It has been customary at the April Conferences

It has been customary at the April Conferences to make announcements and to read some statistics. We regret the absence of Elder Reed Smoot, of the Council of the Twelve. I have a telegram from him reading as follows : ¶

Telegram from Elder Reed Smoot

"I send greetings to the Saints assembled at the General Conference. Allie's serious sickness, only thing that prevents my presence. Blessings of God is the only power that can save her. I would appreciate the faith and prayers of the people assembled, asking our heavenly Father to grant, if it is his -will, that she be given further life, with renewed health and strength." ¶

Reed Smoot. ¶

Other Authorities Absent

The Presiding Patriarch is absent on account of ill health. ¶

As you all know, Elder James E. Talmage, of the Council of the Twelve, is presiding over the European mission, and cannot, therefore, ■be with us. I regret, on account of the serious illness of a daughter of Brother Joseph W. McMurrin, of the First Council of Seventy, that he also is absent. All the others of the General Authorities of the Church are in attendance today. ¶

Changes and Releases

There has been a change in the presidency of the Lethbridge stake, President Hugh B. Brown being honorably released, and Asael E.' Palmer appointed president; a change also in the Maricopa stake, J. W. ¶

Lesueur being honorably released and James Robert Price being sustained as president. ¶

Changes and releases in the mission field: John H. Anderson has been released as president of the Swedish mission, and Andrew Johnson appointed to succeed him. ¶

Ernest LeRoy Butler has been released as president of the Samoan mission, and Willard L. Smith appointed as president. ¶

Brigham S. Young has been released as president of the Northwestern States mission and William R. Sloan appointed as his successor. ¶

Joseph Quinney, Jr., has been released as president of the Canadian mission, and Charles H. Hart appointed as his successor. ¶

Brigham H. Roberts has been released as president of the Eastern States mission, and Henry H. Rolapp appointed as his successor. ¶

New wards have been organized: Kimball ward, St. Joseph stake ; Cedar Third ward, Parowan stake; Manila ward, Lyman stake; Lankershim ward, Los Angeles stake; Littlefield ward, Moapa stake; Ogden Twentieth ward, Ogden stake ; and the Graham and Hibbard wards in the St. Joseph stake have been combined. ¶

We mourn the loss of the following bishops since our last meeting : John A. Hunt of St. Charles ward, Bear Lake stake; Edgar O. Nielson of Cleveland ward, Bannock stake; Edwin Olpin of Pleasant Grove First ward, Alpine stake, and John J. Burgner of Darby ward, Teton stake. ¶

Financial Statement

Following is a list of expenditures from the tithes of the Church for the year 1926: ¶

Stake and Ward Purposes — There has been returned from the tithes to the stakes and wards for operation, maintenance, and building construction, $1,530,243.64. ¶

Education — Expended for the construction and operation of Church schools, $837,810.47. ¶

Temples — Expended for the construction, maintenance, and operation of temples, $322,500.36. ¶

Charities — For the care of the worthy poor and other charitable purposes, including hospital treatment, $187,570.43. ¶

Missions — For the maintenance and operation of all the missions, and for the erection of places of worship and other buildings in the missions, $738,737.75. Total $3,616,862,65. ¶

Other Charities — In addition to charities paid from the tithes, as before named, there have also been disbursed the Fast Offerings, other charities and assistance rendered by the Relief Society, in the sum of $436,055.44, which amount, added to the $187,570.43 paid from the tithes, makes the total charity assistance rendered by the Church, $623,625.87. ¶

There were transferred from the California mission, at the time of the organization of the Los Angeles stake of Zion, the Adams ward ¶

chapel and other chapels to the value of $200,000. The California mission at the present time owns chapels of a value of over $400,000. The chapel at Oakland is as fine a chapel, and holds about as many people, as any of our ward chapels in the stakes of Zion. It has been decided to organize another stake of Zion in Northern California, with San Francisco, Oakland and surrounding country to compose that stake. ¶

There have been collected by the various wards of the Church and paid to missionaries, to assist in their maintenance, $128,299.65. ¶

Report of the Auditing Committee

"President Heber J. Grant and Counselors, Building. ¶

' Dear Brethren: As the Church Auditing Committee, we have to report that the accounting of the Church, as shown by the records in the First Presidency's office and in the office of the Presiding Bishopric, is all that could be desired. The receipts and disbursements, the revenues and expenses of the Church are so carefully and accurately kept that the present worth or financial status of the Church is clearly shown. The affairs of the Church are wisely administered, and the present showing is excellent. It is gratifying to know that the credit of the Church comes under the very highest rating, but it is still more gratifying to know that the Church is under no necessity at present to use its credit in the commercial world by borrowing money. ¶

"(Signed) ¶

"HENRY H. ROLAPP, "JOHN C. CUTLER, "PETER G. JOHNSTON, ¶

"Auditing Committee." ¶

Statistics

Church Growth — Children blessed and entered on the records of the Church in the stakes and missions, 19,701. ¶

