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Clark Braden (1831- c.1915) Braden-Kelley Debate (1st edition: Cincinnatti, 1884) Part 5 of 7 pages 175-219 pp. 113-174 pp. 175-219 |
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THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 175 MR. KELLEY'S SEVENTEENTH SPEECH.
176 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE.
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178 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE.
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THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE.
185
GENTLEMEN MODERATORS, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: -- I will first call your attention to one or two things that have been mentioned by the negative, and then proceed to finish my argument, and take up afterwards and more fully examine the objections that have been made. It seems to me that the difficulty with my opponent is that he is not himself conversant with what is in the books. For instance, he makes considerable sport of the fact that glass should be referred to so far back as the time when the Book of Mormon places it. Why, I took up Dr. Smith's Bible Dictionary to-day and opened at the word glass, and he put it at the time of Joseph in Egypt the first, thing, and said that doubtless it went back farther than that; but to that time they were positive having discovered the means that were used as far back as that for blowing glass. And yet, Mr. Braden is making objections here. It seems to me that if he will be a little more critical and inform himself better on some of these points, it will be more to the satisfaction and edification of the audience. Again, he estimates that a book written closely, (after the manner of the English language, of course), would comprise two thousand pages of manuscript. He forgets to tell you that the plates did not pretend to be written in the English language, and that it was a phonetic system of writing used. Now to contain all of the books, all of the words, that were upon those plates in the phonetic system that the Reporter before me is using, or some other phonetic system, it would not take two thousand pages nor any thing like two thousand pages. Yet, that is the way he gets his mule's load. But how about Spaulding's 48 sheets, if it would take two thousand pages? I asked him to explain this before by showing the inconsistency in the Spaulding claim, but he has never noticed it. I have showed clearly from Howe's own words that this 48-page manuscript which came into Howe's hands, was the "Manuscript found." It purported to have been found. I did not misrepresent the language of either Howe or Hulburt. Braden misrepresented me that is all there is to that. Another way he gets his mule's load is this: He estimates a chunk of solid gold to be so much. Well were the thin leaves of the plates solid gold? And would a book of gold leaves weigh like solid gold? In order to et his 250 pounds he stretches everything. Then he starts out with his mule's load, (250 pounds) and wonders if there is any man in the world that could have done as Joseph Smith says he did. At the same time he takes up the Bible and reads where Samson carried off the gates of Gaza, where he slew his thousands and tens of thousands, where he leaned against the pillar and the whole edifice in which they were came down; and he swallows that down easily, and that is certainly a thousand times bigger thing than the 250 pounds load. But he says, there has been so many stories told about this: Well here is the trouble with Mr. Braden. He hunts up these stories that have been told about how they got the plates, and how the plates were translated; goes to all the persons he can find who will tell stories, (but who know nothing) instead of opening the standard works and accepting the statements of those who do know something about it. I could go around and hunt up stories enough that have been told by one people or denomination against others in this country when there has been a conflict, to sink anybody; because when a person gets a little miffed at somebody, it is quite natural to begin to tell stories about him. I remember meeting a gentleman a short time ago, as I was going to Willoughby, (there was also, in the company a Baptist and a Congregationalist Minister,) who was berating Alexander Campbell, and telling all kinds of stories about him; and in order to prove that Campbell was bad, he said that when he went back to Scotland to visit his own home, they would not even allow him to preach in their churches. I said to them, "That is no evidence to me against Mr. Campbell, for as good men as ever lived have been traduced and prohibited from preaching to old neighbors when there was nothing against them." But can find men who will tell stories about this one and about that one, and often persons who prefer to believe them to the truth, and there are right here persons who have told me since last evening, that some of the parties to whom he referred last evening as knowing certain things against the Saints, they would not believe on oath; but is that any reason that I shall drag their characters before this audience and begin to berate them in that way? That is not the manner to discuss questions properly. Neither is it proper to even make attacks upon the character of parties from stories; because, as you have been shown time and again, the facts of history are such as to show that as soon as you assume that position you destroy the foundation of the Bible which is the agreed standard of truth in this controversy. Now there were and are now, just as many different stories told with regard to the resurrection of Jesus, and the way that the Disciples moved along in their work as ministers after his resurrection, as there is about the plates and the angel that visited Mr. Smith. There were many different stories told about what Paul said when he was converted, and we have two different stories as to some things which occurred then handed down in the Bible. And yet 186 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. he wants one straight forward story with regard to the plates from which the Book of Mormon was translated, notwithstanding the fact that the same evil power is in the world to make stories to-day as in the first century. I could take up the seventh chapter of Kings and read to you a story from that single ch'apter, which is in fact bigger than any in any two chapters in the Book of Mormon. It states that Elisha died and after he was dead he prophesied to the king and got mad because the king did not do to suit him. There was more power in his bones after he was dead than there was when he was alive, because they let a dead man down into his grave, and the corpse touched the bones of Elisha, and the man arose and stood upon his feet as soon as the bones of Elisha touched him. It makes Elisha out to have died twice. Makes him talk after he did die to the king who came to visit him. Gives to his dead bones more power than it did to them while alive. And yet we have "stories." That is no argument, no way to debate. The things that I cite are in the standard the Bible. I am yet with that. If Mr. Braden's style of telling stories aud asserting is the way that this question is to be tried, I might as well go away from my argument and the clear proofs that I have brought, because all the answer he makes to them is, why there is not a prophecy that says anything about it, right in the face of the fact that I have cited more than 40 prophecies that are directly in point, and he has not shown that I have misapplied a single one of them. Another thing: He says that David Whitmer told different stories. I deny that he ever did. I know persons say that he did tell different stories, but they are the same kind of persons who told different stories about Joseph Smith. They believed that he was an impostor, and in order to put it down they believed that anything that they could do against him would be proper; and they were ready to lie or even steal, and willing to hatch and tell stories to put the impostor as they called him down, or to do anything else to put him down, no difference how or what it was. I will now read you the statement of David Whitmer made quite recently, and you will see that the statement that he once denied his testimony is entirely false. The statement that Oliver Cowdery denied his testimony and he did not confirm it upon his deathbed too, is wholly false. The statement that Martin Harris had denied his testimony at some time was false. Martin Harris ever stood by his testimony, and confirmed it the last act and speech of his life. David Whitmer's statement September 15th, 1882, to Wm. H. Kelley, G. A. Blakeslee, of Gallen, Michigan, and others is as follows: "Elder Whitmer remarked that he did not feel much like talking as he had not been feeling well for some time. He appeared feeble. He is now upwards of seventy-six years of age, havinig been born January 7th, 1805. He is of medium height, and rather of a slender build; but this appearance may be on account of age and recent illness. He has darkish brown eyes, and his hair is white and thin. Has a good head and honest face. He talks with ease and seemed at home with every subject suggested; and without an effort, seemingly went on to amplify upon it, so that we had nothing to do but question, suggest and listen. His intellect is far more vigorous and retentive than we expected to find. He is careful in his speech, for he studies to express himself in such a way as not to be misrepresented. A reporter called to see him some time ago, asked a few questions and went off and published that he had denied his testimony concerning the truth of the Book of Mormon. This hurt him so that he is very careful now to have some known friends present when strangers call to see him. This accounts for the presence of others when we were there." Speaking of Joseph Smith the Seer, he said, and this is very nearly his wording: "It makes no difference what others say. I know Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, and he translated the Book of Mormon by the inspiration of God from the plates of the Nephites." Let me say in this connection that all these assertions that there was a curtain between these parties, and that he was secluded, are false in all their particulars, and the statements that one told this thing to a certain one, and that thing to a certain one, are simply the lies that were conjured up against these parties in New York by those who wished to injure them. The parties never told any such thing as that themselves. And yet that is what we have before this audience. He further said: "Some people think if they can only make it appear that Joseph's life and character were not perfect, and that he had human weaknesses, that it would prove that he was not a prophet, yet the same persons will believe that Moses who killed the Egyptian, and David who had Uriah killed, and who took a multitude of wives, and Solomon who was a polygamist and idolator; and Peter who lied and cursed, etc., were all prophets, and should be honored and respected. What the individual life of Joseph Smith was after he translated the Book of Mormon, has nothing to do with the question as to whether he was, or was not inspired to bring that book forth." "Do you know anything against his character?" "I know nothing against him. I have heard some things, these I know nothing about. I have nothing to say about the character of any one only as I know. It is not my mission to talk about the character of any. My mission is to testify concerning the truth of the coming forth of the work of God." "What kind of a man was he when yom knew him personally?" "He was a religious and straitforward man. He had to be; for he was illiterate and he could do nothing of himself. He had to trust in God. He could not translate unless he was humble and possessed the right feelings towards every one. To illustrate so you can see. One morning when he was getting ready to continue the translation, something went wrong about the house and he was put out about it. Something that Emma, his wife had done. Oliver and I went up stairs and Joseph came up soon after to continue the translation, but he could not do anything. He could not translate a sinule syllable. He went down stairs, out into the orchard, and made supplication to the Lord; was gone about an hour -- came back to the house, asked Emma's forgivness and then came upstairs where we were and then the translation went on all right. He could do nothing save he was humble and faithful." He could do nothing save he was humble and faithful as reputable a man as there is in the United States to-day David Whitmer as I shall show you by the statement of more than twenty-five witnesses, a Judge of the Courts of the State of Missouri, and men living where he lives ia Richmond, Ray county, Mo. THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 187 His statement concerning the vision they had of the plates and the angel was as follows: "I was plowing In the field one morning, and Joesph and Oliver came along with a revelation, stating that I was to be one of the witnesses to the Book of Mormon. I got over the fence and we went out into the woods, near by and sat down on a log and talked awhile. We then knelt down and prayed. Joseph prayed. We then got up and sat on the log and were talking, when all at once a light came down from above us and encircled us for quite a little distance around; and the angel stood before us." This was in the day time. No jugglery, no slight of hand about this. Martin Harris was not present at this time, and he was not present when the other two saw what they declare here. Now he describes the angel. "He was dressed In white, and spoke and called me by name, and said: 'Blessed is he that keepeth his commandments.' This is all that I heard the angel say. A table was set before us, and on it the records were placed. The records of the Nephites from which the Book of Mormon was translated, the brass plates, the ball of directors, the sword of Laban, and other Plates. While we were viewing them, the voice of God spoke out of heaven saying the book was true and the translation correct." I now offer you the irrefutable testimony of David Whitmer as published in the Chicago Times in the year 1881, which will fully refute the false and slanderous stories which so many have sought to circulate against him, and which my opponent deals so largely in. Also what the first men of the county in which he lives say about him. It is headed "A Proclamation," and reads as follows: "Unto all Nations, Kindred, Tongues and People unto whom these presents shall come: It having been represented by one John Murphy, of Polo, Caldwell county, Missouri, that I in a conversation with him last summer, denied my testimony as one of the three witnesses to the Book of Mormon. To the end, therefore, that he may understand me now, if he did not then, and that the world may know the truth, I wish now, standing as it were in the very sunset of life, and in the fear of God, once for all, to make this public statement: That I have never at any time denied that testimony or any part thereof, which has so long since been published with that book, as one of the three witnesses. Those who know me best, well know that I have always adhered to that testimony And that no man may be misled or doubt my present views in regard to the same, I do again affirm the trut,h of all my statements as then made and published. "He that hath an ear to hear let him hear; It was no delusion! What Is written is written, and he that readeth let him understand. And that no one may be decieved or misled by this statement, I wish here to state that I do not endorse polygamy or spiritual wifeism. It is a great evil, shocking to the moral sense, and the more so because practiced in ihe name of religion. It is of man and not of God, and is especially forbidden in the Book of Mormon itself. And if any man doubt, should he not carefully and honestly read and understand the same, before presuming to sit In judgment and condemning the light which shineth in darkness, and showeth the way of eternal life as pointed out by the unerring hand of God. In the Spirit of Christ who hath said: "Follow thou me, for I am the life, the light, and the way," I submit this statement to the world. God in whom I trust being my judge, as to the sincerity of my motives and the faith and hope that is in me of eternal life. My sincere desire is that the world may be benefited by this plain and simple statement of the truth. And all the honor be to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, which is one God. Amen. DAVID WHITMER, SR. RICHMOND, MO., March 19th, 1881. TESTIMONIAL OF CITIZENS. We, the undersigned citizens of Richmond, Ray county, Missouri, where David Whitmer, Sr., has resided since the year 1838, certify that we have been long and intimately acquainted with him and know him to be a man of the highest integrity, and of undoubted truth and veracity: A. W. Doniphan.G. W. Dunn, Judge of the Fifth Judicial Circuit. T. D. Woodson, President of Ray Co. Savings Bank. J. T. Child. Editor of Conservator. H. C. Garner, Cashier of Ray Co. Savings Bank, W. A. Holman. County Treasurer. J. S. Hughes, Banker, Rickmond. James Hughes, Banker, Ricomond. D. P. Whitmer, Attorney at Law. Jas. W. Black, Attorney at Law. L. C. Cantwell, Postmaster, Richmond. George I. Wasson, Mayor. Jas. A. Davis, County Collector. C. J. Hughes, Probate Judge and Presiding Justice of Ray County Court. George W. Trigg, County Clerk. W. W. Mosby, M. D. Thomas McGinnis, ex-Sheriff, Ray County. J. P. Quesenbery. Merchant. W. R. Holman, Furniture Merchant. Louis Slaughter, Recorder of Deeds. Geo. W. Buchanan, M. D. A. K. Reyburn. Given at Richmond, Mo., this March 19th, 1881." Also the following terse statement from the Conservator, a newspaper published in the State of Missouri, and opposed to the religion of Mr. Whitmer: AN EXPLANATION. "Elsewhere we publish a letter from David Whitmer, Sr., an old and well known citizen of Ray, as well as an indorsement of his standing as a man, signed by a number of leading citizens of this community, in reply to some unwarranted aspersions made upon him."There is no doubt that Mr. Whitmer, who was one of the three witnesses to the authenticity of the gold plates from which he asserts that Joe Smith translated the Book of Mormon (a fac-simile of the characters he has now in his possession with the original records), is firmly convined of its divine origin, and while he makes no efforts to obtrude his views or beliefs, he simply wants the world to know that so far as he is concerned there is no variableness or shadow of turning. Having resided here for nearly a half a century it is with no little pride that he points to his past record with the consciousness that he has done nothing derogatory to his character as a citizen and a believer of the son of Mary, to warrant such an attack upon him, come from what source it may, and now with the lillies of seventy-five winters crowning him like an aureole and his pilgrimage on earth well nigh ended, he reiterates his former statements, and will leave futurity to solve the problem that he was but a passing witness of its fulfillment. His attacks on the vileness that has sprung up with the Utah Church must have a salutary effect upon those bigamists who have made adultery the corner stone in the edifice of their belief." -- Conservator, March 24, 1881. Let me call your attention now to another thing that has been stated with regard to the manuscript of this book, as it was when carried to the printer, and it was Major Gilbert's statement, so Mr. Braden said. I snowed you what Major Gilbert's statement was as it was published two years ago. Yesterday I telegraphed to David Whitmer, who has in his possession the original manuscript from which the Book of Mormon was printed, and asked him to examime that manuscript and telegraph to me whether in it the proper names and the sentences began with capital letters, and whether there was any punctuation marks; and this is his answer: RICHMOND, MO., FEBRUARY 20. "E. L. Kelley, Kirtland, Ohio: There are capital letters beginning proper names and sentences and all necessary punctuation marks in the original manuscript. (Signed) DAVID WHITMER." 188 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE.
