nations that lead the march of civilization, but that even in Mohammedan and in heathen countries her cause is gaining ground. ¶

In the same way he interprets the laws that protect the young against cruelty, oppression, and injustice, citing the Factory Act of 1833 and the Mines and Collieries Act of 1842 in England as examples of a steadily-increasing effort since that time to diminish and prevent the degradation of the race by the enslavement of childhood to labor. Moreover, it is now regarded as unjust to deal with young delinquents as if they were old and hardened criminals. "No more herding of children ten and twelve years old in the common jail ! Juvenile courts and probation officers, asylums and reformatories; an intelligent and systematic effort to reclaim the young life before it has fallen into hopeless bondage to crime ; this is the spirit of the civilized legislation of today. In 1903 no less than ten of the American states enacted special statutes with this end in view." ¶

The abolition of ancient and medieval methods of judicial torture — such as the rack and the thumbscrew— and the abandonment of brutal and degrading methods of execution are also mentioned : Criminals are no longer impaled, crucified, disemboweled, or buried alive; and capital punishment, which was formerly inflicted for stealing and for forgery, is now confined to the two great crimes of murder and treason. Some things that were once punishable are no longer prosecuted, such as heresy, witchcraft, religious nonconformity; and, on the other hand, new offenses have been created that were formerly ignored, such as the adulteration of foods, gambling, the violation of laws in restraint of the liquor traffic, selling cigarettes to children, tapping electric wires, disfiguring the landscape with advertisements or printing them on the American flag, making combinations in restraint of trade, sleeping in a public bakery, spitting on the floor of a street-car. "A large part of what appears to be the increase of crime in recent years (according to statistics), is due to this new definition of misdemeanors. * * * Another part comes from the greater efficiency in the execution of the laws and the greater completeness in the tabulation of reports. * * * Pike's History of Crime in England estimates that in the fourteenth century murders were at least sixteen times as frequent as in our own day." ¶

The learned doctor also refers to the abolition of the slave trade, the establishment of international law, the granting of copyrights to foreign authors, and the purchase, by the United States government, of the lands owned by the Spanish friars in the Philippines, instead of the confiscation of those lands, which would have been the rule a hundred years ago. These and other acts are cited as evidences that the spirit of justice is growing among men and nations. ¶

In regard to the increase of kindness in the human race, he thinks that the evidence is even more clear and strong. "There are more people in the world who love mercy, and they are having better success in making their spirit prevail. More is being done today to prevent and mitigate human suffering, to shelter and protect the weak and helpless, to minister wisely to the sick and wounded in body and in mind, than ever before in the history of mankind." The work begun by John Howard a hundred and thirty years ago, which has done so much to cleanse away the shame of a cruel, filthy and irrational prison system, is given prominent mention. Our author affirms that since the middle of the nineteenth century charity has grown twice as fast as wealth in England, and three times as fast in France. In the United States the amount of the larger gifts ($5,000 or more) rose from $29,000,000 in 1893 to $107,000,000 in 1901. And "with all this increase of money comes an equal increase of care and thought in regard to the best way of using it for the real benefit of mankind. Reckless almsgiving is recognized as an amiable but idiotic form of self-indulgence. The penny dropped into the beggar's hat gives place to an inquiry into the beggar's condition. * * * * * * * * Schools of philanthropy are established to study and teach the economy of generosity. Asylums are investigated and supervised. Relief funds are intrusted to responsible committees, who keep books and render accounts." ¶

Upon the broad theme of international mercy, the doctor states that since the days of Abraham there have been three hundred and fifty great famines in various parts of the world, but, he asks, who ever heard, before the nineteenth century began, of any of the hungry nations receiving help from the outside? "Now, within a week after the distress is known, money, food, and help of all kinds begin to flow in from all quarters of the globe." The Hague tribunal is referred to as an effort to get rid of the hell of war, or at least to mitigate its horrors and torments, and comparison is made between modern and ancient methods of conducting war. "Let any man," he says, "read the story of the siege and sack of a town in Holland by the Spanish soldiers, as it is given in Motley's 'Dutch Republic,' and compare it with the story of the capture of Paris in 1870, or even the taking of Pekin in 1900, and he will understand that war itself has felt the restraining touch of mercy." "Not one of the great nations of the world today would dare to proclaim a war in the name of Religion." ¶