Children baptized in the stakes and missions, 15,024. ¶

Converts baptized and entered on the records of the stakes and missions, 6,663. ¶

There are now 96 stakes of Zion, 915 wards, 77 independent branches connected with the stakes, and 27 missions and 734 branches in the missions. ¶

Social Statistics — Birth rate, 31 per thousand. Marriage rate, 13.9 per thousand. Death rate, 7.7 per thousand. Families owning their own homes, 72 per cent. Persons recommended to the temple, 58,958, or 6 per cent more than in 1925. ¶

Missionaries from Zion, December 31, 1926, 2,188. [Remainder of this statistical table is badly garbled in the OCR scan and cannot be reliably transcribed: local missionary count, missionaries engaged in stake work, and total figures are not legible.] ¶

The Assistant Historian of the Church, Elder Andrew Jenson, has ¶

handed me a compilation of the missionaries that have been in the field from the year 1830 until 1926. The lowest number is 16 missionaries, the first year of the Church. The highest number sent out in anv year is 1,313, in 1925; 1,235 in 1926, and 1,211 in 1919. The total is between 35,000 and 40,000 missionaries that have been sent into the field. \ jl I ¶

Reports from the Missions

Speaking of the missions, I will read some few requests from a number of mission presidents : ¶

The Northcentral States: "We shall be losing about twenty missionaries in the next twenty days, which will bring us down to about fifty-seven. Our greatest need, therefore, is more missionaries." ¶

Central Statess "We need long-term missionaries more than anything else right at the present time." ¶

California mission: "We are parting with short-term missionaries almost daily, and need fifty elders and twenty-five lady missionaries to care properly for the districts that are open. More missionaries will be released during the next three months than the foregoing number." ¶

Australian mission: "In this report we have four fewer missionaries than a year ago, and in February we have nine who will leave this mission, and unless we receive recruits very fast we will be very shorthanded by the first of March." ¶

German- Austrian mission: "Our work is going forward by leaps and bounds. We are needing four or five elders each month in order to hold our present field. We should be opening new fields." ¶

Danish mission : "Elders are needed as we will soon be seriously handicapped on account of so many who will receive releases to return home." ¶

Swedish mission : "During the coming month there will be about five other elders released. We would appreciate receiving more brethren, especially those who understand Swedish ; or better still if they can speak it." ¶

The French and Swiss-German missions also make the same appeal. ¶

(At this point President B. H. Roberts remarked: "I wish to join the chorus in behalf of the Eastern States mission.") ¶

I might say that the chorus will be unanimous, for I do not believe there is a single mission that has not made appeals, but I have just put down a few to read here this afternoon. ¶

(President B. H. Roberts: "President Grant, remember our great population in proportion to our number.") ¶

I find that each and every mission president is thoroughly converted that he needs more missionaries than the others. ¶

There is another thing that I rejoice in, above everything else in our missionary work, and that is, all the missionaries are thoroughly convinced that their mission president is the finest of all the mission presidents, and that their mission is the best, although it may be in faroff Australia, or any other place. The outpouring of the Spirit of the ¶

Lord upon our missionaries is such that they rejoice and are happy in their labors. ¶

Visits Since Last Conference

Since our last conference lit has fallen to my lot to be actively engaged in visiting some of the stakes of Zion. I have visited the Big Horn section of the country and other sections of Wyoming and Montana. I also visited some of the wards in the San Luis valley, dedicating a small chapel in Wyoming and one in Denver, Colorado. I visited the St. Joseph, Maricopa and Los Angeles stakes, and some of the stakes in Utah, holding meetings with the Saints in Arizona and dedicating two chapels there and four in the Los Angeles stake. I have had the pleasure of holding meetings with the Saints and missionaries in Omaha and Lincoln, Nebraska ; Rock Springs and Green River, Wyoming. This was the first time that I have had the pleasure of being at Lincoln, the capital of Nebraska, or at Green River and Rock Springs. In addition 'I have visited a number of the wards in the different stakes here in Utah, dedicating chapels, during the last six months. ¶

Favorable Attitude Towards the Church

There is a most wonderful change in the attitude of the people of the world towards the Latter-day Saints. I find no difficulty whatever in getting publicity in the various papers ; and when I travel, in different cities in the east and west, the north or the south, those who have interviewed me have given correct reports of the interviews. Brother James E. Talmage is also getting splendid publicity in the European papers. He has extensive notices and there seems to be no prejudice in the press of Great Britain at the present time. ¶

