1844-07-20-New York Tribune-Joe Smith The Mormon Prophet
Joe Smith, the Mormon Prophet
Source: New York Tribune, 20 July 1844, page 4
For The Tribune.
Joe Smith, the Mormon Prophet.
Joe Smith is dead and gone. He was one of the most remarkable men of the age. The time for writing his history has not arrived. Men who have known him long and well, differ in their estimate of his character; the future historian alone can reconcile the contradictory statements of his friends and enemies, and place him in his true position. The personal manners of every man make him friends or enemies, regardless of his principles and of his conduct. This remark is clearly illustrated in the case of Smith. He was a man of rough exterior and coarse manners; thousands who approached him were so completely disgusted at once by his manners, that they refused to look at the good he claimed to have done. But notwithstanding this he was a remarkable man, and has left the impress of his genius upon the age in which he lived; he has carved out for himself a title to a page in the history of his country, and his name will be remembered, for good or for evil, when the names of half the ephemeral Statesmen of the age will be forgotten.
Born in the very humblest walks of life, reared in poverty and obscurity, without education, without intelligence, accustomed for years to rude and severe labor, rough even to the hour of his death in his deportment, course, vulgar, low, he has succeeded in establishing a RELIGIOUS CREED, which has been proclaimed through out America and Europe, in the Barbary States of Africa, along the banks of the Nile, amid the ruins of ancient Jerusalem, and in the Courtly Halls of the modern capitol of the Russian Empire. The Creed which he has established and which in the last few years has made rapid progress throughout the civilized world, will continue to flourish until millions of converts will stake their eternal destiny upon its truth.
He has founded a city upon one of the most beautiful spots in the whole Western world, where he has gathered together more than twenty thousand inhabitants from every part of the earh, of every nation, tongue and kindred; he has planned one of the most magnificent architectural specimens of the age, and reared to the hight of forty feet a Temple which, when completed, will be at once the most beautiful, the most costly, and the most noble building in America. Its walls are of solid stone four feet in thickness, supported by thirty lofty pillars, whose huge size and strength will endure as long as time will last. That building is a monument which will never decay, and the name of its founder will never be forgotten. Who can gainsay that Smith was a remarkable man? He ruled by the force of his genius. Like Bonaparte, he could control and command his fellow men. The secret of his power is unknown, but the fact that he lived in the full enjoyment of unbounded influence up to the hour of his death is indisputable. For the last few years he had acquired property rapidly, and whenever he traveled he used an expensive equipage. He was a pretended prophet of God, and a tavern-keeper! He labored for the souls of men gratuitously; he supplied their temporal necessities for dollars and cents.
In his personal appearance, I have said Joe was rough; he was a remarkably stout and athletic man; he loved to wrestle, and gloried in his ability to "floor" the strongest man in his community. In his deportment, he was either gay or angry, sometimes indulging in hearty but coarse jokes, and sometimes imprecating curses upon those who had displeased him. He was an arbitrary man, and loved power. He claimed for his Municipal Court such unbounded power as no Court ever yet exercised, and under shelter of such claim he committed acts alike destructive of law and order. He was also ambitious and vain, and it was this last trait that involved him in all his difficulties, and finally consummated his ruin. If he had not been intent on the exercise of his power, and determined to gratify his vanity as well as to glut his revenge, he would in all probability have been alive at this hour. But his vanity prompted him to disregard the threats of his enemies, and to persevere in the execution of his own plans, when he ought to have conciliated and yielded. It was his great fault to persevere in all his plans, even when prudence and circumstances demanded a different course. He has been accused of many crimes; of adultery, forgery, counterfeiting, and of an attempt to murder Governor Boggs of Missouri. That he availed himself of the power which he wielded to gratify his sensual appetite I have no doubt; he was a man of strong passions, and his education had not taught him to control or suppress his desires; but that he ever engaged in the other acts wherewith he stood charged, I seriously doubt. The men who would have sworn it�the men who murdered him�would not have stopped at the commission of a less crime, to gratify their hatred and their revenge. They had resolved on his destruction, but they feared to encounter him, when he had the ability to defend himself. He was a man of genuine courage, and would have fought to the last moment of life. He was pursued by a band of three hundred infuriated demons, and cruelly shot down like a wild beast, while confined in a small room where ho could not escape. It was a glorious exit for him. Whatever there was of evil in his heart will be forgotten in the recollection of his death. He will be eulogized bv his disciples, and worshiped as a God. Time and distance will embellish his life with new and rare virtues, and more than earthly power; his doctrines will flourish, his influecce will extend to ages yet unborn, and future generations will celebrate his birth and death by public festivals, public prayers, and an unlimited devotion. H. M.
- Lewistown, Illinois, July 10, 1844.
