Brigham Young
Prophet, Statesman, Pioneer

The second president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Unidentified Author (1968)

In 1925, a noted American biographer, not of the “Mormon” faith, wrote these words about Brigham Young:

As a statesman Brigham Young is one of the few Americans deserving of the adjective great. In a situation of precariousness and importance he showed himself a man of resourcefulness and sturdiness, and his personality contributed as much as that of any one man to the development of the western half of the United States. (Morris R. Warner, Brigham Young [London: Jonathan Cape, Ltd., 1925], pp. 454-455.)

Brigham Young was indeed one of the great men of the nineteenth century. To Latter-day Saints (“Mormons”) he was the “Lion of the Lord,” a prophet, a courageous leader with immense wisdom and foresight, quick to defend the rights of his people.

He was born of humble parents in a log cabin on June 1, 1801, at Whitingham, Vermont. The son of a veteran of the Revolutionary War, he worked on his father's farm as a youth. His mother died when he was fourteen, and he hired out as an apprentice to learn the trade of a carpenter, cabinet maker, painter, and glazier—skills that were to come in handy in his later years when he would build cities.

Brigham Young's formal schooling consisted of eleven days of instruction under a traveling schoolmaster. However, his mother taught him to read, and he was a natural student and a keen observer of events and of the world around him. As were many great men of his time in history, he was a self-made man.

At the age of thirty, in 1832, Brigham Young was a cabinet maker in Mendon, New York, living in a simple colonial home he had built for his wife and two daughters. One day a copy of the Book of Mormon came into his hands. This book was his first introduction to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

After months of hard study, Brigham Young accepted the Book of Mormon as truth and joined the Church, being baptized at Mendon, April 14, 1832. Soon after, his wife, brothers and sisters, and aged father also joined the Church.

That September, his wife died, and Brigham Young journeyed to Kirtland, Ohio, where headquarters for the Church were then located. There he met the young “Mormon” prophet, Joseph Smith, for the first time, and there he was to undertake new tasks in life that would make him a leader of men.

Brigham Young had not been in Kirtland long when he was sent as a missionary to Canada. He had scarcely returned from that assignment when the Prophet Joseph Smith sent him to New York to gather together the new converts to the Church and lead them in a caravan to Kirtland. Carrying out the responsibilities of this major task demonstrated early Brigham Young's capacity as a leader.

In the years that followed, he worked diligently in behalf of the Church, serving more missions, accepting newer and greater responsibilities, enduring hardships at the hands of persecutors, helping to build the city of Nauvoo, Illinois, and eventually becoming one of the foremost Church leaders under the Prophet Joseph Smith.

The fire of persecution which raged against the “Mormons” in those trying early days of the Church tempered the character of Brigham Young like fine steel, and a great man emerged—a man to whom the nation would eventually point with patriotic pride.

After the Prophet Joseph Smith was martyred by a mob at Carthage, Illinois, in 1844, Brigham Young succeeded him as prophet and leader of the Church. He was later sustained as the second President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

In the winter of 1846, Brigham Young led the Latter-day Saints from Nauvoo into the wilderness. Behind them, mobs sacked their beloved city and destroyed their newly-built temple.

Brigham Young had learned from Joseph Smith and through prophecy that the destiny of his people lay far to the west, beyond the limits of civilization, in the tops of the Rocky Mountains. Ill-equipped as they were for such a long trek, the “Mormon” pioneers turned their backs on their Illinois home and set out toward the western horizon.

The exodus of thousands of people in covered wagons across the plains to Utah is an epic of human industry and endurance unexcelled in American history. Never before had such a large mass of people braved the hostile wilderness and attempted to cross the prairies to the Rocky Mountains.

George Barnard Shaw was later to say of him:

Brigham Young lived . . . to become immortal in history as an American Moses by leading his people through the wilderness into an unpromised land. (“The Future of Political Science in America,” Improvement Era, July 1937, p. 413.)

Brigham Young led his people to the Great Salt Lake Valley where they founded a great commonwealth. In the years to come, he laid the groundwork for agricultural and industrial development, established peaceful coexistence with the Indians, served as territorial governor, and for thirty-three years directed the spiritual and temporal affairs of the Church, bringing thousands of colonists from all parts of the world to settle in the West.

Sites for the construction of temples were dedicated under Brigham Young's direction in Salt Lake City, St. George, Logan, and Manti, Utah. He lived to see a temple completed only on the St. George site, but the others were begun during his lifetime.

Brigham Young served as governor of the state of Deseret, as the pioneers called the area they settled. When Utah became a territory in 1850, he became its first governor, taking the oath of office on February 3, 1851. In 1854, Col. Edward J. Steptoe of the United States army was appointed governor but declined the position and sent a petition bearing the names of federal officials, army officers, and prominent citizens recommending that Brigham Young be reappointed. President Franklin pierce allowed Governor Young to continue in office.

An ardent advocate of education, President Young founded the Deseret University, now the University of Utah; the Brigham Young Academy, now the Brigham Young University; and the Brigham Young College, now discontinued.

A leader in experimental agriculture in the west, Brigham Young conducted an experimental farm on the outskirts of Salt Lake City to determine which crops would best accommodate themselves to the Utah climate. His work in irrigation also set patterns for years to come.

He was a friend to Indians. His policy, “It is better to feed them than to fight them,” paved the way for lasting friendships and a peace with Indians that could not otherwise be achieved.

As did many prophets and patriarchs of Old Testament times, Brigham Young had more than one wife. He was the father of fifty-seven children. Joseph Smith had received divine revelation directing him to re-establish this ancient practice of polygamy.

When Congress later enacted laws prohibiting polygamy, the Church, which teaches obedience to law, issued a declaration forbidding the practice. Since 1890, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has neither sanctioned nor permitted polygamy, and its practice by a member is grounds for excommunication from the Church.

Brigham Young died at his home in Salt Lake City on August 29, 1877. His last words were as if the Prophet Joseph Smith had come to take him into the spirit world, for he said: “Joseph! Joseph! Joseph! Joseph!” Brigham Young had finished his life's work.

Half a century later, an English journalist, Harold J. Shepstone, summarized Brigham Young's accomplishments and attributes with these words of tribute:

In the development of those desert wastes, Brigham young dug canals, imported plants and animals, built railways and telegraphs, established industries and banks, constructed theatres and universities, and encouraged literature, music, and art. The handpress for the newspaper and the machinery for the first sugar factory were brought by ox-teams across a thousand miles of desert sand. He planned and erected temples and tabernacles still used by his people today and the wonder of modern architects. He was the founder of a hundred cities and settlements and the Governor of one of the Territories of the United States.

At the same time he took care of an almost constant stream of immigration from the Old World and across the American continent, establishing men in places where thy could be independent and subsist themselves, all the while acting as their spiritual leader, adviser, and guide.

He possessed, in superlative degree, qualifications that always go with greatness: intelligence, loyalty, faith, courage. It is possible to disagree with his religious belief, but it is not possible on the record of history, to question his sincerity nor his superb statesmanship.

As the spiritual and temporal leader of his people, Brigham Young proved to be a teacher of great wisdom, a philosopher of keen insight, and a theologian of rare inspiration.

The following extracts from some of his sermons are representative of his teachings on a variety of subjects, religious and practical.

MARRIAGE AND PARENTHOOD

It is for the husband to learn how to gather around his family the comforts of life, how to control his passions and temper, and how to command the respect, not only of his family but of all his brethren, sisters and friends. It is the calling of the wife and mother to know what to do with everything that is brought into the house, laboring to make her home desirable to her husband and children, making herself an Eve in the midst of a little paradise of her own creating, securing her husband's love and confidence, and tying her offspring to herself with a love that is stronger than death. (Journal of Discourses 10:28.)

The father should be full of kindness, and endeavor . . . to cheer the mother, that her heart may be comforted and her affections unimpaired in her earthly protector, that her love for God and righteousness may vibrate throughout her whole being. (Journal of Discourses 8:62.)

The mothers are the moving instruments in the hands of providence to guide the destinies of nations. Let the mothers of any nations teach their children not to make war. The children would grow up and never enter into it. (Journal of Discourses 19:72.)

If you mothers will live your religion, [and] in the love and fear of God teach your children constantly and thoroughly in the way of life and salvation, training them up in the way they should go, when they are old they will not depart from it. I promise you this. It is as true as the shining sun, it is an eternal truth. (Journal of Discourses 19:92.)

It is not my general practice to counsel the sisters to disobey their husbands, but my counsel is—obey your husbands; and I am sanguine and most emphatic on that subject. But I never counselled a woman to follow her husband to the devil. (Journal of Discourses 1:77.)

WEALTH

My policy is to get rich; I am a miser in eternal things. Do I want to become rich in the things of this earth? Yes, if the Lord wishes me to have such riches, and I can use them for good advantage. (Journal of Discourses 2:144.)

You know very well that it is against my doctrine and feelings for men to scrape together the wealth of the world and let it waste and do no good. (Journal of Discourses 9:186.)

Men and women who are trying to make themselves happy in the possession of wealth or power will miss it, for nothing short of the gospel of the Son of God can make the inhabitants of the earth happy. (Journal of Discourses 11:329.)

If you come naked and barefooted (I would not care if you had naught but a deer skin around you when you arrive here) and bring your God and your religion, you are a thousand times better than if you come with wagon loads of silver and gold and left your God behind. (Journal of Discourses 4:204.)

