Show DISCOURSE delivered by apostle F 1 M lyman at logon logan cache conference sunday morning august ath 1889 REPORTED BY A WINTER it is very gratifying to see so many of the latter day saints of this stake gathered together quite a variety of subjects have been spoken upon by the brethren in the meetings gs that have been held here during this conference the topic upon which president pitkin spoke to the priesthood last evening the bondage of debt to which the lat ter day saints are subject at the present time is one that I 1 have had occasion to speak upon during the last three months quite frequently in the southern part of the territory and I 1 have felt that it could not receive too careful attention the course that our people have taken in relation to their business affairs I 1 think is ruinous and tends to keep them in poverty and in a state of dependence and of humiliation the way that we have adopted of we airbag out and eating up our substance before we have earned it or before we have grown our crops puts us under obligations to somebody and we do not feel free and comfortable as latter day saints ought to feel we ought to be the freest of all people I 1 understand that the gospel is the perfect law of liberty so that one part of the gospel of jesus jesus christ has not been properly observed by the lat ter day saints or they would not be today in the bondage of debt that they are wrong ways and methods have been followed or we would not be in our present condition it was shown to us last night by the brethren that we have been buying bachl machinery nery extravagantly and possibly wagons perhaps we have bought extravagantly of clothing or we may have lived aved extravagantly tor for we are likely to be extravagant where we pur for them I 1 think we would be much more careful in purchasing if we paid down for our goods but when we buy on time merchants and machine men have time prices and they charge from ten to thirty per cent more for goods when they sell on time than they do when they sell for cash down they must do that because when they sell on time they are running risks possibly of losing part art of the principal or perhaps arl all of it then in addition to the very high soldon price rice that is charged for goods sold on time they charge an extravagant interest if you are under the necessity of borrowing money from the bank and can gi I 1 e good good security you can obtain tal nit it for ten or twelve per cent per annum and possibly for less than that if you borrow a large amount but on en machinery and wagons you will find the interest is generally one and a quarter and one and a alolf and even two per cent a month if the latter day saints would only practice a little self denial for one or two years 11 8 1 or three years if necessary until 1 1 they had some means ahead to pay for the goods that they need they would obtain them for about one third less than they leave to pay for them now but the way we are doing at present we are always paying for dead horses for clothing that is worn out and for machinery and wagons that are useless it is much more satisfactory according to my experience peri ence to pay for live horses for new clothing and for new dew machinery and wagons I 1 have felt to plead with the lat ter day saints throughout this territory to change their course of business I 1 beg of merchants to quit trusting the people and educate them to buy their goods and pay for them when they get khem and add machine men do the same I 1 would advise the latter day saints in this region of country to use your old machinery and your old wagons to use your old boots and shoes and patch and mend them and get along with them as best you can until your increase of crops of catt cattle leand and of money may be such that you may be able to pay for whatever you need this is the way to success to prosperity and to enable you to have means not only to make yourselves comfortable but to have means with which to aid in the building up of the kingdom of god men that will take this course will have no difficulty in paying their tithing and it wont be necessary to take the whole crop as it is harvested to pay your obligations and have to excuse yourselves from paying any tithing because you owe more than you have raised you will have crops and you will owe nothing and your wealth will be In increasing creasi 11 9 and you will be able to build better fences and better homes and put more min comforts forta in the house a and to clothe your children better an and d live better yourselves instead of living at the dying rate that bat a great many of us do at the present time I 1 do not speak in this way because I 1 have bave been free from obligations and have conducted my business successfully and rightly all my life but the counsel I 1 give to you is good for me i and will will save and bless me as well as a s it will you and I 1 need it as well as you do up to my being forty three years of age I 1 never went into debt I 1 waited till I 1 was that age before I 1 contracted a debt before I 1 borrowed money or went under obligations to anyone previous to that time I 1 was rather inclined to loan and to help others instead of needing to be helped myself and though I 1 have been comparatively ively successful so far as I 1 have borrowed