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MR. BRADEN'S EIGHTEENTH SPEECH.
192 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE.
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THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 195
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MR. KELLEY'S NINETEENTH SPEECH. GENTLEMEN MODERATORS, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: I call your attention to a statement that was made by my opponent to the effect that I had stated in the debate at Wilber that some eighteen months before the Book of Mormon appeared, Sidney Rigdon and Alexander Campbell had a passage at arms over the religion of the Mormons. I stated no such thing. What I gave to the audience upon that, I read from their own book, "The History of the Disciples on the Western Reserve." I will read it to you. Instead of being eighteen months before, it was a passage of arms between them, as this says, two and one-half months before, just as I read it at Wilber. What answer will Mr. Braden have to this misrepresentation of what was said, when it was said, and also who said it, at Wilber? The statement is as follows, p. 209: "The discomfiture he experienced at the hands of Mr. Campbell, At Austintown, when seeking to introduce his common property scheme, turned him away mortified, chagrined and alienated. This was only two and one-half months before he received, in peace, the messengers of delusion." The idea is carried here in their own history that Rigdon joined the Saints two and a half minths after this affair at Austintown because he got a back-set from Campbell and was mad. This alienated him. Well, if this did it, clearly then it was not because Rigdon was in any way mixed in with our faith before. This was only two and a half months before he "received, in peace, the messengers of delusion," -- Campbellite testimony. Remember that they were not in controversy over any principle of what he calls the Mormon faith. There is no community plan or common property plan in the faith of the Latter Day Saints, nor in the Book of Mormon. That only exists in the minds of those who could not, or did not wish to understand our faith. It is not only not according to the faith of the church, but is contrary to its principles and the faith as the church believed in 1830. You will have to change, again, Mr. Braden, upon that, and find something else from which to make out your case. Last evening when I closed, I was exposing the fallacy of his reasoning in trying to make an argument on the assumption that quotations from the Bible are contained in the Book of Mormon. There is no such thing in the Book of Mormon, but if there was such, he could not make use of it as an argument until after he had established the proposition that God had not also spoken to the people on this continent, because that is the question in this controversy. If He did speak to them, the presumption must be that the instruction would be much the same as upon the other, and it could appear without any copying. In the translation of the prophecies of Malachi, Isaiah, etc., and the account given of the instructions of Jesus to the people upon this continent, there is such a difference in the general use of the anglicisms, as I have before shown, as to place beyond the possibility of a doubt the fact that these were not copied. It was either done by inspiration, as claimed, or by persons acquainted with both languages. But he persists that because of the general wording of the sentiment, even if expressed by the Holy Spirit, that it must convict the work of plagiarism. The objection is on a par with his argument associating the Corinthian Church with "Mormons, Spiritualists and negroes" in order to try to burlesque the church because of its spiritual gifts. "They are persons subject to low manifestations of the spirit," he says. He admits, then, that these gifts exist with persons in this age, viz: Mormons, Spiritualists and negroes. Where is his argument, then, confining them to the first century? I have found a lower spiritual manifestation than this, it seems -- that of no manifestation at all. That is where the Disciple Church comes in. They do not claim any at all; and it ia lower, certainly, than the Corinthian saints. But, my friends, we are in good company -- the company of Jesus and all the apostles and prophets and prophetesses of Christianity; and I thought when he so absurdly divided up the spirit the other night into the miraculous, the indwelling, the sealing and the resurrecting powers, and then facetiously tried to put the saints on a par with Baalam's ass because it spoke with the miraculous, as he said, that he as much lowered the standard of Jesus, Peter and Paul, as he did that of the Latter Day Saints; for they, too, had this miraculous power; and Paul says, "I speak with tongues more than you all." Mr. Braden seems to get into a comer upon every position he takes. The only hope he now has, however, is to try to make so many objections that I shall not have time to take them up and examine them at all. True, a man can make a running fight, and throw dust and dirt in his style for a time, but this will all wash off if the investigator will only permit the application of a little pure water. But he is wrong again -- should I take up by item and examine these pages in the Book of Mormon which he claims are quotations. Let me now candidly consider them: He reads a passage from the Book of Mormon and says, "A quotation from Shakespeare's Hamlet, before written;" but how does he know? This is on a par with this continual asserting, without any THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 197 proof. Why did he not say that Shakespeare took it from Job, who wrote 3,000 years before Shakespeare's time, and in whose book the same thought and wording in great part occurs. "Before I go whence I shall not return, even to the land of darkness and the shadow of death." And again; "Man goeth to his long home." Job 10:21 and 16:22. The wording in Nephi and Shakespeare are not the same, nor more alike than the Bible and Shakespeare, or the Book of Mormon and the Bible. This shows conclusively that Mr. Braden did not know what he was talking about when he charged the plagiarism. He had to follow John Hyde's criticism made thirty years ago, however. Another; "Shepherd hath called and art calling." Book of Mormon, page 223. He left out seven words in this one sentence in order to make it read badly. He quotes again: "Stabbed by a garb of secerecy," Book of Mormon, page 402. "Oh! what a stab," he exclaims. Yes, but the stab is not as bad, after all, as the perversion by Braden. The true reading is, "Stabbed by his brother by a garb of secrecy." How do you like such grand arguments thrown into your faces, my friends, by this Reverend gentleman? Why did you, Mr. Braden, leave the words "by his brother" out? Was it to deceive? Again: "They buried their weapons of peace." Page 272. He left out the explanation, "or they buried the weapons of war for peace." Again, "No afflictions save swallowed up in joy." Page 298. It reads, "He also gave them strength that they should suffer no manner of affliction, save it were swallowed up in the joy of Christ." Do you say it is contrary to Christian experience, when rightly read? "I ought not to harrow up in my desires the firm decrees of a just God." Page 288. No, nor should Mr. Braden harrow up in his desires such a strong disposition to misquote these men. Again he says: "Episcopalians preach from high pulpits and have liturgies." Read the text, my friends, and you will find he has put in all of this. "Episcopalians," "pulpits," "after their style" and "liturgies." Who could not find objections after this style of argument? It is too weak for a ten year old boy. Again, on page 322 he says: "An inspired prophet scalps his enemy, just like any other 'big injun who likes heap much scalp.'" Yes, just like big Indian Braden misrepresented it. It reads: "As [Zerahemnah] raised his sword [against Moroni] behold one of Moroni's soldiers smote it, even to the earth; and he [the soldier] smote Zerahemnah that he took off his scalp and it fell to the earth." What have you to say to this? Again, he charges imitation of incidents, and cites the deliverance of the three Hebrews from the furnace as being played in the book; but an examination shows that the cases are not so similar as to indicate any imitation or copying whatever. The entire history of the two is dissimilar. Thus, I might go through the entire list exposing the spuriousness of the criticisms; but shall I so waste my time? Are you edified by criticisms that will, in no way bear examination? You, doubtless, wish him to give such, that, hereafter, you will be able to give a reason for not believing in the teachings of the Book of Mormon when questioned upon it, do you not? Not to have something put into your minds jthat will make you look ridiculous in the eyes of a person posted, if you should give it for a reason. He again takes up the Book of Mormon and gets off this: "For do we not read that God is the same yesterday, to-day and forever, and in him there is no variableness, neither shadow of turning." "Yes," he says, "we read it in the New Testament;" and then he tries to make you believe the writer (Moimon) was quoting from that. Had he turned to Alma 5:3; 2 Nephi, 12:7; Nephi 11:1; Mosiah 1:8 he would have seen that it was here where the writer read it, and not from the New Testament. He argues that because the expression is similar to that in the Bible it must have been taken from it. This is not correct. In the Veda, which bears a date 1,200 years before Christ, we read, "O God have mercy! give me my daily bread!" Rig-Veda 6:37. Did Jesus steal it when he put it in the Lord's prayer? Take another. (Rig-Veda 9:113, 8) "Where life is free, in the third heaven of heavens, where the worlds are radiant, there make me immortal." Did Paul steal this idea to get material for his Corinthian letter? According to Braden's way of reasoning he must have done so. Of the ancient Zend-Avesta, Dr.Haug remarks: "The Zoroastrian religion exhibits a very close affinity, or rather identity with several important doctrines of the Mosaic religion and Christianity." Chips from a German workshop, page 125. He objects to the use of the word Christ and Christian over here before the birth of the Savior. Eusebius Eccl. His., page 21, 22, says: "The very name Jesus, as also that of Christ, was honored by the pious prophets of old. * * * Moses attaches the name of our Savior, Jesus Christ; * * the prophets that lived subsequently to these times, also plainly announced Christ before by name." Paul says: "Moses esteemed the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt." It may be the Campbellite idea, that Christ was not known at all and not doing anything for humanity till he was born in Judea, and that he was not in the Church; but it is not Bible. It was Rigdon's idea, however, until his conversion to "the faith once delivered to the saints," in the year 1830; and, therefore, he could not have put the reverse of it in the Book of Mormon. "Without this (this same Jesus) there was not anything made that was made." "He was as a lamb slain from the foundation of the world." He began his work for man that early. "Was in the Church in the wilderness." He had a Church under Moses and was there. He was preached to 198 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. Abraham and Noah, and was known of Enoch, for his is "the only name under heaven whereby man can be saved," and Enoch was saved, saved through the name of Christ! "Before Abraham was, I am," said Jesus. "And they did all drink of that spiritual rock, which rock was Christ," says Paul. These are the teachings of the Bible; they are also the sentiments taught in the Book of Mormon. They are not the teachings of the Campbellites, nor were they ever such; nor of Sidney Rigdon till after his conversion in 1830. Rigdon therefore, had nothing to do with the getting up of the Book of Mormon, or its publication. He was as distant from that scene as Braden himself. He tries to make a point against the work because Mormon said that he did not know what change was effected in the three disciples who should remain and not die. Yet he says: "Christ said they should remain 'mortal.'" Christ said no such thing. He said: "Ye shall never endure the pains of death." Then, there was to be some change wrought in them. This was done when afterwards Jesus touched them; and Moroni, referring to this change said that he did not know whether they were "mortal or immortal," (he knew they could not die), without, in the least referring to the grand clothing upon and "abundant entrance" which would super-abound over this change in the time when Christ would come in his Kingdom and glory, and all should be changed like unto him. He next misrepresents the record on p. 137, Book of Mormon, in making Mosiah and his people meet Coriantumr, whom he says must have been, at least, 500 years old. The record makes the people of Muluk and Corianturar meet, and not the Nephites and Coriantumr; and these Mulukites came out from Jerusalem near the time of Lehi, and landed on that part of the continent and are, several hundred years afterward, found by the Nephites; and Mosiah gets and reads the record of Coriantumr instead of meeting the man. In the late writings of explorers they have found the word "Muluc" right here where the Book of Mormon located these people. See North Americans of Antiquity by Short, pp. 436 and 438. Why did he pervert it in order to take my time up with an explanation? Again, "What is the use?" he says, "of the Jaredites bringing over the animals when they found them here?" That is another misrepresentation of the record. It was the people of Lehi and Muluk, who came near two thousand years after, who found the animals already here; these animals having been before brought by the Jaredites; but which were found by another people, and they found them without care on the continent, as stated by Jeremiah in the 49th chapter of his prophecy. He would like to dodge the irrefutable proof of Jaredites' account of bringing the animals first to the continent, 4,000 years ago, as the book sets out; and this, because I have so fully corroborated by science that it was done. Again he says: "There were two nations spread over the entire continent at the same time, and yet they knew nothing of each other." The record gives the particular parts of the continent on which those nations existed, and shows directly contrary to Braden's statement, giving particularly an account and description of the territory that divided these peoples, (The Nephites and Mulukites), and shows why they did not discover each other sooner. Yet, he wants me to give my reason of how they could have remained so long without the knowledge of each other. Does he expect me to give a different reason to that stated in the book itself? That is ample, full and satisfactory. If not, why did he not attack the reason given instead of mis-stating the history? Again, he tries to show that Moroni wrote 47 pages of the book after he had no plates upon which to write. Turning to page 494 of the book I find the objection is not found in the book, but only in Mr. Braden's crooked reading. Moroni says: "Behold my father hath made this record, [account of the history and destruction of the people,] and he hath written the intent thereof; and behold I would write it also [the same account] if I had room upon the plates, but I have not, and ore I have none, for I am alone." This is the plain statement which he tries to twist. Not that he had no plates to write upon, but "no room upon the plates," for that account. He then writes the things for which he had room. Can you see the point now, Mr. Braden? If not I will take to rubbing them in a little. He goes back to the barges and says it would take 2,000 boats with sharp points to hold as much as the ark. Who, except himself, said they had sharp points? The book says they were peaked. Does it say they were peaked after the manner of the torpedo boat, or after the style of the Great Eastern, that would of itself, doubtless, hold as much as the ark? Will he say that the ark was not peaked? Here is a fair sample of his reasoning: If the cubit spoken of in the description of the ark was the same as the sacred cubit, (which he admits he does not know), then the ark was so long and would hold so much. Just so, Mr. Braden. Now let me apply your mode of reasoning to the other side. If the tree which these boats were likened to in length was as long as some of our trees, and the animals which went in at the door as large as some of our animals, and the boat builded in proportion to the length, which is to be presumed, then the eight vessels that brought the Jaredites here would equal the probable capacity of at least two arks. Is not this fairly his style? This profound logic reminds me of his wise interpretation of Mark 16. Here it is verbatim: "Go ye (Who? The eleven ?) Preach the gospel to every creature" (Who preach? The eleven?) "He that believeth and is baptized," (by THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 199 whom? The eleven?) shall be saved; and these signs shall follow them that believe; (Believe what? The preaching of the eleven?) Anybody else? No. Nobody but the eleven." What about following the believer in the preaching, which Matthias hould do, he was not one of the eleven. Oh, he will leave him out! You will! What about the preaching of Paul and Barnabas? They were not of the eleven; yet those who believed their preaching received the Holy Ghost, and the signs followed? What about Ananias? He was not one of the eleven, nor an apostle either, yet Paul received the manifestation, (miraculous, too,) of the Holy Ghost under his hands. This solution of his reminds me of the darkie's discourse upon which he was interrogated by another gentleman of color. A few such questions as these would spoil Braden's entire theory. This is after his interpretation of 1 Cor. 12:13. "For by one spirit are we all baptized into one body." He says that Kelley does not know the difference between baptized by the spirit and baptized by the command of the spirit." Let us see if Braden does. The following is Jesus' language: "Except a man be born of the water and of the spirit" Oh, no, Jesus! Braden says you do not understand it. You should have said: "Except a man be born of water and of the command of the Spirit." Yes, that is very clear; Kelley cannot understand it. Take another: -- Paul, Titus, 3. "By the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost." Hold a moment, Paul! Braden says "by the command" of the Holy Ghost ye are renewed. My friends, whether Kelley can understand or not, he has it just as Jesus and all the apostles did. But Braden has the effrontery to add to the word of God and insert in the plain teaching of Paul, the words, "the command of," in order to keep up his Disciple theory, that the baptism of the spirit is not for our