History of Utah, 1540-1886 - Brigham Young University

354 MORMONISM AND POLYGAMY.
•• A sacred duty is the constant effort to convert all
men throughout the world to a belief in the divinity
the presence of God, angels, and these witnesses, of your own free will and
accord?' 'Yes.' 'In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by the authority
of the holy priesthood, I pronounce you legally and lawfully husband and
wife, for time and for all eternity. And I seal upon you the blessings of the
holy resurrection, with power to come forth in the morning of the first resurrection,
clothed with glory, immortality, and everlasting lives; and I seal
upon you the blessings of thrones, and dominions, and principalities, and
powers, and exaltations, together with the blessings of Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob. And I say unto you, Be fruitful, and multiply and replenish the
earth, that you may have joy and rejoicing in your prosperity in the day of
the Lord Jesus. All these blessings, together with all other blessings pertaining
to the new and everlasting covenant, I seal upon your heads, through
your faithfulness unto the end, by the authority of the holy priesthood, in
the name of the father, and of the son, and of the holy ghost. Anten.' 'The
scribe then entered the date of the marriage, together with the names of my
mother and the one or two friends who accompanied us. ' When the marriage
is a polygamous one, the wife stands on the left of her husband, and the bride
at her left hand. The president then puts this question to the wife: 'Are
you willing to give this woman to your husband, to be Ins lawful and wedded
wife for time and for all eternity? If you are, you will manifest it by placing
her right hand within the right hand of your husband.' The right hands
of the husband and bride being thus joined, the wife takes her husband by
the loft arm, as in walking, and the ceremony then proceeds as in the manner
quoted above. Young's Wife No. ID, 388. Mrs Stenhouse, who gave a polygamous
wife to her husband, states that in her case the ceremony was performed
at the altar, her husband kneeling on one side, and the two women
opposite him; the wife being required to join the hands of the contracting
parties as in the other case; but it does not appear that she afterward took
her husband's arm. Indeed, the position of the three would render this impracticable.
See Tell It All, 453-4. Of course, as these ceremonies took place
in the endowment house, the temple robes were worn.
But apart from ordinary marriage as known among gentiles, remarriage of
converts and polygamous unions, the church in its benelicence, by an additional
marriage rite, secures to her children eternal salvation accompanied
with permanent positions of rank. This is effected by the ceremony known
as spiritual marriage, based upon the following tenets: No unmarried man or
woman can be eternally saved. One woman can save one man only; but a
man can be instrumental in the salvation of an indefinite number of women.
Sealing may be either for the dead, or for those yet alive. Persons sealed on
earth need not necessarily live together. Brigham, in a discourse delivered
in Nauvoo, Apr. 6, 1S45, announces the doctrine in the following language:
'And I would say, as no man can be perfect without the woman, so no woman
can be perfect without a man to lead her. I tell you the truth as it is
in the bosom of eternity; and I say so to every man upon the face of the earth:
if he wishes to be saved, he cannot be saved without a woman by his side.
This is spiritual wifcism, that is, the doctrine of spiritual wives.' Times and
Seasons, vi. 955. ' No woman can be sealed to two husbands; she must choose
which it shall be whom she will marry for eternity. The man can be sealed
to as many wives as he pleases. If the husband will be baptized for a former
husband who perhaps died out of the church, then it leaves the wife at liberty
to make that choice. If she feels that her second husband is her preference,
she can be baptized for some dead female, and have her sealed to her
dead husband, so as to secure his conjugal happiness forever.' Mrs Richards'
Inner Facts, MS., 5. ' If a husband has lost his wife by death, before he had
the opportunity of attending to this holy ordinance, and securing her as his
lawful wife for eternity, then it is the duty of the second wife, first, to be