MISCELLANEOUS REMARKS ON RESTITUTION.

Liverpool, November 30, 1847.

Reverend and Dear Sir,—A question has sometimes been asked concerning infants—with what bodies will they come forth? Will they be raised in the stature of manhood or adult size? We believe not; but as they fall, so will they rise again—the size of their stature when they rise, will be the same as when they fell asleep in death. Little children are the subjects and residents of the kingdom of heaven. Their angels do always behold the presence of our Father in heaven.

It is not the size of a person's stature that constitutes any certain mark of the measure of one's capacity, either to exercise power or enjoy felicity. Jesus possessed all power in a mere stature of human size. Still, nothing is fully perfect till it has attained the measure of the grand Designer, and accomplished the end of its creation. Hence it may, with some probability, be inferred, that children will mature and come to their full stature after the resurrection; this, however, is more a matter of opinion than of any direct revelation that has come to my knowledge.

It will, of course, from what has been said, be discovered that the righteous will enjoy a happy recognition of each other in every endearing relation that is common to mankind in their present mortal state. Their familiarity will be that of perfect innocence and felicity. Children, in the millennium, or after the first resurrection, will need the same paternal care, tutorage, and guidance, which is required by them now. In the absence of their proper parents they will, doubtless, receive adopted parents, or an equivalent guardianship of the angels of God. Such is the established order of progressive intelligence, through the medium of living teachers, that all the redeemed of heaven and earth, are under the special guardianship of the ministering authorities of God.

Oh, how happy and blessed are those parents and children—husbands and wives—who shall meet in the palaces of the just, and recognize each other after so long an absence! Unspeakably joyful that day and hour when friends, that have been long separated, shall again strike hands together, and celebrate their re-union in the courts above. To die is gain, because the righteous are exalted and introduced to higher orders of intelligence. New fields of discovery and enjoyment are constantly opening, to intensify their interest and swell their bosoms with the liveliest emotions. They may and do remember their righteous friends that are left behind, for a little season, with kind desires, and cannot advance in knowledge and glory very advantageously without them; still it is the knowledge which they possess of superlative glories ahead, that principally occupy their minds. Truths and keys, explanatory of the boundless and skilful works of God, and facilitating their progress towards dominion and power, and blessing, and salvation, are continually warming up their hearts and inciting them to onward deeds. The valiant and faithful that have fought a good fight and kept the faith, are hailed with delight and thanksgivings on their reception to the heavenly courts, and most cordially welcomed to the embrace of the great and venerable progenitor of our race.

Thrice happy are those who keep their present estate, and secure an imperishable inheritance on this planetary portion of their interminable existence; and equally deplorable, on the other hand, the condition of those who, filled with the delusive spirit of anti-revelation, keep not their present estate, and prefer the darkness of no revelation, in their day; because they have changed the ordinances, and transgressed the laws, and broken the everlasting covenant.

Again, it may be asked, will not those who have died without the knowledge of the gospel, during many centuries past, perish for want of the gospel? And where is the justice of leaving persons to perish, for want of that which it is not in their power to obtain?

Were not many of our ancestors, that have died in past generations, good people, yet as the gospel was not revealed in their day, and they could not enter the kingdom by being born of the water and of the Spirit, have they perished? These, indeed, are interesting inquiries. To the first inquiry I respond—they have not perished, in the sense or manner in which those have perished who have rejected the offers of the gospel; not having known the gospel, they have never rejected it. They have not disobeyed laws and ordinances of which they have not heard, or which were never imposed upon them. They are neither rewarded or punished according to gospel laws; but such as have lived without law will be judged without law. Where there is no law there is no transgression—where there is nothing given, there is nothing required; but it is required according to what a man hath. Whatever light they have had, by that light will they be judged; and whatever privileges and blessings the law, under which they have lived, can confer, such will be awarded to them. Still our fathers, who have died without the gospel, are in a condition far inferior to those who have received and obeyed the gospel.