time. Again, he takes up the text: "My words they are spirit and they are life." Here it is, no spirit except through the medium of the word; yet they received the Holy Spirit on Pentecost day, shed through Jesus Christ and not the word. Philip preached the word at Samaria, but the word did not give them the Holy Ghost, nor they did not receive it through the medium of the word. But when Peter and John laid their hands on the believers in the word which Philip had preached, then the Holy Spirit fell upon them. "And when Simon saw that by the laying on of the apostles' hands the Holy Spirit was given, he offered them money." Again, Paul says to the Ephesian saints: "After that ye heard the word of truth, ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, after that ye believed." O, no, Paul! when they believed the word they had it, Braden says. The scripture is plain without his torturing it. Jesus says: "The words that I speak unto you they are spirit and they are life." Obedience to the words will bring forth the life, is the idea taught. "I know that the commandment is life everlasting," says Jesus again. Not if a man has it and does not keep it, however, but if he keeps it, it will bring him into life. It is the royal road. So of the spirit. If he follows the commandments he will receive the spirit, the seal of adoption shed abroad into the heart by Jesus Christ as a comfort and acknowledgment for having kept the word. But if he hears and believes the word and then does not comply therewith, he does not get the spirit shed abroad from on high, and enabling us to cry "Abba Father" any more than if he believed the word and will not comply therewith he will get the life spoken of therein by Jesus. Mr. Braden objects to the Book of Mormon because of the use of the word "arrest." Do not try to arrest the scripture. Yes, arrest. Webster says, in defining the word, "anything by power, physical or moral." And Bishop Taylor uses the word in that sense: "Were sad arrests to his troubled spirit." You can select a more appropriate word according to the usage now, but the idea conveyed is the same if the other is used. He still, for want of argument, infringes upon the modesty of this audience with his smart turn, borrowed from Howe, on the word ox; but I took up your school dictionary to-day and copied as follows: "When wild animals are spoken of (such animals as are found in the woods) ox is very often applied to both male and female." When I quoted this the other night he shook his head. But that is nothing. He has shaken his head at a number of other facts during this discussion. The audience, I judge, can likely see the points made during the debate without he or I having to shake our heads at them. So much for his jack and bull criticism. But he says, that Joseph Smith said some hard things about the actions of David Whitmer and Oliver Cowdery in 1838. Yes, he wrote a letter after lying in jail for weeks surrounded by as wicked and foul-mouthed a guard as, perhaps, ever kept any man, and from which he suffered abuse each hour, and at a time when there had been a misunderstanding between these parties and some others, as to the proper thing for the church to do; there had, likewise, arose a division, and a hot one too, -- just like it was between Paul and Barnabas at Antioch, when they got so mad at each other they would not travel the same road; like Elisha 2 Kings, 13:19: "And the man of God was wroth," but he is there represented to be prophesying all the time; and when the friends of one of these parties had told their side of the story to Joseph and Hyrum Smith while they were thus jailed and treated as dogs, it was more than humanity could endure; and they right lively retorted back. But what has that to do with the truth of the Book of Mormon, or to show that Mr. Smith was trying to build up a rotten church. He fearlessly turned his own witnesses out when they were charged with doing things which, years 200 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. after, were proven to be entirely false so far as implication in counterfeiting, roguery, etc., was concerned. A little different to the way some churches do now, I know. They keep those charged with bad conduct for fear of an exposure. Mr. Smith must have been honest or he would have feared an expose too, from them in the matter of their testimony. He would not have dared to do what he did, had this their testimony not been true. They were honest in their testimony, or they would have gone back upon it after this treatment; and so, instead of being an argument against the credibility of the testimony of the witnesses to the Book of Mormon, it is in its favor and highly so. These men had every inducement possible offered them to make them go back upon their testimony: -- Money, popularity, political fame, etc., but they would not; and they have, through as terrible persecutions as the world has ever seen since the days of the spike and the rack, maintained the truth of their statement and taught it to their children's children; their families to-day being members of the church, and abiding in the doctrine of Christ as set out in their testimony of being contained in the Book of Mormon and the Bible. Every trying circumstance in which these witnesses have been placed is a standing monument, attesting the truth of their testimony as first given to the world; for they have stood the test as does the solid rock. There is nothing in the argument then as to what Joseph Smith may have said about these witnesses for Braden's side. Here, I will notice that "gordian knot" of his. It is simply misstatements and misrepresentations that confuses my opponent, however, in this. The brother of Jared was not commanded to bury his record up in the ground, as my opponent stated, but to seal it up. It does not say that Jared's history should not be made known until the Gentiles were converted. It was brought to light after Christ had been crucified. The account was re-written by the Nephites on plates and sealed up along with the record of the Nephites. It was this part of the plates, or book, that Joseph Smith did not translate, and is not to be translated until the Gentiles repent. My opponent has the two distinct periods and writings and circumstances confounded, which, by the way, is quite a habit he has of doing things dull scholar that he is. The people of Limhi did not get the plates that were sealed up by the brother of Jared, or the interpreters so far as we have an account, but they obtained the record of Ether written on twenty-four plates. The last Jaredite king lived a long time with the Mulukites, and Mosiah discovered them at Zarahemla. From Coriantumr, the last Jaredite king, the plates of the brother of Jared and interpreters came into the possession of the Mulukites, and from them to Mosiah. This appears evident from the fact that the interpreters are not spoken of until that time. The Book of Mormon does not state just how the sealed part fell into the hands of the Nephites, but this is the way in which it could very naturally have come in to their hands. There are many things that were not written; indeed, the record only claims to give an abridgement of the things done. The interpretation of engravings by the "gift and power of God," Book of Mormon, page 137, is the same as translating by stones, page 200. The stones were of no benefit only as God would manifest his power and wisdom in the same. Just as with the Urim andThummim, a stone which was in Aaron's breast-plate, that shone by the power of God and through which the high-priest obtained revelations. Josephus says: "It ceased to shine one hundred and fifty years before Christ," i. e., the power of God ceased to accompany the stone; hence no revelation; and in that. case the stone was worthless as an interpreter or instrument through which to gain knowledge. Is this his only "Gordian Knot?" But he next objects, that the book ought not to be believed because the printer did not do his duty: There are typographical errors, and gramatical errors and errors "et punctu-at-em." Just so. I begin now to see that my opponent means business. Did any of you ever see a book that did not contain such errors? I never have. When last in Chicago I paid nearly $10 for the best Oxford print Bible, printed upon silk paper and with all the care, it seems, that could possibly have been taken to get it correct; with the advantages of all the various editions of that book, and skilled help, at the command of the publishers, and I have noticed in it since my return home a typographical error. I refer to this to apprise you to begin with, of the difficulty in the way of issuing a publication of the size of this book, and having it absolutely correct. The Book of Mormon was printed at a small office in a little village of Western New York, 55 years ago, by men who were not scholars, and not much printers either; and he expects to find everything just right even when examined in the light of the progress in these things, made since that time. My opponent has his mark set high. He wants to see one of the impossibles. He says he can find two thousand mistakes in the book. Suppose he can, what of it? The American Bible Society make the claim, so I understand, that there are twenty-three thousand errors in the Bible of this character; but does this interfere with the divine claim of that book, or so change the sentiment, or reading that it was not entitled to the respect and belief of all people? Certainly not. In the publication of the Book of Mormon he wants God to furnish the means of translating the work; then to write down the translation as made into English, set up the type, read the proof, and be responsible for all poor or worn out type, blunders of copyists, etc., and then, doubtless, he would have the heavy press work done by inspiration. "Just to think," Braden THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 201 says, "of the Lord correcting himself; revising his own proof reading." He certainly ought to be reasonable if he is not. Does he not know that the chances are ten to one against the scribe of Mr. Smith getting all of the words just as they came from the lips of the translator, to say nothing of the copy from this. The translator had to change scribes often during the time of translating, on account of the persecutions against him, -- the violence of mobs -- and to not have had many mistakes of words and punctuation, would have required a miracle each day equal to that of the raising of Lazarus. Before he has made any point at all against the translation he must show that the original manuscript was wrong and that, too, in sentiment and doctrine. Not simply in the dropping of a word, or the misuse of a word. Such an objection is entirely frivolous when considered by thinking people. The process of translation, as described by those who witnessed it, is clear and reasonable. The power of inspiration was with the unlettered, yet humble boy, during the work of translation. It was as Aaron gazed upon the Urimand Thummim when he received the divine will. But it did not write down the words. Mr. Smith had to procure a scribe who did this. Is it an argument against the truthfulness of it that he did so? The result of the work is a translation that is plain, simple, easy to be understood; correct in sentiment and thought; pure and elevating in teaching; fully instructive and enlightening, in morality and religion, -- to both the unlearned and the wise. Who shall demand more? He has presented no mistakes of teaching or thought, neither has my opponent shown a single material difference in the corrections in thought or sentiment in the later editions. There have been corrections of grammatical and typographical errors. Again, he states, that Martin Harris told somebody, so somebody told him, that he (Harris) saw the plates by the eye of faith. Suppose he did, what of it? Did he mean by that to convey the idea that he did not see them? On no! he wanted to show that a person was only privileged to see them through the exercise of faith in God. Does any man object to that? That is the way Peter, James and John were permitted to be the especial witnesses of the transfiguration in the Mount, and is certainly sensible. Remember that Martin Harris never went back on his testimony in regard to his viewing the plates and witnessing the manifestation of the power of God upon the occasion, but affirmed the truth of the same, and the truth of the work all through his life to his enemies and his friends, his neighbors and his own family. But I ask, What is the point to be gained in this discussion by so viciously attacking the character of these witnesses, and that of Joseph Smith, or Sidney Rigdon? Has it been pertinent in answering my argument? Have I attempted to cram you with what any of these parties said about it, and thereby undertaken to prove the Book of Mormon true? Have the Saints ever so held out the claim to the world that men and women should believe in this book because these witnesses said it was true? Does the book so hold? No, sir. All these questions must, in truth, be answered in the negative. No more have we done so than the apostles asked the people in their time to believe in the religion they brought, simply from their statements. The witnesses were for the purpose, of offering to the people a prima facie case, such as would require them, if honest, to hear and investigate the matter, and be sufficiently forcible to hold them responsible for refusing to entertain and consider the message. But their testimony was not all that the people were to be able to test the matter by -- far from it. That would have been the way for most men to work, but not our Heavenly Father. He says, "To the law and to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word it is because there is no light in them." Isaiah 8:20. This is the divine rule, and ministers ought to abide it. The apostles so proved their faith by the law already believed in by the people, besides being witnesses, and thus presenting a prima facie case to the world. Hence Paul says of the citizens of Berea, "These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily whether those things were so." Acts 17:11. And Jesus says: "They (the scriptures) are they which testify of me." The true test, then of the faith of a people, is not in the stories told about them by their enemies, or the false witnesses that are so often set up to destroy a good man, as witness the 6th of Acts, 12 to 15 verses; but it is in the consideration of principles, and by the attainment of knowledge through the divine promise. "If any man will do his will he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God" -- a higher, grander and more exalting plane than that of harkening to the voice of the slanderer, or following in the trail of the tale-bearer. |
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MR. BRADEN'S NINETEENTH SPEECH. GENTLEMEN MODERATORS, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: -- Was Joe Smith the originator of Mormon polygamy? The last argument that we present in reference of our opponent's claim that Joe Smith was a true prophet of God, and that the Book of Mormon that he gave to the world is of Divine origin, and worthy to be accepted as a revelation, is the damning fact that Smith was the originator of the abomination Mormon polygamy, and the author of that blasphemy entitled, "A Revelation in Regard to Celestial Marriage." This damning fact that after wallowing in lewdness for years, without even the pretended sanction of that profanation of marriage, polygamy, he gave to the world that infamy, blasphemously entitled "A Revelation in Regard to Celestial Marriage," and was the originator of that adomination Mormon polygamy, is enough to sink him and every pretended revelation from him below the vilest depths of the most infamous corner of the lowest hell. On no other topic have the "re-organized" done so much lying to the square inch as in denying that Smith was the originator of Mormon polygamy I propose to end the controversy for ever on that topic. Dr. McIntyre, family physician of the Smith's in Manchester, N. Y., declares that the house of Joseph Smith, Sr., was a perfect brothel. Ezra Pierce, Samantha Payne and other schoolmates and associates of the Smith's, testify that Smith was lewd, and so were the family and the entire money hunting gang, and that the digging was done at night by a gang of low men surrounded by lewd women, who loafed in the daytime and prowled around at night, and that the Smiths were the worst of the gang. A sister of Joe left New York enceinte and unmarried. Levi Lewis testifies that while Smith was pretending to translate his pretended plates he tried to seduce Eliza Winters and defended his infamous attempt, declaring that adultery was no sin. Dr. John Stafford, a schoolmate, testifies that Joe was a great admirer of Mohammed and the Koran, and defended Mohammed's polygamy and the Koran in teaching it; and that he heard him repeatedly declare that polygamy was right, and that nature and the Bible taught it. In March, 1832, Smith was stopping at Mr. Johnson's, in Hiram, Ohio, and was mobbed. The mob was led by Eli Johnson, who blamed Smith with being too intimate with his sister Marinda, who afterwards married Orson Hyde. Brigham Young, in after years, twitted Hyde with this fact, and Hyde, on learning its truth, put away his wife, although they had several children. Lyman Johnson, another brother of Marinda Johnson, and a leading Mormon, repeatedly declared that he knew that polygamy was practiced by Smith and others in Kirtland. Martin Harris told J. M. Atwater, Mr. Clapp and many others that polygamy was taught and practiced by Smith and in Kirtland under the name of "spiritual wifery." Lewis Bond and Ezra Bond have repeatedly stated that their father and mother, who were amongst the first Mormons in Kirtland, repeatedly declared that Smith practiced polygamy in Kirtland, and that he followed a girl into a privy and committed fornication with her. Mrs. Bond made such declaratons to Mrs. Hansbury and others. Lewis Bond says his father is so disgusted with the dishonesty of the Josephites in denying what he knows to be true, that he will not affiliate with them. Fanny Brewer testifies that Smith had serious trouble in Kirtland, arising from his seducing an orphan girl living in his family, and that Martin Harris told her that Smith was notoriously lewd and untruthful. Mr. Moreton one of the first Apostles, told his daughter, Mrs. Hansbury, and her husband that Emma Smith detected Joe in adultery with a girl by the name of Knight, and that Joe confessed the crime to the officers of the Church. W. W. Phelps stated that while Smith was pretending to translate the papyrus, for his book of Abraham, he declared that polygamy would yet be a practice of the Saints. Martin Harris told J. M Atwater, that the doctrine of spiritual wifery was first positively announced as a revelation, by Rigdon, before a meeting of the officials of the Church, in an old building that