An Illustration of the Former Attitude in England

When I was in Europe, as the president of the European mission, during the entire three years that I was there, they published no article that we presented, and no report of a favorable nature was ever published in any of the papers. I call to mind visiting one of the great London papers that had published from seven to ten columns of the vilest statements regarding the Latter-day Saints. I took with me a letter of introduction from the manager of the shipping house in Liverpool with which we had done business for over 60 years, vouching for the integrity, not only of myself but of all my predecessors as the presidents of the European mission of the Church. The editors of this paper positively refused to make any refutation of the slanderous articles they had published, or to publish a single thing that I wrote, announcing that they thought they had published exactly what they ought about the "Mormon" people. I told them that I defied them to find a man that had written any of those articles who could furnish them with a certificate of character, but that I carried with me a certificate of my integrity and honesty, signed by all the non-"Mormon" bankers in Salt Lake City at that time; that I also had letters from bankers and influential business men from New York to San Francisco ; that I did not carry with me any recommendation from "Mormon" institutions or from "Mormons." Had I done so, I told the editor, it would be like writing a letter myself : "To Whom It May Concern : The bearer, Heber J. Grant, is honorable. Respectfully, Heber J. Grant." He said, "Never mind your opinion, Mr. Grant, we will not publish anything regarding your people." I happened to remember that the gentleman's name was Robinson. As I reached the door and put on my two-story hat — which it is necessary to wear in Europe, if you are considered anybody— I turned around, took it off and said: ¶

"I understand that your name is Robinson, that the editor-in-chief, to whom my letter is written, is out of the city." He said : "Yes, that is right." "Are you acquainted with Phil Robinson?" "Yes." "Would you believe anything and everything that Phil Robinson says about the 'Mormons?'" He said: "I certainly would." I said: "Was he the correspondent of the London Daily Telegraph, one of the two greatest — and I emphasized 'greatest' because his paper was not one of the two — in London?" He said: "He was." "And you would believe everything he wrote?" "I would." "Buy his book entitled Sinners and Saints and you will find that everything you have published about the 'Mormons' is a lie, pure and simple. If you can't afford two shillings, I will buy the book and present it to you with my compliments." He said : "You astonish me." I said : "You are not the first man who has been astonished when confronted with the truth regarding the 'Mormon' people. I have met your kind from Tokyo, Japan, to London, who have refused to publish the truth about the 'Mormons.' " He said, "Write a half column." I said, "Thanks for small favors, large ones received with greater thanks. Seven to ten columns of falsehoods written against our people, and a half column allowed for refutation!" Within a couple of hours he had the half column. He kept it the usual 30 or 60 days and returned it with the usual printed slip that I have seen many times : "The Editor regrets that he cannot find space for the enclosed manuscript, and it is returned." When I see those "regrets" I cannot but think of the saying: "Polite lying is an accomplishment. It lubricates business, varnishes unpleasant facts, and promotes friendships." ¶

Tributes Paid to the Latter-day Saints

Since that time there have been thousands of splendid tributes paid to the Latter-day Saints. I have before me one which was written, I think, seven years ago this coming June. I have never heard it quoted in this Tabernacle, so I am going to read it. It is from Franklin K. Lane, secretary of the interior, as I remember, under President Wilson : ¶

"Cross the border you come down into Utah. ¶

"Never speak disrespectfully of the 'Mormon' Church. It has as law-abiding, steady, hard-working, kindly a group of people in Utah as will be found anywhere this round globe over. Brigham Young may not have been a prophet of Almighty God, but he worked a miracle when he crossed from the Missouri river over that desert, leading his band of a few hundred followers with their pushcarts, going out into that unknown waste, and turned the land that lies around Salt Lake City into a garden. ¶

"I brought from Egypt, several years ago, the greatest irrigation expert in the world, perhaps, the man who built the Assuan Dam upon the Nile— Sir William Willcocks, the man who claims to have discovered where the Garden of Eden was located, at the junction of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers — and I sent him to look over the irrigation enterprises of the United States, and he said : 'Nowhere else have I seen people who understand so wisely how to apply water to land as around Salt Lake City.' ¶

"Utah has wonderful beauty in it as well as great stretches of desert that are to be reclaimed. We have just discovered a new beauty spot there, Bryce canyon." ¶

And many of them are just discovering Cedar Breaks, Zion canyon and the north rim of the Grand canyon, also. ¶

As I stated before, I say again, I rejoice in the change of sentiment of the press of Great Britain, the splendid fruits that are attending President James E. Talmage in getting publicity in the newspapers. ¶

Monument to the Three Witnesses Dedicated

I had the pleasure here, yesterday, of dedicating a little monument to the memory of the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon. ¶

Thousands in All Parts Have a Testimony

I rejoice that there are thousands and tens of thousands of people from the country of the midnight sun, Scandinavia, to South Africa, from Canada to South America, and upon the islands of the sea, reaching clear out to New Zealand and Australia, who can testify that God has seen fit to answer their earnest prayers and has given to them, as is promised here in the Book of Mormon, a testimony regarding this remarkable and wonderful record. I read the words of Moroni : ¶

"Now I, Moroni, write somewhat as seemeth me good ; and I write unto my brethren, the Lamanites ; and I would that they should know that more than four hundred and twenty years have passed away since the sign was given of the coming of Christ. ¶

