Show D a SCOURS E BY gitl gill berbr ELBE R ORSON PM AT aulm THE twentieth ivard ard meeting flou brouse blouse so sf ef 01 on da sunday afternoon decem fair ard 1876 deg geo OEO F 3 tim THE following passages of scripture were read the chapter of isaiah from the to the ath verses anufrom and from frem the to the verses the ath chapter of revelations from the to the verses the chapter of isaiah from tile the to the ath verses and the chapter of isaiah from the oth to the verses I 1 eider E elder ider lder pratt then said I 1 have read these passages not with the idea of selecting from them any one passage but more particularly particular Y to impress upon the congregation the fact that something must take place which never has been fulfilled I 1 since the day that isaiah lived ind and prop prophesied healed among the people you will admit with me that there never has been a universal destruction of all the wicked and the transgressors from off the face of theearta the earth there have been scores of millions of sinners upon the earth since the utterance of this prophecy present time but the wholesale destruction spoken of has never taken place you will all admit with me also that the signs which are to appear in the heavens aboul about the time of this universal destruction of tho the wicked have not dye yet t taken place wo we are told not only that the sun shall be darkened in hla hia going forth but the stars shall refuse their shi shining f ning if only the sun sunt were to be darkened the heathen nations that could not account for it might say eay it had reference to some great eclipse tsuch as has occurred in different aug eng ages es but butt when they find that all atho tho stars of heaven withold their light and there is not even so much pauch f as a glimmer of light and the sun too becomes as black as sackcloth lothi they cannot impute it to an eclipse for an eclipse would not destroy the I 1 alight of the stars that are scattered over the concave of heaven wo are aare also told in connection with this that the tho earth is to be affected ta awell as tho the heavenly bodies it is to roll to and fro like a drunken man man mau the mountains aro to bo be broken brouen down and the whole eart earth 11 aiato ja to be dissolved no such thing ella elia sever seven taken place since the day lathis ft this prophecy was uttered it is therefore yet to be fulfilled e L again isaiah in the chapter has said that every valley shall be bo exalted and every mountain and chill ambill shall be made low and the crooked croo kroo crooked ked shall be made straight and the rough places plain and the glory of the lord shall be revealed 9 aud nud gand gaud and all flesh shall see it together 11 an event as that has never 1 ot I occurred for we havo have many mountains in all parts of the earth and erthe nhe the valleys are not yet exalted neither rither are the rough places made smooth we are told that not only are the tho mountains to be broke broken 11 fc erk mcdown down and the valleys exalted and the rough places made smooth but I 1 the 10 jaarth earth itself Is to be dissolved his agrees with the prophecies of the he psalmist david he was permitted to see the great day of the coming oming of the lord and anti has described bed it in many of his psalms among kinong other things which he says hall shall take place ia is that the hills should hould melt like wax at the pres ence nce of the lord they of course will vill fall down by the force of gravity ty and fili 1111 up the thet valleys suc sue such h an wont event has lias never taken place since the he day the prophecy was uttered ye are told also in another place by ay iy the prophet isaiah ilow how that ther servants he of god in those notable days should call upon the name of tho lord loid oh that thou fc rend the heavens that thou come down that the mountains might flow down at thy presence As when the melting fire burne burneth tb the fire th the e waters to boil boll to make thy name known to thine adversaries that the nations might tremble at thy presence which prayer sprayer shall be answered another thing Is fooken spoken of besides all these changes that I 1 have named there will be a great removal of certain portions of the earth the earth is moved exceedingly cee coe as contained in the verse or of the bath chapter of isaiah and in the following verse baill referring to the changes that this earth is to undergo it reads and shall bo be removed liko like a cott cottage ige age we are still further told in the same chapter that tho tile the lord mabeth tile tilo earth empty cuilty and mabeth it waste and gurnith it upside down etc that is many portions of tile the earth which now lie tie burled buried will be thrown to the surface and many portions which now aro arc tile the upper crust of the earth will be turned under the earth is now divided into continents and islands we may ask are these to eh change al ae their loc location a the answer is yes the apostle and revelator john in the ath chapter of revelations tells us that he saw raw in vision vilo after the opening of the sixth s th seal geal al amon among 9 other remarkable things that every mountain and island were moved out of their places such islands as great britain will change their location as well as those of the pacific