This condition of theirs is consequent upon the early transgression of their progenitors. The condition itself may not be blameworthy. Their conduct, in a pre-existent state, may have deserved for their bodies in this world to be without the privilege of the gospel; or withholding gospel privileges from them in this world, may be followed with future blessings compensatory for their loss, when they shall prove themselves worthy of a better condition. The gospel martyr sustains a great loss, but the magnitude of his reward is designed to overbalance his loss.

Our devout and worthy fathers that have died without the gospel, cannot, indeed, enter the celestial kingdom of Jesus Christ without conformity to the identical laws and ordinances of his kingdom. But provision is made for them, whereby they can conform to the requirements of the gospel, not altogether in their own persons alone, but through proxy, or the obedience of others, provided they voluntarily accept of that obedience rendered by others for their benefit.

Startle not, my dear sir, at this idea that is so repugnant to the prejudice of protestants. The principle of substitution is at the foundation of the great work of redemption, and forms a chain of gratitude and obligation of the purest and noblest metal. Jesus died for others, because they could not have saved themselves without his obedience for them. The preachers of righteousness pass through many tribulations, and sacrifice houses, lands, and country, in order that others may become rich both temporally and spiritually; without this order of suffering, the just for the unjust, no man could be saved.

Paul says, I rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ, in my flesh, for his body's sake, which is the Church. Every man that has the priesthood of Christ may suffer in his measure and degree a propitiatory sacrifice, according to the degree of priesthood with which he is clothed. He may become a subordinate saviour to his fellow-men, Christ being, however, the CAPTAIN of all men's salvation. Hence, the prophets plumply call men SAVIOURS who shall be raised to officiate in Mount Zion.

Paul also instructs Timothy how he can save men and himself. This distribution of saving gifts, instead of eclipsing Jesus of the glory of salvation, magnifies his glory, because He is the spring and source of all salvation. God the Father reigns over all, and Jesus under him, and men reign under Jesus as kings and priests. Kingdoms rise up within kingdoms, but Christ is the King of kings. Peter tells how the devout and honourable dead may be saved, who never heard the gospel on earth. He says, the living may be baptized for them, and then they can be judged according to men in the flesh. Says he, "else why are ye baptized for the dead?" Baptism for the dead was better understood in Peter's days than the doctrine of the resurrection. Doctrines are sooner obliterated from the mind than ordinances. But after the destruction of the Temple, and the baptismal font, baptisms for the dead must of course cease, because there was no longer an acceptable place for this ordinance to be ministered. Peter explicitly declares, that the gospel was preached to the dead, by which also he went and preached to the Spirits in prison. Now if the gospel was preached to the dead, then mercy, and deliverance, and salvation, were preached to the dead; but these could not be preached to them without the ordinances, because the ordinances of baptism, and gift of the Holy Ghost, are a part of the gospel; for except a man is born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. But if a righteous man is baptized for his departed friend, the law requiring baptism is magnified, and God can justify the departed spirit that believes, and accepts the same.

Baptism for the dead, however, only takes away the disabilities under which they labour; unless this is done for them they cannot be redeemed, however penitent they may become. The blood of Christ took away the disabilities of all the human family, so that all mankind can now be saved through faith and obedience. But no man is saved by the blood of Christ, without faith and obedience; and if they count His blood an unholy thing, and sin against the Holy Ghost, there is no more sacrifice for sin, neither is there forgiveness for such in "this world, nor in the world to come." No person will be led by the Spirit to be baptized for any such description of persons; no person that is the friend of Christ will ever lend a helping hand towards redeeming such obdurate spirits. Many worlds must pass away before they can be fit subjects for the visitation of God's mercy. But there are those who will prove their lineage to be descended from those who slew the prophets, and "fill up the measure of their fathers," and some will even shed innocent blood—for whom there is no resurrection, only to be plunged into a lake of fire, and writhe under the gnawings of the worm that never dies. Among those in former ages who were of the lineage of the murderers of prophets, priests and high-minded divines are distinctly noticed by Jesus Christ, and their pedigree flatly exposed; and, sir, if you will allow me any credit for veracity, and attach any weight to the most palpable and irrefutable proof, you may assuredly know, that preachers of modern christianity have occupied a conspicuous part in the tragic scenes of Missouri and Illinois.—I will admit that many distinguished divines do eloquently extol the ancient prophets—speak in glowing diction of the faith of Daniel, Abraham, and Sampson, and of illustrious miracles, and beautifully portray the crucifixion, agony, and triumph of Jesus. But, alas! with the next breath, and while soaring aloft with the ardent sympathies of their hearers, they prove their pedigree to be that of the self-same murderers of the very prophets they affect to eulogize. Electrified and warmed up in the pseudo atmosphere of Calvary, and the story of redeeming love for a cloak of maliciousness, their words, though smoother than oil, are sharper than drawn swords. The innocent Saints feel their piercing thrusts from pulpits that bear the cognomen of St. Peter, and St. Paul, and St. Jude.