"And I seal up these records, after I have spoken a few words by way of exhortation unto you. ¶

"Behold, I would exhort you that when ye shall read these things, if it be wisdom in God that ye should read them, that ye would remember how merciful the Lord hath been unto the children of men, from the creation of Adam even down until the time that ye shall receive these things, and ponder it in your hearts. ¶

"And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye wi uld ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true ; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost. ¶

"And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things. ¶

"And whatsoever thing is good is just and true; wherefore nothing that is good denieth the Christ, but acknowledgeth that he is." ¶

Christ Is Denied by Many

The Christ is denied today by hundreds of thousands of people. Many of the men who are teaching in our great universities are denying that Christ was the son of God. Many men who are ¶

teaching from the pulpit do not acknowledge that Jesus Christ was in very deed the Son of the Living God, the Redeemer of the World, coming to the earth with a definite mission. ¶

While in Europe I purchased a book by Senator Albert J. Beveridge entitled The Young Man and the World. One of his chapters was devoted to the young man preparing for the ministry. He said : ¶

"Any man who assumes to teach the Christian faith, who, in his own secret heart questions that faith, commits a sacrilege every time he enters the pulpit. ¶

"He is like the chemist's grain of wheat, perfect in all its constituent elements except the mysterious spark of life, without which the wheat grain will not grow. ¶

"If, then, you do not believe what you say, and believe it with all your soul, believe it in your heart of hearts, do not try to get other men to believe it. You will not be honest if you do. The world expects you to be sure of yourself. How do you expect to make other people sure of themselves if you are not sure of yourself? ¶

"I would rather be sure that when a man dies he will live again with his conscious identity, than to have all the wealth of the United States, or to occupy any position of honor or power the world could possibly give," said a man whose name is known to the railroad world as one of the ablest transportation men in the United States. * * * ¶

"A few years ago a certain man with good opportunities for the investigation and a probability of sincere answers, asked every young preacher whom he met during a summer vacation these questions : ¶

"'First: Yes or no; do you believe in God, the Father; God a person, God a definite and tangible intelligence — not a congeries of laws floating like a fog through the universe; but God, a person in whose image you were made? Don't argue; don't explain; but is your mind in a .condition where you can answer yes or no?' ¶

"Not a man answered 'Yes.' Each man wanted to explain that the Deity might be a definite intelligence or might not; that the 'latest thought' was much confused upon the matter, and so forth and so on. ¶

"Second : Yes or no ; do you believe that Christ was the .Son of the living God, sent by him to save the world? I am not asking whether you believe that he was inspired in the sense that the great moral teachers are inspired — nobody has any difficulty about that. But do you believe that Christ was God's very Son, with a divinely appointed and definite mission, dying on the cross and raised from the dead — yes or no?' ¶

"Again not a single answer with an unequivocal, earnest 'Yes.' But again explanations were offered and in at least half the instances the sum of most of the answers was that Christ was the most perfect man that the world had seen and humanity's greatest moral teacher." ¶

I maintain that Christ could not have been humanity's greatest moral teacher unless he was in very deed the Son of God, because he announced that he was the Son of God, that he was the express image of his Father, and that those who had seen him had in very deed seen the Father ; therefore if the foundation of his structure were false, he could not be a great moral teacher. ¶

"Third. Do you believe that when you die you will live again as a conscious intelligence, knowing who you are and who other people are? ¶

"Again not one answer was unconditionally affirmative. 'Of course, they were not sure as a matter of knowledge.' 'Of course, that could not be known definitely.' 'On the whole, they were inclined to think so, but there were very stubborn objections,' and so forth and so on. ¶

"The men to whom these questions were put were particularly high-grade ministers. One of them had already won a distinguished reputation in New York and the New England states for his eloquence and piety. Every one of them had had unusual success with fashionable congregations. ¶

"But every one of them had noted an absence of real influence upon the hearts of their hearers, and all thought that this same condition is spreading throughout the modern pulpit. ¶

"Yet not one of them suspected that the profound cause of what they called 'the decay of faith,' was not in the world of men and women, but in themselves. How could such priests of ice warm the souls of men? How could such apostles of interrogation convert a world?" ¶

The Testimony of the Saints

I rejoice that every Latter-day Saint living can answer without a moment's hesitation all three of those questions, "Yes, yes, yes." The very foundation of the Church rests upon the fact that a boy not yet 15 years of age saw God himself, a glorified man, beyond the power of any individual to describe, and that God introduced Jesus Christ to this boy. The very foundation of the Church rests upon the further fact that the man who baptized the Savior of the world, John the Baptist, laid his hands upon the heads of Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery and ordained them to the Aaronic Priesthood, with the authority to baptize each other and commanding them to do so ; that Peter, James and John, the apostles of the Lord Jesus Christ, laid their hands upon the heads of these men and ordained them to the apostleship, giving to them the power to proclaim the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and build up his Church in the world. ¶

