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THE
valley of Utah has been called an oasis in the desert. It is
surrounded for the most part by lofty mountains, which seem to shut
it out from the rest of the world; and for this reason the Mormons
claim for their capital the divine protection which was signified by
the mountains round about Jerusalem. It was in the hope of being
left in peace to develop his peculiar institutions that Brigham
Young chose this valley for the settlement of his people. But the
construction of the Pacific Railway, which passes through the
territory of Utah, put an end to their isolation, and brought them
into the very highway of continental travel. When I was in this
country nineteen years ago I met Mr. Colfax, then vice-President of
the United States, and on my asking how the Government meant to deal
with Mormonism, his reply to me was, “I guess the Pacific Railroad
will pretty well settle that question.” It is often boasted that
Utah was but a desert when taken possession of, and that it is
Mormon skill and labour that have turned it into a garden. But this
is a great exaggeration. Being obviously the bed of an ancient lake,
the plain has mostly a good soil, and it needed only cultivation and
irrigation to make it productive, idleness, is strongly denounced by
the Mormon authorities, and not wholly on disinterested grounds.
One-tenth of the entire produce of every kind is remorselessly
claimed by the Church, and idleness would not be a good contributor
to the sustentation fund. The Mormons have certainly done well as
farmers, but no better than the Gentiles in many other parts of the
country.
The settlement was begun in 1847,
and Salt Lake City dates from that time. It is now a city of 30,000 inhabitants,
but nothing like Omaha or Denver. Brick and timber are nearly the
only building materials, and even in the best streets wooden
shanties are interspersed with tall brick erections in the way that
shows that the stage has not been reached when taste asserts its
claims as well as utility. The only remarkable buildings are the
Tabernacle, the Assembly Hall, and the Temple—all adjacent. The
Tabernacle is a huge, featureless building, like the back of a
turtle or an oblong dish-cover: the profane call it “The Church of
the Holy Turtle.” It is said to be seated for 12,000.
The Assembly Hall is a more architectural erection, and was designed
for use in winter, when the congregations are smaller. The Temple is
a huge structure, not yet completed, built, you might suppose, of
Aberdeen granite, and when finished will be by far the most imposing
edifice in all Utah. It is to be used for inaugurations, marriages,
or other occasions to which the provannm
vulgus are
not admitted. It is an imposing structure, but wants harmony and
repose, the parts cohering rather than forming a harmonious whole,
and the general impression garish rather than venerable.
The population of Utah territory is about two hundred thousand, of
whom some fifty thousand are “Gentiles,” the rest Mormons. At first
there were no Gentiles, and it is certainly not with the goodwill of
the Mormons that they are now so numerous. A friend in New York, Dr.
Ellinwood of the Presbyterian "Mission Board, told me he
had been three times in Utah. The first time he dared hardly to peep
or mutter against Mormonism; the second time he had for a fellow-traveller
Brigham Young’s nineteenth wife on her way to the city to expose and
denounce Mormonism; on the third he found the Christian Churches,
represented by active organizations, doing a great amount of good.
Many causes have contributed to bring respectable Gentiles to Utah.
Ogden, which stands a few miles to the north of .Salt Lake City, is
a great railway centre; there are many minerals in the territory
which the saints cannot develop; some are always renouncing
Mormonism; and the capabilities of the valley have attracted outside
capitalists, who say, in American phrase, “there are millions in
it.” If the effort to be made at the elections next February shall
succeed, Salt Lake will become, as Ogden has become, “an American
city,” the Mormons will be dispossessed of its government, and then
its development is expected to go on very quickly. This consummation
is not unlikely, for the recent action of the Federal Government has
deprived all polygamists of tin* franchise, and a woman’s suffrage
that helped the Mormons greatly has been abolished. Moreover, there
are many of the saints themselves who in their secret hearts would
not regret a measure that would hasten the “booin'’ under which
their property would perhaps double its value. One of the most
outstanding and wealthy families of the city -the Walkers -are
perverts from Mormonism. The 'Walker House is the best hotel in the
place, and the Walker Store is a vast establishment. Old Mr. Walker,
I am sorry to say, was a Scotsman, who turned Mormon; but being
lulled on by Brigham Young to pay a tithe which he thought too high,
he abandoned the connection. His sons, I believe, are all men of
wealth and influence.