Lewd men of the baser sort catch the Lethean fire, and throughout the nation the righteous poor feel the Upean blast that sprung from the sacred desk. Thousands are thrown out of employment—writs, and every species of oppression are poured out like a storm of hail upon them. Property is sacrificed—the Saints flee, homeless and shelterless, to seek an asylum in the wilds of the everlasting hills.

Again, I will invite your attention to the union of the fathers and the children, and a faint outline of the innumerable kingdoms that are to rise up in the boundless dominions of the Supreme King. No king on earth or in heaven is so omnipotent or omnipresent as not to need subordinate ruling agencies, in order to control innumerable subjects. Hence the Lord God of all the earth has a host of holy angels that communicate his will, and minister his pleasure among the hosts of heaven and the inhabitants of the earth. From the highest heaven, even his own peculiar dwelling-place, to the lowest heaven, and from thence to the earth, this order of delegated authorities is maintained. His dominions extend through all space, and the number of his constantly increasing subjects cannot be computed.

How, then, are these innumerable kingdoms governed? Every organization has its own president or ruler, from the orbit of countless millions to the smallest division that convenience may require—from the ruler of many cities to the ruler of the smallest ward of a city. A man's gift maketh room for him, and bringeth him into the presence of great men.

Now, the strongest tie of government, of union, strength, and happiness in any confederation whatever, either in heaven or on earth, is that which springs from parentage, or the paternal tie. The first lesson of address which God teaches his subjects is to call him Father—our Father, &c. The father feels the strongest of all attachments to his children; for them he toils and provides, and to them he gives the fruit of his labours, and the wisdom and knowledge that flows from his lips. Every father is expected to look after his own progeny. If it were not that the hearts of the fathers were turned to the children, in the last days the earth would be smitten with such a sore and heavy curse that no flesh would be saved; but for the elect's sake, and for the sake of the fathers who have obtained promises concerning their posterity in the last days, the earth will be preserved as an inheritance for righteous men. From the dust of mother earth has arisen a sufficient number of righteous men to secure the endless perpetuity of its existence among the worlds that God has made. Glory and honour be to God for this unspeakable favour! Some worlds have passed away and are not, doubtless because they abode not in the law given them.

According to promise, God has sent Elijah just in the dawn of the great and notable day of sweeping the wicked with the besom of his wrath, to turn the hearts of the children to the fathers. The children are told of kindred ties between them and such as once held the true priesthood, and wrought righteousness on the earth, and of their consequent heirship to thrones and dominions through faith. Through the gift of the Spirit they respond to the same, as good tidings of great joy. The Spirit of God works in them mightily, that they may come to the knowledge of their ancestors, that were once in honourable remembrance before God for their faith and priesthood. By revelation, and by records and traditions, and by the spirit of adoption, they will learn their relationship to the heavens; and the vacant links of lineage between them and their forefathers in the priesthood, will be sought after on earth, and under the earth, and in the heavens, in the set times of restitution; for God will gather together in one in Christ, all things in heaven and upon the earth and under it, in the dispensation of the fulness of times.

The different federative unions of the whole family of heaven and earth, when organized according to the law of adoption, have their own respective patriarch or president to represent them in the grand council of the just, Jesus Christ being head over all things to the Church, in all ages, worlds without end. Every dispensation under Him has its own presidency and grand council, from whence emanate all the laws that spring from the Apostle and High Priest of our profession in the heavens.

By the federative laws of adoption, a representation may be had in the grand council of each dispensation, with more practical facility and order than otherwise. Jesus is an advocate for the whole human family before the Father; "and every High Priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins."

A mediatorial and intercessoral work pervades the priesthood according to the measure of the grace bestowed. The union of families, not according to the capricious and changeable institutions of men, but according to the laws of heaven, upon the basis of virtuous affection, and upon the confidence of permanent security in righteousness, will form a solid phalanx against the intrusion of discord and the spirit of alienation from God. The righteous will be bound together, by the ties of adoption and kindred, in the "bundle of eternal life." This united confederation of strength and affection will be peculiarly needed, in order to endure the shock which society must receive both in heaven and upon earth, and under the earth, in the last dispensation; for every tree that the Eternal Father hath not planted shall be hewn down, and the institutions of men shall come to nought. Every man's hand shall be against his fellow; and while distrust and discord shall insinuate their baneful influence into the secret chambers of the most familiar acquaintance, the Saints shall have peace like a river, and their union and joy shall abound. Then the nations that have sneered at prophets will be filled with disquietude and fear! Violence and rapine will stalk abroad with a bold front! Innocence, and integrity, and virtue will hide in confusion or be utterly banished! But the Church—"the pillar and ground of the truth"—will be quiet and undisturbed! Virtue and innocence, truth and wisdom, will abound within her gates! She will come up from her tribulations like sheep from the washing—fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners!

And when the victory of truth over error is won, all nations will fear the name of the Lord our God. "The law shall go forth from Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem." The Jews shall be gathered to Jerusalem, and the city shall have been built in troublesome times. The outcasts of Judah shall re-occupy their own land; and the gatherings of Israel shall be commemorated in everlasting songs and festivals, because the greatness of the work shall surpass any deliverance that Israel has ever experienced before from the hand of the Lord. Therefore, behold the days come, saith the Lord, that it shall no more be said, The Lord liveth that brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt. But the Lord liveth that brought up the children of Israel from the land of the north, and from all the lands whither he had driven them. And I will bring them again into their land, that I gave unto their fathers. Behold, I will send for many fishers, saith the Lord, and they shall fish them; and after will I send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain, and from every hill, and out of the holes of the rocks, for mine eyes are upon all their ways. I will cause them to know mine hand and my might, and they shall know that my name is the Lord. And Satan shall be bound on the face of the whole earth; and for the first time in the lapse of more than six thousand years, there shall be made a perfect demonstration of the majesty and glory of the kingdom of God on the earth; and the purity, efficiency, and wisdom of his laws.

Jesus Christ shall come in like manner as he went up. He shall set his feet upon Mount Olives, and the earth shall quake at his presence. His nation shall acknowledge their Lord and their God, whom their fathers had crucified. The city of the New Jerusalem shall come down out of heaven, even the city of the great King. In this city will be displayed the skill of the great architect of the world,—the builder and maker is God. The names of the twelve tribes, and of the twelve apostles of the Lamb will not be the least distinguishable in this most extraordinary city that was ever revealed to man.

This vision of the future residence of the apostles and patriarchs, appears to have been unfolded to the apostle John, in a kind of farewell visit, and must have ravished his heart with unspeakable delight and ecstacy. His soul was suffused with joy and rapture, and he fell prostrate with feelings of worship toward the messenger of such tidings. Jesus had, indeed, told the apostles that he would go away and prepare mansions for them. And that there were many mansions. But never before, probably, had he described the celestial state and residence so beautifully and minutely as now. The height, and length, and breadth of the city, and the names of some of the most distinguished personages who should occupy mansions therein, together with the gates of pearl, and the foundation walls of all manner of precious stones, were distinctly shown to him.

The future residence of the Saints, we perceive, is not an ideal thing without reality. They will need houses for their persons, and for their families, as much in their resurrected condition as in their present state; they will be as sensible of the works of art, taste, beauty and grandeur there as now, and far more so.