used to stand southwest of the Temple, W. S. Smith and others testify that the practice of sealing women to men was so much talked of at Kirtland, while Smith was there, that it became a by-word on the streets; and that common report said, that a bitter quarrel between Rigdon and Smith shortly before they left Kirtland was because Smith wanted to have Nancy Rigdon a girl of 16 sealed to him. In the article on marriage on pages 239, 330, Book of Doctrines and Covenants, adopted, Mormons say by the annual conference in Kirtland, April 1834, we read: "Inasmuch as this Church of Christ has been charged with fornication and polygamy." This proves that the acts and utterances of Mormons had been such, before April, 1834, that outsiders charged them with polygamy. R. M. Elvin and other leading Josephites have admitted that Rigdon and Smith have taught Spiritual wifery or "sealing women to men in time for eternity." They claim that it confers none of the privileges of marriage, but when a woman allows another man, besides her husband, to get such control over her, as to be sealed to him in marriage -- call it spiritual, or celestial, or whatnot -- she will allow him the privileges of terrestial marriage. Such was the result in Smith's case always. In the "Elders' Journal," edited by Joe THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 203 Smith, No. 2, page 38, published in Kirtland, November 1837, in an editorial, Smith publishes some questions that he says "Were asked daily and hourly, by all classes of persons while we were traveling." The 7th is "Do Mormons believe in having more wives than one?" Smith himself confesses that the acts and utterances of Mormons had been such, that all classes of persons asked him daily and hourly, while he was journeying between Kirtland and Far West. "Do Mormons believe in having more wives than one?" Scores of persons who were prominent among the Mormons in Missouri, have declared that Smith confided to his confidants, that he had received a revelation in favor of polygamy, but that it was not prudent to make it public. The time had not come to make known the will of the Lord. In Nauvoo, while discussing the extraordinary power conferred by the charter they intended to ask from the Illinois legislature, Smith said that they needed such extraordinary powers, for the Turk, with his harem, would come to Nauvoo, and they must have power to protect him in polygamy. Smith declared in a sermon he preached in 1840, that polygamy was right. It was right, in the sight of God, for a man to have as many wives as he pleased. People of polygamous countries would be converted and want to come to Zion, and Mormons must have polygamy as an established institution, and then they could bring their polygamous wives with them. He made the same argument from the Bible that Brighamites now make. This sermon raised such a storm he became alarmed, and tried to lie out of his revelation of polygamy, by declaring that he was only trying them (the Mormons). But he rebuked them for their rebellious spirit in daring to oppose what he said, and told them that their hardness of heart prevented the will of the Lord being revealed and carried out. He practiced polygamy himself and taught it to other leading Mormons, who also practiced it in secret and taught it to others. His intimacy with Julia Murdoch, his adopted daughter, caused trouble with his wife, who sent the girl to her father. At one time he had in the Mansion House eleven girls, that he called his daughters, saying that he had adopted them to take care of them. His wife left the house and he had to dismiss his harem, to silence the scandal, and get his wife back. Rushton, who was a sort of factotum about the Mansion House, testifies that while Mrs. Smith was in St. Louis on business, the wife of a leading Mormon took her place in Joe's bed, and that he saw her there when he went to Joe's room for some keys. The complaisant husband was made an apostle for his submission to the will of the Lord. Did space permit we could give the sworn statements of Orson Pratt's wife, Wm. Law's wife, Dr. Foster's wife, Wm. Mark's daughter. Nancy Rigdon, Martha Brotherton, Melissa Schindle, and a score more of as respectable women as ever lived in Nauvoo, that Smith tried to seduce them into spiritual wifery. We could quote the affidavits of scores of men and women that positively swear that they knew of his lewedness with scores of women. We could quote the revelations of Van Duzen and his wife and others in regard to the orgies of the Endowment House. The fact that these revelations made before the death of Smith, are an ex- act description of the orgies of the Endowment House as practiced in Utah, proves that they were practiced in Nauvoo before Smith's death, as these parties declare, and that Smith was their author as Utah Mormons now declare. In the fall of 1842 Joe secretly performed the first plural marriage ceremony. He married Wm. Noble to his first plural wife, and Noble united Joe to his sister. Joe had had scores of spiritual wives before this, but without the farce of a ceremony of marriage. Soon after he took the beautiful wife of B. H. Jacobs as a plural wife as she and others testify. In the winter of 1843 Smith gave to S. H. Jacobs an article presenting the usual arguments for polygamy. Jacobs published it in the "Wasp" and in pamphlet form. Joe was trying the Saints again. The opposition to the infamy alarmed him again, and he tried to lie out of it, and pretended to oppose polygamy. He told the people again that their rebellious spirit would not let the will of the Lord be made known. In the spring of 1843, however, matters had gone so far, so many had gone into polygamy, Joe's wife was making so much opposition to his course, that he could wear his mask no longer. June 12th, 1843, he dictated to William Clayton "A Revelation in Regard to Celestial Marriage." N. K. Whitney, who has done more of Mormon official writing than any other man, declares he heard it dictated to Clayton, and that he copied it from the copy taken down by Clayton. Joseph C. Kin[g]sbury testifies that he heard it dictated and copied it also. When the original copy, taken down by Clayton, was presented to Smith's wife, she declared it was from the devil and burned it. David Fullmer and others who were Apostles and high Councillors testify that Hyram Smith presented the revelation to the Apostles and the Council, and that it was adopted and sanctioned. In the Spring of 1844 Marks, Higbee, Law and others seceded and held meetings. In these meetings, ladies of the highest character, positively testified that Smith and other Mormon leaders had tried to seduce them into polygamy. Scores testified to the polygamy of Smith and Mormon leaders, and to the abominations of the Endowment House and other secret meetings of the Mormons. In June 1844 the malcontents issued a paper called the "Nauvoo Expositor." In it were affidavits of sixteen as respectable ladies as were in Nauvoo, that Smith and other Mormon leaders had tried to seduce them into polygamy. Joe's answer was to send a mob of his tools to destroy the press and compel the publishers to fly for their lives. They swore out warrants 204 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. for the arrest of Smith. He was put in jail at Cartage and murdered, not by Missiourians and Illinoisians, but by men whose wives and daughters he had tried to ruin. He fell, not as a martyr to religion, but as a victim to his own crimes, as he himself declared when going to Carthage. Such are the facts in regard to the career of Smith in his connection with Mormon polygamy. We prove our statement by the testimony of intimate acquaintances of Smith in New York, leading Mormons and citizens in Kirtland, leading Mormons in Missouri, leading Mormons in Nauvoo. We have cited the statements and certificates of scores. We prove that Smith was the author of the revelation in favor of Polygamy by Clayton to whom he dictated it. Whitney and Kingsbury who heard it dictated and copied it. By Fullmer and other apostles and councillors to whom Hyram Smith presented it, and by whom it was sanctioned. We cite the testimony of Edwin Hunter, presiding bishop of Utah church, in an affidavit dated Salt Lake City, September 1st, 1883. He solemnly swears, "Since 1842 he has held most intimate relations, personal and official, with the leading men of the Church. President Joseph Smith was his warmest personal friend, he was herald and armor-bearer to Joseph. From this very intimate and personal relation and intercourse he knows that Joseph Smith both taught and practised the celestial and eternal order of marriage from the beginning of our acquaintance to the time of his death." This is but one of scores that can be cited, scores to whom Smith taught polygamy. The testimony of Eliza R. Snow, Eliza Partridge, Emily Partridge, Lucy Walker, Mrs. Jacobs and others to whom Smith was married in polygamy. The testimony of others who saw him married in polygamy among the rest, the oath of his niece, the daughter of Hyram Smith, that she saw him married in polygamy. The oaths of persons for whom he performed the ceremony of plural marriage. W. Noble, J. B. Noble, J. D. Lee, and others. The reply to all this array of evidence is an impudent denial, without one particle of rebutting testimony, and abuse of the witnesses as liars and perjurers. As the persons who now pour out such abuse did not make such denials when the facts were recent, and make them now when they think the evidence can be weakened by such denials, on account of lapse of time, these denials are merely thu retort of the cornered ruffian, "You are a liar." It is amusing to read the weak efforts of the Josephites to get rid of the damning fact that Impostor Joe was the originator of those abominations. Mormon polygamy and the revelation in favor of it. They remind one of the lawyer who was defending a man charged with stealing a kettle and failing to return it. He said I. The plaintiff never had a kettle. II. We never borrowed his kettle. III. We returned the kettle. IV. The kettle was worthless. V. We paid for the kettle. VI. The kettle was ours in the first place. In like manner, I. T. W. Smith suggests that in giving Impostor Joe that revelation in favor of polygamy, the Lord did not do different from what he did in his revelation to David through Nathan; thus tacitly admitting that Joe did have such a revelation and that it is all right. II. The leading editorial in the first number of the Saints' Herald says that the Lord gave that revelation to Joe to punish Joe and the Mormons. III. In the same number Isaac Sheen says Joe had such a revelation and that it was from the devil. IV. Joe lied and said he received such a revelation, when he did not. V. It is a lie and a forgery gotten up by Utah Mormons. VI. It is a lie told by the Gentiles. As the "clodings" peddler tells us, "you takes which you likes." It is all the same material -- lie -- throughout. When the Josephites started, they did not dare to deny that Joe was the originator of Mormon polygamy, and the author of that revelation. The facts were too recent and there was too much evidence to be lied down. Forty years have elapsed since the revelation was given and over fifty since Joe first taught and practised polygamy. Now they impudently try to lie out of it. We will stop all such lying attempts by quoting their own testimony, given when they started, and when the facts were recent and the evidence so palpable that they freely admitted the truth themselves. On page 26 of the Saints' Herald, Vol. 1, No. 1, William Marks, one of the leaders in the re-organization movement, one of their founders and a leader till his death, declares that June 1844 he was presiding elder of the Stake at Nauvoo, and presiding officer of the High Council. At that time the Church had in a great measure departed from the pure doctrines and principles of Jesus Christ. It was revealed to him that the only way to purify the church was to dis-organize it. A few days after this revelation to him, the Prophet Joseph sought an interview with him, and said to him in these words, verbatim, for they were indelibly impressed on his memory: He had for a long time desired to have an interview with me on tlie subject of polygamy. It would prove the overthrow of the church and we would have to leave the United States on account of it. He would go before the congregation and proclaim against it. I must go before the High council and proclaim against it. He would prefer charges against those in transgression, and I must sever them from the Church, if they would not make complete satisfaction." From this clear, positive and circumstantial evidence of one who was high in authority at Nauvoo when Smith's influence as a prophet was omnipotent in the church -- one who was intimate with Smith -- one who knew perfectly all that was going on in the church -- one who was one of the founders of the Re-organization and a leader till his death, as given in the first number of the official organ of the Re-organized, we prove: THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 205 I. That while Smith was living, and when his influence as a prophet was omnipotent in the church, this abomination was so prevalent that Marks, presiding elder at Nauvoo, declared that the only way to purify the church was to dis-organize it. II. That this abomination, polygamy, prevailed to such an extent that its author, Smith, became alarmed and declared that it would be the ruin of the church, and that the Mormons would be driven out of the United States on account of it. III. The testimony of Marks and of Smith himself substantiates the charges of the witnesses we have cited, that polygamy was prevalent in the church when it was under the control of Smith, and when his influence as prophet was omnipotent in it. Also the statements of witnesses in regard to the orgies of the Endowment House and other secret meetings in Nauvoo. The church had become corrupt in polygamy and lust. Marks does not state how far Smith was responsible for the horrible state of affairs that so alarmed him, but as he had been and was the great prophet, and as his influence was omnipotent, so startling an innovation as polygamy could not have become so prevalent unless, as hundreds of witnesses testify, he was the originator of it. Josephites appeal to Marks' statement that Smith told Marks that he and Marks must oppose it. True, but it was because he found that the people of the United States would drive the Mormons out of the country on account of it, and thus ruin Mormonism. We quote from page 27 of the first number of the official organ of the Josephites a statement of Isaac Sheen, one of the founders of the Re-organization, and one of the leaders till his death: "Joseph Smith repented of his connection with this doctrine (polygamy) and said it was from the devil. He caused the revelation on that subject (polygamy) to be burnt. When he vohintarily came back to Nauvoo and surrendered himself into the hands of his enem es, he said he was going to Carthage to die. At that time he also said that if it nad not been for that accursed spiritual wife doctrine he never would have come to that" (condition.) By this positive statement, published with approval in the first number of the official organ of the Josephites, and made by one of the editors, a founder of the Josephites and a leader till his death, we prove: I. That Joseph was the author of the vile pretended revelation in favor of polygamy. II. That the statement made by Mormons in Utah is true, that the original of the revelation was burned. Sheen tries to give Smith credit for burning it. Utah Mormons tell the truth and say that his wife burned it. III. That Smith publicly and openly confessed that he was the author of it, and that the death he feared would be caused by his crimes in polygamy. We will now clinch the matter by quoting from the leading editorial in the first number of the official organ of the Re-organized, written, it is said, by Z. H. Gurley, one of the founders of the Josephites and a leader in that body, and an editor of that official organ from which we quote, pages 8 and 9: "This adulterous spirit" (of polygamy) "had so captivated their hearts" (the hearts of the Mormons), "that they" (the Mormons) "desired license from God to lead away captive" (in polygamy) "the fair daughters of his people." Could the Lord do anything more or less than Ezekiel hath prophecied? The Lord hath declared by Ezekiel what kind of an answer he would give them. Therefore he answered them according to the multitude of their idols. Paul had also prophecied "for this cause God shall send them strong delusions that they might believe a lie, and that they all might be damned." In Ezekiel the Lord also says "I will set my face against that man, the prophet, and I will cut him off from the midst of my people, and ye shall know that I am the Lord." The death of the prophet (Joseph Smith) is a fact that has been realized, although he repented of his iniquity (polygamy), "and abhorred it before his death." By this leading editorial of the first number of the ofiicial organ of the Re-organized, written by one of the founders and leaders of the Josephites, one familiar with Smith, and what transpired in Nauvoo we prove. I. That Smith was the author of the revelation in favor of polygamy, and that his death by violence was caused by his connection with the iniquity of polygamy. II. That Smith repented of this iniquity before his death. This confirms Sheen's testimony. These three declarations of founders of Josephites made in the first number of their official organ ought to palsy the tongues of the Josephites with shame, when they are trying to lie out of the truth in regard to Smith's polygamy. The Josephites assert that these men have since retracted their statements. If that were true it would merely show that in the first number of the "Saints' Herald," when the facts were recent, they stated what was true, because the evidence could not then be gainsayed; and that since then, when they think that the evidence has disappeared, they are trying to lie out of the truth they once confessed. But we defy Josephites to produce evidence that they have ever retracted these statements. These statements stood for years unquestioned and admitted. Now Josephites try by cheek and impudence to lie out of the damning fact that Joe Smith was the originator of Mormon polygamy. The evasions of Josephites when forced to face this crushing array of testimony are contemptible in their weakness. They heap abuse on the one who presents the evidence. That is as sensible as it would be for a pettifogger to abuse the lawyer whose array of evidence he could not meet. It matters not what the lawyer may be. That does not affect one particle the evidence of the witnesses he presents. They abuse and villify the witnesses They are liars, slanderers, &c., although they are 206 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. most of them Mornions, and were leaders among the Mormons