Elder Joseph E. Robinson.

(President California Mission.)

"Praise ye the Lord; blessed is he who bringeth salvation." This is the strain that we have just listened to and the burden of the song rendered.

I want to read to you from the holy scriptures an admonition from Paul's great epistle to his own brethren, the Hebrews, as recorded in their book, second chapter, beginning with the first verse:

"Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip, For if the word spoken by angels was steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense of reward; How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation: which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him; God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, according to his own will?"

I have thought that we may be well admonished in this day by this exhortation of Paul's just as well as the ancient Saints, for God has borne witness in this day and age. He has revealed Himself anew to men in the flesh. His beloved Son, our elder brother, the first born among many brethren in our primeval childhood, in the pre-mortal life, born of woman in the meridian of time, crucified on Calvary's cross, resurrected and risen from the dead, the Redeemer of mankind, hath made Himself known again, and by personal ministry re-established His Church in this day, with divers gifts, with the visitation of angels, with tongues and interpretation of tongues, with miracles, with healings and with all the gifts and signs that followed in the wake of the ancient apostles. Therefore as these things are manifest before our eyes, how can we hope to escape if we neglect so great salvation? Shall neglect, shall indifference, shall unbelief wean us away from the covenants of our fathers and mothers, and lulling us to sleep in the sense of security, make us unmindful of the responsibility that rests upon us as children of the Most High? For in such sleep we forget God, forget our calling, and therefore lose our election and reward.

In the remarks of Elder Orson F. Whitney and Joseph F. Smith, Jr., in the tabernacle, this morning, it was fairly indicated to us that it is the unbelieving one who has shut himself away from God. Let me read the admonition of the Master, as recorded in the twentieth chapter of St. John: After He had arisen from the dead and had made Himself known to the brethren and the faithful saints upon that first Lord's day, the Sunday that they observed by gathering together to partake of the emblems of His blood and flesh, and being afraid of the Jews, had shut themselves up into an upper room, when they were suddenly visited by the Master. We read that they were affrighted because they thought they had seen a spirit, but He said unto them, "Peace be unto you," and admonished them that it was even He Himself, and invited them to come forward and thrust their hands into His side, and feel the prints of the nails in His hands and in His feet, which witnessed that it was even He Himself and not His spirit. They seemed fearful still, and evidently did not take advantage of His invitation. Then He asked them if they had any bread or meat there, and they brought Him a broiled fish and part of a honey comb, and He did eat in their presence. They bore witness of this to Thomas, who was not present that day but who was one of the chosen disciples. Thomas, as many men today, would not believe the testimony of his brethren. He said, I will not believe it unless I can see and feel the marks of the nails in His hands and His feet, and when they had come together upon the next Sunday, the Master again appeared before them, and these are the words that are recorded:

"And after eighth days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said Peace be unto you. Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands, and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side, and be not faithless but believing."

Remember this admonition, "Be not faithless, but believing."

"And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God."

The Master rejoined, saying:

"Thomas, because thou hast seen me thou hast believed; blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed."

So here again do I read this admonition, that we ought to be faithful and not faithless, that we ought to be believing and not unbelieving. And if you will recall the remarks of Elder Smith this morning, you remember how he cited the men of the world who hold the places of prominence as teachers and ministers for Christ, who do not accept the atonement of the Master, who do not accept the fact that He is the Only Begotten of the Father in the flesh, who do not believe we are created in His form, but that if we are made after Him at all it is in reason only that we resemble His personality. They question the statements of the early fathers of the ancient church, the statements of the apostles and of the patriarchs of old, because they think that in this day we have come into more learning and knowledge relative to the great course of life and the being of this world, its creations and its environment.

Let me recite a few words of Colossians Robert G. Ingersoll. His brother Obed was a minister, so called, of the gospel of Christ. The colonel expected that when death overtook him his brother would see to the last sad rites, and would speak parting words of benediction over his body. But his brother died early in life, and the Colonel had the sad office to fulfill instead for his brother. In addressing the people assembled, he likened the life of his brother unto that of a beautiful ship that had set sail under most favorable circumstances, every sail in place, every rope taut, everything in order, so that a most successful voyage seems propitious, when suddenly, without a warning, the vessel, struck amidships by a submerged rock, had broken it in two, and it drifted out upon the waves, driven and tossed by the winds, and was scattered to the four parts of the earth, never more to be brought together again. But when he had drawn this picture, his own soul within him remonstrated with the thought, and he expressed these feelings:

"This life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of two eternities. We strive in vain to pierce beyond the heights. We cry, and the only answer is the echo of our soul: he who lies before us, mistaking the approach of death for the return of health, murmured with his latest breath, I am better now."

And the Colonel concludes:

"Let us hope in spite of doubt and fear, dogmas and tears, that this is so, of all the countless dead, for in the dark night of death hope sees a star and the listening ear catches the rustling of a wing."

A complete contradiction to his former statements, and showing that within his heart, as within the soul of every man, there is something that reaches out after the infinite. He said, "We strive in vain to pierce beyond the heights: we cry, and the only answer is the echo of our wail." Now because he was faithless; anti lacked faith in God and in His work;--he believed not, and therefore he received no answer, for we are to walk by faith and not by sight. And I take it in this scripture that I read to you, the Lord Jesus rather reproaches Thomas than blessing him, though happily for Thomas, he did confess his Master when his eyes beheld Him and his ears heard His loved voice; but the Master said to him, "Thomas, thou hast believed because thou hast seen me. Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed." And so with these modern men who were quoted today. So with Colonel Ingersoll. Those who are faithless and are not believing, do not have the testimony of the Christ. The Holy Ghost does not come to them as a witness for it has not been conferred upon them. They have not complied with the teachings of the Master, wherein He said, "My doctrine is not mine, but His that sent me, and if any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether I speak of God or whether I speak of myself." And that promise is to the least of the children of our Father and to the least that shall come in the flesh, as well as to the great ones of the earth who lived with the Master in His day.

