to raise a corner of the veil they spread before the gaze of

the profane.

But before commencing an account of their doctrine and social condition as we viewed it, we will briefly sketch the history of Mormonism from its origin to the present day.

END OF THE FIRST BOOK,

BOOK THE SECOND.

HISTORY OF THE MORMONS.

SECTION I. PONTIFICATE OF JOSEPH SMITH.

CHAPTER I.

LIFE OF THE PROPHET UP TO THE PERIOD OF THE ESTABLISHMENT OF HIS RELIGION. 1805-1830.

FAMILY OF JOSEPH SMITH.-BIRTH OF THE PROPHET.-HIS YOUTH. -HIS VISIONS.-HIS MARRIAGE. THE GOLD PLATES AND THE URIM AND THUMMIM.-TRANSLATION OF THE PLATES.-MARTIN HARRIS AND PROFESSOR ANTHON.-OLIVER COWDERY.-THE WITNESSES TO THE BOOK OF MORMON.-ORGANIZATION OF THE NEW CHURCH.-PUBLICATION OF THE TRANSLATION.-ANALYSIS OF THE BOOK OF MORMON. SPAULDING'S ROMANCE. JANE LEADE. MEXICAN GLYPHICS.

THE inclinations of man, his tastes, his character, the course of his passions, the direction taken by his faculties, are generally determined by maternal influence. Childhood in its home, takes the imprint of all around it. But it is principally, nor do we need any physiological induction to be convinced of this, by the mind and by the heart of a tender and impulsive mother, whose love is ever anxiously

VOL. I.

Q

ministering to all his wants, that the mind and heart of the child are fashioned. This influence will be much greater still, when it calls to its aid the marvellous. Nothing is so fascinating to a child as tales of supernatural occurrences bordering upon magic. Nothing is more easy than to accustom its ductile imagination to prodigies and spirits, especially in a social position where such ideas are constantly recurring, and where there is an absence of those relations with the outer world which might tend to restrain or modify them. Hence there is no reason for our being surprised at its having been believed that the founder of the Mormon religion derived from his family associations the source of his vocation, a certain predisposing motive to the part he played, that is, to the mission of religious renovation which he arrogated to himself, and sought to accomplish.

In point of fact, however, it would be exceedingly rash to adopt this solution; nor is it at all admissible, save with a limitation, which it is important to indicate with some little precision. Yes, doubtless, the mystic circle in which Joseph Smith was brought up; the atmosphere swarming with pious visions, in which his infancy and early youth were passed; the halo, as it were, of spiritual appearances and miraculous agencies by which his mother was ever surrounded; all this was calculated to act upon his imagination; all this, too, was necessarily not without influence on the direction of his ideas; and one can imagine that