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Show PLURALITY OF WIVES. 187 sidered a perfectly virtuous and honourable one, and the lady maintains, without blemish, the same position in society to which she would be entitled were she the sole wife of her husband. Indeed, the connection being under the sanction of the only true priesthood, is deemed infinitely more sacred and binding than any marriage among the gentile world, not only on account of its higher and more sacred authority, but inasmuch as it bears directly upon the future state of existence of both the man and the woman; for it is the doctrine of the church, that no woman can attain to celestial glory without the husband, nor can he arrive at full perfection in the next world without at least one wife: and the greater the number he is able to take with him, the higher will be his seat in the celestial paradise. All idea of sensuality, as the motive of such unions, is most indignantly repudiated; the avowed object being to raise up, as rapidly as possible, " a holy generation to the Lord," who shall build up his kingdom on the earth. Purity of life, in all the domestic relations, is strenuously inculcated; and they do not hesitate to declare, that when they shall obtain the uncontrolled power of making their own civil laws, ( which will be when they are admitted as one of the States of the Union,) they will punish the departure from chastity in the severest manner, even by death. As the seer or president alone possesses the power to approve of these unions, so also he alone can absolve the parties from their bonds, should circumstances in his judgment render it at any time either expedient or necessary. It may easily be perceived, then, what a tremendous influence the possession of such a power must give to him who holds it, and how great must be the prudence, firmness, sagacity, and wisdom required in one who thus stands in the relation of confidential adviser, as well as of civil and ecclesiastical ruler, over this singularly constituted community. Upon the practical working of this system of plurality of wives, I can hardly be expected to express more than a mere opinion. Being myself an " outsider" and a " gentile," it is not to be supposed that I should have been permitted to view more than the surface of what is in fact as yet but an experiment, the details of which are sedulously veiled from public view. So far, however, as my intercourse with the inhabitants afforded me an opportunity of judging, its practical operation was quite different from what I had anticipated. Peace, harmony, and cheerfulness seemed to prevail, where my preconceived notions led me to look for nothing |