So we may not wonder at the lack of understanding upon the part of those who were regarded as wise and prudent after the knowledge of men, for God has said that He had not chosen many rulers from among the great and the wise;--but from those who were looked upon as insignificant, from the meek and the lowly of the earth He has raised up witnesses unto Him who bear with them such earnestness in their testimony that men cannot make light of the same, no matter if they stumble in their language or not. We feel it in their very presence, in the clasp of their hand. We read it in the light of their countenance, and cannot doubt the testimony of such men as these, to whom God has spoken by the voice of His spirit, or unto whom the Holy Ghost has come and borne witness of the truth, taking of the things of the Father and of the Son and revealing them to men. Not only the wise men, so called, of the world, but, sad to relate, some of our own young men, who have a little smattering of the knowledge of the world, and who have studied some of the philosophies of men, who are misinformed, and whose philosophies are not grounded on the truth, have by their specious pleading been led to believe, as was stated this morning, in evolution and in the higher criticism of the scriptures. They will tell us that the books written are not to be ascribed to those whose names follow as the authors of the works, that they are eastern allegories and fables and stories, and that they are not true histories of the dealings of Providence anciently nor in the meridian of time; but the deductions that they make and the sophistries that they teach are much more difficult to explain, to accept and believe than the plain, simple statement of the holy scriptures themselves.

An added testimony to the truth of these scriptures comes to us in the manifestos of some of the greatest living scientists, members of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, as given, I think, but about six years since, when unitedly these men declared that not only the history of the Bible and of Gods hand-dealing with His people was true, but the very miracles performed, as stated in the New Testament, the turning of water into wine, the revivifying of the dead, the healing of the leper, the unstopping of the ears of the deaf, and the opening of the eyes of the blind, not only might be demonstrated scientifically, but were true to the principles of higher science. This wisdom and knowledge is gleaned in part now by men in their blindness; and these very men feel that about us there are forces unharnessed as yet to serve men's will,--planes upon which we do not function, and are slow to reject the testimony of men of the past and even of the present, who say that they do know because they have come in touch with this power and are witnesses of the hand-dealings of Christ and of the visitation of angels and the healing of the sick, etc.

Why, how weak, how impotent after all, despite all that man has achieved, is man himself. Our poor ears, though they have been enraptured by the melody of song this afternoon, so sweetly rendered by the combined choirs and by the instrument accompanying them,--our poor ears can only interpret and receive a very few of the vibrations that we call sound, and between the vibrations of sound and sight there lies a wondrous field, unheard, unknown, unexperienced by mortal man, because in our weakness, our finiteness, we cannot function in that plane. The sights that might be seen, the sounds that might be heard, are uninterpreted and unseen because we are mortal. But sometimes God quickens the ear and the eye of man, and they hear and see things unheard and unseen before. And so the poets have declared that

"Ever near us though unseen,/The dear immortal spirits tread,

And all the universe is life;/There is no dead."

Ofttimes in rejecting so great salvation, we do it by looking back mournfully, as was stated this morning, into the past, by thinking of things that might have been, by weeping over time and conditions and opportunities, perchance, that cannot come again, or that we lose because we look to the past and do not take heed of the present, and look for the future. Ofttimes too there may be dreamers who are living in the future, who have builded up for themselves an ethereal existence that is not real, and because it is unreal is unhealthy. I have met people who think that they are so saintly that if they can retain certain divine thoughts, they shall never die, that they shall not taste of death, that they arrest the seeds of dissolution, and cannot even grow old. I have seen them not only grow decrepit and old, but die since they first announced this doctrine to me in the mission field. Such creatures and dreamers of the future--and men who look mournfully to the past, and put off the issues of the present for the future. crucify today between the thieves of yesterday and tomorrow the opportunities for salvation gained only by living godly in Christ Jesus today.

I admonish you Latter-day Saints to see to it that so far as you are concerned, complying with the doctrines of Christ you shall set in your hearts and in the hearts of your children such love of truth, such a testimony of the Christ, that you will not be led astray by the specious pleading of so called learned men, but in the effulgent sun of revelation you will be able to say, as did Peter, that "Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God :" that with one of the ancient prophets you can say, "as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." If tried, if tormented, if perplexed with griefs and fears, if there be obstacles in your pathway that you feel that you cannot surmount, if broken-hearted because loved ones have been wrested from you, or wantonly have gone astray, still be like Job, who could sit down in the ashes of his once happy home and declare, "though he slay me yet will I trust him," "for I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that be shall stand at the latter-day upon the earth; and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God, whom I shall see for myself and mine eyes shall behold, and not another, though my reins be consumed within me." That is the faith that surmounts the doubts and the difficulties of today; that is the faith that will enable you to surmount every obstacle; that is the faith that will help you to recognize the hand of God in all of His hand-dealings, and meet meekly chastisement when it shall come from His beneficent hand. "Be not faithless, but believing, for blessed are they who have not seen and yet have believed."

May the peace of our Father be with you, I ask in the name of Jesus. Amen.