The Mormon creed is very skilfully constructed. It
professes to conserve the whole Bible, the whole doctrines of
Christs family, and the moral law. To this it adds, as if it were an
innocent supplement, faith in the Book of Mormon, in the divine
mission of Joe Smith, and in the doctrine that God continues to hold
direct intercourse with the head of the Church, thus making him
infallible, and making resistance to his orders an unpardonable sin
against earth and heaven. The Mormon Government is ostensibly
dual—namely, civil and ecclesiastical. But, in point of fact, the
rulers of the Church are also the civil rulers and judges of the
territory, and this makes their power enormous. Besides the
president of the Church (at present Wilfrid Woodruff, a
coarse-looking old man, with a most unspiritual face), there are
twelve apostles, and a body of elders distributed over the whole
Church. There are two hundred and seventy wards in the territory,
each of which has its presiding officer; and the wards are
subdivided into small districts, superintended in like manner. Thus
it happens that the rulers of the Church have the most minute
acquaintance with the affairs of every member. Every transaction of
buying or selling, every cent of income, every dollar of profit is
known, and a tenth must be most religiously paid to the Church,
which thus becomes very rich. Nay, the president may announce that
he has divine authority for demanding a man’s house, or his land, or
whatsoever he has. A woman may be told that she is to many some
fellow who already has a dozen wives. If she refuse, she cannot get
to heaven, into how many other matters of private life this system
of tyranny has penetrated we cannot tell.
The Church has a supreme belief in her missionary function, and in
her destiny as the centre of the Church of the future, when all the
world shall be converted to Mormonism. Her
characteristic hymns are full of this expectation, and no doubt many
of her more ignorant people devoutly believe in it. She can
requisition foreign missionaries, so many from every ward; and
wherever these arc sent, they must go at their own cost, and occupy
themselves wholly in making converts.
Usually they go about their work very quietly. Again and again I have
heard it remarked as strange that so many Scotsmen are Mormons. But
I do not wonder. They are not typical Scotsmen. The missionaries go
about the slums of our cities, or our mining villages, express much
concern for the hard conditions of labour, perhaps during a strike,
then picture to them Utah as a land flowing with milk and honey,
tell them their expenses will be paid out to the place (to be repaid
afterwards), they will get fifteen or twenty acres free, and will
rapidly rise to prosperity and wealth. They do not tell them that in
other parts of the United States they may have a hundred and sixty
acres free, without being subject to the appropriation of a tenth of
the produce to the Church. To the religiously disposed they road
from the English Bible, sing evangelical hymns, and leave the
impression that Mormonism is a peculiarly devout form of
Christianity. Often the converts have been told nothing of polygamy;
and it is only after their arrival that they have found that neither
their bodies nor their souls are their own. On the other hand, the
Mormons have the character of being kind, neighbourly, and
considerate towards one another; and every effort is made by the
Church to stimulate the esprit
do corps, and
keep the sect united and hearty. Although the territory of Utah is
their chief settlement, they are by no means confined to it. They
have colonies in most of the Mountain States; and they are very
astute in political matters, not attaching themselves formally to
either party, but holding the balance between the two. The ablest
man among them is said to be a Air. Buchanan, who was their
representative in the Senate, and who is extremely skilful in those
wire-pulling operations that may conduce to their advantage.
But the political tide has been against them for some years, and is
likely to be against them still more in the future. In 1882 Congress
declared polygamy to be unlawful; but as there were neither judges
nor juries disposed to enforce that law, it became only an example
of the folly of laws which are not supported by the general
sentiment of a people. It was not till 1882 that
more decided steps were taken. The “Edmunds” law of that year was a
very stringent one. A body of United States commissioners was
appointed to settle the affairs of the territory; and there was
established a military fort, Fort Douglass, with a detachment of
United States troops, and artillery pointed at the great Mormon
buildings, ready, in case of necessity, to reduce them to ruins.
Since that time open polygamy
lias ceased to be known. Both polygamy and cohabitation with a
plurality of women or quasi wives
were declared criminal (the former having the severer penalty), and
already some three hundred men have been committed to prison, mostly
for the latter offence. Others have had to take to the “underground
railway,” or to commit their extra wives to its care—in other words,
to hide. If you ask where Mr. So-and-So is, it is common to hear
that he is “in the underground.” The practice of avowed polygamy
is now a tradition of the past. As you ride through Salt Lake City,
you are shown the house where Brigham Young lived and died. Adjacent
to it is his civil office, and next to it his ecclesiastical.
Opposite is the Amelia Palace, a more handsome house, the abode of
his favourite wife. Here
and there are other houses which used to be occupied by other wives.
One large house shows a long range of gables—one. it is said, for
every wife that lived in it. In spite of the largeness of his family
he died immensely rich. It does not appear that his sons or his
daughters have come to honour.
The moral effect of the system is such as might be easily foreseen.
Avowedly lit was devised for the purpose of placing under regulation
those tendencies which elsewhere lead to all manner of licentious
irregularity. The hymns sung in worship contrast it triumphantly
with such practices. But the effect has been the very opposite.
