e did in 1888, and he
hates that authority as much as ever. But he is today not only the
Prophet of the Church; he is the Prophet of Mammon; and all the powers
and principalities of Mammon now give him gloriously: "All Hail!"

Chapter XIX. The Subjects of the Kingdom

But what of the Mormon people? How can such leaders, directing the
Church to purposes that have become so cruel, so selfish, so dangerous
and so disloyal--how can they maintain their power over followers who
are themselves neither criminal nor degraded? That is a question which
has given the pause of doubt to many criticisms of the Mormon communism
of our day. That is the consideration which has obtained from the nation
the protection of tolerance under which the Prophets flourish. For not
only are the Mormon men and women obviously as worthy as any in the
United States: there is plainly much of community value in their social
life; there is manifestly a great deal of efficiency for human good in
their system and in the leadership by which it is directed; and this
good is so apparent that it appeals easily to the sympathetic conscience
and uninformed mind of the country at large.

Let me try, then, to exhibit and to analyze the causes that keep such a
virtuous and sturdy people loyally supporting the leadership of men so
unworthy of them that if the people were as bad as the ends to which
they are being now directed, modern Mormonism would be destroyed by its
own evils.

In the first place, the average Mormon chief is sincere in his
pretensions and self-justified in his aims. Usually, he has been born,
in the Church, to a family that sees itself set apart, in holiness, from
the rest of humanity, as the direct heirs of the ancient prophets or
even as the lineal descendants of Christ. From his earliest age of
understanding, he is taught the divine splendor of his birth and
impressed with the high duties of his family privilege in being
permitted to bear a part in preparing the earth for the second coming
of the Savior. He is taught that, though all the world may be saved and
nearly all the people of this sphere will in some eternity work out
a measure of salvation, he and 143,999 others are to be a band of the
elect who shall stand about the Savior, on Mount Zion, in the final day.

He is taught that, next to Christ, Joseph Smith, the founder of the
faith, has performed the largest mission for the salvation of the world;
that in the councils of