His studie was but litel on the Bible.--_Chaucer_.
Imaginations fearfully absurd,
Hobgoblin rites, and moon-struck reveries,
Distracted creeds, and visionary dreams,
More bodiless and hideously misshapen
Than ever fancy, at the noon of night,
Playing at will, framed in the madman's brain.
--_Pollok, in Course of Time_.
The abode of the dead, where they remained in full consciousness of
their condition for indefinable periods, or even for eternity, has
been the theme of many a writer both before and after the advent of
the Saviour of men. Annihilation is repugnant to the common
intelligence. Homer sends Ulysses, Dantelike, to the realms of the
dead, where he converses with them he had known in life. The Stygian
River, the dumb servitor, Charon, the coin-paid fare, are all well
known in the classics of the ancients.
In some later religio-philosophic studies the names are different;
some have tartarus, some purgatory, some paradise. The last is the
name adopted by the Mormons.
The heroes of Homer seemed never to hope for a release from the bonds
of Hades. Voluptuous Circe, the Odysseyan swine-maker, told the hero
of those tales he was a daring one:
"... who, yet alive, have gone
Down to the abode of Pluto; twice to die
Is yours, while others die but once."
Many well meaning minds have tried to discover in the Bible, or
otherwise reasonably invent a second probation for the unrepentant as
an addendum to the final resurrection of the just. Not a little has
been made of the term "spirits in prison" (1 Pet. 3. 19, 20), and of
"baptism for the dead" (1 Cor. 15. 29). In the intensity of zeal, or
as a proselyting advertisement, the Latter-Day Saints proclaim the
possibility of all the inhabitants of the grave (paradise) being saved
in heaven. To this end, early in the history of the organization,
there was implanted the doctrine of preaching to the departed and that
of proxy ministrations.
From their Articles of Faith I take these two:
3. We believe that through the atonement of Christ all mankind may
be saved by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel.
4. We believe that these ordinances are: First, Faith in the Lord
Jesus Christ; second, Repentance; third, Baptism by immersion for
the remission of sins; fourth, Laying on of hands for the gift of
the Holy Ghost.
Now, since without immersion there is no remission of sins, and since
they who are in prison (paradise) are eligible to salvation, therefore
some one must be baptized for them and have all the other rites of the
plan likewise administered in their name. That "all things may be done
decently and in order," there was received a "revelation" to the end
that temples must be built, recorders and other officials appointed,
and all the paraphernalia necessary for the work prepared. When these
rites are consummated some elder of the church who dies goes to the
spiritual prison house and tells the people therein confined that
these most meritorious works have been done for them on earth; in
fact, this is the chief reason for their going thither. They who will
believe this story and repent of their sins are then and there
entitled to "a right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the
gates into the city."
Not only are the people redeemed from all their sins by the pious
ministrations of the many temple-workers, who, like Samuel,
continually serve and minister therein, but as marriage relations are
to continue throughout the endless ages of eternity, and children are
to be born forever and ever, these dead have the hymeneal ceremony
performed "for eternity"; this act is known as the "sealing" process.
Men are here married--by proxy--to others than the actual living wife,
sometimes with her consent, sometimes without it. One old gentleman,
whose name is not to be mentioned, was sealed thus for eternity to
Martha Washington and to Empress Josephine. It sounds farcical and
foolish in the extreme; fit only to be counted as a silly joke,
unworthy the attention of a sane soul for a minute; but it is terribly
sober when it is remembered that there are hundreds of thousands of
innocent, honest, and unsuspecting Mormons who really and truly
believe this to be the only road to eternal life and exaltation.
Added to this is the doctrine of the deification of men. All the true
and faithful Mormons are to become gods by and by, and create and
populate new worlds; hence the value of polygamy; in fact, this world
is but one of the samples of this truth. Adam is the owner and ruler
of earth, and to him we pray. He is our God. As such he is only one in
an endless procession of such beings.
"There has been and there now exists an endless procession of the
Gods, stretching back into the eternities, that had no beginning and
will have no end. Their existence runs parallel with endless duration,
and their dominions are limitless as boundless space."[3]
Possibly the most popular hymn among these people is the following,
written by one of the wives of Joseph Smith, Eliza R. Snow. It is in
their collection and now in use: