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Show 88 THE MORMON LION all stood. A huskiness that developed into a rasping cough forced the cadaverous Second Counsellor to an abrupt close after he had invoked all manner of blessmgs upon Brigham and was proceeding to do the same by Brother Heber Kimball. After another hymn Chilcott mounted the rostrum to address the congregation. He wore no peculiar garment, but, like the other high officials of the Church, kept on his hat during the service. He began wtth a statement that hts own and Brother Brigham's discourses would be shaped for the especial benefit of the last band of Saints that had reached Zion. They had yet to learn of the wonderful purifying revival, the Reformation. After praising our company for our steadfastness in the face of adversity, he reminded us that we of the handcart trains had not been the only ones to suffer for the sake of the Kingdom. With glowing eloquence, he first described how the Lord's innocent sheep had been driven from Nauvoo by the ravening Gentile wolves. Many a martyr had perished from fever and toil and cold during the great exodus. Yet, like their forefathers the Israelites of old God's chosen people had made their way over th~ deserts and mountains to the Promised Land. They had established a Paradise amidst desolation- they had built Zion where once was a solitude! In the face of war with the Lamanites, the meddling of the Federal Government, and season after season of crop failures and famines, the foundations of the Kingdom of Heaven had been laid even as the foundations of the new Temple. The entire congregation was stirred. Men and women alike nodded and smiled and wept with uncontrollable emotion as he recounted to them the oftrepeated story of those who had come first to the Valley. He held up a piece of woollen cloth and told how it had been shorn and dyed and spun and woven, all during the journey of the exodus. THE MORMON LION 8g At the sight of that worn and faded relic even Lucy and Mrs. Senby wept and I felt my heart gripped afresh by convtction. Could a people have endured so much and yet be mistaken? Could they have built tllis prosperous and industrious city in the midst of the vast western deserts without divine approval of their beliefs and practices? When the applause that greeted his terse summary of the Kingdom's industries and resources had subsided, Chilcott raised his hand for stlence, and cned out with fiery eloquence: " But who was it led the Saints of the Latter-Days out of Babylon? Who guided Israel unto the new Zion? There was no pillar of fire by night and pillar of smoke by day to lead us through the wilderness to our Jordan. Had they been needed, who doubts that the Lord would have sent them unto us? But there was no need! With us was one greater than Moses. We were led by the Lion of the Lord ! " The Tabernacle rocked with the wild applause of the congregation. Chilcott had still a word to say. His voice deepened to the note of reverent awe : " Hearken, brethren !- you who have so recently come unto Zion, and no less you who long ago found refuge among the chambered valleys of the mountains from that abomination of desolation, the Gentile world. You are about to be honoured by the exhortations of Brother Brigham. His words are as much more important to us than those of the Saviour and Apostles in the New Testament as their words were to the people at that time more than those of Noah in the Old Testament. Whatever our leader and Prophet speaks is the Word of God unto us. The Lord has given us a man that we can talk to, and thereby know His divine will, even the same as if God Htmself was present among us. " I affirm unto you, not one of all your number shall be saved except it be through this man. He holds the keys of life and salvation upon the earth. |