There is no Latter-day Saint that would deny the vision in the Doctrine and Covenants which I have quoted time and time again, and perhaps did so at our last conference, stating : ¶

"And now, after the many testimonies which have been given of him, this is the testimony, last of all, which we give of him : That he lives ! ¶

"For we saw him, even on the right hand of God; and we heard the voice bearing record that he is the Only Begotten of the Father — ¶

"That by him, and through him, and of him, the worlds are and were created, and the inhabitants thereof are begotten sons and daughters unto God." ¶

Marriage for Time and Eternity

I rejoice in the fact that every man and every woman married in the temples of the Lord are married for time and for all eternity. What an absurdity for us to believe in a ceremony uniting our wives to us for eternity if there were no existence beyond the grave. ¶

The Church is also founded upon the fact that Moroni came and delivered the plates to Joseph Smith. We have no doubt as to the individuality of Moroni who delivered these plates. ¶

An Illustration, with Testimony and Comments Thereon

It seems that there are others who lack faith in addition to those that I have referred to in my quotation from Senator Beveridge's book. ¶

Away back in 1910, January 31, Reverend T. H. Martin made some very remarkable confessions that were published in the Anaconda Standard. A man challenged me, after I had read these statements and ¶

commented upon them, and said I would get myself into trouble because it was only a lot of "Mormon" lies ; that no minister ever delivered such a sermon, and he warned me to stop or I would get into trouble. The warning, however, did not take root nor yield any fruit. The next time that I spoke he asked me if I had seen the Anaconda Standard. I told him no, but inasmuch as I gave the exact date that it appeared, it was up to him to bring an Anaconda Standard and to come and show me that it was not in it. The very next time that I saw fit to preach upon this subject was in the North Sanpete stake of Zion. After my sermon Elder Barrus Cox came to me, and said : ¶

"Brother Grant, I am the identical elder who sent that Anaconda Standard to the Liahona, from which they published extracts. I have an extra copy. Would you like it?" ¶

I told him I needed it in my business, and he gave it to me; so I have read this sermon with my own eyes in the Anaconda Standard. Reverend Martin said : ¶

"For a long time the following questions have been uppermost in my mind : "Is the church anything but a mere social organization? Is the Christianity of today the true doctrine of the Christ of the Bible? Has the so-called Christianity of today anything in it that ought to attract more than any other creed that is supposed to help humanity? Is not the church of today being boycotted and that justly? ¶

"I know that such interrogations will not be very savory to many people, but knowing something concerning the church from top to bottom, and as I fear God, and would rather be true than be esteemed, I fearlessly propound them. * * * But with all of this I maintain that the Christianity of the present is face to face with a lamentable loss. The Christianity of today has acquired much, but in its getting it has lost its own soul, it has lost the Holy Ghost." ¶

I declare in all soberness that all over the wide world wherever the gospel of Jesus Christ has gone, (the gospel revealed to us through the Prophet of the living God, Joseph Smith), the Holy Ghost has been bestowed upon men and women by the hundreds and thousands, if not tens of thousands, and they are willing to testify to their knowledge regarding the divinity of this work and to bear witness that God has, by the revelations of the Holy Ghost to them, given them a testimony of the divinity of this work, also a testimony of the divine mission of Joseph Smith and the divinity of the Book of Mormon. ¶

"No true man will dare to refute this argument, for go where you may in Christendom today you will find that our religion is void of the supernatural element which the Bible claims it must have in order to exist." ¶

Go all over the wide world, wherever you will today, and you will find that the supernatural element does exist in the Church of Christ. ¶

"The commission to the early Christian teachers was that they must be imbued with power from on high and then go and baptize all nations in the name of the Holy Ghost, and that power was always manifested when they performed the deed." ¶

And that power has been manifested among the Latter-day Saints all over the world. ¶

"The Christian religion of the present is merely a social code and has nothing ¶

in it whereby it could claim a divine origin. It is truly pitiable to behold the church religion of today trying to save this sinful world. ¶

"We have lost our magnet. The Christ who said he would draw all men to him if he is lifted up is disobeyed and ignored in the multiplicity of our present church life. Since we have presented many substitutes to the world for genuine spiritual power, but they are of no more value in the saving of the sinner than an artificial heart would be in pumping blood through the arteries. We are like men trying to run an engine without steam. ¶

"The church of today is the church of man, not the church of God. I predict its crashing to pieces like a ship on the rocks before a heavy sea, in the near-by years, unless there is a mighty turning to God in our ranks." ¶

I announce to all the world that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is in very deed the Church of God, and that there are thousands and tens of thousands who have been given this knowledge just as absolutely and as perfectly as I have it. ¶

"We have a great, educated, school-made ministry, but an unconverted ministry." ¶

