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Show PRACTICAL POLYGAMY. 131 to become adulterers, rogues, liars, and blasphemers, and finally " enter into their exaltation," upon condition that they will " marry a wife according to covenant." The con dition is certainly a very easy one to comply with, as the majority of all Christendom are marrying without expecting any such benefits. The number of each sex in Utah is about equal, and a general application of the revelation, and not confine it to polygamists, would be very effectual, I should think, in stopping the practice, particularly if its bene fits were extended to women, who, poor creatures, are de pendent upon their husbands for salvation, as they believe. CHAP. XVI. PRACTICAL POLYGAMY. IT is far from my purpose to enter into any argument against a practice so unnatural, so degrading, and so abhor rent to the better feelings of the refined of all Christian na tions, as polygamy is. Nothing that I might write, in the way of argument, would benefit the masses of this infatuated people, if circulated amongst them, which it never would be ; but it is to enlighten the public that they may under stand the abominations that exist, that I write. That polyg amy was strongly reprehended in the early history of the church they have been taught by some of their own people, who now form the sect of Josephites, and many of the older Mormons knew such to have been the case ; but so great is their delusion, that they blindly adhere to the teachings of Brigham Young, however inconsistent they may be. Motives of policy, combined with a desire for the gratifi cation of the baser passions and lusts, were most unques tionably concerned with the prophet who first authorized and practiced polygamy, and whether that prophet was |