In this identical world, where they have been robbed of houses and lands, and wife and children, they shall have an hundred fold. The nations of the earth shall bring their glory into the city of their immortal residence. And the diversified wisdom of Solomon, displayed above all earthly kings, shall be but a miniature picture of the visible and tangible glories that will be exhibited to the eyes and ears of resurrected Saints on the very erarth where they once suffered. If ever an earthly sovereign sat upon a throne, and swayed a royal sceptre, and wore a glittering crown of surpassing richness and beauty, then shall men and women who have suffered loss and shame for the gospel's sake, be seated upon thrones in the city of the New Jerusalem, and their mandates shall be heard and obeyed to the ends of the earth; and the riches, and dominion, and power, and blessing, and glory, that shall encircle them, no tongue can describe. Oh! wonderful transition, from darkness to light, and from the degrading bondage of Satan into the liberty of the sons and daughters of God! Glorious emancipation! Who can contemplate the recompense of reward without ample satisfaction for all the withering scorn, and piercing sarcasm, and bloody hatred, that have been endured? Give me a name that shall never perish,—a habitation among heaven's kings,—a seat in the council of the just, where the fairest among the sons of men shall sometimes minister in his own person, and it shall suffice for having fought a good fight, and kept the faith once delivered to the Saints. Oh, enchanting prospect of rapturous delight!

The thought of such amazing bliss
Should constant joys create!

But grovelling unbelief will ask, how can such an immense city be let down to the earth, or suspended over it, and contiguous to it? I reply, How can the earth be suspended in vacant space? How could Jesus ascend up till the eye could see his person no longer? How could Elijah go up in the chariot of Israel? How could the angel fly through the midst of heaven, that the prophets Zechariah, John, and Daniel saw speaking to the young man Joseph? How can Christ come with his ten thousand Saints, and descend with a shout? How will Saints, by tens of thousands and millions, be caught up to meet him in the air? How do birds fly in the air, and vast planets hang on nothing? Oh! marvellous unbelief! shall not He who organized worlds out of their chaotic state, reorganize them at His pleasure, so as to suit the capacity and pleasure of immortalized bodies, that have kept their second estate, and have obtained right and title to enter the pearly gates of the royal city?

Isaiah says, that the Lord's work, in the last days, shall be a marvellous work and a wonder. The changes wrought in the condition of the earth will be very great. The face of its surface will be greatly changed. There are many islands and lofty barren mountains, and sunken pestiferous valleys, and sterile plains, that will be revolutionized. Indeed, far the greatest part of the earth stands covered with water. The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunken man, and shake terribly before the coming of the Son of Man. It shall even be turned upside down; and the approach of Christ shall be indicated by a succession of great events and changes. But a most extraordinary appearance in the heavens shall be distinguished, and known as the sign of the coming of the Son of Man. Whether this sign of the Son of Man will be some planetary body of an imposing aspect, first making its appearance in the heavens and gradually approximating to the earth, or whether it shall be stationary, is not, and probably, will not, be fully revealed, except to the children of revelation, for that day shall come upon the nations as a snare.

But it is revealed that an extraordinary sign in the heavens shall make its appearance, announcing, with sublime and terrific grandeur, the near approach of the Son of Man. The calamitous state of the nations, convulsed with the sword, pestilence and famine, with which God will plead with all flesh before the Son of Man shall come; followed also with great convulsions of nature, will lead many to practise wild and visionary impositions, pretending that Christ has indeed come, and that he has been seen in the wilderness, or in the secret chamber, &c. But let it be understood distinctly, that even as a remarkable star escorted the Son of Man in his first advent, and became not only visible but stationary over the very point of earth where Jesus was born—marvellous indeed!—even so, and much more visible will be his second coming.

The brilliancy of the lightning, extending over the whole heaven, from east to west, will not be more manifest to the inhabitants of the earth than the approach of the Son of Man at his second coming. Still many will behold, wonder, and despise, and perish; because it is written, that whosoever shall reject that prophet shall be destroyed from among the people. The false signs and wonders that shall be got up in opposition to the true, will deceive and harden the nations, and they will not discern between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not.

Even the sign of the coming of the Son of Man may be contemplated by multitudes, barely as an unaccountable phenomenon; and familiarity with the sight of it will beget indifference, hardness of heart, and contempt for all such like things.

Your humble servant,

ORSON SPENCER.