What, indeed, can be the effect on young men when they see their
father going oil' to San Francisco to visit one of his wives, or
away to Nevada after another? Mutatis
mutandis, they
will follow his example. He claims for it the sanction of religion,
but they see that there is precious little of religion about it; and
if there be, it is a religion which they despise, so that very
probably they become unbelievers. The whole relations of the sexes
are thrown out of joint. Illegitimacy is said to be very common, but
as the statistics are wholly in the hands of the Church, the facts
are not known precisely. Profanity, falsehood, and similar vices
abound. Many prosecutions for polygamy have broken down, because
even where it was notorious, the witnesses swore the other way.
The scene within the Tabernacle on a Sunday afternoon is very
striking. All the congregations meet in their parish churches in the
morning; but in the afternoon there is a mass meeting in the
Tabernacle, where they celebrate their communion. The galleries were
unoccupied, but the vast area was filled. I should suppose there
might be seven thousand present. One could not but be struck with
the plainness of their appearance. They evidently belonged to the
hard-working classes, and the less cultivated of them, for there was
hardly an intellectual countenance among the whole. The rulers of
the Church occupied benches on a platform, whore the desk and books
were placed. The services, as in other churches, were singing,
prayer, preaching, and the communion. There were two preachers, both
energetic and effective. Their sermons were apologetic, for there
were seven hundred excursionists that day in the city, and many of
these were present. T should rather have heard a sermon from the
Book of Mormon, and exhortations such as one is told are often
addressed to the peculiar people to keep them stanch and firm. The
communion was a painful spectacle. Bread and water were handed round
the immense audience, and partaken of with the utmost nonchalance,
no token of reverence being apparent even on the benches occupied by
apostles and elders. The children partook along with their parents,
and were even obliged to do so. A poor child in front of me,
tortured with ophthalmia, struggled hard to keep down her head, but
her mother would not allow her, and shook her into compliance.
When I went to call on the Presbyterian minister, I found him
occupying as his study an apartment which had formerly been occupied
by one of the three wives of a polygamist. He took down four
well-scored books from his shelves, and asked me if T knew them. Two
of these were Mr. Stalker’s books on the “Life of our Lord” and the
“Life of St. Paul,” for the latter of which he had an extraordinary
appreciation. Another was the “Personal Life of David Livingstone,”
whom he regarded as the greatest missionary since St. Paul. The
fourth was “The Public Ministry and Pastoral Methods of our Lord.” I
could not but express a strange pleasure at finding my books doing
duty in the citadel of the Mormons. I told him that I had been
disappointed that the book on our Lord’s ministry, which I had
thought would be a useful one, had fallen dead at home; but that I
had found compensation for that disappointment in many testimonies I
had received from ministers in the United States and professors of
pastoral theology, including Dr. Hastings of Union Seminary, New York,
and President Fisk of Chicago, to the interest with which they had
road it. Dr. M‘Niece (surely this must be a corruption of M‘Niesh)
occupies a good position and exercises
all excellent, influence. We attended his church on Sunday morning,
and I preached
for him in the evening. There was a second Presbyterian church in
the city in the course of formation. Most of the Gentile churches
seem to he in a vigorous state. These churches are doing good work
also through their schools. The public schools and school-books are
pervaded by Mormonism. Denominational schools are inevitable, and
they appear to be very efficient. One of these which I saw was a
collegiate institution, under charge of the Presbyterian Church,
admirably conducted, a sort of secondary school, with from two to
three hundred young persons. Altogether from fifteen hundred to two
thousand children are being taught in them, and I was informed that
forty per cent, of these were of Mormon origin, but very likely to
abandon the system altogether.
If polygamy dies out, will Mormonism survive? Possibly it will, and
it may give no little trouble. The essence of Mormonism is that it
is a priestly government, subordinating the political to the
spiritual, and bringing to bear on its objects a power which is
virtually that of spiritual infallibility. It has intrenched itself
very strongly, has acquired great wealth, is very intolerant, and
has inspired the mass of its people with a wonderful faith in the
reality of its claims. Such a system will not easily pass away. Its
mischievous influence may be perpetuated for a long time to come. It
is like one of those noxious weeds that have their roots deep in the
ground, and that are ever cropping up on every side, let the farmer
do what he may.
A drive through Salt Lake City and its suburbs, including Fort
Douglass, is exceedingly enjoyable. The ranges of snow-clad
mountains that close in the view gleam brightly in the sunshine, and
the green plain all around is full of tranquil beauty. Certainly
“every prospect pleases—” Is it necessary to complete the couplet |