before they gave their testimony. Calling them names will not set aside their evidence. They appeal to the denials of Smith and others. The cheek displayed in such a plea colossal. On the same ground every scoundrel arraigned for crime should be declared innocent because he denies it. If persons who accept such denials were judges in criminal trials, they would set every scoundrel free the moment he set up the plea, "not guilty." If men commit so infamous a crime as polygamy, they will not hesitate to lie out of it. The Pratts, Taylor, Richards and others, who united with Smith in such denials, now admit that they and Smith were practicing polygamy, when the denials were made, and that they and Smith lied in denying it, because it was not then prudent to avow it. Smith's revelations and teachings containmany instances where concealment and deception were commanded under similar circumstances. Smith's character for fraud, lying, cheating and deception were notorious all his life. The impudence of persons who will appeal the denials of such a person in the face of hundreds of witnesses whose testimony is clear and direct, is idiotic it its silliness. When the clear positive testimony of O. Pratt, P. P. Pratt, Taylor, Richards, Kingsbury, Clayton, and scores of others is quoted to the Josephites, that they saw Smith unite in plural marriage many persons, that they saw him married in plural marriage, that he united them to other men and women in plural marriage; that he dictated, in their presence, the revelation in favor of plural marriage; they howl "Brighamite" "Polygamist," and sneer at the one quoting the testimony, for uniting with Utah polygamists in defaming the character of martyred Joseph. The Josephites publish and use as their standards, the works of the Pratts and other Utah Mormons. They quote their testimony in their books, and accept it unquestioned, on all topics, except their positive declaration that Smith was the originator of polygamy. If these men and women are worthy of perfect credence on all other topics, as the Josephites show, by the way they quote them, they are worthy of as much credence, when they declare that Smith was the author of polygamy. The course of the Josephites in this is absurdly contradictory, and is an insult to the good sense of all people of sense. They quote these parties with absolute confidence on all other matters, and they cannot reject their evidence on this topic merely because it contradicts their lying attempt to lie out of Smith's connection with polygamy. Young Joseph appeals to what he says his mother told him. If Emma Smith ever made such statements to him she lied in the face of what she knew hundreds knew of her troubles with Joe in New York, over Eliza Winters, and in Kirtland over the Knight girl and several others, that she herself charged Joe with adultery in Kirtland, and that he confessed it to her and the Church, that she sent Julia Murdoch to her father because of Joe's intimacy with her, that she left the Mansion House in Nauvoo on account of Joe's harem of girls, and that she knew of his polygamy, and was present at his marriage to four of his plural wives. She either lied in the face of all this evidence, or young Joseph lied in manufacturing that evidence. I have heard several persons who were intimate with her and her history, make this statement. Finally they appeal to the teachings of the Book of Mormon and the Book of Doctrines and Covenants. The Book of Mormon condemns secret societies in scores of instances, far more positively than it does polygamy, yet Rigdon, Smith, and leading Mormons become members of such societies, and instituted them, in the face of these scores of positive condemnations of them. Several as glaring violations of the teachings of the Book of Mormon can be cited. The teachings of the standards of the church do not amount to a feather's weight in the face of such an array of evidence of the facts; especially when Smith trampled them under foot in scores of instances. But the Book of Mormon leaves the door open to polygamy. Immediately after the passage quoted to prove that it condemns polygamy, occurs this language. After declaring that the people must keep the commandment against polygamy, just given to them, it adds, "For if I will raise up a seed unto me, saith the Lord of hosts, I will command my people. Otherwise they shall keep my commandments," (against polygamy). This means just this, "If I will raise up a seed unto me, I will command my people to practise polygamy. Until then they are to keep my present commandment against polygamy." That this is what it means is evident from the fact that in the pretended revelation in favor of polygamy the great object of polygamy is declared to be to "raise up a seed unto the Lord." In that sentence following the commandment against polygamy the door is left open for polygamy, when Rigdon and Smith chose to introduce it. This is confirmed by Smith's language in an entry in his diary under date of October 5th, 1843. Gave instructions to try those persons who were teaching, practising and preaching the doctrine of plurality of wives. For according to the law; I hold the keys to this power (to teach and practise polygamy) in the last days. For there is never but one on the earth, at a time, on whom this power (to teach and practice polygamy), or its keys are conferred. And I have constantly said, that no man shall have but one wife at a time, unless the Lord orders otherwise." Smith does not order persons to be dealt with because polygamy is wrong, but because they are rushing ahead with it without authority from him. They are making it too public and leading others into it, when he alone has that power. He teaches that men shall have but one wife, unless the Lord, through him, gives permission to THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 207 have more than one. Joe had given the revelation in favor of polygamy, but he had not allowed it to be publicly taught yet. Persons could avail themselves of the license it gave, only as he, in person, allowed them to do so. Such are the facts in the case in regard to Smith's polygamy. There is not as clear evidence in favor of any pretended revelation Joe ever gave, as in favor of this revelation in favor of polygamy. The Josephites have no more warrant to reject this, than any other revelation. We defy the Josephites to present as clear evidence that Smith dictated any other revelation as we have presented for this. As clear evidence that he gave any other revelation, or as clear evidence that Smith practiced any other practice, as we have given that he practiced polygamy. Let them select the revelation or practice and undertake it. As intelligent a Mormon as the writer ever met declared to him that she was disgusted with the duplicity of the Josephites in denying the palpable facts of history. The only true course was to acknowledge the truth that Smith was guilty of licentiousness and polygamy, and was the author of the revelation in its favor, and then claim that it no more affected the Book of Mormon than Solomon's polygamy affected his writings. Will Joseph Smith and his followers cease to deny the plainest facts of history and own the truth in regard to Smith's connection with polygamy? They are lying for no purpose, for no one believes them, and the only result is to cover them with infamy for their impudent falsehood. KELLEY'S CLOSING SPEECH ON FIRST PROPOSITION. GENTLEMEN MODERATORS, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: -- It is with no little gratification and pleasure that I am again permitted to claim your attention in the consideration of the question, "Is the Book of Mormon of Divine origin, and are its teachings entitled to the respect and belief of all Christian people?" This is also my last thirty minutes upon the proposition and after answering the objections and assertions last presented by my opponent, I shall pass to a review and general summary of the arguments and positions upon the questions by both disputants. I am surprised to find my opponent at this late time in the discussion, telling the audience how much he can prove. He has now had ten evenings in which to do this, and he has not done it. I suggest that it will look better for him to first do something if he can towards proving his stories, or meeting the argument of the affirmative, and then tell you what he has done. I have been waiting and listening with patience too, these ten evenings for some testimony to meet, or arguments to reply to, but nothing has fallen upon my ears except bundles and scraps of the most dogmatical assertions, bound up with statements of what he can prove by Mr. Rudolph, or by witnesses from Mr. Howe's book, or Mr. Tucker's; or what Mr. Campbell, Mrs. Amos Dunlap or somebody else has said. Of these persons named by him, are Mr. Rudolph, a minister of his own denomination, who lives but three miles away, and Mr. Howe who lives but nine. Of these I took the firm position from the very first, that I had myself had conversations with both within the past few months, and that neither of them in fact knew a single thing that was in the least contradictory to my positions upon this question, and invited him to put them upon the stand here for examination, the latter at my expense. Has he done so? Has he tried to have them appear? Will I find him after this discussion has closed, traveling the country through, and telling what he can do, or what his witnesses knew? But he says now, that he don't claim Mr. Howe as a witness, only as a lawyer who compiled the evidence. But I have attacked the compilation itself, the manner of the work and what it contains. Shown the gross perversions and misquotations in it, and demanded that' Mr. Howe first satisfactorily account for this, and the destruction of the originals of the purported statements and affidavits contained in that book, and the original manuscript of Mr. Spaulding before it is proper under any view of the case to use them before this audience. This is the only basis Mr. Braden has for these stories. All pretended authors, in all their publications of these, either took them from Howe's book or some other work that had taken them from his book, and the entire list when examined, have gone down as having been concocted in the same spirit and manner as the story of the guards of the sepulchre who were made to say, "His disciples came by night and stole him away while we slept." But he now has another witness on what Rigdon said in 1826. 208 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. Suppose it to be true that Sidney Rigdon did take the position in 1826, or 1827, that the Apostlic religion could not be introduced in full, unless it was with the gifts accompanying and following the believer in Christ, what of it? Was it not a truth readily ascertained from the reading of the New Testament? He would not in this have been adverse to Charles Wesley. The same doctrine was taught by Mr. Wesley. And yet he could not claim for a moment that Mr. Wesley had anything to do in connection with Mr. Smith in getting up the Book of Mormon. Such statements as this which he has placed before you for argument, only lay bare the terrible weakness of his positions. Again he has tried to run something in the discussion this evening at the last hour in the hope that he might possibly be able to throw me off the main argument and get me to leave the question under discussion, as he has done, and debate a new issue. What other reason could he have had for charging polygamy at the last hour? Was it because he thought I had not the time to answer him, and also make a summary of my arguments, and he would thus further prejudice your minds against Mr. Smith? What has polygamy to do with the debate upon the present question? Does he suppose that I cannot answer the false and slanderous charge of polygamy against Joseph Smith? and does he not know that I have answered in this country abler men, and those better posted upon that charge than is Mr. Braden or any preacher of the so-called Christian church ? (Applause.) Those, too, who have had far better opportunity for knowing as to the truth of the charge. It is a comparatively easy matter to answer to that charge under a proper question and at a proper time. I have only to refer to my books and the many citizens of Kirtland here to show that the parties who have been peddling on the outside that the Saints believed in polygamy while here in Kirtland, or any kind of marriage in any relation contrary to the one lawful wedlock in monogamy, have told absolute falsehoods having no reasonable basis whatever for such assertions. The people of Utah themselves who believe in and practice polygamy, pretend to no such thing. And persons' who are so given to tale-bearing as to insidiously hawk about such things against a people innocent of any such charge are in a far more deplorable condition than any classes of the Saints whom it has been my lot to meet. The law of the church was then, and is now, specific upon this question. In paragraph 2 of section 42, in a Revelation to the church in 1831, the instruction is emphatic: "Thou shalt love thy wife with all thy heart, and shall cleave unto her and none else, and he that looketh upon a woman to lust after her shall deny the faith and shall not have the spirit; and if he repents not he shall be cast out." Again, in section 49, paragraph 3, it is written: "I say unto you that whoso forbiddeth to marry is not ordained of God, for marriage is ordained of God unto man; therefore it is lawful that he should have one wife, and they twain shall be one flesh, and all this that the earth might answer the end of its creation; and that it might be filled with the measure of man, according to his creation before the world was made." This is the strongest sentence expressive of but a single person of each sex in proper wedlock that I have ever met with in any book, and it came in a revelation to the church here in Kirtland, through Joseph Smith. Yet he seeks to lug into this discussion the question of polygamy to arouse the mean sense of prejudice of the people. His own arguments, however, completely decapitate him. He says that "Elder Wm. Marks stated in a letter that Joseph Smith told him in the year 1844, just before his death, that he (Smith) would prefer charges against those in transgression, and that he wanted him (Marks) to cut them off from the church." That being true, it certainly could not be true what he stated but a few moments before, that Joseph Smith was in transgression while here in Kirtland. It was six years before this that Mr. Smith was in Kirtland, and yet he has him making charges against the transgressors. Braden wants you to believe that Mr. Smith was himself in transgression and was to prefer charges against himself. The absurdity of that conclusion has only to be referred to in order that it be exposed. Who does not know that Mr. Smith could not have been guilty of any such a thing for six years while right with these parties without their knowledge? And such being the case, it is perfectly absurd to think that he would have dared to instruct Elder Marks, the President of the High Council in Nauvoo, that he would prefer charges against the transgressors and Elder Marks should cut them off. And to do also as he did in February of that same year, cut a man off from the church for that same crime, publicly and fearlessly. In connection with Elder Z. H. Gurley of Iowa, I met this question of the origin of polygamy among the Latter Day Saints before the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives during the first session of the 47th Congress, and we were able there, and in our "memorial," and "argument," presented to the President and each Senator and Representative, to maintain our case in opposition to those versed in the theory of those people who believe in polygamy; and do you think I could not sustain my position here? Mr. Braden: Do it, do it. Mr. Kelley: I am ready and prepared to do it if you wish to take up that question. But I shall not leave the question now under consideration to do it. I am in the affirmative here. Suppose that Mr. Smith did have more wives than one, what has what he did, after the publication of the Book of Mormon, to do with the question of whether it is true THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 209 or not? There is no dispute by anybody of the fact that his first, and as we claim his only marriage, took place in the year 1827, the same year he began the translation of which this book is the result. He was then but twenty-one years of age. But further, I open the Book of Mormon here at page 116, and read as follows: "For behold, thus saith the Lord, this people [the ancient Inhabitants] begin to wax in iniquity; they understand not the scriptures, for they seek to excuse themselves in committing whoredoms, because of the things which were written concerning David and Solomon, his son. Behold, David and Solomon truly had many wives and concubines, which thing was abominable before me, saith the Lord; wherefore, thus saith the Lord, I have led this people forth out of the land of Jerusalem, by the power of mine arm, that I might raise up unto me a righteous brunch from the fruit of the loins of Joseph. [Joseph in Egypt.] Wherefore I, the Lord God, will not suffer that this people shall do like unto them of old. Wherefore my brethren, hear me, and hearken to the word of the Lord: for there shall not any man among you have, save it be one wife, and concubines he shall have none: For I, the Lord God, dclighteth in the chastity of women and whoredoms are an abomination before me: Thus saith the Lord of Hosts " Polygamy then is clearly condemned by this book under discussion. I open to other works of the church and I find that it is absolutely denounced; and I fail to find a single word, scratch of the pen, or fully established act of Joseph Smith, in any place during his life, where he ever in any manner or way approved or countenanced in any form at any time a sentiment or thought contrary to, or in disregard of, the veritable teaching of Jesus Christ upon the sacred rite of marriage, wherein he says: "Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female; and for this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they twain shall be one flesh." Matt. 19:4, 5. Some pretend to believe that he practiced polygamy privately; but after a careful and candid examination of what they have claimed as evidences for this, I have found that they have invariably fallen far short of what would honestly be called, under the laws of evidence, proofs. Whereas, on the other hand, I have also noticed that the claim has either been made by persons who would like to have it so, in order to (in a manner) excuse their own evil practices, or by those who desired it so, in order that they might have a weapon with which to assail the faith of the Saints. Then there is no foundation for, or reason In any shape why Mr. Braden should make his polygamic assault here to claim my attention. Now