ocean and all others in lile like manner J arid I 1 have no doubt there will be a vast avast change between th the location of bf continents and the location of the great oceans and seas at that time the earth will doubtless be rolled back to the position it formerly occupied we read that there is to be a restitution of all things spoken 01 0 1 by the ther mouth of all the holy prophets if the earth is to be restored to its former condition as it once existed soon after the creation then so far as continents and oceans are concerned there will bo be a restitution of those portions of the globe as well as many things not mentioned in prophecy these passages which I 1 have read occurred to my mind principally after I 1 came to this house I 1 aliat liat hau had nothing particular to present to the congregation nothing studied or prepared I 1 prefer to depend upon the spirit of the lord to direct me when engaged in preaching the gospel 1 and my mind seems to be direct directed d to tho the great events that are to transpire in the overthrow and destruction of the wicked nations the great events to transpire in which the sun will become black as sackcloth and every star withold its light and cast themselves down as the falling of figs from tile the fig tree all of which will bo be very remarkable in their nature the prophet joel says and it shall come to pass afterward that I 1 will pour out my spirit upon all flesh and your sons and aud your daughters shall prop prophesy hes bes your old men shall hall L dream dreams d your young luen iuen shall see visions vision Q and I 1 will show wonders in tho the heavens antl and in the earth blood and fire and pillars of smoke the sun shall be turned into darkness I 1 and the moon into blood before the great and terrible day of the lord come etc do you suppose my brethren that the lord would have inspired much such men as the psalmist david the prophets isaiah joel john tile tiie revelator rov Eov elator I 1 as well as many others other to speak 0 of f events of this description which chic h were to take place in the latter times if no such thing would transpire no certainly not these things too are so frequently alluded to that we cannot have any dubiety upon our minds in regard to the design of the lord I 1 have hare no doubt a great many changes hate have taken place udon our globo globe since sincel that great change wrought upon it at the time ef of the creation there certainly was a creat great change wrought upon it then for we are aro told that when the lord organized the earth it was waa enveloped in la a great ocean of water there being no dry land laud in sight but the lord by his power and word or in other words by his immutable laws caused that the waters should be gathered together into one place and hence the dry land appeared I 1 do not mot suppose that this chadwe change was effected in 0 f an eye i I 1 believe the lord has certain established laws by which he accomplishes his hig hig his wonderful erfal works pertaining to alibis all ail his creations how long this thia submerged earth had an existence before the lord commanded the great deep that enveloped the tho whole solid surface of the same to be removed is not tor for me to say eay no one can tell how bow many years or thousands of years or how many millions of years this earth may havo have existed in the form of partial or imperfect organizations before this great event happened of wil wll which 1 1 ich moses gives an account the periods mentioned h in a the history as recorded in tho the ut chapter of Ge genesis nests 1 are represented as beginning with the evening and ending with the morning seven such periods are mentioned how long these periods called days were I 1 cannot tell itis very evident they were not governed by the rotation of the earth on its axis because the gun eun did not give light during the first three days or periods it was on the fourth day that the lord caused the light of the sun run to shine thine upon this little speck apeck of cie atlon but there were three days prior to that when the sun aun did not shine upon the earth what then was to distinguish between the light and darkness we of course cannot say there was war an eternity of past duration before the period called the first day 11 the materials we hs latter day saints believe existed from all eternity the materials had no beginning bec bee inning they were not created there is one particular to which I 1 wish to call your attention the ocean seems to have been gathered by itself when the dry land appeared and whether or not there were any that period of our globes history we are not informed you yon might inquire what has occasioned two great continents and two great oceans intervening between them and how are we to account for the appearances of islands and seas as they now exist these are arc the results of other changes since the days of the organization of this earth as proclaimed by moses tho the flood no doubt produced some changes on the tho surface of our globe but still I 1 do not believe for a moment that it could have produced the changes changer we now see so far fan astae as the location of the different islands and continents Is concerned we descend to a period bince the flood in IR the days of felcz felez we are told the