Mormon History

Mormon Schisms - 1884

The Salt Lake Daily Tribune

September 20, 1884

ELDER  SMITH.
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He Entertains a Tavern Audience at the Chapel Last Evening.

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Rev. Alexander Smith of the Reorganized Church of Latter day Saints, spoke to a full house at the chapel of his sect last evening. He took his text from the 12th chapter of Nephi in the Book of Mormon, which he compared with the latter portion of the 6th chapter of St. Luke in the New Testament, and said that he would have something to say as to the causes which had led a large portion of the people astray.

In his efforts here he had been trying to show why he and his brother could not join hands with the people of these valleys. If any person failed to follow the revelations given by his father, that is no evidence that he was a false prophet. There were plenty of evidence in his revelations to prove his authority, and that the judgments which are denounced against the people have been fulfilled. He quoted from Revelation 10. 5, in which the prophet, his father, had received direct instructions from heaven in regard to settling the country in Missouri. In this revelation they were admonished to be at peace with the surrounding people, and some of the old Saints may still be found in these places in Missouri, down whose cheeks the tears will course when they hear the sound of the real gospel again, and recognize the old spirits which animated the religion of the prophet.

The speaker gave a sketch of the ravages of the war of the rebellion in Jackson county, and said that many of the old people there say that the Lord has meted again to them what they meted to the Saints in those early days. He told of the inconsistencies of one Wm. B. McClelland, who professed the true gospel in the meetings held by the reorganized Latter day Saints, and would afterwards go out and curse himself in the street for being such a fool. He then referred to the experience of T. B. Marsh, who rebelled on account of some difficulty over a pint of milk, and was excommunicated from the church. In his old age he returned to a contemplation of the faith. He said that Oliver Cowdery and David Whitmer had both become disconnected from the church, but that they had never gone back upon their testimony, and all this was in consonance with the revelations given to the prophet concerning the people, and the judgments they must suffer for transgression. His efforts are directed, he said, to the redemption of those who have departed from the primitive faith, and he read further selections from the Book of Mormon to prove what this faith is, and to what extent the branch in these valleys had gone astray. The speaker then proceeded to prove that the Utah Zion was not the one referred to in the revelations of his father, and that Independence, Nauvoo and Kirtland are the component parts of the real Zion, which will be built up by the Saints when the true faith is understood. He denounced in strong language the pretence that his father had ever said that his people would come and build Zion in the mountains, and cited as evidence the fact that Brannan took his party by ship to upper California, to which section all of Brigham Young's movements were directed until he halted here in these valleys.

The speaker said much else to show that the work he represents is the only true version of his father's cause now remaining in the world, and that the dominant church here, is sailing under false colors.

 

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