Lord Jesus organized His church, established his priesthood and gave to his servants a commandment to go and teach all nations.

They were faithful in discharging their commission, and many received their testimony and obeyed the gospel. Satan, however, working in the hearts of the disobedient, stirred them up to anger against the saints of God, and they were persecuted, imprisoned, and slain. All the apostles, save John, sealed their testimony with their blood, and thousands of their followers were put to death. Edicts the most cruel and heartless were formulated against them by the Roman emperors, and executed with relentless vindictiveness, until the saints of God were well nigh destroyed.

*

Meantime heresies crept into the churches; false teachers arose teaching perverse doctrines to draw away disciples after them; the Gospel was perverted, the laws thereof were transgressed, the ordinances were changed, the covenant was broken, until scarcely a vestige of the gospel as delivered to men by the Son of God and his authorized servants remained.

After the sword, the prison, the rack, and the flame in the hands of a powerful, pagan government, together with apostate influences and false teachers had done what they could to break down or corrupt the church of Christ, then another

*See Outlines of Ecclesiastical History, part II., "The apostasy.

evil, more dangerous than all that had gone before was brought to bear upon it. A Roman Emperor, Constantine, was converted to the "Christian religion”—yet by that time, 313 A. D., no more like the religion of Christ than dim, misty twilight is like the glorious light of the noon-day sun. He soon loaded the bishops with new honors, dignities and powers. The churches were made wealthy, and luxurious living succeeded the simplicity in the manner of life characteristic of earlier times among the followers of Christ. This luxury, ever more dangerous than storms or quicksands, poverty or chains, proved more disastrous to the church, more fruitful in its corruptions of the Gospel than the storms of persecution which had beaten upon it from its inception.

Through these combined evils that I have very briefly enumerated, the gospel was corrupted, the authority of God, the priesthood, was taken from among men; and then followed long ages of spiritual darkness and wickedness. At last, however, the time came to usher in the dispensation of the fullness of times, in which all things in Christ, both things which are in heaven and things which are in earth, are to be gathered in one, and the work of the Father pertaining to the salvation of this creation, the earth, and those who inhabit it, is to be consummated.

To open up this work a prophet was raised up in the person of Joseph Smith, and to him the

Lord revealed his purposes; telling him also that the creeds of men were an abomination in his sight; that men were drawing near to him with their lips but their hearts were far from him; that they taught for doctrine the commandments of men, having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof.*

After this the angel Moroni was sent to reveal the Book of Mormon; and as it contained an account of the gospel as it was taught to the ancient Nephites on the western hemisphere by the Messiah, and the prophets and apostles authorized to teach in his name; and as this record had been preserved for generations from the hands of wicked men, and has never been corrupted, it contains the fullness of the gospel in its plainness.

While this Nephite record was in course of translation the Lord sent John the Baptist, as already stated in the chapter on authority, to restore the Aaronic Priesthood; afterwards Peter, James and John came and restored the Melchisedek Priesthood, and by the authority which these priesthoods conferred upon him, and under the direction of the Almighty, the Prophet Joseph Smith organized the church, and ordained men and sent them out to preach the gospel in all the world, as a witness that the end was near.

*Pearl of Great Price, p 57.

For more than fifty years has this proclamation been sounded among the nations, and thousands have been gathered to the place appointed for the saints to assemble and prepare for the glorious coming of the Messiah. The work has met storms of opposition from the press, pulpit and Congress. Ridicule and the violence of mobs have assailed it; drivings, confiscations of property, imprisonment, and banishment have at various times conspired to dishearten those who have accepted it. But in spite of pulpit, press and Congress; in spite of ridicule, the violence of mobs, unjust imprisonment, schemes of confiscation and drivings, the church of Christ moves steadily on to the fulfillment of its high destiny, and the gospel is being preached in all the world.

CHAPTER XXXIII.

SALVATION FOR THE DEAD.

HE reader will have observed, doubtless, that according to the history of the gospel, as given in the last chapter, there have been long periods of time when it has not been upon the earth.

One of these periods was from the time that Moses and the Holy Priesthood, together with

the fullness of the gospel, were taken from among the children of Israel, until the restoration of the gospel in the days of Messiah's ministry in the flesh. Another such period was from the time the gospel was corrupted, in the first two or three centuries of the Christian era, and its restoration in the present dispensation, through the Prophet Joseph Smith.

What became of those who lived in those long periods of time-those untold millions, who never so much as heard the gospel?—I might push the inquiry still further, by calling attention to the fact that even when the gospel has been upon the earth, there are countless millions who lived and died without having an opportunity of obeying it. What is their fate?

In order that the force of these remarks may appear more clearly, I will refer to the present state of the religious world, that is, to the strength of the respective religions, as represented by numbers:

According to the latest and best information on the subject, there are throughout the world:

Making the total of all Christians 378,874,936

The other religions stand as follows: