After referring to their stupendous works in stone, and their skill in the fine arts, involving the most delicate carving, Mr. Conant remarks of the old American race who wrought them:
And it is difficult to conceive how, without cutting implements equal, at least, to our own in hardness, such delicate and such stupendous works could have been executed. And to the question whether they possessed a knowledge of working iron, the wise man will hesitate long before he answers in the negative. It should be remembered, too, how quickly—unless under most favoring conditions—iron corrodes to dust and leaves scarcely a trace behind. The piles of the Swiss lake-dwellings, the cedar posts of the mounds, may endure for ages, while iron—so hard, and more precious than gold in the advancement of the world's civilization,—speedily melts away before the gentle dews and air of heaven.[54]
There is more to the same effect, but our limits will admit of no further quotations.
It has to be conceded that the weight of assertion on the part of writers on American antiquities, is against the existence of the horse, cow, ass, goat, sheep, etc., in America within historical times, and before the advent of Europeans. There is no evidence developed so far that satisfactorily proves that any of the native races of America, wild or civilized, had any knowledge of the horse and other domestic animals named at the time of the discovery of America by the Europeans. The Book of Mormon, however, repeatedly and most positively declares that all these animals existed in great numbers. The first Nephi, for instance, says:
We did find upon the land of promise, as we journeyed in the wilderness, that there were beasts in the forest of every kind, both the cow and the ox, and the ass and the horse, and the goat and the wild goat, and all manner of wild animals, which were for the use of men.[55]
The same animals, with others, are enumerated as existing also in Jaredite times, and in the reign of King Emer—the fifth of the Jaredite line of kings—that people are said to have had—
All manner of cattle, of oxen, and cows, and of sheep, and of swine, and of goats, and also many other kind of animals which were useful for the food of man; and they also had horses, and asses, and there were elephants and cureloms, and cummoms; all of which were useful unto man, and more especially the elephants, and cureloms, and cummoms.[56]
It is to be observed, curiously enough, that elephants are spoken of as being in use for domestic purposes in connection with the horse and cattle, etc., and it is rather a striking circumstance that the remains of these animals, together with those of man, have been unearthed in various parts of the American continent, though their existence is accredited to very ancient times—to ages long prior to either Nephite or Jaredite times.[57]
It is held, of course, by opponents of the Book of Mormon that this apparent conflict between the book and the supposed facts, as they are declared to be by the writers on such subjects, constitutes a grave objection to the claims of the Book of Mormon. And, indeed, in the present state of our knowledge upon the subject, it has to be admitted that it constitutes one of our most embarrassing difficulties. Still it should be remembered that there is a wide difference between a difficulty for which one has not at hand an adequate explanation, and one that would be fatal to the claims made for the Book of Mormon. The fact has to be admitted that the native Americans seemed to have had no knowledge of the horse at the time of the discovery of America, but that does not necessarily carry with it the conclusion that he did not exist and was not used a thousand years before that time. His apparent extinction may be and is sarcastically referred to as "a very strange thing," still, "strange things" do sometimes happen; and the extinction of species of animals is not an unknown thing in the history of our earth. Indeed our scientists are confronted by just such—nay, with the identical "strange occurrence;" namely, the sudden and complete disappearance of the horse from the American continents. First let me explain that the result of recent long continued investigation upon the subject leads our scientists to the conclusion that North America was the original home of the horse—the place of his "evolution." In the Century Magazine, for November, 1904, is a very elaborate and very able article on "The Evolution of the Horse in America," really a study of the "Fossil Wonders of the West," by Henry Fairfield Osborn, Professor of Zoology in Columbia University, and Curator in the American Museum of Natural History. Speaking of the migration of the horse from America to Europe, he says:
About the early or mid-Pliocene period there apparently occurred the long journey of the true American breed horses into Asia and Europe and over the newly made land-bridge of Panama or of the Antilles into South America. That the true Old World horse actually came from America is inferred because of the sudden appearance in the Upper Pliocene of the Siwalik Hills of northern India, in northern Italy, and in England, of five species of the true horse, of which no ancestors have been found in either Europe or Asia. Another strong argument for their American origin is found in the simultaneous appearance in the same countries of the camel, which we positively know to have been an exclusively American-bred animal. It is possible, however, that in unexplored portions of northern Asia the evolution of true horses may have been progressing. I am sanguine that traces of this great exodus and migration of the horses will be discovered in the rocks of northern Asia, and that this great problem in the history of the horse will be solved in favor of America.