We have a great converted ministry. I remember on one occasion preaching in Phoenix, with the late President John Henry Smith. The legislature was in session at the time. They called upon us at the hotel and asked if we would condescend to preach, stating that they had rented the opera house and would crowd it to overflowing. As we were in the habit of renting our own houses and generally failing to get an audience we very kindly condescended. They fulfilled their pledge. The house was crowded to overflowing. Some of the good people came from Mesa, about twenty miles away. After the meeting one of the Saints told me that a man in front of her, turned to his friend, and, with the word "damn," that some people claim is only emphasis and not swearing, said with emphasis, "That man is an earnest talker." Pretty soon he said, with emphasis, again: "That man is a good talker." Pretty soon he said, with double emphasis: "That man believes every word he is saying." ¶

Testimony of a Miner

On another occasion I remember being with Elder John Henry Smith and Charles W. Penrose in Park City. The opera house was filled to overflowing, and men were standing up. Someone afterwards told one of our brethren that he heard a man sixteen hundred feet under the earth, one of the miners, turn to his friend and say: "Did you hear those three 'Mormons' preach?" "Yes." "What did you think of it?" "Oh, I did not pay much attention." "Well, I want to say to you, away down here sixteen hundred feet in the earth, that what those men said rings in my ears. They said, each one of them, they knew that God lives, they knew that Jesus is the Christ, the Redeemer of the world, the Son of God. They said they knew that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God. I have been dropping into their meetings occasionally since then. They have a little bit of a rented hall but they have decided to organize a ward here instead of a branch and to build a meeting house, and I have sent ten dollars in an envelope 'from an unknown friend.' There were no if's, no and's, no but's, about what those men said. It was an absolute, direct declaration of their faith." ¶

Knowledge Counts in Testimony

I remember one occasion when a professor, who was studying in Berlin in preparation for his doctor's degree, said to my daughter, who was there studying the German language, that it was a shame the way the three young elders murdered the German language, and how poorly they had explained our faith. He said that he had read a hundred tracts about our faith and all our Church books, and he would be very glad to stand up and deliver a lecture of an hour on the faith of the Latter-day Saints and make a fair explanation of it. I was very glad that my young daughter gave him to understand that he did not know that God lives, that Jesus is the Christ, or that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God, and she would prefer to have those young boys who murdered the German language declare those three things, than to have somebody explain that which he thought was the faith of somebody else. ¶

It is knowledge that counts. I have had as high as twenty missionaries arrive at once in the Liverpool office, scarcely one of whom had ever stood upon his feet to say a word about the gospel, and I have known the entire lot of them to run out of ideas in less than two hours, after I had told them that we sometimes held meetings for five hours, and that they would be permitted to speak as long as they desired. Those same elders, who did not deliver more than a half dozen sentences, have returned to the Liverpool office at the end of two years, and they have delivered clear-cut sermons, bearing testimony of the absolute knowledge that God had given them of the divinity of the work in which we as Latter-day Saints are engaged. ¶

"We have a great host on our Church rolls, but they are, with but few exceptions, an unconverted host." ¶

We have a converted host. It is very seldom indeed that" any individual out in the world receives "Mormonism," the gospel of Jesus Christ, except with the opposition of family and friends and relatives. Very many young men have been turned out of their homes by their parents for embracing the gospel. I could give you incident after incident where young men and young women have been cast out as a thing of evil, by their own parents, for embracing "Mormonism." It is not popular. It has never been popular, and nothing short of an absolute conversion in the hearts of men and women would lead them to embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ. ¶

"There are periods in the Christian era we look back upon with wonder and admiration. In those days men were convicted of sin and a judgment to come." ¶

In our day men are convicted of sin and a judgment to come, and all over the world where that conviction comes into their minds they go down into the waters of baptism for the remission of their sins and they do receive the Holy Ghost. ¶

"Then the more than human element was visible in our creeds." ¶

The more than human element is visible today in the Church of Christ all over the world. ¶

"Holy men had heavenly visions." ¶

Holy men and holy women have had heavenly visions by the hundreds and the thousands in our Church. ¶

TESTIMONY OF HEALING "Sickness was cured by spiritual power." ¶

I could stand here and relate to you by the hour instances where sickness has been cured by spiritual power in this Church of Christ, where men and women and children who have been given up to die have been healed by the power of Almighty God. I spoke here of Brother Joseph W. McMurrin being among those who are absent. Brother McMurrin was shot clear through his vitals, and the bullets lodged right under the skin on his back. I heard John Henry Smith promise that man, when blessing him, by the authority of the apostleship of the living God, that he should live and not die, as he had received these wounds while guarding the servants of the living God, and that there should be left upon his body no physical weakness because of these terrible wounds that he had received. I have it from the lips of Brother McMurrin himself that he has never felt any physical weakness because of these wounds. ¶