there have been a great many stories told here by him; and a great many things asserted and reasserted with regard to character, and he has jumped from one conclusion to another, in order to dodge the real question at issue, prejudice your minds, and save his failing cause. But in fact he has only succeeded in proving one instance to this audience as yet, to show that there has been lying and stealing going on, as he has charged; and that was the instance where he proved that his Campbellite Minister, whom he put upon the stand (Mr. Moss) stole a revelation from Martin Harris' Hat. (Applause.) When my time was called I was discussing the manner of honorable debate and showing you how persons might respectfully prove or disprove the claims of the Book of Mormon, or any other work making a claim to inspiration. Showing that these things are brought to the attention of the people: First: In the form or character of signed statements, or petitions which are properly used to set forth the truth of a matter, and when in harmony with established rules may be said to establish a prima facie case. This is not such a class of evidence however, as will enter with any degree of force in determining the truth of a matter at issue. Second. The evidence to be afterwards introduced to prove the case set forth in these statements, or duly prepared petitions. The joined issue is ascertained by an examination of the points in these orderly statements. The positions taken and the claims made by the parties. But, in this discussion, my opponent has tried to make the issue upon the characters of the signers; which position I have certainly proved cannot be tolerated under the divine rule, as it makes no difference in the argument whether a man comes from the mean city of Nazareth, is called a "wine bibber, "gluttonous," "stirer up of sedition," or a "deceiver," the rule is: "If I say the truth why do you not believe?" Never mind if they do say I am the carpenter's son, and Mary is my mother, and Joses and Simon, and Judas and James are my brothers; nor whether I eat with "publicans and sinners," or wash before or after eating. "Which of you convinceth me of sin," (by the word.) "He that is of God heareth, (receiveth, abideth in, judgeth by,) God's word." But aside from this I told you from the outset of this discussion that I offered the statements signed by these witnesses for the purpose of setting forth the object, character, and claims of the work, under the rule requiring me to present my case. I showed in this way that I had upon all points complied with the law in this regard and then proceeded to bring the evidence as provided in the law to prove my case. There were three ways in which I could do this, and prove it beyond a reasonable doubt; I could follow one or all; but if I proved it in either way, I would be entitled to the verdict, which would be, that the Book of Mormon is of divine origin, and its teachings are entitled to the respect and belief of all Christian people. 1. By the internal evidences of the book itself. Examining them under the rule in the constitutional and accepted standard, the Bible: "Whosoever transgresseth and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. If there come any unto you and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed." 210 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. From the first I read copiously from the Book of Mormon to show that in doctrine and teaching it was absolutely in harmony with the New Testament, and that whosoever in faith and doctrme was a believer in the principals taught in the Bible, was already a believer in the doctrine and faith set forth in this book. Further I affirmed that the sentiments which I read were in perfect harmony and keeping with all other sentiments contained in the Book and held out as a rule of faith and practice; and called upon my opponent to produce a single paragraph of bad instruction contained in the book if he could. What was his answer to these proofs? "Impostor Joe," and a "set of rascals." "Mormonism, and the Mormon Deity," "We have all the revelation God ever intended the world should have in the Bible." We think God spoke to Peter and Paul, but as for this book we don't want it. Just because! That has been his strongest argument all the way through the entire ten evenings. Then when this was stale, he referred you to what Aaron Wright said what he heard read twenty years before he said it. And, ditto, Henry Lake, John Miller, et al, in Howe's book, beautifully closing the argument with "and it came to pass." 2. The second way in which I could under the law prove my case was by taking the things written in the law prophetically, and prove my claim by comparing it with the prophetic utterances, and if the book in its object and charcter was in agreement with them, and no other reasonable interpretation of these prophecies was adverse, I would be entitled to a judgment of having sustained the question upon that. I cited these prophecies and showed their fulfilment, and that the book was well fortified with these from Genesis to the Apocalypse, a summary of which I will give you this evening, and he answered me with "the Koran will apply as well to the passages." And then it was Sidney Rigdon, and again the character of the witnesses to the Book of Mormon, and ["]the Spaulding story." What had all of this to do with my argument upon the prophecies? I was not asking him to take what the witnesses said abuut it. I only offered them as the signers to a respectable paper showing that I had a prima facie case. What has he to say about the evidences I bring from the prophecies in support of the work? "If you believe in Moses and the prophets ye would believe in me, for they wrote of me." This is the position of the Savior upon the question of how to test a case by the prophecies. My claim here and the claim of the Saints for this book is strictly in harmony with this instruction of Jesus and it should be so examined: Moses and the prophets, and Jesus Christ, and some of the apostles spoke and wrote of it. 3. The third line of proof was by the prophetic evidence contained in the book Itself and demonstrated to be such: -- First. By showing that the statements made in the record of the habitation, character, condition, nativity, enlightenment and final termination of the ancient races of man (and in many instances of classes of animals), of the continent were such that if true, the work must be of a divine origin, for when published a knowledge of these things had not been attained by the world. This could be attested by the introduction of such evidences as have, since the publication of the book, been brought to light through research and discovery. Second. By the occurrence of certain remarkable events in fulfillment of prophetic statements made in the book, and which have taken place within the knowledge of the people since the publication. To substantiate this I presented the attested greatness of the ancient civilizations of America by their works, monuments and ruined palaces and cities, discovered and explored since the publication of the Book of Mormon. And secondly, gave the history and narration of certain things which had occurred in fulfillment of predictions in the book, showing that as predicted therein on page 103, tne blood of the Saints had gone up into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth in the diabolical butchery of their men, women and children in Missouri and Illinois; that the devouring fire, and fierce and vivid lightnings, earthquakes, and smoke in foreign lands, so as to crimson the rays of the sun itself, had taken place as foretold by one of the prophets on page 496; that the book from the first had been fought as and called a Bible by its enemies as predicted in it on page 105; that the historical early and latter rains had returned to refreshen and bless Palestine, and prepare for Israel's return there soon after its publication, as foretold on pages 102 and 107; that the peculiar work of the cyclone had taken place to the astonishment of all people, as declared in the book in the figure of the "tempest," and many other predictions and the fulfillment that I might name. To all of this what has been his answer? 1. That Joseph Smith could have gained this knowledge of the habitation. greatness and civilization from things already known to the world of the antiquities of America, and as a proof cited Priest's work that was published before the Book of Mormon, he said. I took his (Priest's) work, and showed that what he had cited you as a prior publication of Mr. Priest was not a work upon antiquities at all, but a book of tales entitled, "The Wonders of Nature and Providence." He made a great display of the names of authors Priest quoted from, mentioning Boudinot, Edwards, Elliot, Cotton Mather, et al; but failed to read to you a single thing these men had said upon the subject, and, imdeed, they had said nothing except as to enter their speculations upon the subject of whether the American Indians were the descendants of the "lost tribes of Israel." I had preceded him, however, in this, showing there were such speculations; but what had all this to do with the great civilizations, works of art, location of cities, skill and mechanism, towering THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 211 cliff dwellings and cities, and the grand, enlightened and populous nations described in the Book of Mormon and since verified by discovery? I asked him. And so far as answering is concerned he has sat dumb and speechless throughout the ten evenings. But he could talk about Solomon Spaulding, Mrs. Dunlap, Dr. Winters, Alexander Campbell and Pomeroy Tucker, and try to vilify Sidney Rigdon and others. But again, I pointed him to the prophecies in the book and their fulfillment, and he could only cry, "Impostor Joe," "Sally Chase," "Money digger," and "such abominable trash and stuff." What had all of this to do as to whether these prophecies had actually been fulfilled or not? I refer to his kind of weapons and methods of warfare to show you how he has effectually escaped making an argument touching the issue. The book is here, and the question presented for proof under the agreed standard between us (the Bible) is, Does it fulfill the requirements of the law? He has only referred to this, however, by asserting that not one of the prophecies apply. But my judgment is that they do apply, and I have given you my reasons for applying them and claimed that they can be properly applied to nothing else, and the time is past for the fulfillment of many. He has stood before you under the name of a theologian and has not even dared to take a position as to what they did refer to, lest he be caught. He told you some person in London applied some of them in one way, and Mahomet applied some in another; but when I ask him to examine them and meet the issue here, he goes back to hurling epithets at the witnesses to the Book of Mormon, who are called for an entirely different purpose. I took up the other line open to me and showed that the statements made in the work upon the ancient state and civilization of the continent as developed by writings within the past fifty years were corroborative, and convincing of the truth of the work; and he at once takes the ground that all this development in the ancient civilization is but a reproduction of what was known before the publication of the book. The finding of the fossil remains of the animals which had ceased to exist when America was discovered by Columbus, and which were not known to have existed upon the continent till after the publication of the Book of Mormon, and I am referred to Cortez' invasion of Mexico, where he found the people in such a state of barbarism that they were sacrificing human lives to gods made with their hands for a solution. To the march of Pizarro in Peru, who met with the Incas in their rudeness; but was this an indication that two highly cultivated and civilized peoples had lived and died in these very countries? No, sir; nor has such a deduction ever been made from the then condition of the peoples. The facts of these great civilizations arise from the researches among their ruins. Before, it was only a speculation as to whether the Aztecs and Toltecs and Incas, or either of them, had ever been a civilized and enlightened people. It was only ascertained by explorers through the distinct character of the sculpture and paintings, roadways, and ruined palaces and temples, and buried cities, that these three distinct; civilized peoples had existed here, the discoveries of which were subsequent to the published record in the Book of Mormon. Then he goes back again to his tub of vilification and slander, and attacks the witnesses offered to make the prima facie case. But what of the main evidence? Not in the least referred to by him. Suppose our case was before a court in the shape of written pleadings and signed. There we would respectively present our cases as we have presented them here. As the one affirming, I begin and introduce my evidence to prove my case, as set out in my pleading, and rest. My opponent, when his time conies, instead of introducing evidence on his side, contents himself by vilifying the signers to my petition which I have never introduced to prove the main issue. I would go on and prove my case, and my opponent would content himself with an attack upon these same witnesses. The result would be that at the close of the trial he would find himself sitting with his chair from under him. Now look at the kind of proof for the Spaulding story from this standpoint of the evidence. He first introduces his witnesses to make his prima facie case, viz: to show that Spaulding wrote a manuscript. That is all right; they can do that by mere statements or affidavits. But when he comes to his main case he has only these same statements -- only this and nothing more; and he introduces these same statements to show what was in the manuscript they say was written, and they burn the manuscript itself. Can you swallow their story, then? All of his statements and affidavits have first gone through the hands of Howe, who I have shown you so fully (that even Braden has not denied it), filched and garbled from our books to try to make his points. Were the statements clean then, after having passed through this sickening sewer? Who will say that they were? Then we were told that the Whitmers and Harris and Smith expected to make money out of the thing. The lie is given to it from the very first by the public writings. They were distinctly told as early as 1823 that they should not make money out of it, and that was published and of record from the first. Why should these plain, published facts be contradicted by his witnesses of easy reputations? And why should he continually harp on character? Is his faith so based upon frail humanity that he judges mine to be? He has examined into the private lives of these men as though he expected we were to be saved through or by their acts. What has their acts to do with our faith? Does he violate respect of Jesus' unblemished life by pretending to compare the wayward life 212 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. of mankind with it? Of any person? Does not Jesus stand out alone the model and pattern in life to the children? Do we take any of the apostles' or prophets' private lives as an example to model after, except so far as they followed Christ? Oh no, the Saints do not; but my opponent's ire has been aroused; it is "war to the knife, and the knife to the hilt" with him; and he will open his mind and heart to nothing good unless it perchance comes through the small glasses through which his vision is alone lighted. Man can never reach truth in any sense by such a course, and I advise him to change, and now. SUMMARY. In conclusion, ladies and gentlemen, I shall now briefly summarize the arguments adduced in the investigation of the proposition, as I have contrasted the proofs of both the affirmative and the negative, and the methods pursued by each in the examination of evidence. I showed to you:First, That the standard by which men and revelations are to be tried, and their teachings and claims to divinity determined, is the doctrine and words of Jesus and his servants, viz: "to the law and the testimony." This is the advice of the prophet Isaiah to the people when testing the teachings of the professors of his time. Not by their pretended supernatural works, their characters, or the lies told about them. Isaiah 8:20. Jesus submits this same rule to the hypocritical Jews as the one holy and just, as the rule by which he would submit and be tried as to his claims when they would fain attack his character; submitting that "He that is of God heareth God's words. Ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God." John 8:47. "Whosoever transgresseth and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son." 2 John, 9th verse. Second. By this DIVINAE rule, I showed that the writings of the Book of Mormon must be tried, and its claims to a divine origin must be determined. By this rule the book stands approved, its teachings being In strict harmony with those of Christ, the prophets, and apostles, as attest the contents of the volume entire -- and as proof of which, I cited certain passages found on pages 99, par. 16, 224, par. 4, 242, par. 4, and 249, par. 8, and which were cited as but reflecting the sentiment of the book throughout. By the Bible, therefore the claims of the Book of Mormon to a divine origin upon a doctrinal basis are found to be true. Third. The avowed object of the book in its being brought to light to convince the Jews and the Gentiles that Jesus is the Christ, the Savior; as witness the preface of the work, and pages 441, and 290, read the first evening, is a good one and in harmony with the Bible. By the voice of two or three witnesses shall every world be established. Fourth. I also presented as bearing upon the investigation of this question, the great and divine truth, enunciated by the apostle Paul and Peter, that God created the nations of the earth, and determined the bounds of their habitation, for the express purpose of being sought after, felt after and being found of them. And the only way any nation has been able as yet to really find him, is by seeking him through the revelation he has given to them. They could only work righteousness to acceptance with him by conforming to the law of righteousness, (the gospel,) as it is therein that his righteousness is revealed. See Acts 17:26, 27; 10:34, 35. Evidence does appear both in the Book of Mormon and in the accounts of modern scientific investigation, and archaeological discoveries on the American continent, showing that the ancient inhabitants of this continent knew of and worshiped God, and therefore the claims of the Book of Mormon to containing a record of the gospel as revealed to the ancient inhabitants of this continent is both scriptural and reasonable. This great fact is of importance in this controversy, illustrating the thought, that He who Scattered the people from the Tower of Babel, abroad "upon the face of all the earth," (and hence some were brought to the Western continent,) as is affirmed by the Bible and twice stated in Genesis, chapter 11, versus 8 and 9, left them not without providing for their moral and spiritual welfare. This the Book of Mormon teaches regarding the Jaredites who journeyed to this land from the tower, and were blessed here with a revelation of God's will to them and here again the Book of Mormon and the Bible agree in thought. Fifth. The Book of Mormon teaches that the branches of the tribe of Joseph of Egypt emigrated to this continent about 600 years before Christ, and here became a great people, and were blessed with manifestations of God's will. To this agree the prophetic blessings of Jacob upon the sons of Joseph, Manasseh and Ephraim, when blessing them concerning things to come. He predicted they should become "a multitude in the midst of the earth," geographically locating them on this continent when taking our stand in Egypt, and extending our measure to "the midst of the earth." Not only this, but the descendants of Joseph alone were to become a multitude of nations, whereas the entire twelve tribes became but two nations, so far as the Bible informs us, on the Eastern continent. Gen. 48:14-19. On this continent the multitude of nations is fully represented in the aborigines, and in the different nationalities congregated here since the time of the discovery. And the Bible bears out the Book of Mormon in its claims again. Sixth. In Genesis, chapter 49: 21-26, Jacob blesses Joseph with a land situated beyond the sea, or "over the wall," and to which Joseph's descendants were to emigrate; and not only this, but this landed blessing prophetically given to Joseph was to far exceed in geographical boundaries and extent THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 213 the land of Canaan, the land of Jacob's progenitors; for he said, "The blessings of thy father have prevailed above the blessings of my progenitors, unto the utmost bound of the everlasting hills. They shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head of him that was separated from his brethren." Moses also, when blessing the tribes of Israel for the last time, marks Joseph distinctly with a landed estate that in none of its leading characteristics refers to their little portion of Palestine: A land blessed with the deep that coucheth beneath; great inland seas or lakes of fresh water; the precious things of its everlasting mountains and its noted hills, the ores and minerals of which Canaan is devoid; the great variety of fruits, indicative of varieties of temperature, which was not true of Joseph's little portion in Palestine. But the land of America fills this prophetic description of Moses to the very letter, thus confirming the Book of Mormon in its claims that Joseph's descendants came and inherited this land anciently. In the history of the Book of Mormon I showed to you that two companies of Israelites came to the continent, one landing upon the western coast of South America and the other in Yucatan, and that afterwards these peoples were united. From the discoveries and explorations since made, I showed you that this was corroborated in the fact that the cities builded in Yucatan were quite different from those builded by the Jaredites in other parts of Central America. That such a people did exist is proven also by Mr. Short, pages 436 and 438, where he says they still preserve in history the word "Muloc," and as used by them it means "union." The Mulockites of this part of Central America were the very people the Book of Mormon says united with the people of Nephi; and to maintain that the evidence from the explorer and linguist is corroborative of the narrative in the book, is entirely reasonable and legitimate. Seventh. I showed you that the fact that Ephraim should be hidden, mixed and unidentified with the people, until one should stand up with the Urim and Thummim to declare him was entirely scriptural: and the fact that the one who translated the record of the Book of Mormon had this instrument by which the positive light was turned upon the prophetically first born of Joseph in pushing the work of gospel progress, in the last days, was a convincing evidence of the Book of Mormon and its agreement with the Bible. Eighth. That the people to whom Jesus referred in John 10:16 were emphatically of Israel, and that they did hear his voice and were those whose record we have in the Book of Mormon. Ninth. That the "ensign to be lifted up" in Isaiah 18; the message represented by the writing upon the stick of Joseph in the 37th chapter of Ezekiel; "the book," which was to contain the doctrine of Christ set forth in the 29th of Isaiah, and the "gospel," which John witnessed committed by the angel in Revelations 14:6, all pointed to the culmination of a certain thing, and the inauguration of the same work, at a time in the world's history, "just afore the harvest," when "Lebanon "was to be turned into a fruitful field," "in the hour of his [God's] judgment, in the time when the "Son of man shall come;" and that these prophetic descriptions are fully and completely answered in the coming forth, object, character and work of the Book of Mormon, and that it is therefore a light indeed to the people and the precursor of the glory of Israel. Tenth. That the work was not to commend itself through its excellency of speech or words of man's wisdom, but absolutely as declared by the prophet, be blessed to those who should seek after the wisdom and power of God; "for the wisdom of their wise men shall perish and the understanding of their prudent men shall be hid." Isaiah 29:14 -- all of which is fully answered in the message brought by the Book of Mormon. (Time called). I thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your patient hearing. (Applause). |
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MR. BRADEN'S CLOSING SPEECH. GENTLEMEN MODERATORS, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: -- The proof that Impostor Joe was the author of Mormon polygamy seems to have completely unbalanced my opponent. He howled and ranted and talked against time till his chagrin, anger and evident consciousness of defeat were pitiable. The argument is this. The Re-organized denounce polygamy as from the devil. God would not give such a revelation. If Joe did give to the world such a pretended revelation, it was from the Devil and not the Almighty, according to the Re-organized themselves, and he was a prophet of the Devil and not of the Almighty. We take them on their own grounds. We presented the testimony of William Marks, intimate with Joe and high in authority under Joe, and one of the re-organizers of the Re-organized, one of their founders and teachers, one of the editors of their official organ, that when the power and influence of Joe Smith was omnipotent among the Mormons as their prophet, polygamy prevailed to so fearful an extent that Marks had a revelation that the only way to purify the church was to utterly dis-organize it. Also that even Joe himself, the author of the abomination, eas alarmed, and said that polygamy would be the ruin of Mormonism. This was while Smith was living and his influence was omnipotent. Will Kelley deny the statement of Marks, one of the founders of his re-prganized concern? We read the declaration of Zenos H. Gurley, in the first number of the official organ of the "Re-organized" written by Gurley, one of the editors, and one who was intimate with Smith in Nauvoo and who was one of the re-organizers of the Re-organized, one of the founders of Kelley's organization, who declares, positively, that the Mormons wanted to go into polygamy, and that Joe gave them the revelation, and that he repented of the iniquity of giving this revelation and was punished for it by a violent death. Will my opponent deny this statement? We presented the positive statement of Isaac Sheen, one who was intimate with Smith and knew all that transpired behind the scenes in Nauvoo, one of the re-organizers of the Re-organized, one of the editors of their official organ, one of the founders of the organization, that Smith was the author of that abominable, so-called revelation, that he declared himself that he was the author of it, and that, if it had not been for the practice and teaching of polygamy in which he had indulged, he would not have been involved in the troubles that cost him his life. Will my opponent deny this positive restimony of three of the re-organizers of the Re-organized, the three editors of the official organ of his organization, three of the founders of his so-called church? Does he dare attempt it? His appeals to the Book of Mormon and Book of Doctrines and Covenants amount to nothing. The Book of Mormon is full of the anti-Masonic rant of the times of its origin. Yet Rigdon and Smith afterwards became Masons. Joe never had a pretended revelation that he could not contradict by another pretended revelation. We have proved that from infancy he was a notorious liar. We have proved that he and his confederates repeatedly lied in denying the most palpable facts. Mormons lied for years in denying that spiritual wifery and polygamy were practiced and taught among them, when the testimony of hundreds of persons who saw and heard it, proved that they were lying. The facts we have proved, that Smith advocated polygamy before he left New York, that he tried to practice it in Pennsylvania, and said adultry was no sin, the declarations of Mormons who were behind the scenes in Kirtland, that he practiced it secretly in Kirtland, that he practiced it in Missouri, that he declared in Kirtland that it would be the practice of Mormons, his declarations to his confederates in Missouri that he had such a revelation, his practice of it in Nauvoo, teaching it extensively in private, his taking plural wives, as the affidavits of such wives and witnesses prove, his performing the ceremony for others; the testimony of men to whom he dictated the the revelation, of the one who took a copy from this original, of apostles who passed on the revelation in high council, and the editors, re-organizers, founders of the Re-organized, in the first number of their official organ, render Kelley's attempted denial brazen in effrontery, and idiotic in its worthlessness. In his attempt to reconcile the gross contradictions in the Book of Mormon, that we exposed, he falsifies its statements. The plates of Ether which Limhi found, were not the plates of Jared's brother, which were not to go forth until after the Gentiles were converted. He did not explain how any Jaredite plates could be in the keeping of King Benjamin, when Mosiah, Benjamin's son and successor, did not obtain the plates until after Benjamin's death, and the Nephites did not know of the existence of the plates, or the people who had them, until after Benjamin's death. The Book of Mormon does say, in so many words that Coriantumr died among the subjects of King Zarahemla, who reigned 250 years before Christ, or 350 years after the Nephites reached America, and 340 years after THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 215 the Zarahemlites reached America; or at least 350 years after all the Jaredites, except Coriantumr were slain. Moroni did say he could write no more for his plates were full, and he could make no more plates. In representing that he afterwards wrote the Jaredite portion, the Book of Mormon does make him write on nothing, 57 pages of the Book of Mormon. Unfortunately for my opponent's gabble about the sticks of Ephraim and Juda, the same Hebrew word means "rod," "staff," "stick" "scepter." In not one instance are rolls or books called sticks. Ezekiel wrote on a literal stick as Aaron wrote on a literal stick. We have several times proved from the context that his long string of prophecies can refer only to Israelites on the old continent, and not to Israelites in America, for there never were any such, and the speakers knew nothing of America. We have several times exploded his archaeological stuff If any one will compare the characters on real glyphs with Joe Smith's lying pretended fac simile of what was on his pretended plates, he can see the difference between real glyphs and a clumsy fraud gotten up by an ignoramus. The contradictions to Mormon statements that I have exposed, I quoted from Mormon books themselves. I showed that Mormon statements are contradictory. By quoting Smith from Mormon books we proved that Smith, Harris, Whitmer, Cowdery and others flatly contradicted themselves. In the same statement of Whitmer that Kelley read a portion of, are silly yarns about angels plowing seven acres of land, sowing eleven acres of plaster, old Maroni trudging along the side of Whitmer's wagon, lugging the plates, and sweating like an old tramp. The silly lies of Whitmer, Harris, Smith and Moroni destroy their testimony. Kelly says Whitmer is a most estimable man. I read from his own copy of the Mormon official organ, the "Times and Seasons," the statement of Smith that he was an ass braying out cursings, and was cut off from the church for lying, slander and plotting robbery and murder. We read an official document issued by Rigdon and 82 Mormon officials, their highest officials, that he was guilty of lying, stealing, counterfeiting, and was a blackleg of the blackest dye. The Book of Mormon declares that the plates were engraved by divine command, by the gift of God, translated by the gift of God, and the witnesses declare that God told them the translation was correct, yet the Mormon Deity had to correct 5000 blunders!! CONCLUDING SUMMARY The issues in this debate have been: I, did mankind need new revelations in addition to those in the Scriptures, when Joseph Smith pretended, in the Book of Mormon and other pretended revelations, to give to the world new revelations, in addition to those in the Bible? II. Was Joseph Smith a true prophet of God? III. Did Joseph Smith, in the Book of Mormon and other professed revelations, give to the world new revelations, in addition to those in the Bible? We have been agreed: 1. That man needs a revelation of religion and morals. 2. That it should be given by inspiration of chosen men. 3. That inspiration and revelation should be attended and attested by signs, wonders and superhuman powers. 4. That the Bible is a revelation given by inspiration, attended by signs, superhuman powers. 5. That these superhuman powers did benevolent work for man while attesting inspiration and revelation. 8. That they committed evil superhuman powers, and enabled man to overcome them. 7. That they aided and directed man in matters incidently connected with the development of the revelations of truth recorded in the Bible. 8. That they deceloped and cultivated his spiritual nature. We have agreed in this concerning the Bible and superhuman power connected with it.The issues have been: 1. Has man received inspiration, superguman power, and new revelations since the apostles of Christ completed their work? Or more particularly, did he need inspiration, superhuman power, new revelations, when Joseph Smith pretended to be inspired, possessed of superhuman power, and to give new revelations in addition to those in the Bible? 3. Does the Bible teach that inspiration, superhuman power and new revelations are possible? That they were and are to continue, as an essential consitituent element in the church? 4. Or does it teach that they are to cease? That they perfected their work when the New Testament was perfected? That the law of God was and is, that they should cease, when the New Testament was completed, having accomplished their work? Our position has been that, just as, in the analogous cases, of exercise of miraculous power in creation, as in the growth of each individual existence in the animal and vegetable world, or in the work of framing a constitution, and organizing a government under it, so in the exercise of miraculous power, and the influence of inspiration, in the giving of revelation there was an end, a purpose to be accomplished, and that that purpose determined the time of its continuance, and that it ceased, when it had accomplished its purpose, and was succeeded by a higher and more perfect condition, for which it had prepared the way. We explained that there have been two influences of the Holy Spirit. 1. The direct and miraculous, seen in inspiration, revelation, and miracle. 2. The ordinary through the truth. The first is not a moral influence, produces no moral change. Left the person influenced just as it found him. That the only moral influence the Holy Spirit has exerted on men has been through truth. Conversion and sanctification can be accomplished only through the truth. The Bible speaks of these manifestations of the Holy Spirit: 1. The inspiration enjoyed by the inspired men of the Old Testament, and until the ascension of Christ. 2. Ba ptism in the Holy Spirit. 3. Spiritual gifts 216 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. imparted by the hands of an apostle. We proved that promises of Joel, John the Baptist, and Jesus, in regard to the Holy Spirit, all had reference to the miraculous influence of the Holy Spirit. That the promise of the Comforter was to the apostles alone, and was miraculous. That Jesus limited the promise of Joel "to all flesh." to believers; and that his language in Mark 16, logically does not extend beyond the apostles; such apostles as would preach believing his promise to be with them; for it concludes "they" the apostles "went" everywhere preaching, and the Lord was with "them" the apostles "attesting their work," the work of the apostles, with the signs he had promised to the apostles. We proved that Peter limited the promise of Joel to such believers as "the Lord should call," to the exercise of the spiritual powers that Joel promised. We proved that the Lord called by the imposition of an apostle's hands, that none but an apostle could impart these gifts. That they never descended to a third person. We proved that there never were but two instances of baptism in the Holy Spirit, and that, as there is one baptism, only water baptism is in the church. Baptism in the Spirit has ceased. We proved by an appeal to Eph. 4, that spiritual gifts were to remain until the church was completed, or become a perfect man, and the faith was completed in the New Testament. By an appeal to 1. Cor. 12-18, that there is a more excellent way than the exercise of the best spiritual gifts. That prophecy, all speaking by inspiration, knowledge, all revelations, tongues, all mere signs, were to cease; when the church was completed in organization, and the New Testament, the perfect law of liberty, that which makes perfect, was completed. We proved by our appeal to Daniel's prophecy that all vision and prophecy were to cease about 105 years after Christ. That as miraculous work in creation ceased, and gave way to the higher, the operation of natural law, so miraculous work in revelation ceased, and gave way to the higher, the moral power of truth. We next stated the forty cardinal ideas of religion and showed that Christianity contains all of them, expresses each perfectly as a universally applicable truth, and that it is an absolute religion of universal and eternal truths, perfectly expressed, and can not be outgrown. We demanded of our opponent, what single truth had been given to the world by Mormon pretended revelations, not in Christianity. What idea that was not better expressed in Christianity, than in Mormonism? He has utterly failed to meet this question. We proved that all Bible writers and speakers speak of the work of Jesus and the apostles, as perfect, the last, the final. They never speak of any thing that is to succeed it. They declare that Christ came in the fullness of the times. That in Christ dwells the fullness of the Godhead, in him was all fullness. They say that all fullness is in his church. That the Gospel is the fullness, the completeness of God's word. That the church is perfect in organization and faith or doctrine. That God gave to the apostles all things pertaining to life and godliness. This utterly forbids all ideas of Mormon revelation. They are needless, for the perfect, that which is complete, the fullness, all things have been given in Christianity. We then presented the history of the Book of Mormon and proved that it had a base human origin, and was fabricated as a fraud to deceive. We proved by the concurrent testimony of seventeen witnesses, one of them Rigdon himself, that Solomon Spaulding wrote a romance called the "Manuscript Found;" that he wrote three drafts or manuscripts of this romance and part of another before his death. We have proved that the "Manuscript Found" had in it these features found in the Book of Mormon, and found in no other books but the Book of Mormon and the "Manuscript Found": 1. The plot of the "Manuscript Found," as witnesses describe it, was just what Mormons give when describing the Book of Mormon. 