Speaking further of the horse in America in very ancient times, our author says:
The preglacial or earliest Plieistocene times in America, as in Europe were of temperate climate with increasing coldness. The country was covered from north to south with three noble species of elephants, namely, the northern mammoth, the Columbian mammoth, and the imperial mammoth or elephant of Texas; there were also large and small camels, and a variety of large ground-sloths which had recently made their way over the new land bridge from South America. The great number and variety of our preglacial horses speak for favorable conditions, and constitute an additional proof of the American-origin theory. In 1826 Mitchell aroused wide-spread interest by the discovery of the first true fossil horse of America, found near the Navesink Highlands of New Jersey. This was seventy-eight years ago; it antedated by a quarter of a century Leidy's discoveries in Nebraska. The wide geographical range, as well as the great variety in size and breed of the American preglacial horses, is indicated by the following facts. One animal (Equus complicatus), about the size of a small western broncho, originally found near Natchez, has been traced all over the Southern States from the isles of the Gulf of Mexico to South Carolina. A larger horse with very elaborate grinding teeth has been found in the Northeastern and Middle States. On the extreme western coasts of California and in Oregon occurs the large "Pacific horse" perhaps closest to the existing species of horse. In Nebraska we quarried a whole season, securing remains of hundreds of horses belonging to another species. In a portion of this quarry all the larger limb bones were found broken in two. This suggested to me the possibility that these larger bones, the only ones known to have contained marrow, had been broken by man, who was primitively a great marrow eater, but we searched in vain for any collateral evidence of this hypothesis. To my knowledge, no human remains have been found associated with those of the fossil horse in North America; but I confidently expect that such association will be discovered, as it has been in South America. By far the largest species of either wild or domesticated horse known has been determined by Mr. Gidley in Texas, and has appropriately been called the "giant horse." The grinding teeth exceed those of the Percheron draft-horse by one third. At the other extreme is a diminutive horse, discovered both in Florida and in the valley of Mexico.* * * * * * A more welcome discovery could hardly be imagined, therefore, than that by our party, in 1899, on the eastern edge of the Llana Estacado of Texas. It was no less than a small herd of six or seven preglacial horses. * * * * * * This true American horse was certainly rather ungainly-looking, proportioned like the larger primitive horses of Europe, with long body, short limbs, sloping sides, and quarters like those of some of the zebras. Like the early cave-horses of Europe, it had a large head, convex forehead, stout limbs, spreading hoofs and splint-bones which represent the last of the lateral toes.
Then, coming to the strange circumstance of the total "elimination of the horse from the American continents," the professor says:
When we look back upon the enormous antiquity of our horse, upon the ceaseless trials of nature by which it was produced, and upon the splendid varities of breeds which roamed over the country in preglacial times, we cannot but regard the total elimination of this race as a calamity for the North American continent. * * * * There is no doubt that we supplied South America with the horses which under the peculiar conditions there began to separate into a number of distinct breeds. The extremely short-limbed Hippidium of the pampas of Argentina was contrasted with the more normal long-limbed horses found in various parts of South America. The horse also persisted in South America until the advent of man; during the Upper Pleistocene lake formations its remains are found associated with chipped stone implements, with pottery and fire refuse, proving that it was both hunted and eaten. The evidence, however, for the total extinction of the horse is as strong in South as it is in North America, and it is generally accepted that in 1530 Mendoza reintroduced the horse into the La Plata region, just as the Spaniards reintroduced it into our Southern States. The rapid spread of several breeds of horses in South America and of the mustangs in North America bespeak highly favorable conditions of life. Many of these horses have reverted to a very primitive condition, notably the striped yellow duns of Mexico. The increasing cold and the advancing ice sheet of the glacial period are commonly assigned as the cause of the extinction of American horses. The fact that most of our native fauna became extinct at the same time lends probability to this theory. But this does not explain the elimination which also occurred to the south in Central and South America, and for other reasons it seems to me that the temperature theory is not adequate to explain all the facts. The great herds of kiangs, or wild asses, and other breeds which subsist under the extreme conditions of the northern winters, as well as the survival of the horse through the glacial period in Europe, demonstrate the capacity of this family to endure cold. Another class of causes which should certainly be taken into consideration is the occurrence of a wide-spread epidemic among the quadrupeds, such as the rinderpest of Africa, or that which is spread by the tsetse-fly. In certain parts of South America the puma is an animal especially destructive to horses.
May not the last named class of causes be as confidently relied upon to explain the apparent extinction of the horse in America since the close of the Nephite period, as to explain his extinction in the more ancient preglacial times?
What is more embarrassing than the apparent absence of knowledge of the horse by the natives at the time of the European discovery of America, is the absence of any positive and abundant evidence of the remains of the horse in the tumuli or other ruins of the land; and an absence also of any drawing or other representation of the horse in the native picture writing or sculpture, while many other animals and birds and fish are frequently represented both in picture writing and sculpture.
Kitto notes the fact, however, that from the account of the burial of Jacob,[58] and from the Song of Moses,[59] it is clear that horsemen were a part of the Egyptian army, and yet there is but one solitary specimen of a man on horseback amongst the infinite variety of sculptured representations of their manner and customs.[60]
Daniel G. Brinton, one of the most competent writers upon the subject, says:
There is no doubt but that the horse existed on the continent contemporaneously with post-glacial man; and some palaeontologists are of opinion that the European and Asian horses were descendants of the American species;[61] but for some mysterious reason the genus became extinct in the New World many generations before its discovery.[62]
May it not be possible that a too great antiquity is claimed for most of the evidences of the existence of these animals in the western world? The convictions of Nadaillac, concerning the non-existence of the horse in America within historical times (and previous to the Spanish invasion), was well nigh shaken by some of the discoveries of Charnay. The latter, "in the execution of a mission entrusted to him by the French government, superintended the excavation of some tumuli, mountains of rubbish probably, which had covered for many centuries the relics of the ancient Toltecs"—the native Americans who most resemble the Nephites, judging from their traditions. One dwelling, which Charnay unearthed, "consisted of twenty-four rooms, two cisterns, twelve corridors, and fifteen little staircases of extraordinary architecture and thrilling interest."
"This is not all," continues Charnay. "In the midst of fragments of pottery of all kinds, from the coarsest used in building, such as bricks, tiles, water-pipes, to the most delicate for domestic use, I have picked up enamels, fragments of crockery and porcelain, and more extraordinary still, the neck of a glass bottle iridescent like ancient Roman glass."
"Amongst the debris," says Nadaillac, "lays the bones of some gigantic ruminants (perhaps bisons?), the tibia of which were about one foot three inches long by four inches thick, the femur at the upper end about six inches by four inches. Admitting that there is no mistake, these facts are absolutely new, for previously it was considered that the early Americans did not know how to make either glass or porcelain, and that before the arrival of the Conquistadors (the Conquerors, the Spaniards) none of our domestic animals were known in America, but that of the oxen, horses, and sheep living there at the present day are all descended from ancestors imported from Europe."
"The excavations have also yielded some little chariots that Charnay thinks were the toys of children. Now, supposing these toys to have been a reproduction in miniature of objects used by men, we must conclude that the Toltecs employed carriages, and that their use was not only given up, but absolutely unknown on the arrival of Cortes. These discoveries, we can but repeat, greatly modify the conclusions hitherto accepted. But are these really original productions? May they not have been imported? This is after all doubtful, and new proofs are needed to establish certainly that the objects discovered really date from the pre-Columbian period before we can admit that in the eleventh century the Toltecs possessed domestic animals, that they knew how to make and fashion porcelain, glass, perhaps even iron, for Charnay also collected in his excavations several iron implements.[63]
Priest, in his "American Antiquities," speaks of "a great number of tracks, as turkeys, bears, horses, and human beings, as perfect as they could be made on snow or sand," found impressed in the surface of a solid rock on a certain mountain in the State of Tennessee, situated a few miles south of Braystown. He says, "that these are the real tracks of the animals they represent, appears from the circumstance of this horse's foot having slipped several inches, and recovered again; the figures having all the same direction, like the trail of a company on a journey."[64] Referring later to this subject, he says:
The horse, it is said, was not known in America till the Spaniards introduced it from Europe, after the time of its discovery by Columbus, which has multiplied prodigiously on the innumerable wilds and prairies of both South and North America; yet the track of a horse is found on a mountain of Tennessee, in a rock of the enchanted mountain, as before related, and shows that horses were known in America in the earliest ages after the flood.[65]
The question, then, for the present may be stated thus: The Book of Mormon positively testifies to the existence, in America, of these animals in both Jaredite and Nephite times. There have been discovered, by the researches of men, abundant evidences of the horse's existence in America, but they claim a very much greater antiquity for that existence than Book of Mormon times. It must be admitted that the weight of evidence, though not all the evidence, as it stands at present, is with those who make such claims; still it may be reasonably claimed, as for instance in the evidence found by Charnay and referred to in the passage I have quoted from Nadaillac, that some of the evidence points to a more recent existence of the horse on the American continents. Very much more evidence may yet be hoped for on the subject as explorations shall become more perfect and more extensive.
Relative to other domestic animals, Bancroft says, speaking of those in Central America:
Turkeys, ducks, geese, and other fowl were domesticated; and pigs, rabbits, and hares are mentioned as having been bred. Multitudes of bees were kept for their honey and wax, and hives are spoken o, by Las Casas without description. Gomera says the bees were small and the honey somewhat bitter.[66]
It has sometimes been questioned whether bees were found in America; and their supposed non-existence has sometimes been urged as an objection to the Book of Mormon, which positively states that the Jaredites brought with them to the northern continent "deseret," which by interpretation is "honey bee."[67]
The foregoing passage from Bancroft, and very much more evidence that might be quoted, sets that question at rest.
Relative to other domestic animals referred to, the cow, goat, sheep, etc., is a subject much more easily disposed of, for the mountain sheep and great herds of buffaloes may be the domesticated animals of ancients gone wild.
The story of the migration of the Jaredite colony from the coast of Asia to America in eight barges, driven across the seas by strong winds, has been an incident ridiculed by nearly every writer against the Book of Mormon from the beginning. Rev. Alexander Campbell especially makes merry over it, and disgraces himself by the garbled and unfair manner in which he relates the story.[68] But it was reserved for Rev. M. T. Lamb to make the most of such objections as may be urged against these barges.[69]
Omitting all reference to his silly ridicule and "smartness," in which he but mimics the methods among infidel writers when dealing with the story of "Noah's deluge," the objection against the Jaredite migration and barges may be stated thus:
1. The barges are too small and too few in number to carry Jared's colony, the animals they are said to have taken with them, and the necessary provisions.
2. Each barge had an opening in the top of it for the admission of air into the vessel, which could be closed at will in the event of there being danger of submersion. A similar opening made in the bottom of the barge but capable of being kept closed—and when closed water tight—at the will of the occupants—is regarded as unnecessary and ridiculous.
3. The provisions made for lighting the interior of the barges by means of transparent stones made luminous by the touch of God's finger, is unusual and just subject for ridicule.
4. The length of the voyage (344 days), being propelled by furious winds, the eight barges keeping together till their arrival at the promised land—is all regarded as too wonderful for belief.
Let us now consider these several objections one by one.
1. The barges are inadequate to convey the colony to America. They are said to have been small and light on the water. But how small? The length is described as "the length of a tree."[70] But of what tree? A tree one hundred feet long, or one two hundred feet long, or longer? Who may tell? Small; but small in comparison of what? Perhaps small in comparison of the ark, the traditions concerning which were well known to Jared and his brother, for they lived but a few generations removed from the time of its construction. The size of the ark is variously given because of the variations in the length of the cubit, by means of which its dimensions are described. The one usually accepted, however, omitting fractions of feet, is as follows: 525 feet in length; 87 feet in breadth; 52 feet in height.[71]
If this vessel was in the mind of the Jaredite who described the barges as "small," and he meant they were small in comparison of the ark, they could still be good-sized vessels, notwithstanding the descriptive term "small;" as they also could be good sized vessels notwithstanding the length of them is described as the length of a tree, since they could be, if some trees were in the mind of the writer, from one to three hundred feet in length. The breadth and depth of them is not given, but doubtless those dimensions would be in good proportion of their length, for their safety, and not at all as the width of a tree is to its length.
As to their being inadequate for the colony of Jared and the animals they brought with them to the New World, it should be remarked, in the first place, that the colony of Jared was small. A number of years after the arrival of the colony in America, the two principal families, that of the Prophet Moriancumr and of Jared, are given as follows: The former had of sons and daughters twenty-two, while the number of sons and daughters of the latter were twelve. How many of these sons and daughters were born after the colonies arrived in America is not known, but the numbers are given in connection with the statement that the brother of Jared—Moriancumr—was become old and was anxious to make some provisions for the settled government of the people. The "friends of Jared and his brother" at the time of the departure of the colony from Babel are set down as "twenty-two souls," but how many were born of these after the colony arrived in America is not known; but certainly these figures make it clear that the colony of Jared was small.
Secondly, it should be remarked that the number of animals the colony brought with them in the barges may not be determined, but most likely the number was few, and mainly for breeding purposes in the new home to which the people were being led.
In view of these reflections, the writer is of the opinion that the candid reader will find no insuperable difficulties in the way of accepting the barges as adequate to the conveyance of the colony from one land to another.
I know there is no particular progress made in the matter of removing one difficulty by pointing to another of like nature, especially such difficulties as Mormon believers of the Bible, as well as sectarian believers of it, are equally under obligations to explain as best they may. Still I think it proper to remark that sectarian ministers, who are confronted with the difficulties which infidels present concerning the inadequacy of Noah's ark to house Noah and his family and all the animals that they were to take into the ark with them, with the necessary food supplies for the five months through which the flood prevailed, (the very lowest estimate of the time) cut a sorry figure when making mouths at Jared's barges.
2. Relative to the openings in the top and bottom of the barges which has been so fruitful a source of merriment for reverend opponents of the Book of Mormon, it is only necessary to say that the opening provided for at the bottom of the barges was doubtless some merely emergency provision.
3. There is nothing in the matter of the transparent stones made luminous by being touched by the finger of God that is too much for a reasonable credulity in one who believes in God and his power. The stones, called Urim and Thummim, in the breast-plate of the Jewish High Priest were made luminous under the power of God, and through them in some mysterious way the will of God was communicated to a prophet. It is no more marvelous that God, at the solicitation of one prophet should make transparent stones luminous, by touching them with his finger, than that he should write his law upon the tablets of stone with his own finger for another prophet;[72] or that he should make a bush luminous, for that matter, or cause it to burn and yet not be consumed.[73]
Especially is belief in the possibility of making these stones luminous easy since the recent discovery of radium by those eminent French chemists, M. and Mme. Curie. Radium is a substance procured from pitchblende, which has not only the peculiar power of radiating light, but which has the power also of imparting to certain other substances, for a time at least, the same property. These eminent chemists were also the first to isolate from other substances, another metal which they called "polonium," after Poland, the native country of Mme. Curie.
Speaking of this latter metal before the Chemical Congress at Berlin, in 1903, W. Markwald said of it:
In a much higher degree even than radium it possesses the property of shining in the dark, and although it is known that actual particles infinitesimally small are being shot out from it continually—a fact which is proved by magnetic experiments—this strange substance does not seem to exhaust itself, nor to lose its luminous power with the passage of time. Here, therefore, is a hint, at least, of the future possibility of a constant and brilliant illuminant generated without heat or combustion.
An editorial writer of "The Medical News," commenting on Professor Markwald's paper, said:
Professor Markwald's demonstrations at Berlin make it clear that polonium is capable of communicating its radiant energy to many other substances in a very marked way.
In the presence of this knowledge concerning the qualities of these newly discovered metals, it is becoming for even supposedly hardheaded scientists to stop ridiculing the "luminous stones" of Jared's barges, while sectarian ministers, professing to believe in the omnipotence of God. [Text unreadable] splendidly displayed according to accounts given in the Hebrew scriptures, never had any case against the "luminous stones," and their ridicule from first to last has been unbecoming.
4. The adequacy of the eight barges to carry the colony of Jared, together with the seeds and animals they brought with them to the New World is established the moment it was proved that they may have been and doubtless were of considerable size; and by the same fact the difficulty of the length of the voyage was overcome; while the matter of keeping the barges together is a marvel of our opponent's own creation.
While it is true that no direct mention is made of any steering apparatus, it does not follow from this silence that there was no means for steering provided,[74] and an "outlook" from the opening in the upper side of the barge was not impossible. Indirectly, the matter of "steering" is mentioned as a factor in preparing the barges. For Moriancumr (the brother of Jared), the prophet leader, in praying that some means of light might be provided, also said: "O Lord, in them there is no light, whither shall we [by which we shall?] steer?"
Some provision evidently had been made for steering the barges which needed only the convenience of light to render it adequate.
These considerations dispose of the difficulties of the barges keeping together.
The Marvels of Liahona—"Compass."
This divine instrument, found by Lehi at his tent door, while still in the wilderness of Arabia, and which he describes as a "round ball of curious workmanship" of fine brass, within which were two spindles, of which Nephi says: "and one pointed the way whither we should go into the wilderness, and * * * I, Nephi, beheld the pointers which were in the ball; that they did work according to the faith and diligence and heed which we did give unto them."[75]
This curious instrument in an incidental way is called a "compass" in several passages.[76] Whereupon, our opponents seek to bring the Book of Mormon in conflict with supposed historical facts by insisting that the Book of Mormon speaks of the people being in possession of "a mariner's compass, long before the invention of such an instrument!"[77]
The director of the Nephites makes no pretentions to being a "Mariner's compass" of man's invention, and surely the description given above, supplemented as it is by a fuller description in the Book of Alma, where it is called "Liahona," must dispel all thought of this instrument being considered as an ordinary compass, such as is invented by men for navigating purposes; and which, as everybody knows, has but this one quality, namely, its needle constantly points northward because of the magnetic pole force, and mariners knowing one direction may ascertain others. The silliness of argument, which even supposedly grave and reverend historians and essayists descend to on such a point, is illustrated by an alleged incident with which Linn stoops to render his pages luminous, by pretending to quote the manner in which "Mormons in Utah" are supposed to explain the alleged anachronism of the "compass." He says:
The ease with which such an error could be explained is shown in an anecdote of a Utah Mormon, who, when told that the compass was not known in Bible times, responded by quoting Acts xxvii: 13, where Paul says: "And from thence we fetched a compass!"
That is, to quote the passage in full—"From thence we fetched a compass, and came to Rhegium."
This is merely the repetition of an old, silly story told against the Mormons long before they arrived in Utah, and was invented by the Rev. Henry Caswell, author of "The Prophet of the Nineteenth Century," published in 1843. It is of that order of stuff as the tales about the Prophet Joseph attempting to walk on the water, and his pretending to raise the simulated dead.
The antiquity of the compass really, of course, is of no importance in this discussion, since it is not claimed that "Liahona" is a compass, but an entirely different instrument, "and the Lord prepared it;" still, in passing, it may be well to point out that those who have attempted to make capital out of this supposed anachronism have not stated the whole truth concerning the compass.
"The directive power of the magnet," says a respectable authority "seems to have been unknown in Europe till late in the 12th century. It appears, however, on very good authority, that it was known in China, and throughout the east generally, at a very remote period. The Chinese annals indeed assign its discovery to the year 2634 B. C., when, they say, an instrument for indicating the sun was constructed by the emperor Hou-angti. At first, they would appear to have used it exclusively for guidance in traveling by land."[78]
An objection is urged against the credibility of Joseph Smith's account of carrying the plates of the Book of Mormon home from the Hill Cumorah. It is claimed that on account of their great weight it would be impossible for him to carry them a distance of some two miles and repel successfully the three assaults which he alleges were made upon him enroute.
Hyde estimates that a mass of gold plates of the dimensions given, 7x8 inches and 6 inches thick, would weigh 200 pounds.[79] Many others have echoed this objection, and have adopted Hyde's data upon which it is founded. To increase the difficulties they also say, that "besides these plates he had, according to his third story, a breast-plate of brass, Laban's sword, the crystal interpreters, the 'brass ball with spindles,' the director of Lehi. Yet he packs his horse load, keeps these large and awkward shaped things completely concealed, and, at the same time, beat off and outruns two empty-handed men a distance of two miles! Statements must be probable, and, therefore, these ought to be rejected."[80]
This is a misrepresentation. The Prophet did not carry these "awkward shaped things" with him at the time he carried home the plates and repelled the attacks of his assailants. He carried with him the plates only on that occasion. The other articles, or as many of them as he had—I have nowhere found in any narrative of Joseph Smith's, or one by any responsible person associated with him, that he took possession of the sword of Laban or Lehi's director—he carried home at other times.[81]
In passing, I call attention to the fact that nearly every objection urged against the Book of Mormon has in it the element of misrepresentation. If the main fact contended for in the foregoing objection is true, namely, that the plates weighed 200 pounds, and therefore were too heavy for Joseph Smith to carry two miles and at the same time repel his assailants, why add the untruths of the rest of the statement? If the conclusion as to the weight be true, would not that be difficulty enough to present? It may be a little apart from the main question here to call attention to this tendency of misrepresentation in all the objections urged, yet the very strangeness of the circumstance tempts one to notice it, and it reveals the fact that those who are making objections to the Book of Mormon are not quite certain of the strength of such objections as may be urged while rigidly adhering to the facts in the case.
Without accepting or rejecting the conclusions relative to the probable weight of the plates—for it is largely matter of speculation in any case, and the conclusions urged may or may not be near the truth; and, moreover, ground for the difficulty presented would exist if it could be established that the plates weighed 90 or even 50 pounds, wo we will not haggle about the number of pounds in weight—it is conceded that the weight was considerable. In fact, I have already urged that it was a matter which impressed itself upon the minds of the Eight Witnesses, who incidentally say that they saw and "hefted" them.[82]
Replying to this objection it is to be urged, first of all, that Joseph Smith was a strong, athletic young man; and aroused as he was under the stress of the excitement of the occasion, he would be wrought up to his highest physical tension, and when so aroused the limits of what may be done by men in the way of feats of strength and agility have not yet been found. Of course there is yet to be reckoned with the power which God could, and which perhaps he did impart to the young Prophet. If that be accepted as a factor in the event, the objection based on the weight of the plates is swept aside. It matters not, then, whether the weight be 50 or 200 pounds. The difficulty is as easily overcome in the one case as in the other. But when a natural, ordinary source can be appealed to for explanation of such a circumstance as is before us, I do not care to appeal to the supernatural, to the miraculous; and I am of opinion that when the unusual personal strength of Joseph Smith is taken into account, and that the young man was aroused to his highest physical tension by the excitement of the circumstances under which he was acting, I think he could accomplish the things he claims to have performed though the weight of the plates be conceded as considerable.
In conclusion, on this head, I call the attention of the many sectarian "Reverends" who make much of the apostate Hyde's objection, and use his data for arriving at the weight of the plates, to the fact that it ill becomes them to urge this objection, while they have to account to an unbelieving world for the marvelous feats of strength and endurance of many Bible characters, and especially of Samson, for twenty years Judge of Israel. What of this man, bare handed, meeting a lion and overcoming him? What of one lone man, with so poor a weapon as the jaw bone of an ass, slaying a thousand men of a war-like people? What of his carrying away bodily, together with the posts and iron bar which fastened them, the huge gates of the city of Gaza? And finally of his pulling down the great central pillars of the temple of Dagon, so that the temple fell, slaying himself and a host of the Philistines?
If these "Reverend" gentlemen shall say in reply to this that each of these feats of strength and others accredited to Samson is in every case preceded by the statement, "the Spirit of the Lord began to move him," or "the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him;" and that when at last he was caught weakly in the lap of the false Delilah, and in accounting for that weakness it is said, "he wisted not that the Lord was departed from him"—in a word, if his strength is to be accounted for by referring its origin to the Spirit of God resting upon the man, wayward though he was in some respects, that argument must count as much in explaining Joseph Smith's feat of carrying the Nephite plates home and repelling his assailants as in accounting for Samson's exploits.
The Death of Shiz.
The description given in the Book of Mormon of the death of Shiz, the Jaredite leader who fought Coriantumr, "the last of the Jaredites," is regarded as an objection to the Book of Mormon. The description follows:
And it came to pass that when Coriantumr had leaned upon his sword, that he rested a little, he smote off the head of Shiz that Shiz raised upon his hands and fell; and after that he had struggled for breath, he died.[83]
It is claimed that this represents an impossible thing—a man with his head stricken off rising upon his hands! And yet equally marvelous things of this nature have occurred, and are matters of record.
Mr. G. W. Wightman, of the Seventeenth Lancers of the British Light Brigade, and a survivor of the wild charge at Balaclava, relates, in the "Electric Magazine" for June, 1892, the incident of Captain Nolan's death during that charge. Captain Nolan was of the Fifteenth Hussars, and he met his fate, according to Wightman, as follows:
We had ridden barely two hundred yards and were still at the "trot," when poor Nolan's fate came to him. I did not see him cross Cardigan's front, but I did see the shell explode, of which a fragment struck him. From his raised sword-hand dropped the sword, but the arm remained erect. Kinglake writes that "what had once been Nolan' maintained the strong military seat until the 'erect form dropped out of the saddle;' but this was not so. The sword-hand indeed remained upraised and rigid, but all other limbs so curled in on the contorted trunk as by a spasm, that we wondered how for the moment the huddled form kept the saddle."
It is quite as remarkable that a man stricken unto death by the fragment of a shell should continue erect in the saddle, with sword-arm upraised and rigid, while the other limbs so curled in on the contorted trunk that those who saw him "wondered how the huddled form kept the saddle," as that a man as his head is stricken off should momentarily rise on his hands.
Mr. Wightman, in the same article, relates the still more remarkable case of Sergeant Talbot's death:
It was about this time that Sergeant Talbot had his head clean carried off by a round shot, yet for about thirty yards farther the headless body kept the saddle, the lance at the charge firmly gripped under the right arm.[84]
After this well attested fact, and many others of a similar nature that might be cited, it is not worth while being skeptical about Shiz convulsively rising on his hands for a moment after his head was stricken off.
Concluding Reflections.
The foregoing are not all the objections urged against the Book of Mormon, but they are the chief ones and the only ones I consider worthy or necessary of notice here; and even some of these scarce pass muster on the score of being worthy of consideration. I have already called attention to the tendency of misrepresentation in these objections; it is a characteristic of all objections that I have ever seen urged against the Book of Mormon. Why it is so I shall leave those to explain who make the objections. The arguments made against the Book of Mormon, especially those made by professed ministers of the Gospel, are wonderfully similar in spirit to those made by skeptics against the Hebrew scriptures, and in fact against all written revelation. The same scoffing at miracles; if they differ from those of the Bible—and sometimes when this difference is one only of degree—then it is argued that they cannot be true, because of said differences; if the miracles resemble those of the Bible—however remotely—then they are plagiarisms of the Bible, and are idle imitations unworthy of belief. The same old complaint of skeptics is made against the inadequacy and imperfections of the language—the language is not that of an All-Perfect Deity—it is unlike what might be expected of God, the human elements are all too apparent. And so one might continue through the whole gamut of criticism against the Book of Mormon.
Sectarian divines who would complain bitterly of such arguments if used against the Bible, do not hesitate to employ them and couple with them all the bitterness, ridicule, sarcasm, ribaldry, inuendo, and even misrepresentation that a certain class of skeptics have employed against the Bible. I do not mention these things in the way of complaint; I only want to point to the fact of them, that the reader, with me, may wonder at them and ask himself the question, why is this the case?
