"silver-breasted," "golden Babylon," characterize respectively the
Roman, Graeco-Macedonian, Medo-Persian, and Babylonian empires,
which, in reverse order, ruled successively the ancient world.
Beginning with Babylon, the "head of gold," these four universal
powers figure in the Prophet Daniel's interpretation of
Nebuchadnezzar's dream (Daniel 2).
6--713. **Asian Kin.** Alexander the Great extended his conquests as
far eastward as India, whose native inhabitants claim kinship with
European peoples through a common Aryan ancestry. If this claim be
true, then the Hindoos, like the Europeans, are descended from
Japheth, the eldest son of Noah, and consequently are "Gentiles"--a
word springing from "Gentilis," meaning "of a nation," that is, a
nation not of Israel.
7--718. **Kurush.** Cyrus, founder of the Medo-Persian empire.
8--730. **Lofty Vineyards.** D. and C. 88:51-61.
9--731. **Spirit Moon and Speaking Stars.** The Holy Ghost and the
Apostolic Twelve.
10--732. **The Woman Wonderful.** The Church of Christ, represented
by a Woman (Revelation 12), and referred to in other places as the
Bride, the Lamb's Wife.
11--736. **Glory's Symboling.** Sun, moon and stars, symbolizing
celestial, terrestrial, and telestial glories. (D. and C. 76:96-98.)
12--742. **Vicegerent.** The Comforter, concerning whom Jesus said,
"It is needful that I go, or He will not come unto you." In other
words, the greater Light had to depart, before the lesser could shine
in its fulness.
13--743. **The Unembodied One.** Says Joseph the Seer: "The Father
has a body of flesh and bones, as tangible as man's; the Son also;
but the Holy Ghost is a personage of spirit." (D. and C. 130:22.)
14--748. **After and Ere.** God and Christ, the Father and the Son,
by the power of the Holy Ghost created all things, and by that power
will raise all from the dead.
15--756. **Prophet Still Pleading.** The Spirit of Prophecy, typified
by John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness.
16--774. **Those Fluent Stars.** The Twelve Apostles, oracles of God
and crown of the Church of Christ. (Rev. 12:1.)
17--781. **Save Haply One.** John the Beloved. (John 21:20-23; D.
and C. 7 and 77.)
18--789. **Leading the Lost.** It is believed that John the Revelator
will lead the Lost Tribes from "The Land of the North." (D. and C.
77:14; Rev. 10:8-11.)
19--806. **The Man-Child.** The Man-Child of the Apocalypse (Rev.
12:5) represents the Priesthood--divine authority--which was taken
from the Earth, with the fulness of the Gospel, after the passing of
the Apostles.
20--815. **Japheth Sways.** Gentile domination over Israel,
particularly in those nations where the Jews have been and are still
oppressed.
21--820. **Antaeus-Like.** Antaeus was a fabled giant, vanquished by
Hercules. Each time that Hercules threw him the giant gained fresh
strength from coming in contact with the ground.
22--822. **Conquering His Dust-Adoring Conqueror.** The modern Jew is
said to hold the purse-strings of the world.
23--831. **That Gentile Hosts Might See.** Saul of Tarsus, afterwards
Paul the Apostle, persecuted the Church of Christ before his
conversion (Acts 9:1-19). Thus was typified the spiritual blindness
of Israel, which caused the Gospel to be carried to the Gentiles.
Paul, the principal agent for their illumination, declares:
"Blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the
Gentiles be come in." (Rom. 11:25.)
24--832. **Martyred, Immolate.** Israel's dispersion, like Adam's
fall and Christ's crucifixion, was part of a mighty plan for the
promotion of the human race. Adam fell that mortal man might be.
Christ died to burst the bands of death and make the fall effectual
unto the higher ends ordained. The children of Israel were scattered
over the world, in order that the Gospel might make its way more
readily among all peoples. The history of Israel is the history of a
martyred nation, suffering for the welfare of other nations, whatever
may be said of the transgressions of the chosen people, which
occasioned and justified the calamities that came upon them.
