BIOGRAPHICAL.

"I was born," writes the Prophet Joseph Smith, "in the year of our Lord 1805, on the 23d of December, in the town of Sharon, Windsor County, State of Vermont. My father, Joseph Smith, Sen., left the State of Vermont and moved to Palmyra, Ontario County, (now Wayne County,) N. Y., when I was in my tenth year. About four years afterward he moved with his family into Manchester, in the same county.

Some time in the second year after our removal to Manchester, there was in that place an unusual excitement on the subject of religion. It commenced with the Methodists, but soon became general among all the sects in that region of country; indeed the whole district seemed affected by it, and great numbers united themselves to the different religious parties, which created no small stir and division among the people, some crying Lo, here! and some Lo, there! When the converts began to file off, some to one party and some to another, it was seen that the seemingly good feelings of both the priests and the converts were more pretended than real; for a scene of great confusion and bad feeling ensued, priest contending against priest, convert against convert.

I was at this time in my fifteenth year. My mind was called up to serious reflections and great uneasiness, and I often said to myself what is to be done? Who of all these parties is right? or, are they all wrong together? If any of them be right which is it, and how shall I know it? While I was laboring under the

extreme difficulties caused by the contests of these parties of religionists, I was one day reading the Epistle of James, first chapter, fifth verse, which says: 'If any of you lack wisdom let him ask of God, that giveth unto all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.' Never did any passage of Scripture come with more power to the heart of man than this did at the time to mine. It seemed to enter with great force into every feeling of my heart. I reflected on it again and again, knowing that if any person needed wisdom from God, I did; for how to act I did not know and unless I could get more wisdom than I then had, would never know; for the teachers of religion of the different sects understood the same passage so differently as to destroy all confidence in settling the question by an appeal to the Bible. At length I came to the conclusion that I must either remain in darkness and confusion or else I must do as James directs, that is, ask of God. I determined to 'ask of God,' concluding that if he gave wisdom to them that lacked wisdom, and would give liberally and not upbraid, I might venture. So, in accordance with this, my determination to ask of God, I retired to the woods to make the attempt. It was on the morning of a beautiful clear day, early in the Spring of 1820. It was the first time in my life that I had made such an attempt, for amidst all my anxieties I had never yet made the attempt to pray vocally."

We are all acquainted with the result of this wonderful prayer of faith. How

that the powers of darkness seized upon the youthful supplicant, paralyzing his tongue and threatening him with instant destruction, and how in his extreme alarm he made the gigantic effort to throw off the enemy from the unseen world, when the pillar of light appeared to deliver him, and the heavenly vision of two glorious personages was shown, while the portentous words were spoken: "Joseph, this is my beloved Son,-Hear Him!"

This was the first vision of the Prophet. It chronicles the fulfilment of ancient prophecy and opens the Gospel dispensation of the fulness of times. Joseph told his relatives and the ministers of the sectarian churches of his vision. His family received his word with surprise, but they believed him; the sectarians at once denied his vision and commenced to torment and persecute him. Holding fast to his testimony that he had "seen a light and heard a voice," he pursued his ordinary labors, subject at times to the temptations and follies of youth, until the evening of September 21st, 1823.

On that night he retired in a meditative mood to his room and, shortly after lying down for the night, while earnestly praying to God for forgiveness of his sins and for a manifestation of the divine favor, a light appeared in the room and the angel Moroni visited him, communicating the existence of the plates of the Book of Mormon and the character of its contents, also of the Urim and Thummim, which God had prepared for the purpose of translating the plates. The angel told him that the Lord would require him, when the time should come to take the plates and translate them, and on peril of his life not to show them to anyone, only as he might be directed,and that his name should be spoken among all people and nations for good and evil.

"While he (the angel) was conversing with me about the plates," writes Joseph, "the vision was opened to my mind that I could see the place where the plates were deposited, and that so clearly and distinctly that I knew the place again when I visited it." This spot of such

historical interest was the ancient Cumorah, and is now called in the neighborhood, "gold bible or Mormon hill.” It lies about three miles south of Palmyra on the Canandaigua road. Its northern side is abrupt and precipitous and gradually declines to the country level, southward, like the whole series of hills lying between Syracuse and Rochester. Near the top of the western side and not far from the northern end of the hill, among a few barren trunks of beech trees, is the spot where the records were deposited.