And now a final word as to these objections. Are all the objections to the Book of Mormon satisfactorily answered? Are all difficulties which they represent removed? Frankly, no; they are not. Every one must feel that. But, on the other hand, do these objections that are not entirely and satisfactorily answered constitute an insuperable difficulty in the way of a rational faith in the Book of Mormon? My answer is, they do not. Nor does incompleteness of evidence on any particular point necessarily mean error as to the general result of the evidence. But a little more time, a little more research, a little more certain knowledge, which such research will bring forth, will undoubtedly result in the ascertainment of facts that will supply the data necessary for a complete and satisfactory solution of all the difficulties which objectors now emphasize, and on which they claim a verdict against the Book of Mormon.
Meantime, do not our opponents recognize the fact that some responsibility devolves upon them in the controversy? What of the positive evidences and arguments advanced in favor of the Book of Mormon? Have we not a clear right to expect and demand a recognition of these, or else a clear confutation of them? It is nugatory, as George Stanley Faber successfully contended respecting infidel arguments against the Christian religion—it is nugatory to say that the evidences in favor of the Book of Mormon are weak and unsatisfactory, while yet no regular confutation or that evidence, and those arguments are brought forward. To state difficulties, paraphrasing Faber,[85] is one thing; to refute evidence and answer argument is another. The work which we have the right to demand of our opponents is a work in which they shall go regularly through the treatise, say of Charles Thompson, of Orson Pratt, or Parley P. Pratt, or George Reynolds,[86] and last, and perhaps least, the less worthy treatise of these pages, taking argument after argument, necessarily showing its utter inconclusiveness, and the inconclusiveness of the whole cumulative evidence and argument, bringing out the triumphant conclusion that the evidences in support of the claims of the Book of Mormon are too weak and unsatisfactory to command reasonable assent.
This is what is incumbent upon the opponents of the Book of Mormon. The mere statement of difficulties is not sufficient; for be it remembered that mere difficulties though unanswered, or even unanswerable, cannot set aside direct and positive evidence. "A negative presumption," says John Fiske, "is not created by the absence of proof in cases where, in the nature of things, proof is inaccessible,"[87] as is the case in respect of some proof to meet objections urged against the Book of Mormon. Again our author says: "No amount of negative evidence can outweigh a single well-established item of positive evidence."[88] And again: "Negative evidence, as every one knows, is a very unsafe basis of argument. A single item of positive evidence will always outweigh any amount of negative evidence."[89] The positive evidence that stands for the claims of the Book of Mormon become the difficulties that our opponents must overcome before they can hope to overthrow the claims made for the Nephite record. Until this is done, I shall hold that the mass of evidence which it has been the effort of the writer through these pages to set somewhat in order, is sufficient, both in quality and quantity, to fill the mind who pays attention to it with a rational faith in the Book of Mormon—THE AMERICAN VOLUME OF SCRIPTURE.
THE END.
1. Nephi xiii: 14.
2. Mosiah xx.
3. Alma xiv.
4. Alma xxiv.
5. Mosiah xxvii: 18-23.
6. Mosiah xxix.
7. "Mormonism" (1857) pp. 280-282.
8. "The Golden Bible," Rev. M. T. Lamb, (1887), chapter v.
9. Elsewhere on the subject of these signs given to the Nephites, I have said: "I think I see something very beautiful and appropriate in these marvelous signs. I think it is fitting that he who is described in the four Gospels as well as in the fifth (III. Nephi, Book of Mormon) as the 'Light and Life of the world,' should have his entrance into earth life proclaimed by a night in which there should be no darkness, and that a new star for a season should appear in the heavens, to be a witness to the people that 'the Life and Light' of mankind had indeed come into the world. And equally appropriate is it that when he who is described as the 'Life and Light of the world' is laid low in death, the world should have the testimony of light eclipsed. I see a beautiful appropriateness in these signs, and in them I see added pictures in the life and career of the Lord Jesus Christ." ("The Fifth Gospel," a Discourse by the writer replying to criticisms of Dr. W. M. Paden on III. Nephi, Defense of the Faith and the Saints, pp. 381-2.)
10. III. Nephi xi.
11. "The Golden Bible," p. 162.
12. Compare II. Kings ii: 7-13 and Acts i: 4-9.
13. Compare Acts xix: 11, 12, Acts v: 15 with II. Kings iv: 29.
14. Compare Matthew ix: 18-26 with II. Kings iv: 32-37.
15. Matthew xiv: 15-21.
16. Compare Rev. x: with Ezekiel ii and iii.
17. See "The Golden Bible," pp. 273-283.
18. Chapter xxxvi this work.
19. See Ibid, chapter xxxiv.
20. "American Antiquities," p. 355.
21. Dictionary of Book of Mormon (Reynolds) p. 223, also Mos. xxviii.
22. Mosiah xxvii: 34. I take it that the sons of the king are named in the order of their ages and Ammon is named first.
23. Century Dictionary, word Andes. The Encyclopaedia Britannica gives the word "Anti" as the probable origin of the word "Andes;" also "Anta" or "Tapir;" and "Antis" the name of a tribe resident in the mountains of Peru.
24. Conquest of Peru, Vol. I., p. 113, note.
25. Alma xxiv: 3-5.
26. Alma xxiii: 17.
27. Alma xx: 4.
28. Mormon vi: 14.
29. Alma xxxi: 3.
30. Alma 56: 4.
31. Alma xxxvii: 7.
32. Alma 56: 9.
33. II. Nephi v: 16.
34. "Native Races," (Bancroft), Vol., IV, p. 779.
35. "Conquest of Peru," (Prescott), Vol. I., p. 37.
