II. "We believe that men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam's transgressions."—Yet the Mormons hold the Son to be necessary to reconcile fallen man to the Father and the Holy Spirit, to sanctify and purify the affections of men, and also to dwell in them as a teacher of truth. "The spiritual substance of man was formed in the beginning after the same image as the spiritual substance of the persons of the Father and the Son. Previously to the fall, these spirits were all moral in their nature; by the fall the spirits of men lost their morality and virtue, but not their essence—that continued the same: by the new birth man regains his morality and virtue, while the essence remains the same; it now becomes a moral, virtuous image, whereas the same substance was before immoral. Paul (1 Cor., xv., 49), in speaking of the resurrection, says, 'As we have borne the image of the earthly, let us bear also the image of the heavenly!'" Unlike the more advanced faiths—El Islam and Unitarianism—the Mormons retain the doctrine of a "fall." It contrasts strangely with their dogma of man's perfectibility. They have not attempted to steer clear between the Scylla and Charybdis of predestination and free will.
III. "We believe that through the Atonement of Christ all mankind may be saved by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel."—After Adam had fallen from his primal purity, a council was held in heaven to debate how man should be saved or redeemed from the state of evil. The elder brother Lucifer, son of the morning, the bright star in glory, and the leader of heavenly hosts, declared, when appealed to, that he would save man in his sins. But he who is emphatically called "the Son"—Christ—answered, I will save him from his sins. Lucifer, the "archangel ruined," rebelled, was cast out from the planetary abode of the Father, and became, under the name of Satan, the great ruler and "head devil" of evil spirits, and of the baser sort of imps and succubi. I can not say whether in their mysteries the Mormons represent Sathanas as the handsome man of El Islam, or the horned, tailed, and cloven-footed monster which monkish Europe fashioned probably after pagan Pan.
IV. "We believe these ordinances are, 1st. Faith in the Lord Jesus; 2d. Repentance; 3d. Baptism by immersion for the remission of sins; 4th. Laying on of hands by the gift of the Holy Spirit; 5th. The Lord's Supper."—Faith is not only the "evidence of things that appear not, the substance of things to be hoped for," the first principle of action, and an exercise of the will in intelligent beings toward accomplishing holy works and purposes, with a view to celestial glory; it is also the source of power both on earth and in heaven. We find that by faith God created the world (Heb., xi., 3); and, "take
