Blessing and Prayer for Peace

Gratitude for Faith of People

It is needless for me to tell you good people how grateful I am to be here today. I missed the Conference six months ago, and I am grateful beyond expression to all of you good people, to the Saints generally, and to some people who are not members of our Church for your and their faith and prayers in my behalf that I should be healed. I am grateful to the doctors who so kindly, carefully, and energetically at home, and while in Los Angeles, gave me the benefit of their services. ¶

I lack the capacity to express the gratitude and thanksgiving in my heart for the blessings of the Lord to me and this people. I humbly pray that while I am speaking to you this morning the Spirit of the Lord may be and abide with me. I do not expect, however, to preach to you this morning, I simply desire to express my gratitude to the Lord, and I expect to have the pleasure this afternoon, as my doctor, Silas Smith, consented that I may speak again, at the close of the Conference. ¶

Kindness Acknowledged

I am grateful to my friends in California, to my relatives and to my railroad, banking and insurance friends, to Mr. Chandler of the Los Angeles Times, and to all of the officials of the Church in California, because of their fine attention to me and their interest in my welfare. I am grateful for the fine treatment I received at the Catholic Hospital in Los Angeles. ¶

I am very thankful for our fine Conference, for the wonderful attendance here today, and for the magnificent body of the Priesthood that were together last night. ¶

The Film "Brigham Young" Commended

I am thankful beyond expression for the very wonderful and splendid moving picture that has been made of Brigham Young. I have heard some little criticism of it, but we cannot expect the people who do not know that Brigham Young was in very deed the representative of God upon this earth, who do not know his wonderful character, to tell the story as we would tell it. We know that he was a prophet of the living God and the representative of the Lord here upon the earth. There is nothing in the picture that reflects in any way against our people. It is a very marvelous and wonderful thing, considering how people generally have treated us and what they have thought of us. Of course there are many things in the picture that are not strictly correct, and that is announced in the picture itself. It is of course a picture and we could not hope that they would make a picture at their expense, running into a couple of million dollars, to be just as we would like it. We know that Brigham Young was a powerful and wonderful man, the greatest man of his day, and one of the great things about Brigham Young was that he always gave credit to Joseph Smith for everything that he did. He claimed that he was simply building upon the foundation laid by the prophet of God, who had seen God and conversed with Jesus Christ. He never doubted for one minute the final triumph of the people here in Utah. He was a man of God, and the people thought the world and all of him. ¶

The Church Making Friends

I am very thankful for the health of the people. I am very thankful for the very marvelous and wonderful change that I find wherever I go in the attitude towards the Mormon people. To be known as a Mormon, living the Gospel of Jesus Christ, is a recommendation to all those that know us as a people. As the years come and go the Word of Wisdom and all the various teachings and doctrines laid down by the Prophet Joseph Smith and so faithfully and strongly carried out by Brigham Young are making us friends all over the world. ¶

Blessing and Prayer for Peace

The doctor told me I could have five or six minutes, or even ten. I have occupied only about five, but as I am going to talk to you again at the close of the conference, and as I do not want to overdo in the least degree, I shall simply say, God bless you, one and all. God bless the honest the world over. God bless all good people, and hasten the day when people shall seek to God for guidance and direction, when wars will cease and peace will reign, is my prayer, and I ask it in humility and in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, our Redeemer. I bless you by the authority of the holy Priesthood of the living God that I hold, and I do it in the name of Christ, our Redeemer, Amen. ¶