While relating this incident in the Farmers' ward, upon one occasion, Stanley Taylor, the one-armed hackman, arose and said : "Brother Grant, it was in my hack that Brother McMurrin was picked up and carried to his home. I heard the doctors say : "Take his dying statement, because no man ever lived who was in such a condition." But he did live. Right at that identical time a man was shot in this city, with one bullet through him, exactly where the two went through Brother McMurrin, and he died on time. ¶

The very last time that I had the pleasure of conversing with President Joseph F. Smith, except the night before he died, he said : ¶

"Heber, I never saw you looking better. I recall that as I was in the hospital when you were operated upon, the chief surgeon, Dr. Allen Fowler, turned to me and said : 'Mr. Smith you don't need to discuss the possibility or the probability of this man living. He has to die. It would be a miracle if he were restored to health, and this is not the day of miracles.' " ¶

I give to the Lord Almighty the credit and the glory, for it is by his power that I am here today. There were nine doctors present when I was operated upon, and eight of them said I had to die. The nurse told me this the day I was leaving the hospital. I said : "I have no desire to meet the eight, but I would like to meet the ninth, the one who said I would live." I asked him why he disagreed with all the other doctors. He was a southerner and he said : "Mr. Grant, I just took a chance, sir. I have felt the pulse of ¶

thousands of gentlemen in my life, but I never felt a pulse just like yours, sir. That heart of yours never missed one, single, solitary beat during the one hour and three-quarters, sir, that you were under the knife, and I said to myself : 'that heart will pull him through' ; so I just took a chance." ¶

ON OBSERVING THE WORD OF WISDOM — ANOTHER TESTIMONY ¶

We have in our Doctrine and Covenants a revelation which says : ¶

"There is a law, irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundations of tin's world, upon which all blessings are predicated — ¶

"And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated." ¶

One of the laws of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is that each and every Latter-day Saint shall keep what is known as the Word of Wisdom ; that we shall abstain from tea, coffee, tobacco and liquor. Had I not lived the Word of Wisdom, had my blood not been pure. I am convinced beyond the shadow of a doubt that I would not have been entitled to that wonderful promise contained in the Word of Wisdom, that those who obey this Word of Wisdom shall be blessed, and that the destroying angel shall pass them by as he did the children of Israel and not slay them. I am convinced that my heart would not have had pure blood, had I not fulfilled the law, and I would not be standing here before you today. ¶

Upon one occasion when my brother, Joseph Hyrum Grant, (who in later years, presided over the Davis stake of Zion) was in charge of a livery stable in this city, a number of employes of the Z. C. M. I. shoe factory were enjoying an outing at Calder's Park, now known as Nibley Park. My brother who had charge of the transportation, called their attention to the fact that a storm was threatening, and he urged them to return home, stating that a part of the road between the park and Salt Lake City was a turnpike and there was danger of this long drag being overturned in a storm and in the darkness. But they passed a resolution that they would hold the firm blameless if any accident occurred. ¶

Going home in the darkness the vehicle was overturned and several people were quite seriously injured. One of the girls had a number of bones broken and as a result of her injuries and exposure in the storm, pneumonia set in. The doctor in attendance declared that she could not live, and would probably die before morning. My brother felt very much distressed about the matter, having been the driver of the vehicle. He asked me to go with him to administer to that girl, stating that he had received the witness of the spirit that she should live. ¶

When we stepped up to the bed, I told him that she was dying and would be dead before we could get our hands off her head. He turned deathly pale and declared that he had received a manifestation of the Lord, and that he knew, as he knew that the gospel is ¶

true, that if we would bless her she would live. We did bless her, and in confirming the anointing I was impressed to promise her that the bones should knit, that she should be made well and go back and run her machine in the Z. C. M. I. shoe factory. I did not know that she had been running a machine or what was her work. That evening I met the superintendent of that factory and he said : "I have just returned from the home of Marie DeGray, and she was dying. I am convinced she is dead by now." I said : "Brother Rowe, you go up into your office and sit down and write : 'Marie DeGray is not dead. Marie DeGray will not die, but she will get well and come back and run her machine in your factory.' It has been manifested to me by the spirit of the living God." He said : "I don't need to write it, because from what you say, I know that she will live." ¶

Still Another Testimony of the Healing Power

He then related to me an incident which had occurred in his own family. Said he: "In London, before I came to this country, one of my daughters was very sick, and the attending physician said she could not live till morning." He sent, as I remember, three miles across the great city of London, for Junius F. Wells and his companion to come and administer to his daughter, and she was restored to health. "The next day," said Brother Rowe. "the doctor came to my home and handed me a written certificate, duly signed, stating that my daughter was dead. I invited him into the parlor and introduced him to the 'corpse.' So when you tell me that this girl will recover, I accept your statement, for I know that the healing power of God is in this Church, as well as I know that I live." ¶

Testimony of the Gift of Tongues

"Holy men spoke with other tongues as the spirit gave them utterance." ¶

Holy men and holy women have spoken with other tongues, as the spirit has given them utterance. One of our Articles of Faith reads : ¶