25--841. **From 'Neath the Yoke.** The future redemption of the Negro
race.
26--843. **See and Hear His Risen Lord.** The House of Israel is
privileged to receive the personal ministrations of the Saviour,
while the Gentiles are ministered to by the Holy Ghost. (III Nephi
15:23.)
27--847. **In the Mire.** Beginning of the Christian departure from
the true Faith.
28--850. **The Heaven-Lit Torch.** The Light of the Gospel, enjoyed
by the primitive Christians, though compelled to hide from their
Roman persecutors and worship God on mountain tops and in the
catacombs.
29--852. **Incense * * * Diana's Shrine.** Diana was a deity
worshiped by the Romans. "Incense"--metaphorically the vain
philosophies, traditions and customs, adopted by the false Church
that came up in the place of the true Church and paganized itself in
order to be popular with the world.
30--855. **Shearing Compromise.** The result, spiritually, of the
enthronement of Christianity as the state religion of the Roman
Empire, A. D. 324.
31--861. **East from West.** The pseudo Church, as well as the Empire
of the Caesars, divided itself into East and West, with
Constantinople and Rome as the capital cities.
32--874. **She Was Wont.** "She" stands for the true Church of Christ.
33--880. **Crimson Courtesan.** The Scarlet Woman described by John
the Revelator (Rev. 17).
34--900. **Till the Judgment Sits.** A reference to Daniel 7:21-27.
35--902. **Glory Lift the Gloom.** Messiah's second coming.
36--903. **The Moonlike One.** The Holy Spirit, ruling the Night of
Ages, after the Light of the World has departed.
37--908. **Impelling to All Action.** The impelling power of the
Spirit of God is interestingly set forth in I Nephi 13:10-19. See
also Lowell's poems "Columbus" and "A Glance Behind the Curtain."
38--951. **Wayward Son of Deity.** Napoleon and other conquerors type
the class of characters here described.
39--973. **Some Said Jeremias.** When the Saviour inquired, "Whom do
men say that I am?" Peter answered "Some say Thou art Elias, and some
say Jeremias." Elias and Jeremias are Greek forms of the Hebrew names
Elijah and Jeremiah. Joseph Smith, however, drew a distinction
between the spirit of Elias and the spirit of Elijah. (Compendium,
pp. 281-283.)
40--983. **Mirror and Model of Humanity.** "God created man in his
own image." (Gen. 1:27.)
41--997. **Incomprehensible.** So modern Christians contend
respecting Deity. It is true only in part. God's unrevealed infinite
fulness is of course incomprehensible to the finite mind. But what He
has revealed concerning Himself is not incomprehensible. Else why did
He reveal it?
42--1008. **Each as a Star.** The Jewish or Mosaic Dispensation shed
light that prepared the world for a greater--the Christian
Dispensation; which, in its turn, made ready for one greater
still--the Dispensation of the Fulness of Times. This is the
significance of "Elias." (Compendium, p. 281.)
43--1020. **A Weapon for the Right.** Such writers as Voltaire,
Paine, and Ingersoll, subserve the cause of Christ by shattering
false traditions, erroneously supposed by many to be true teachings
of the Saviour and his Apostles.
---
CANTO FIVE
1--Title: **The Messenger of Morn.** The fore part of this Canto,
down to and including the line, "Out, out of her, my people, saith
your God," summarizes the message borne by the modern Prophet. The
curtain now rises upon the last act of the redemptive drama--the
final restoration of the Gospel; Joseph the Seer, as the Elias of the
scene, heralding the tidings of the approaching millennial reign.
2--1052. **Whence Ye Were Hewn.** An allusion to Isaiah 51:1-3.
3--1060. **Wastes of Unbelief.** Gentile or heathen lands, refreshed
by the sprinkled blood of Israel--the blood that believes--and by
spiritual visitations that accompany or follow such dispersions.
4--1061. **Japheth, Thy Planet Pales.** Japheth stands for the
Gentiles, whose "fulness" now "comes in."