PAYMENT OF DEBTS

A man who will not pay his honest debts is no Latter-day Saint. . . . A man who will run into debt, when he has no prospect of paying it back again, does not understand the principles that should prevail in a well regulated community, or he is willfully dishonest. (Journal of Discourses 11:258.)

THRIFT AND INDUSTRY

To be prudent and saving, and to use the elements in our possession for our benefit and the benefit of our fellow beings is wise and righteous; but to be slothful, wasteful, lazy and indolent, to spend our time and means for naught, is unrighteous. (Journal of Discourses 16:16.)

Idleness and wastefulness are not according to the rules of heaven. (Journal of Discourses 14:44.)

PURPOSE OF LIFE

The whole mortal existence of man is neither more nor less than a preparatory state given to finite beings, a space wherein they may improve themselves for a higher state of being. (Journal of Discourses 1:334.)

The Gospel of the Son of God that has been revealed is a plan or system of laws and ordinances, by strict obedience to which the people who inhabit this earth are assured that they may return again into the presence of the Father and the Son. (Journal of Discourses 13:233.)

RELIGION IN DAILY LIFE

Human beings are expected by their Creator to be actively employed in doing good every day of their lives. (Journal of Discourses 9:190.)

We do not allow ourselves to go into a field to plough without taking our religion with us; we do not go into an office, behind the counter to deal out goods, into a counting house with the books, or anywhere to attend to or transact any business without taking our religion with us. If we are railroading or on a pleasure trip our God and our religion must be with us. . . . My religion is to know the will of God and do it. (Journal of Discourses 14:118.)

If we teach righteousness, let us also practice righteousness in every sense of the word; if we teach morality let us be moral; let us see to it that we preserve ourselves within the bounds of all the good which we teach to others. I am sure this course will be good to live by and good to die by, and when we get through the journey of life, here, what a consolation it will be to us to know that we have done as we have wished others to do by us in all respects. (Journal of Discourses 11:130.)

THE NATURE OF GOD

I believe in a God who has power to exalt and glorify all who believe in Him and are faithful in serving Him to the end of their lives. (Journal of Discourses 11:122.)

He has given form, motion and life to this material world; has made the great and small lights that bespangle the firmament above; has allotted to them their times and seasons, and has marked out their spheres. He has caused the air and the waters to teem with life, and covered the hills and plains with creeping things, and has made man to be ruler over His creations. All these wonders are the works of the Almighty Ruler of the universe, in whom we believe and whom we worship. (Journal of Discourses 11:120.)

He presides over the [spheres] that illuminate this little planet, and millions of worlds that we cannot see; and yet He looks upon the minutest object of His creations; not one of these creatures escapes His notice; and there is not one of them but His wisdom and power have produced. (Journal of Discourses 1:39-40.)

Our God and Father in heaven, is a being of tabernacle, or, in other words, He has a body, with parts the same as you and I have; and is capable of showing forth His works to organize beings, as, for instance, in the world in which we live. It is the result of the knowledge and infinite wisdom that dwell in His organized body. His Son Jesus Christ has become a personage of tabernacle, and has a body like his Father. The Holy Ghost is the Spirit of the Lord, and issues forth from Himself, and may properly be called God's minister to execute His will in immensity; being called to govern by His influence and power; but He is not a person of flesh as we are, and as our Father in Heaven and Jesus Christ are. (Journal of Discourses 1:50.)

THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST

The Latter-day Saints believe in Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of the Father, who came in the meridian of time, performed his work, suffered the penalty and paid the debt of man's original sin by offering up Himself, was resurrected from the dead, and ascended to His Father; and as Jesus descended below all things, so He will ascend above all things.

We believe that Jesus Christ will come again, as it is written of Him: “And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus which is taken from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven.” (Journal of Discourses 11:123; see Acts 1:10-11.)

THE MISSION OF JOSEPH SMITH

Who is the author of this work and gathering? Joseph Smith, the Prophet as an instrument in the hands of God, is the author of it. He is the greatest man on earth. No other man, at this age of the world, has power to assemble such a great people from all the nations of the earth, with all their varied dispositions, and so assimilate and cement them together that they become subject to rule and order. This the Prophet Joseph is doing. He has already gathered a great people who willingly subject themselves to his counsel, because they know it is righteous. (Millenial Star, April 16, 1864, p. 247.)

I feel like shouting hallelujah, all the time, when I think that I ever knew Joseph Smith, the Prophet, whom the Lord raised up and ordained, and to whom he gave the keys and power to build up the kingdom of God on earth and sustain it. These keys are committed to this people, and we have power to continue the work that Joseph commenced, until everything is prepared for the coming of the Son of Man. This is the business of the Latter-day Saints, and it is all the business we have on hand. (Journal of Discourses 3:51.)