and invested means I 1 must say that I 1 have not felt so comfortable for table or so safe as when I 1 have not been thus obligated and I 1 could not go before the latter day clay saints and exhort them to follow my example I 1 believe that many have followed it and to their discomfort I 1 believe that I 1 have hurt my own kindred by the example that I 1 have set in borrowing means and I 1 have decided to quit it for the last three years I 1 have been meeting my dobli nations and paying them up and I 1 desire to be one among the brethren to lead out iu in this line and free myself from all my obligations so that I 1 shall be able to say that I 1 owe no man a cent and then live within my resources I 1 have never dever borrowed money to live upon but like lik a great many others I 1 lave have borrowed to invest in business and to accomplish something in that line lioi have concluded however to change in that regard and I 1 recommend others to do the same I 1 believe that the lord requires us to establish industries and to provide employment and the men who who WW step forward with the means that they have at their command and do something in this line will v ill recel e the blessings of the lord and will receive the blessings of the poor in zion who desire employment I 1 believe also that it will be a good thing for the latter day saints who have means to buy the surplus grain in this country instead of allowing it to go away too to buy the wheat the all barley the oats the corn and these grains that may be preserves preserved from year to year this will be a legitimate proper investment f whether cheth e r a f famine a nine I 1 b be e D near e a r or ws ar away I 1 am not able to say but butram I 1 satisfied that this will be a good measure to be adopted by the latter day sainte and if there are men who have a few thousand dollars in their possession it aul wul 1 pay them to provide elevators or gra granaries narles of some kind to e hb 3 the wheat and to keep it ivi in country because it will be needed aee aa people are flocking in here her rapidly the 8 while the drouth is cau causing 1139 of crops to be short in many P jao DO the country you will have ow but doubt a surplus in this stoe stake be throughout the land grain way maw and I 1 a y comparatively scarce to w that for men who have speculate with it will be a alegita lur ziti make C b ase investment for them to p pa it in the surplus grain and to kio it this country instead of SS ut out it will be needed here if it is necessary that it should bbous where go out of the country let it go it will bring the largest P advant lb price and be of the greatest aag would age to the people here W we 0 good obi obtain aw gwi rather that our brethren prices for their grain I 1 thilla it IL the staff of life should alid that this here at home a good figure should M be the brethren who raise it well paid for their work cape the lord requires us tog to ga 0 of ful attention to the tempora to life he also requires quires Te us strict attention to the d to the y in regal reg araw of life in speaking take up on obligations that brethren knaad i themselves I 1 have recommended recoding reco to that if brethren are deferro de terro be under obligation for any va cation whatever let it be for the support i of their children I 1 would gore MOO debt brethren in going ing into d 0 the chefe tc readily for the education du cation athing ai j almost children than for it roper 1 else but I 1 beli believe eve that p economy be adopted the tedas zion may be as well educe ed with alth people of the world eire are fathers going auw be everything we buy must gome time and is it not better to pay for ou our goods when we get them and adf thereby secure them at a figure in this way we can save money and be independent and lay something by bv for a rainy day instead of living as a great many people do in the old country they eat tip up their wages before they earn them and when saturday night comes the wages they receive are required to pay for the food they have eaten during the preceding week when a week of sickness happens to overtake thern them they get another week behind and then another week until they hey are a month or two behind the me shopkeepers carrying them on credit all the time then when they obtain employment again they have to practice self denial enough to enable them to liy up a shilling or two every ery week to pay off the old debts and in many instances people have been known to pawn their sunday clothing to enable them to procure a weeks living I 1 some bitnes wonder if that kind of training in dt the e old u antry country has not had some effect upon some of the latter day saints in zion and it they have not come here with the idea that there is 18 no other way to live than to go in debt a week or a month and then PV P lt it after look among your U neighbors ebors and see if you cannot filk alna some who always manage to mee meet it their obligations as they are due lj and others who live without contracting debt who pay as they go 8 or else do not go see if those neigh neighbors bora are not comparatively independent see if they do not have the chance of purchasing at a great advantage and procuring goods very cheap 13 since 1 nce coming to logan a brother has told mla ala me die of a