ly
life. It swept away for ever from His Society the conception of woman as
a mere toy or slave of man, and based true relations of the sexes on the
eternal foundation of truth, right, honor, and love. To ennoble the
House and the Family by raising woman to her true position was essential
to the future stability of His Kingdom, as one of purity and spiritual
worth. By making marriage indissoluble, He proclaimed the equal rights
of woman and man within the limits of the family, and, in this, gave
their charter of nobility to the mothers of the world. For her nobler
position in the Christian era, compared with that granted her in
antiquity, woman is indebted to Jesus Christ."--_Life and Words of
Christ_, vol. ii, p. 349.

6. The Blessing of Children.--When Christ, a resurrected Being, appeared
among the Nephites on the western continent, He took the children, one
by one, and blessed them; and the assembled multitude saw the little
ones encircled as with fire, while angels ministered unto them. (3 Nephi
17:11-25.) Through modern revelation the Lord has directed that all
children born in the Church be brought for blessing to those who are
authorized to administer this ordinance of the Holy Priesthood. The
commandment is as follows: "Every member of the church of Christ having
children, is to bring them unto the elders before the church, who are to
lay their hands upon them in the name of Jesus Christ, and bless them in
His name." (Doc. and Cov. 20:70.) Accordingly, it is now the custom in
the Church to bring the little ones to the Fast-day service in the
several wards, at which they are received one by one into the arms of
the elders, and blessed, names being given them at the same time. The
father of the child, if he be an elder, is expected to participate in
the ordinance.

The blessing of children is in no sense analogous to, far less is it a
substitution for, the ordinance of baptism, which is to be administered
only to those who have come to years of understanding, and who are
capable of repentance. As the author has written elsewhere, "Some point
to the incident of Christ blessing little children, and rebuking those
who would forbid the little ones coming unto Him, (Matt. 19:13; Mark
10:13; Luke 18:15) as an evidence in favor of infant baptism; but, as
has been tersely said:--'From the action of Christ's blessing infants,
to infer they are to be baptized, proves nothing so much as that there
is a want of better argu