5--1077. **Mother of Centuries.** Time, as distinguished from
Eternity (though technically eternity includes time), comprises seven
thousand years, or seventy centuries, covered by seven Gospel
dispensations. The Quorum of the Seventy, with the presiding First
Council, is a probable typing in this connection.
6--1079. **Teach Them to Be One.** "It is necessary, in the ushering
in of the dispensation of the fulness of times, * * * that a whole
and complete and perfect union and welding together of dispensations
and keys and powers and glories should take place and be revealed
from the days of Adam even to the present time."--Joseph Smith, (D.
and C. 128:18.)
7--1084. **Shiloh Reigns.** Shiloh is another Hebrew name for
Messiah, whose reign of a thousand years will equal in duration one
revolution of the planet Kolob. (Abraham 3:4.)
8--1085. **Hast Labored.** The seven thousand years of Earth's
"temporal existence" correspond to the seven seals of the Apocalyptic
Book (Rev. 5 and 6) and are as seven great days, four of which had
passed before Christ came, while nearly two have gone by since.
According to this reckoning we are now in the Saturday evening of
human history. The Millennium will be the seventh day--the World's
Sabbath. (D. and C. 77:12; Abraham 3, 4, and 5).
9--1089. **Ancient Tidings.** The Everlasting Gospel, first revealed
to Adam, who presides over all the dispensations. (History of the
Church, Vol. 4, pp. 207-209).
10--1103. **What I Know.** Joseph Smith is said to have expressed the
wish that he might reveal his identity and declare all that God had
made known to him.
11--1117. **Gibborim.** Mighty ones. King David's six hundred guards
were called "The Gibborim," for their heroic bravery. (Geike, "Hours
With the Bible," Vol. III, pp. 254, 276, 325, 339).
12--1118. **Worthy The Word.** The explanation of this phrase is in
that saying of the Saviour's: "Is it not written that they are gods
to whom the word of God comes?"--meaning, of course, a superior race
of men.
13--1136. **Fifth of Seven.** The Fifth Angel is he who "committeth
the everlasting gospel." (D. and C., 88:103).
14--1165. **From Wintry Sleep.** At this point begins the personal
history of the Prophet, who is also the subject of previous
allusions. ("Writings of Joseph Smith"--Pearl of Great Price).
15--1214. **Dual Presence.** Joseph's vision of the Father and the
Son.
16--1217. **Unknown Mount.** A mountain referred to in the Book of
Moses. (1:1).
17--1235. **An Atlas.** Atlas was one of the Titans. He is depicted
with the globe on his back.
18--1247. **Exalted Man.** "God himself is an exalted man."--Joseph
Smith, ("Times and Seasons," August 15, 1844).
"As man now is, God once was;
As God now is, man may be."--
Lorenzo Snow, Biography, p. 46.
19--1261. **Wisdom of the Wise.** The stanza in which this phrase
occurs is based upon Isaiah 29:13, 14.
20--1283. **A Messenger From God.** The Angel Moroni.
21--1302. **Page to Page.** The Book of Mormon, or Stick of Joseph,
joins with the Hebrew Bible, or Stick of Judah, as foretold by
Ezekiel (37:16-20).
22--1310. **Ready For The Fall.** Prophecy ripe for fulfillment.
23--1311. **Elias Comes.** Moroni, restoring the Gospel, predicts the
coming of a greater, to restore all things.
24--1324. **Fullest Freedom.** The Kingdom of God will protect all
men in the enjoyment of their rights. The citizens and lawmakers of
that Kingdom will not be all of one religious faith. So taught Joseph
Smith and Brigham Young.
25--1331. **Primal Language.** The Adamic tongue or Pure Language,
brought back in the restoration of all things.
26--1407. **Ramah * * * Cumorah.** Book of Mormon names. That book is
an abridged history of two great races, the Jaredites and the
Nephites, who inhabited America prior to its discovery by Europeans.
