Monday April 17, 2000
Old Road to Carthage Joseph and Hyrum Smith traveled on this road on their way to the Carthage Jail in June 1844. This picture is taken on the corner of Parley Street in Nauvoo. Low-res image (23 K). High-res image (142 K). |
No. 1
"I was born in the year of our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and five on the twenty-third day of December...so great were the confusion and strife among the different denominations (in my fifteenth year), that it was impossible for a person young as I was...to come to any certain conclusion who was right and who was wrong...
"While I was laboring under the extreme difficulties caused by the contests of these parties of religionists, I was one day reading the epistle of James, first chapter and fifth verse, which reads: If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God that giveth to all men liberally and unbraideth not: and it shall be given him...
"I at length came to the determination to 'ask of God...I retired to the woods to make the attempt. It was on the morning of a beautiful, clear day, early in the spring of eighteen hundred and twenty...I kneeled down and began to offer up the desires of my heart to God...I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head, above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me" --Joseph Smith, Jr. (1838)
No. 2
"When the light rested upon me I saw two personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name and said, pointing to the other--This is my beloved Son. hear him...
'I had beheld a vision...I had actually seen a light, and in the midst of that light I saw two personages, and they did in reality speak to me; and though I was hated and persecuted for saying that I had seen a vision, yet it was true.. .for I had seen a vision; I knew it, and I knew that God knew it, and I could not deny it." --Joseph Smith, Jr. (1838)
No. 3
"I never feel to force my doctrine upon any person; I rejoice to see prejudice give way to truth, and the traditions of men dispersed by the pure principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ." --Joseph Smith, Jr. (1844)
No. 4
"Patience is heavenly, obedience is noble, forgiveness is merciful, and exaltation is godly; and he that holds out faithful to the end shall in no wise lose his reward. A good man will endure all things to honor Christ, and even dispose of the whole world, and all in it, to save his soul." --Joseph Smith, Jr., and Hyrum Smith (1844)
No. 5
"When a man has offered in sacrifice all that he has for the truths sake, not even withholding his life, and believing before God that he has been called to make this sacrifice because he seeks to do his will, he does know, most assuredly, that God does and will accept his sacrifice and offering, and that he has not, nor will not seek his face in vain." --Joseph Smith, Jr. (1835)
No. 6
"And now, after the many testimonies which have been given of him (Jesus Christ), this the testimony, of all, which we give of him: that He lives!
"For we saw him, even on the right hand of God; and we heard the voice bearing record that he is Only Begotten of the Father--
"That by him, and through him, and of him, the worlds are and were created, and the inhabitants thereof are begotten sons and daughters unto God." --Joseph Smith, Jr. (1832)
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