The Grandin Print Shop in Palmyra, New York
Joseph
Smith asked the Grandin Print Company in Palmyra, New York to Publish 5,000
copies of the Book of Mormon. Was this a large print job for the time? Actually,
what was considered a large print job?
a.
10,000 books
b.
25,000 books
c.
500 books
d.
1,000 books
a.
Persecute them
For the Ohio Observer.
MORMONISM
Mr. Editor.
Dear Sir:- Having been for the last
four years located in Kirtland, on the Western Reserve, I have thought proper
to make some communication to the public in relation to the Mormons, a sect of
Religious Fanatics, who are collected in this town. This service I have considered
as due to the cause of humanity, as well as to the cause of truth and
righteousness. What I have to communicate shall be said in the spirit of candor
and christian charity.
Mormonism, it is well known,
originated with Joseph Smith in the town of Manchester, adjoining Palmyra, in
the state of New York. Smith had previously been noted among his acquaintances
as a kind of Juggler, and had been employed in digging after money. He was
believed by the ignorant to possess the power of second sight, by looking
through a certain stone in his possession. He relates that when he was 17 years
of age, while seeking after the Lord he had a nocturnal vision, and a wonderful
display of celestial glory. An angel descended and warned him that God was
about to make an astonishing revelation to the world, and then directed him to
go to such a place, and after prying up a stone he should find a number of
plates of the color of gold inscribed with hieroglyphics, and under them a
breastplate, and under that a transparent stone or stones which was the Urim
and Thummim mentioned by Moses. The vision and the command were repeated four
times that night and once on the following day. He went as directed by the
angel, and pried up the stone under which he discovered the plates shining like
gold, and when he saw them his cupidity was excited, and he hoped to make
himself rich by the discovery, although thus highly favored by the Lord. But
for his sordid and unworthy motive, when he attempted to seize hold of the
plates, they eluded his grasp and vanished, and he was obliged to go home
without them. It was not till four years had elapsed, till he had humbled
himself and prayed and cast away his selfishness that he obtained a new
revelation and went and obtained the plates.
The manner of translation was as
wonderful as the discovery. By putting his finger on one of the characters and
imploring divine aid, then looking through the Urim and Thummim, he would see
the import written in plain English on a screen placed before him. After delivering
this to his amanuensis, he would again proceed in the same manner and obtain
the meaning of the next character, and so on till he came to a part of the
plates which were sealed up, and there was commanded to desist: and he says he
has a promise from God that in due time he will enable him to translate the
remainder. This is the relation as given by Smith. A man by the name of
[Martin] Harris, of a visionary turn of mind, assisted in the translation, and
afterwards Oliver Cowdery. By the aid of Harris's property, the book was
printed; and it is affirmed by the people of that neighborhood, that at first
his motives were entirely mercenary,--a mere money speculation. The book thus
produced, is called by them The Book of Mormon; and is pretended to be of the
same Divine Inspiration and authority as the Bible. The Mormons came in
Kirtland about six years ago; being taught by their leaders that this was one
of the stakes of Zion--the eastern borders of the promised land. Not long after
their arrival in Kirtland, a revelation was obtained that the seat and center
of Zion was in Jackson county, in the western part of Missouri; and thither a
multitude of them repaired, with Smith at their head. Soon after they were
routed and expelled from the county by the infidels, and many of them returned
to Kirtland. There they have been gathering their converts from various parts
of the United States, until their present number probably amounts to upwards of
one thousand: besides the transient companies of pilgrims who come here from
the east to inquire the way to Zion, and then pass on to Missouri.
They have built a huge stone
[Kirtland] temple in this town, fifty feet high, and 60 by 80 on the ground, at
an expense of $40,000. On the front is this inscription, "The House of the
Lord, built by the Latter-day Saints." The lower story is the place of
worship, the middle for the school of the prophets, and the upper for an
academical school; a distinguished professor of Hebrew is their teacher. He is
now giving his second course, with about one hundred in each class.
While I am exposing these palpable
impositions of the apostles of Mormonism, candor obliges me to say, that many
of the common people are industrious, good neighbors, very sincerely deceived,
and possibly very sincere Christians. They seem to delight in the duty of
prayer, and the services of devotion, and their zeal goes far beyond anything
seen among sober Christ-Christians. Some are enterprising and intelligent,
conversant with the bible, and fond of reading: and here, I apprehend, many who
have heard of them only by common report, are mistaken; supposing them all to
be ignorant and degraded, and beneath the notice of all respectable people. The
prevalence of religious delusion is not to be attributed so much to mere
ignorance, as to the structure and prejudices and pernicious habits of the
mind, a predisposition to be captivated with anything that is new or wonderful.
It is furthermore proper to notice that this
religious sect have been slandered, and belied, and persecuted beyond measure.
We entirely disapprove of those violent measures which have been taken with
them in Missouri and some other places; 1st, because it is an outrage upon
inalienable rights--all men justly claiming to be protected in the enjoyment of
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; and 2d, because it is unwise;
persecution being the most effectual way to build up fanatics in error and
delusion. But since there is a certain class in every community who are
predisposed to embrace any wild delusion which chances to meet them, and since
many such have already been deceived and lured away to Kirtland and to Zion and
have been disappointed and distressed, and reduced to poverty and want; and,
moreover, since there are now many converts abroad who are looking to this
place with longing eyes, as to a land flowing with milk and honey, and
expecting, when they find the means of getting here, to bid farewell to all
earthly sorrow, we think the world have a right to know the state of things among
them. Many of them live in extreme indigence. They suffer accumulated evils by
crowding a multitude of poor people together, when, by a wider distribution,
they might have better means of supplying their wants. Some of them are
wealthy, and they have purchased 3 or 4000 acres of land in different parts of
this town. A grotesque assemblage of hovels and shanties and small houses have
been thrown up wherever they could find a footing; but very few of all these
cabins would be accounted fit for human habitations.
Truman Coe "Mormonism," The Ohio Observer (Hudson), 11 August
1836
Reprinted in
The Cincinnati Journal and Western Luminary, 25 August 1835 (p. 4)
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