little experience that he had in ila this direction he r wing n ma machine hine and paid for it down A few kw days days afterwards another brother her who was a poor man bought w 1 the he sa same me kind of mowing machine M hine on time the one that bought first T was a man of means and W t the i lowest lowest price for cash down iio e poor 01 naan man had to pay twenty dollars more ore for his machine than the other man did for his now twenty dollars ars is avery a very large per machine cage sa on the price of a mowing and the poor man who ought is t to have had the advantage in the po the article had to pay that sesty amount extra because he wanted credit and in addition to this he had to until the pay an extra extravagant vagan t interest machine was paid for this Is not only Sy I 1 tr true ue in regard to mowing machines but it is also true in re rd to hers hay bay rakes and all nd 8 of dise rhoa tile ti achl nery and re alt Is the poor people we poorer and the rich hav are having 31 1 g the advantages brethren we ought to obtain wis dom arora t the bo lord to enable able us so to sl order orde the our lives that at we may have all ur reabell that are within if we will only be care ml ful and aad a lealand lc aland practice self and recognize the folly of indulging ila the tastes and fashions ach sa anda ioa andai e tt ditl of the world it will 1 be en i W w kb in ft self denial to is feces wy m every family and in every A individual it is necessary for the th happiness for the peace for the th wealth and for the health of the lat ter day saints it is necessary ir in eating in wearing and in laboring it should be studied in every walk wait of lve ike the appetites and fancies that are natural to mortal man and that are cultivated by the world lead to destruction you find men who have prospered and who have accomplished complis hed any very great work in the earth and as a rule you will wil find people who have practiced self denial it preserves us from transgression gres sion from corruption from poverty and from misery and increases our wealth and happiness the care that we give to temporal temp bral matters of course tends to increase our worldly prosperity in like manner the care that we bestow upon our intellectual our moral and our spiritual matters increases our intellectuality our morality and our spirituality and strengthens and qualifies us for the duties of the kingdom oi 01 god and prepares us for the coming of the savior the more careful we wc are in regard to the requirements made upon us in the gospel of christ the more circumspect we are in regard to our conversation the happier and more comfortable we are and the nearer we come to living so that the spirit of god may dwell constantly with us it is intended that god should be our companion by the holy spirit which is one of the godhead and that we should feed alike clothe alike labor al alike I 1 ke enjoy alike and live upon one er plane ne and the higher the plane the better ater pleased our heavenly father will be with us the more devoted we are in regard to our prayers the better pleased the father is with us and the more abundantly does he bless us but the prayers that are offered should be the sincere desires of the heart we are not heard for our much speaking nor for the remarkable things that we may as ask k for but the plain simple requirements of our lives offered up unto the father in sincerity bring down the blessings of the lord upon us and when our lives are consistent cons consistent isteni with the prayers that we oter offer god is pleased to answer our prayers upon our heads he to is pleased to heal our sick and to turn evil from us as individuals as families and as a church when we as latter day saints keep the commandments of the lord we have no cause for fear in regard to the kingdom of god but we have cause to fear for ourselves when we are careless and thoughtless when we transgress the laws of aad and disregard the counsels of the holy priesthood and when we do not honor the representatives of god in our midst when the rights of men and women and their personal safety and purity are disregarded by us then we are in danger individually and collectively but when our eyes our ears and our hearts are open to see to hear and to understand the mind and will of god concerning us then he is pleased with us then may we dwell securely in the land and the lord will preserve us and establish us in the land where we are now planted for this is the land that god has designed us to remain in and it will be a land of zion unto us if the statutes statute sand and judgments Judgment of theford the lord are kept thereon the enemy will not have power to overrun us nor to break us in pieces what has been accomplished against the latter day saints efforts u up to the present time with all the efforts that have been made by our enemies to destroy us twelve years ago at the dedication of the st george temple president young made the declaration that if the latter day saints in the future would keep the commandments of the lord the efforts of our emedies and the noise and bluster that they would make would be more remarkable than it had ever been but said he their power will be less since that time the foundations of the logan and manti temples have been laid and the |