2. It purported to be a veritable history of the aborigines of America. So does the Book of Mormon. 3. It attempted to account for the antiquities of America by giving an account of their construction. So does the Book of Mormon. 4. It assumed that Israelites were the aborigines of America and ancestors of the Indians. So does the Book of Mormon. 5. It said the Israelites left Jerusalem. So does the Book of Mormon. 6. They left to escape divine judgments about to fall on these people. So does the Book of Mormon. 7. That they journeyed through and from Southern Asia by land and sea. So does the Book of Mormon. 8. Their leaders were Nephi and Lehi. So does the Book of Mormon. 9. One Laban was murdered to obtain records. So declares the Book of Mormon. 10. They quarreled and divided into two nations, called Nephites and Lamanites. So says the Book of Mormon. 11. There were terrible wars between the two nations and the parties into which they were divided, with awful slaughter. So declares the Book of Mormon. 12. They buried their dead after these slaughters in great heaps, that caused the mounds. So declares the Book of Mormon. 13. In two instances the end of these wars was the total annihilation of all but one who escaped to make a record of the final catastrophe. So declares the Book of Mormon. 14. These sole survivors finished the record of the people and buried it. So declares the Book of Mormon. 15. The "Manuscript Found" gave an historical account of the civilization, laws, customs, arts and sciences of those peoples, So does the Book of Mormon. 16. One party of these peoples were the ancestors of our American Indians. So declares the Book of Mormon. 17. The names Nephi, Lehi, Laban, Laman, Nephite, Lamanite, Mormon, Moroni, Amlicite, Zarahemla, etc. were in the "Manuscript Found." So they are in the Book of Mormon. 18. The use and characteristics of these names in the Manuscript THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 217 Found were precisely the same as in the Book of Mormon. 19. The Manuscript Found was written in scriptural style -- that is, the style of King James' Version. So is the Book of Mormon. 20. "Now it came to pass" occurred so frequently as to render the language ridiculous. Such is true of the Book of Mormon. 21. This ridiculous peculiarity got for the author of the "Manuscript Found" the nickname of "Old Come to Pass." The Book of Mormon is just such a book. 22. The original from which the story was translated was taken from the earth. The same is claimed by the Book of Mormon. 23. One party of emigrants landed near the Isthmus of Panama, and migrated across the continent in a northeastern direction. So declares the Book of Mormon, 24. The land near the Isthmus was called the land of Zarahemla. So declares the Book of Mormon. 25. In a battle between Amlicites and Lamanites, one party marked their foreheads with a red cross to distinguish them from their enemies. So declares the Book of Mormon. 26. The destruction of the nations exterminated took place near a hill called Cumorah. So declares the Book of` Mormon. 27. The Manuscript Found could have been used as a fraud, an imitation of the Bible, a pretended revelation. The Book of Mormon is just such a fraud. Now, then, the reader must do one of two things, believe that Solomon Spaulding, during a period of from twenty-two to fourteen years before the Book of Mormon appeared, by a miracle wrote a romance that contained these twenty-seven great features of the Book of Mormon -- features that no other book except the Manuscript Found and the Book of Mormon ever contained in common -- or that Rigdon stole the manuscript of the Manuscript Found and remodeled it into the Book of Mormon. We proved that the third manuscript of Manuscript Found was taken to Patterson's printing office. That Rigdon was learning the tanner's trade in Pittsburg at that time. That he was very intimate with Lambdin, one of Patterson's printers. That the Spaulding Manuscript Found attracted much curiosity in the printing office. That Rigdon was much interested in it. That he hung around the office, till Engles, the foreman complained of it. That the manuscript was stolen. That Rigdon was charged with stealing it. That he afterwards showed it to Dr. Winters, saying that it was a Bible romance, written by a Presbyterian preacher named Spaulding, giving a history of the Indians, and that it had been taken to a printing office for publication, and that he borrowed it as a curiosity. We proved that he spent so much time over it that his wife threatened to burn it. That he retorted: "Indeed you will not: this will be a great thing some day." We proved by Jeffries that Rigdon told him that he took the manuscript from the printing office and gave it to Smith to publish. We proved by Tucker, Mrs. Eaton, McAuly, Chase and Saunders that Rigdon was seen at Smith's in New York, from the spring of 1827 to the fall of 1830. We proved that he was absent from Mentor for weeks at a time, during these years, and no one knew where. We proved by Bentley, Campbell and Atwater, that he announced years before it appeared such a book as the Book of Mormon, translated from Gold plates, dug up in New York, giving the origin of American antiquities, a history of the aborigines of America, and telling that the gospel had been preached in America just as the Disciples were then preaching it on the Reserve. We proved by Atwater, Dille, Z. Rudolph, John Rudolph, Green, and by Kelley himself, that Rigdon preached and advocated the doctrines in which the Book of Mormon differs from the Disciples, the peculiar ideas of the Book. That he so indoctrinated all his hearers, where he could, that every Rigdonite became a Mormon, when he became one. He had prepared then for the slight change, chiefly a change of name. We showed that when a Mormon preacher read to a Conneaut audience, for the first time they had ever heard it, the Book of Mormon, Spaulding's old acquaintances, who had heard him read his Manuscript Found, denounced the fraud, Squire Wright shouting: "Old come-to-pass has come to life." His brother, John Spaulding, denounced it on the spot We have shown that the witness after reading the Book of Mormon, declares that the historic portions, in all of the twenty-seven great features we have enumerated, is identical with the Manuscript Found of Solomon Spaulding. They reject the religious portion. That accords with the idea that Rigdon stole the Manuscript Found, and remodeled it to the use if a pretended revelation, interpolating the religious portion. The testimony showing that Spaulding wrote several manuscripts explains away the trouble over Rigdon's copying it. He stole it. It explains the size of the Manuscript Martha Spaulding read. She read her father's first brief draft, or the portion he wrote in Amity after Rigdon stole what he had sent to Patterson's office to be published. It explains away all trouble over the discrepancy, the difference between Spaulding's sentiments and the teaching of the Book of Mormon. We then gave a chronology of Mormonism showing that our history of the book accorded exactly with every demand of history. We then proved by the Rigdonisms in the Book of Mormon that Rigdon is its author. We found that no one but a Disciple preacher of the time when it appeared, could have been its author, used its language, and uttered its teachings. We showed that where Rigdon agreed with the Disciples, the Book agreed with them. Where he disagreed it disagreed and very bitterly too. That it advocates Rigdon's ideas on community of goods, restoration of spiritual gifts, new revelations, his fall-down power to which he was subject. His anti-Masonry. His name for believers and for the church. His sermon against infant 218 THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. baptism. That it contains his baptismal formula, his revival expressions, his rant, bombast, fustian and spread-eagle. That it has every mark of being arranged by one mind, not many, as Mormons claim. The style is a unit, not diverse as is the case in the Bible. That one mind is Rigdon. We took up the testimony of Smith, the three witnesses, the eight. We proved that Smith was notorious for his frauds and lies. We exposed his almost countless lies and contradictory stories about the matter. We proved that he never made a statement that he did not at some time, contradict. We proved by the declarations of those who had been his neighbors, associates, and by Mormons themselves that he was notorious for his falsehoods and frauds. We took up the three witnesses. We proved Martin Harris to have been utterly unreliable in his stories about Mormonism. He lied about his interview with Anthon. He told most idiotic lies. He said he never saw the plates with his natural sight. He saw them by faith. We read Joe's warning against adultry and murder, in a revelation addressed to Harris. Joe's denunciation of him as being beneath the notice of a gentleman. That he had been a vile character before he joined the Mormon Church, and he gave his testimony one year before he joined the church. We showed by his ridiculous, idiotic tales, that he was utterly unworthy of belief. We proved by Cowdery's old neighbors that he was worthless and unworthy of belief. By a revelation uttered by Smith that he was not to be trusted. By Hiram Smith that he was a thief and a robber and forger. By Joe that he had been cut off from the church for crime, and was engaged in lying against the Saints, and plotting their murder and robbery. That he died a drunken sot with delirum tremens. We proved by David Whitmer's yarns that his tertimony was worthless. Angels sowing plaster, plowing land, and all such tomfoolery. We proved that Joe said he was cut off with Cowdery from crime, and was engaged with him in circulating lies and plotting the murder and robbery of the Saints. We showed that Rigdon and 83 other Mormons, their leaders, denounced Cowdery and Whitmer as slanderers, liars, thieves, counterfeitors, connected with a gang of blacklegs of the blackest dye. Such are the three witnesses according to Mormons themselves -- Joe Smith, Hyram Smith, Rigdon, and leading Mormons. We showed that the testimony of the eight witnesses was a lie, for they testify to what they could not know. We showed by comparing the revelation announcing to the witnesses they should see the plates with the two testimonials, that Joe wrote all three. He wrote the lie and the confederates in the fraud swore to it. We proved by appeals to their stories in Mormon books that the persons who claim to have seen the plates and their associates in the fraud, tell contradictory stories on every point connected with it. That there is not a statement of one that is not contradicted by others and that the witnesses contradict themselves, every statement they make. On such testimony as this is the Book of Mormon based. We proved that Joe had for years before going into Rigdon's book fraud, been engaged in lying frauds, witching for water, peeping for money with the peep stone he stole from Chase's children, digging for money, lying about it, swindling every dupe he could find, and stealing in connection with it, and that all the witnesses were connected with this money digging, thieving, lying gang, who had been lying to get money by fraud, and a living withouut work. If Joe's peep-stone, stolen from Chase's children, his witching for water, his digging for money, his seeing buried money with his stolen peep-stone were frauds, so was his tale about finding plates, and his tale about translating them. The Book of Mormon is as much a fraud as his digging for pots of money. We showed that his translation of the papyrus was a transparent fraud. So was his Book of Mormon. It was as great a fraud as his Book of Abraham. We showed that the pretended fac simile sent to Anthon and the one in Utah were lying frauds. So was the lie he told about having plates from which he copied these frauds. All these are frauds, one as transparent as the other, and as palpable as the noonday sun to all, except fanatics or dupes. We proved that the Book of Mormon is based on two assumptions: 1. An angel gave a pile of plates to Joe Smith. 2. The Lord gave the translation of the plates to Joe, word by word, by miracle. Of this we have not one iota of proof, except the naked assertions of Joe Smith. We have already exposed his character and frauds. His assertions are no better in regard to this than in regard to witching for water, peeping for money, or his translation of papyrus rolls or his lying fac simile. The Book of Mormon has not one particle of proof that an uninspired book should have. No inter-locking with history, geography, literature and customs. No more than Vernet's "Trip to the moon." It has every feature of a fraud. It avoids all tests like all hands. It lacks every feature that sustains the Bible. It does not interlock with other history, geography, literature and customs. It is not attested by national customs, history; by monumental institutions, by prophecies; by a vast literature based on it; by growing up in the midst of hostile criticism and attacks. It does not form the most wonderful part of the world's history, as does the Bible. It is as isolated from all these tests as Gulliver's Travels. It is as monstrous a fabrication and infinitely more improbable. We examined the book itself. We exposed its contradictions of common sense, its monstrous fabrications, its hundreds of contradictions of itself, its contradictions of the Bible, in history, in doxtrine; its contradictions of the inspired translation of Joe THE BRADEN AND KELLEY DEBATE. 219 Smith, its contradictions of science, of history. We exposed its literary character, its grammatical blunders, its atrocious style, its silly expressions. We show that Mormons admit its ridiculous inaccuracies and atrocities by revising out of it over 5,000 blunders, many of which are perfect monstrosities. Yet it was written by inspiration by the Almighty. The Almighty revising himself! The Almighty learning grammar and composition!! We exposed its quotations from King James' translation, quoting its blunders in text, in transition, in grammar, its obsolete words, its ridiculous copying of the brogue of that translation; showing that it was written by a person who used that translation alone. We exposed its adaptations from modern history and the Bible, its anachronisms, its speaking of things hundreds of years before they existed, its quotations from the New Testament hundreds of years before it existed, its ridiculous quotations from modern authors, proving that it was written after their day. Finally we proved that Joe Smith was the author of Mormon polygamy and the infamy blasphemously called "The Revelation on Celestial Marriage." This alone damns with infamy all claim that he was a prophet, or that a book that emanated from him is of divine origin. In conclusion, ladies and gentlemen, will you believe that Spaulding's miracle in writing a fictitious history of the aborigines of America wrote a book that agreed with a revelation of that history of the aborigines of America in all important features and names, events and even of persons and nations, twenty years before such pretended revelations appeared? Or will you believe that the pretended revelation is a plagiarism from Spaulding's manuscript written twenty years before it appeared? There are twenty-seven great features of the Manuscript Found in the Book of Mormon. The Manuscript Found is twenty years the oldest. They were stolen from the Manuscript Found by the Book of Mormon. Will you believe that Nephites, in America, quoted whole chapters of the Bible written after they left Asia, quoted chapters and hundreds of verses before they were uttered, that they quoted modern authors, quoted the brogue of King James' translators, its grammatical blunders, its obsolete words, quoted Rigdon's baptismal formula, his rant on infant baptism. his revivalisms, his peculiar ideas in every particular, all of which existed before it appeared? Or will you believe as we have proved, that Rigdon stole Spaulding's manuscript and remolded it into a pretended revelation. "to make a big thing out of it." as he declared he would? You can act for yourselves, but common sense says this fraud was started by a backslidden, skeptical man, once a preacher. Another skeptical preacher stole and remolded it. A third infidel gave it to the world with his stolen peep-stone. As it was the work of infidelity, there is a fitness of things in its being defended here by infidel attacks on the Bible. As infidels got it up, an infidel should defend it with infidel sophistries. It was begotten by Spaulding, a skeptical, back-slider, in sin; conceived by Rigdon, another skeptical back-slider in iniquity; and brought forth by Joe Smith, a skeptical admirer of Paine, and an advocate of his sentiments, in depravity and pollution; and has flourished in fraud and fanaticism until it has culminated in Utah in what would make devils blush. |
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last revised: Feb. 3, 2010