On the day after receiving this visitation from Moroni, Joseph started to work, as usual, in the field with his father, but he was unable to perform his customary labor. His father perceiving that he was not strong told him to go home. He started with the intention of going to the house, but in the effort to cross the fence out of the field his strength entirely failed him and he fell prostrate to the ground. ground. While in this condition the angel Moroni appeared again and commanded him to go and tell his father of the vision and commandments he had received. Joseph obeyed and his father replied that the vision was of God, and for him to do as he had been instructed. He thereupon left the field and went to the place where the plates were buried. He uncovered the stone box which contained them, and saw not only the records but the breastplate and the Urim and Thummim. He was about to take them out, when the angel appeared and forbade him to touch them, saying the time had not yet come, and would not for four years. He gave Joseph much instruction in relation to the purposes of God, and the part that it was designed he should take in the work of the Lord upon the earth, and commanded him to return to the hill in a year from that day, and continue to do so each year until the time should come for delivering the plates.

During this period Joseph was engaged in ordinary labor such as falls to the lot of a farmer's son. He was employed in the neighborhood and in surrounding villages by farmers and others to perform manual labor. At one time while in the

employ of Mr. Josiah Stoal of Chenango | County, N. Y., he was sent to labor on a mining claim of his employer's, near Harmony, Susquehannah County, Penn. While there, though unsuccessful in the search for silver, which from the beginning he had tried to dissuade Mr. Stoal from attempting, he found what was of far greater consequence to him, his wife. Boarding in the family of Mr. Isaac Hale he became acquainted with his daughter Emma, and though her family opposed the match, they were married, by Squire Tarbill, in South Bainbridge, Chenango County, N. Y., on the eighteenth day of January, 1827. On the twenty-second of the following September, he repaired as usual, on that day, to the hill Cumorah, when the plates, the Urim and Thummim and the Breastplate were delivered to him by the angel, with a charge that he should be responsible for them, and that if through neglect or carelessness he should let them go, that he should be cut off; but that if he did his utmost to preserve them he should have power to do so. Persecution increased from the day that he obtained the plates. While conveying them from a place near the hill, where he at first concealed them, to his father's house in Manchester, he was assaulted and shot at by enemies lying in wait for him. During the whole time that the plates were in his possession, mobs, vascillating and curious friends, and enemies in various ways sought to deprive him of them, and to defeat him in the effort to translate them. Besides the intrigue of enemies he had the misfortune of poverty to contend with, making what might appear trivial circumstances at this day peculiarly oppressive at the time. However with the aid Martin Harris rendered,in giving the Prophet fifty dollars, the latter was able to remove from the midst of his immediate tormentors, to Harmony, Susquehannah County, Pennsylvania, where in the house of his wife's father he commenced the work of translation. Between December 1827 and February 1828, he copied some of the characters of the engravings and translated them. In

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the latter month, Martin Harris came to him and took the copy of the characters and the translation he had made to Prof. Anthon and Dr. Mitchell, celebrated linguists of New York City, both of whom pronounced them Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyriac and Arabic writings and testified that their translation was correct. The history of the translation and publication of this wonderful volume affords matter alone for more space than this article can occupy. The work was in progress from December 1827 to the summer of 1829 when it was completed and placed in the hands of the printer, Mr. Egbert Grandon of Palmyra. The first edition was five thousand copies, costing three thousand dollars. It was issued early in the Spring of 1830.

During the period of the translation of the Book of Mormon some of the most important events in the life of the Prophet occurred, among them the visitations of John the Baptist and Peter, James and John conferring upon him and Oliver Cowdery the Aaronic and Melchisedec priesthoods. Oliver Cowdery came to Joseph's house in Harmony, April 15th, 1829, which was the first time they met. Two days after, he commenced to write for Joseph and continued to do so, with various interruptions until the book was finished.

On the fifteenth of May 1829, Joseph and Oliver, who had received, prior to this, several revelations, went into the woods near by to pray, and inquire of the Lord respecting baptism for the remission of sins, which they found mentioned in the translation of the plates.

"While we were thus employed," writes Joseph, "praying and calling upon the Lord, a messenger from heaven (John the Baptist) descended in a cloud of light, and having laid his hands upon us, he ordained us, saying unto us: 'Upon you my fellow servants, in the name of Messiah, I confer the priesthood of Aaron, which holds the Keys of the ministering of Angels, and of the Gospel of repentance and of baptism by immersion for the remission of sins; and this shall never be taken again from the earth, until the the sons of Levi do offer