36. The argument is briefly stated by Prescott, and he cites Wilkinson's "Ancient Egypt," Vol. III., pp. 246-254.
37. "History of Ancient Egypt," George Rawlinson, M. A., Vol. I., p. 97.
38. In a note he cites the fact that the British museum possesses several specimens of Egyptian iron, but three of these seven or eight specimens he declares to be of modern date. Vol. I., p. 519.
39. "History of Ancient Egypt," Vol. I, pp. 519, 520.
40. "Ancient America," (Baldwin), pp. 248, 249.
41. "History of America before Columbus," (DeRoo) Vol. I., p. 67.
42. Ibid. p. 68, 69.
43. "American Antiquities," p. 141.
44. Ibid. p. 185.
45. Ibid. p. 225.
46. Ibid. pp. 238, 239.
47. "American Antiquities," pp. 241, 242.
48. "American Antiquities," pp. 260, 261.
49. Ibid. p. 263.
50. Ibid. p. 265.
51. Ibid. p. 269.
52. "Foot-prints of Vanished Races in the Mississippi Valley," pp. 67, 68.
53. Ibid. p. 108, 109.
54. Ibid. pp. 109, 110.
55. I. Nephi xviii: 25. The animals named in this passage are repeatedly referred to in all parts of the Book of Mormon.
56. Ether ix: 18, 19.
57. Pre-Historic America, (Nadaillac), pp. 15-28.
58. Gen. i: 9.
59. Exod. xv: 1, and xiv: 26.
60. "Cyclopaedia of Biblical Literature," (Kitto), Vol. II., p. 973. He quotes Wilkinson as the authority for the above. Vol. I., p. 289.
61. This opinion is defended by Max Schlosser in the "Archiv fur Anthropologie," 1889, s. 132.
62. "The American Race," (Brinton), p. 51.
63. "Pre-Historic America," (Nadaillac), p. 357.
64. "American Antiquities," p. 157.
65. Ibid. p. 263.
66. "Native Races," Vol. II., pp. 721-722.
67. Ether ii:3.
68. Following is Campbell's account of the barges: "Moroni writes the Book of Ether, containing an account of the people of Jared, who escaped from the building of the tower of Babel unconfounded in his language. These people of Jared God marched before in a cloud, and directed them through the wilderness, and instructed them to build barges to cross the sea; and finally they built eight barges, air tight, and were commanded to make a hole in the top to admit air, and one in the bottom to admit water;(!) and in them were put sixteen windows of molten stone,(!) which when touched by the finger of Jesus, became as transparent as any glass, and gave them light under 'the mountain waves' and when above the water.(!) * * * * And the eight barges after swimming 344 days, arrived on the coast of the land of promise!"
69. "Golden Bible," (Lamb), p. 3.
70. Ether 2: 17.
71. Smith's Dictionary of the Bible, (Hackett's edition) Vol. III., p. 2178.
72. Exodus xxxi: 18.
73. Ibid. iii: 2.
74. I have usually found in personal controversies on this point, that our opponents depended upon the statement in the Book of Mormon to the effect that these "barges" should be as a "whale in the midst of the sea." (Ether ii: 24). To which the answer is obvious; namely, it does not follow that they were to be like a "tailless," that is to say "redderless," whale.
75. I. Nephi xvi, II. Nephi v: 12.
76. I. Nephi xviii: 12-21.
77. "Story of the Mormons," (Linn) p. 97. This writer attributes the possession of the "compass" to the Jaredites. Whether it is the slip of a careless writer or an effort on his part to make the matter of the "compass" in the Book of Mormon more ancient, is a question for him or his friends to explain. Many other writers in their anxiety to find anachronisms in the Book of Mormon refer to this "compass." Lamb is positively dishonest in the matter, since he assumes the existence of two instruments. One he calls the "Director," and applies to it the description given above in the text, and the other he calls the "Compass," though clearly this latter word is used in an incidental way in describing the "Director." This is the only way he could create the longed for anachronism, and hence he adopted it. This may secure his fame for ingenuity, but what of his honesty? (See "The Golden Bible" Chapter III., Subdivisions "C" and "D").
78. "Universal Knowledge," (Chambers) p. 203.
79. Following is the method by which he arrives at this conclusion: "The plates of gold measure 7x8 inches, and six inches thick, and are fastened through the back edge with three rings. A box of tin, 10x14, and 3 inches deep, weighs about 125 lbs. gross. The box may weigh 10 lbs., leaving the net weight of tin 115 lbs. Now 10x14x3: 115 :: 7x8x6 : 92 lbs. Had these gold plates been tin, they would have weighed about 90 lbs. But the relative weight of tin and gold is as 19.25 to 7.58. So that 7.58 : 19.25 :: 92 : 220.44. Hence, this mass of gold plates, as they were not so compactly pressed as boxed tin, would have weighed nearly 200 lbs." (Hyde's "Mormonism," p. 244).
80. Hyde's "Mormonism," p. 244.
81. See this Work, Vol. II, ch. iv.
82. This Work, Vol. II, p. 281.
83. Ether xv: 30-31.
84. I am indebted to the kindness of the late Joseph Rich, son of the late Apostle Charles C. Rich, for these two items. He was kind enough to mark the passages and send me the article from the "Electric Magazine," June, 1892.
85. "Difficulties of Infidelity," Sec. I.
86. It is a pleasure to note the work of this my brother, and fellow President in the First Council of the Seventies in this field of Book of Mormon labor. I feel myself much indebted to him because of his great achievements in this field of research.