"We believe in the gift of tongues," and in the interpretation thereof. Karl G. Maeser — than whom no more devoted Latter-day Saint ever lived — told me with his own lips of such an incident as I took a trip with him to Baker City. He said : "Brother Grant, the night that I was baptized I looked up into heaven and said : 'Oh, God, I have found, as I believe, the gospel of thy Son Jesus Christ. I have rendered obedience to it by going down into the waters of baptism. Give to me a manifestation, give to me an absolute witness of the spirit that I have found the truth, and I pledge to you if necessary my life for the advancement of this cause.' " ¶

At that time Brother Franklin D. Richards was president of the European mission, with headquarters at Liverpool. He went ¶

over to Germany to be present at the baptism of the first converts to the gospel in that great empire. Walking from the place where he was baptized to his home, a distance of several miles, Brother Maeser expressed a desire to converse upon different principles of the gospel, through an interpreter. That interpreter was Brother William Budge, afterwards president of Bear Lake stake, and finally president of the Logan temple. Brother Maeser, who understood no English, asked questions in German, and Brother Richards, who understood no German, answered them in English ; Brother Budge interpreting the questions and answers. After a few questions had been asked and answered through the interpreter, Brother Richards said : "Do not interpret those questions, I understand them ;" then Brother Maeser said : "Do not interpret those answers, I understand them." They conversed for miles, the questions in German, the answers in English ; neither man understanding the language of the other. They arrived at the River Elbe and while crossing the bridge they were separated ; when they reached the other side Brother Maeser asked another question, and Brother Richards said: "Interpret it, Brother Budge." When the answer came, Brother Maeser said : "Interpret it." His next question was : "How was it, Apostle Richards, that we understood each other, and now we cannot understand?" Brother Richards told him that one of the fruits of the gospel of Jesus Christ was the gift of tongues and the interpretation. Then he said : "God has given to you and to me this night the privilege of partaking of one of the fruits of the gospel by having the interpretation of tongues. Brother Maeser, you have received a witness from God that you have found the truth." ¶

Brother Maeser told me: "I trembled like a leaf, and I again raised my eyes to heaven and said : 'Oh, God, I have received the witness that I asked for, and I pledge to you my life, if need be, for this cause.' " ¶

Every Latter-day Saint knows that Karl G. Maeser did give his life ; that he labored without ceasing, without any thought of personal advancement, personal honor or credit, but he labored untiringly for the advancement of God's kingdom at home and abroad, as a missionary in his native land, and at the head of our great educational system. ¶

Testimony of Prophecy Through the Gift of Tongues

When I was a child, in a Relief Society meeting, Eliza R. Snow, by the gift of tongues, and Zina D. Young, by the interpretation thereof, promised that child playing on the floor — in the home where Grandma Whitney, my mother, Eliza R. Snow, Zina D. Young, Clara Kimball and other leading Relief Society sisters in early days were meeting — that that child should grow to manhood and become an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ. My mother often said to me: "Heber, behave yourself, and you will some day ¶

be one of the apostles in the Church." I always laughed at her and said : "Get it out of your head. Every mother thinks her son will be the president of the United States or something wonderful. I have no ambitions in that regard." ¶

When I was called to be one of the apostles she asked me if I remembered that meeting in the home of the late William C. Staines on the corner of South Temple and Fifth East. I told her I did. "Do you remember anything that was said?" I replied: "No." "Well," she said, "do you remember Aunt Eliza talking to you on the floor?" I said. "Yes, but I did not understand it." ¶

"Of course, you did not, because she spoke by the gift of tongues." Then she said : "Do you remember anything that Aunt Zina said?" "Yes, I do, mother. I remember that she lifted her hand and said that I would become a great big man." ¶

So when I became tall I used to think of it occasionally, that Aunt Zina said I would be a big man. My mother responded : "She said nothing of the kind ; she said you would be a great big man in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, that you would be an apostle." That is why I have told you, knowing that the gift of tongues was in the Church. ¶

I wish to say to you that my wife, who is dead, promised me, by the gift of tongues, that I should live to proclaim this gospel in many lands and in many climes, and after she passed away, and at a time when eight doctors out of nine said I had to die, I had not then proclaimed this gospel "in many lands and in many climes," but I recovered, and since then I have lifted up my voice in the far-off land of Japan, in the Hawaiian Islands, in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Germany, France, Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Canada and Mexico, bearing witness that I know that God lives, that I know that Jesus is the Christ, that I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet of the true and the living God, and that every gift, every grace, every power that this man says should be in the true Church of Christ, is in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We have the Pearl of Great Price, the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. ¶

That God may help me and you and every soul within the sound of my voice who has a testimony of the divinity of this Gospel of Christ so to live it that other men, seeing our devotion and seeing our integrity and our determination to live the lives of saints may be inspired to investigate the message that we have to bear to them, is my prayer, and I ask it in all humility, and in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, our Redeemer and Savior. Amen. ¶