Their occupancy of the land was successive, the Jaredites coming from
the Tower of Babel, B. C. 2218; and the founders of the Nephite
nation from Judea, B. C. 600. The Jaredites perished about the time
that the Nephites came. The latter were destroyed, A. D. 384, by the
Lamanites, a degenerate and savage faction of their own people, whose
remnants were found by Columbus and named Indians. The golden plates
containing the Nephite-Jaredite record were taken by Joseph Smith
from the Jaredite hill Ramah, called by the Nephites, Cumorah.
---
CANTO SIX
1--Title: **From Out The Dust.** A paraphrase of Isaiah 29:4. The
prediction is held to have been fulfilled in the coming forth of the
Book of Mormon. This entire Canto is based upon the general content
of that volume. It embodies the prehistoric story of America, assumed
to have been related by the angel custodian to the translator of the
buried Book of Gold.
2--1415. **Must Righteous Be.** See Ether 2:8-12.
3--1434. **Former State.** The Book of Mormon is the only adequate
explanation of the origin of the American Indians.
4--1457. **Ancient Altar.** Adam's altar, in Adam-ondi-Ahman,
otherwise Spring Hill, Daviess County, Missouri, (D. and C. 116;
History of the Church, Vol. 3, p. 388).
5--1461. **Dual Grave.** Burial in earth and hell, or death temporal
and spiritual.
6--1466. **Where Adam Dwelt.** According to Joseph Smith, Jackson
County, Missouri, is the ancient site of the Garden of Eden. Our
First Parents, after their expulsion from Eden, dwelt in the Valley
of Adam-ondi-Ahman. See Note 4.
7--1468. **Still Chaste.** The fall of Adam and Eve, while
technically a sin because of a broken law, should be stressed as the
means whereby God's children obtained their bodies, rather than as an
act of moral turpitude. There are two general classes of
crimes--malum per se and malum prohibitum. Malum per se is a Latin
phrase signifying "an evil in itself," while malum prohibitum means
"that which is wrong because forbidden by law." The transgression of
our First Parents was malum prohibitum, and the consequent descent
from an immortal to a mortal condition was the Fall.
8--1470. **Love's Work.** Adam's fall prepared the way for Christ's
redemptive mission. Had there been no fall, man would have remained a
spirit, without a body, and consequently imperfect. Christ redeemed
the soul--spirit and body--and put it in the way to perfection.
9--1471. **Zion of Primeval Days.** The City of Enoch. (Moses
7:18-64; History of the Church, Vol. 4, pp. 209, 210; D. and C.
84:99-102.)
10--1479. **Final Change.** The change wrought upon the people of
Enoch by translation not being equivalent to resurrection, they will
have to undergo a further change, to prepare them for celestial
glory. But they will not taste of death. A similar lot is that of
John the Beloved (John 21:20-23; D. and C. 7); also of the Three
Nephites (III Nephi 28) and of certain ones mentioned by Paul (I Cor.
15:50-54).
11--1480. **New Jerusalem.** The divinely chosen site for the Holy
City is Independence, Jackson County, Missouri.
12--1484. **Japheth * * * Shem.** The reference is to Noah's blessing
upon Shem and Japheth (Gen. 9:26-27). From Shem came Abraham, the
ancestor of the House of Israel; and from Japheth the Gentiles, the
founders of the most enlightened nations of modern times, including
the United States of America. Ham, through Canaan, was the progenitor
of the negro race, long held in slavery in this and other Gentile
countries. The Ethiopian has also served the Semite, as Noah
predicted. How Japheth has "dwelt in the tents of Shem," is partly
shown by the history of Palestine, long dominated by the Gentiles,
particularly the Turks, who still possess it. Japheth's remarkable
blessing has also been realized in the history of our own country,
America, which the Gentiles now inhabit, and where, according to the
Book of Mormon, they are to assist in gathering Israel and building
the New Jerusalem, (III Nephi 20 and 21). It is their privilege to
share, if they will, in all the blessings promised to the chosen
people. (Abraham 2:9-11.) "The tents of Shem" may be interpreted to
mean the homes of the people of God, lineally descended from Shem,
through Abraham.
13--1485. **An Ark of Peace.** "It shall be the only people that
shall not be at war one with another." (D. and C. 45:69).