Our author then comes to the third factor of real betterment — self restraint. In justice and kindness, the world, he believes, is becoming better, but in the matter of self restraint, the willingness to sacrifice one's own passion and pleasure for the good of others, he says : ¶

"Here, I confess, my guessing is confused and troubled. There was a vast improvement from the fourteenth to the nineteenth century, but whether the twentieth century is carrying on the advance seems uncertain. * * * The theory of individual liberty threatens to assert itself in dangerous forms. Literature and art are throwing their enchantments around the old lie that life's highest value is found in moments of intense self-gratification. Speed is glorified regardless of direction; strength is worshiped at the expense of reason. Success is deified as the power to do what one likes. Gilding covers a multitude of sins. On the one hand, we have a so-called 'upper class' which says : the world was made to amuse me ; nothing else matters. On the other hand we have an apparent increase of the criminal class, which lives at war with the social order. Corporations and labor unions engage in a struggle so fierce that the rights and interests of the community are forgotten by both parties. In our own country, lynching— which is organized murder for unproved offenses — grows more common. Divorces increase to 60,000 in one year; and there is an epidemic of shocking accidents and disasters, greater than any hitherto recorded, and due, apparently, to the spirit of unrestraint and recklessness which is sweeping furiously in its motor car along the highways of modern life. ¶

"Is this selfish and headlong spirit growing? Will it continue to accelerate the pace at which men live, and diminish the control by which they are guided ? Will it weaken more and more the bonds of reverence and mutual consideration and household fidelity and civic virtue, until the states which have been civilized by the sanctions of love and the convictions of duty are whirled backward by the passion of self-indulgence into the barbarism of luxurious pleasure or the anarchy of social strife?" ¶

He concludes that it is neither brave nor wise to give these troublesome questions an answer of despair. Two are stronger than one, and if the world has grown more just and more kind, we can reasonably trust that in the long run it will improve in the matter of self-restraint, and the selfish, reckless spirit will be overcome. ¶

This seems to me a very intelligent and comprehensive view. I thought of it while President Smith was speaking yesterday, when he declared that his motive for presenting the Word of Wisdom was the fact that it was more neglected than any other revelation which God had given to this people. Right in line, you see, with the argument of this learned man, that in the matter of self-restraint there is a laxity, even among those who are otherwise just and kind — not just, not kind to themselves, however. And in this spirit of self-indulgence, this unwillingness to curb and control the passions, there lurks a danger that threatens the disruption of society. It behooves every good man and every good woman to stand in a solid phalanx against any tendency that imperils the happiness of the human race and nullifies in any degree, the good that is being done in the interests of temperance, virtue and philanthropy. ¶

One more thought and I will conclude. I wish to recur to a question propounded by Dr. Van Dyke in the fore part of his interesting essay : "Who can measure, in the abstract, the comparative strength of the good and evil forces? Who can tell, beforehand, which way the tug of war must go?" ¶

I can, and you can ; every soul illumined by the Holy Ghost can tell what will be the inevitable outcome. If God and Satan are pulling against each other, what will happen must be plain to every reverent, thoughtful mind. The issue is not in doubt. God will not be mocked; Omnipotence will not be defeated. While He allows the agency of man and the agency of Satan their full play, never at any time has He given to man or to Satan the power to destroy His work or prevent the fulfillment of His predestined purpose. Strength will prevail over weakness. Truth will triumph over error. No matter what trials and persecutions the cause of Christ may have to undergo before its victory is assured, the final outcome will be glorious. Christ will complete His work; the righteous will be saved ; the wicked, damned ; and the world will attain perfection. ¶

"Truth forever on the scaffold ; Wrong forever on the throne; Yet that scaffold sways the future, And behind the dim unknown, Standeth God within the shadow, Keeping watch above His own." ¶