earth was divided this is a very short historical notice of a very mar belous event if it we had the whole account of this occurrence precisely as it transpired it would certainly be extremely won derfel supposing that the one great ante dein dela thin vian continent which must have existed prior to that time were to be divided by several thousand miles of water would not that ba bit a most wonderful event it may ie be enquired what natural laws could have performed sach such buchan an event I 1 do not pretend to say that any regular uniform laws exist by which it was accomplished pil shed but there are laws perhaps that finite man an does docs not comprehend and fully understand which might occasion the division of the earth the lord has under his bis control all the laws of nature whether uniform or not il is j ast as easy eaby for the lord to cause water to stand up as perpendicular walls instanced in ft the caselow the children of israel crossing the red bed sea as it is to cause these waters to settle to their common leve level what causes water to find its level it ia Is the power of god and nothing else we give it the name of gravitation but the power of gravitation g ravita tj on is nothing more nor less than the power god exercises upon the elements an producing duclus uniform laws Ilas lias the lord no other laws in opera tion but the law of gravity yes he can cause tho the law of gravity to be in subjection to other laws for instance a certain man was war cutting down wood with the prophet elisha ellsha when his axe fell into deep water to all appearance lost and the man was somewhat exercised about it because the axe was bo the prophet understanding the tho nature of certain laws higher than that of gravitation exercised the priesthood with which he was endowed commanding the iron to swim and it did so again agaid on another occasion the prophet elisha ellsha knowing that he must succeed the prophet eljah in the ministry and that eljah was about to be translated and taken to heaven asked of him a certain favor before ho he ascended namely that a double portion of his El eljah eijah jah jab spirit ml might bt rest upon him eljah eijah said in response thou hast bast asked tasked a hard thing nevertheless if thou than seest jewhen me when I 1 am taken from froin thee it shall bo be so unto thee but if it not it iseball shall not bo be to so it pleased thu the lord to grant unto ellsha elisha his desire for he beheld the prophet ascend to heaven in a chariot of fire drawn by horeck having baying the appearance of fire ho ire then took the mantle of elijah that fell atom him sandwith and with it he smote emote the waters of the jordan saying where is the lord god of elijah and they parted lilt hither herand and thither and ellaba went over on dry ground here then theris we proc prec cite eiTe a power greater than gravitation As we have already observed when the children of israel had passed oter over the red sea the waters were thrown up like walls on either cither side of them the lord caused the same bamo waters to flow down upon pon their enemies totally destroy destroying lug them again while israel was journeying in the s we are informed inform nd that they came to the river jordan and ana that as the priests who bore the ark of the covenant touched the water with the soles of their feet the waters rose up in a heap and all israel passed over on dry ground from these himple simple testimonies nw haye have shown that god controls the laws of na ture tare are ure arc again the fact of the prophet elijah eiljah being taken up to heaven record records s mother another Ini ing instance tance of the laws law of gravitation leing icing overcome by a more powerful one oue again tho the ascension of jesus after he had bad commissioned his disciples to preach the gospel to all the world was another instance of the tho law of gravitation being overcome by the power of god then let no person suppose that all the great events that will hereafter transpire upon the surface of land and sea have got to take place by reason of some fame glow slow progressive changes occupying hundreds of thousands and perhaps millions of years according to the ideas of modern geologists can they show chow the way the lord can govern and control these things bringing in the course of a very short shod time that perhaps would take millions of ol 01 years to accomplish by the mere progressive changes such as are recognized by geologists how easy it would be for that same power to be mado made manifest in commanding the great ocean to leave its present bed and to gather together in the polar regions in our globe one may ask ark what would hold bold them there they now occupy the common level surface as near the centre of gravity as they can and sustain the centrifugal force exercised by the ithe ro tation of the earth on its axis if they should be rolled back whence they carne came if a great equatorial continent in one continuous us bult belt encircled the globe and the two polar regions were covered with oceans what would hold them in their position it might bo be done without infringing fr particularly on the laws of gravitation tation n how eaby easy it would be for the lord to compress the polar regions of our globe and cause tho the equatorial regions to |