14--1486. **The Ensign.** The Church of Christ in Latter Days.
15--1487. **Joseph Signals Jacob.** Joseph, in Ephraim, begins the
work of Israel's gathering.
16--1489. **Ancient of Days.** Adam as the Ancient of Days will
return to the place where he blessed his posterity. (D. and C. 116;
History of the Church, Vol. 3, p. 388). See notes 4 and 6.
17--1507. **Hesperia.** The West--America.
18--1512. **That Servant.** The servant mentioned by the Saviour to
the Nephites. (III Nephi 21:10, 11).
19--1515. **God's Legion.** "Zion, which shall come forth out of all
the creations which I have made." (Moses 7:64).
20--1517. **Land of Joseph.** America, as the Latter-day Saints have
been taught to believe, was given to Joseph of old as an inheritance.
(Gen. 49:22, 26; Deut. 33:13-17).
21--1519. **Gog and Magog.** Gog is the name of a person; Magog, of a
country or people. According to Ezekiel (38 and 39) Gog, "the chief
prince of Meshech and Tubal," was to come with his people from the
North to invade the land of Israel and there suffer defeat. Gog and
Magog are generally understood as symbolical expressions for the
heathen nations of Asia, more particularly the Scythians. In this
poem the allusion is to those nations that war against Zion.
22--1538. **Where, Joseph?** Joseph Smith is meant. To him, after a
general introduction, Moroni relates the story of the Jaredites, as
told in that part of the Book of Mormon entitled "The Book of Ether."
23--1540. **Wide Severing.** In the days of Peleg the earth was
"divided" (Gen. 10:25). Whether this means the dividing "to the
nations" of "their inheritance" (Deut. 32.8), or a tearing asunder of
the land into continents and islands, is not stated. The latter view,
the one here suggested, may help to explain why the site of the
Garden of Eden is now in North America.
24--1543. **Sons of Shinar.** The Jaredites, who came from the Tower
of Babel, the place of which was "a plain in the Land of Shinar."
(Gen. 11:2). Shinar was Chaldea.
25--1547. **Primal Tongue.** The language of the Jaredites--the pure
Adamic tongue--was not confounded.
26--1554. **A Book Sublime.** A book written by the Jaredite leader,
and yet to come forth. That leader was Mahonri Moriancumr, though
this name does not occur in the Book of Mormon. "The Brother of
Jared" is the only appellation bestowed upon him there. Joseph Smith
supplied the missing name.
27--1557. **Baptismal Billows.** The Jaredites, in barges, passed
through the depths of the ocean, to reach their Land of Promise
(Ether 6:6). Their voyage was therefore a baptism, more literal than
the passage of the Israelites through the Red Sea, and referred to by
Paul as a baptism. (1 Cor. 10:2.)
28--1561. **Shelem's Height.** The Mount Shelem, so called "because
of its exceeding height." (Ether 3:1).
29--1566. **Wing-Like Continents.** North and South America.
30--1573. **Mahonri's Realm.** North America, possessed by the
Jaredites down to about 600 B. C., when the nation was destroyed by
internecine strife.
31--1580. **Freedom's Greater Cause.** The Cause of Christ.
32--1591. **Past Zions Rose.** "Thou hast taken Zion to thine own
bosom, from all thy creations, from all eternity to all eternity."
(Moses 7:31.)
33--1595. **Fortressed by God's Mightiness.** I Nephi 13:19; Ether
2:12; D. and C. 45:70.
34--1601. **"Give Us a King."** The Jaredites demanded a king--a
demand reluctantly acceded to by their leaders, who foresaw, as did
Samuel the Prophet, in a similar situation, the evils that would
result. (Ether 6:22-28; I Samuel 8:4-22).
35--1645. **Solitary Twain.** The Prophet Ether and King Coriantumr,
the last of the Jaredites.
36--1653. **Another Nation.** The Nephites.
37--1657. **After Tale.** These words--part of a brief comment by the
author--introduce a summary of the Nephite narrative.
38--1665. **A Leper.** Jerusalem in her degenerate state.
39--1666. **Prophet Pioneer.** Lehi, a descendant of Joseph, through
Manasseh, with a colony from Jerusalem, succeeds the all but extinct
Jaredites upon the Land of Promise, where they extend the glory of
their great ancestor.
40--1669. **Joseph's Bough.** "Joseph is a fruitful bough." (Gen.
49:22).
41--1690. **Chosen Seer.** Lehi predicts the coming of "a choice
seer" who is to be a lineal descendant of Joseph. The name of that
seer is also to be Joseph, and it is to be the name of his father--a
prophecy fulfilled in Joseph Smith, Jr. (II Nephi 3.)
42--1692. **Buried Lore.** The Book of Mormon.
43--1695. **Favored Son.** Nephi, who succeeded his father Lehi, and
against whom his brothers Laman and Lemuel rebelled, thus dividing
the nation into Nephites and Lamanites.
44--1712. **Heavy Rod.** The Lord used the savage Lamanites to
scourge the enlightened yet ofttimes disobedient Nephites.
45--1717. **Infinite and Spirit Minister.** The Spirit of the Lord,
declared by Nephi to be in the form of man, and with whom he
conversed as one man converses with another. (I Nephi 11:11).
46--1731. **Prophet Prince Foresaw.** Nephi's vision of the future,
in which he beheld events upon both hemispheres--Christ's crucifixion
and resurrection, and his subsequent appearings to the more righteous
of the Nephites, preceded by awful judgments upon the wicked (III
Nephi 8-11).
47--1757. **Final Doom.** The conflagrations that destroyed Nephite
cities were prophetic of the end of the world, which is to be by fire.
48--1771. **Infant Innocence.** The children of the Nephites, blessed
by the Saviour. (III Nephi 17:11-24).
49--1785. **Other Sheep.** Jesus said to his Jewish disciples, "Other
sheep I have, which are not of this fold." (John 10:16). They
supposed that he meant the Gentiles, instead of which, as the Book of
Mormon tells, he had reference to the Nephites and to other branches
of the House of Israel. (III Nephi 15:17-24; 16:1; 17:4.)
50--1803. **Japheth's Destiny.** The Saviour portrays the future of
America and the diverse fates of the obedient and disobedient
Gentiles (III Nephi 16 and 21).
51--1811. **A Lion to the Chase.** III Nephi, 20:16; 21:12.
52--1820. **Sun's Red Glow.** The wrath of the Lamanites, turning
upon their white oppressors.
53--1822. **Eternal Rays.** Divinely revealed laws by which Zion will
be redeemed (D. and C. 105:4, 5).
54--1826. **Servant Marred.** "He shall be marred because of them."
(III Nephi 21:10.)
55--1834. **He Sanctifieth Three.** The Three Nephites (III Nephi
28).
56--1847. **Forebeam of Day Divine.** The happy condition of the
Nephites, for two centuries after the coming of Christ, was a
foretaste of the Millennium.
57--1854. **So Shall It Be.** Terrible calamities are to precede the
Reign of Peace, as they preceded the events that typified it.
(Matthew 24).
58--1869. **Avalanche * * * Sun's Face.** Nephites and Lamanites.
59--1872. **Bloody Chase.** The Lamanites driving the Nephites to
their doom at the Hill Cumorah.
60--1883. **Oriental Sight.** The Western Hemisphere discovered by
the Eastern.
61--1885. **Faith * * * Patience.** The Brother of Jared was noted
for his exceeding faith (Ether 3:9). Columbus triumphed by patient
endurance.
62--1894. **Zion's Land.** Joseph Smith declared the whole of America
to be the Land of Zion.
63--1899. **Oppressed Become Oppressors.** Even the liberty-loving
settlers of New England, who had fled from tyranny in the Old World
to find freedom in the New, enslaved the red man and drove him from
his ancient possessions.
64--1904. **The Motherland.** Great Britain, mother of the New
England colonies.
65--1909. **Man of Matchless Worth.** Washington.
66--1922. **Joseph's Namesake Seer.** Joseph Smith, Jr., (II Nephi 3).