DESERET.
We invite the serious attention of our read-ers to the following communication addressed to the National Intelligencer, respecting the pro-posed State of Deseret. We have known, of course that its population is composed principal-ly of the sect called "Mormons," though we have paid but little attention to either the tenets or the purposes of that association of fanatics. Both are exposed in the subjoined article, and show concusively that it would be an outrage, no less upon dignity and decency than upon Christia-ity, for this Government to "recognize" and erect into a "State" such voluntary outcasts! The worst supposable form of Mexican Gov-ernment is altogether too good for the vile and impious crew who are associated under the name, and infamous practices of "Mormons," and we trust that Congress will never so far compromise the christianity of the country and of the age, as to have anything more to do with this band of disgusting fanatics than to keep them under the strictest surveillance, for their good behavior. The Nation would be less dis-graced and dishonored by the admission of half a dozen "Slave State!" A set of men who disown and deny the Christian's GOD, should receive no fellowship in a Christian Republic.
The Boston Daily Advertiser, from which we copy the article below, says:-
"These people having squatted on lands belong-ing to the United States, consisting of the most pro-ductive tract of lands acquired by the California ees" sion, and having laid claim to a vast adjoining terri-tory in California and Oregon, of sufficient dimen-sions to form several states of a large class, have ap-plied to Congress to be recognized, with the territory thus seized upon, as an independent State, and to be admitted as a member of the Union. An agent of this anomalous association has arrived at Washing-ton, and applied to be admitted as a delegate from a territory of the United States, to a seat in the House, with a right to participate in its deliberations, and to draw pay as a member. The article to which we refer presents a just view of the character and claims of this self styled territory, and we take the first oppor-tunity of laying it before our readers."
The following is the communication from the Intelligencer:-
THE STATE OF DESERET.-Mention is fre-quently made of Deseret, as the name of a Ter-ritory settled by the people commonly called Mormons, and now praying to be admitted to the Union under the name just stated. It is a matter of surprise that this subject has not at-tracted a greater degree of public attention.-This circumstance can only be accounted for by the fact that other subjects of a more urgent nature have for the last few months occupied the time and thoughts of Congress and the Peo-ple. Under ordinary circumstances, there are many questions connected with the settlement of the Mormons and their present application to be admitted into the Federal Union, which would have been thought to require very serious con-sideration.
In the first place, who and what are Mor-mons? The answer is, they are a set of fa-natics, who have sprung up within the last few years, and who believe in the late Joe Smith as a divine prophet. Since the cruel murder of Joe Smith, they believe that his gift and power of prophesy have passed to his successors, and that Divine revelations are regularly and even frequently by them to their followers. The “Book of Mormon" is a pretended revelation, which Joe Smith alleged was communicated to him on golden plates, dug up in the State of New York, written in an unknown language, but translated into English by himself. In point of fact, the greater part of this pretended new Bible was a sort of religious romance, written by a clergyman of New York, not with any in-tention to deceive, but as an effort (a very ill-judged one) at an innocent exercise of the im-agination. By some accident it fell into Joe Smith's hands, and was by him made the sub- ject of the abominable fraud just named. The deluded followers of Smith, calling themselves ‘Latter-day Saints,' emigrated, we believe, from New York to the West. Whether their first establishment there was in the State of Missou-ri, we are not accurately informed. They had not been long in that State before they incurred the ill-will and odium of their neighbors, and were illegally and violently driven out of the State. They took refuge in Illinois, founded the city of Nauvoo, built an abortion of archi-tecture which they called a temple, and grew rapidly in numbers and wealth. Recruits of two descriptions flocked to them; first, simple fanatics, who believed in the pretensions of Joe Smith, a considerable number of whom were en-listed by his missionaries, not only in the Mid-dle and Northern States, but in England; and, second, adventurers of every kind, who flocked to Nauvoo to speculate upon the credulity of the other portion.
To the disgrace of the age this wretched im-posture flourished. As a specimen of its gross-ness we may mention of a fact, stated by an ex-tremely respectable gentleman of this city, as one within his personal knowledge. Being on a tour to the West, he visited Nauvoo from cu-riosity. In the temple he was shown a collec- tion of curiosities, and among them were one or two mummies, which had been imported from Egypt by Joe Smith. The attention of the visitor was called by Smith to the mummy clothes and the writing upon them. 'There,' said Smith 'that's the handwriting of the patri-arch Abraham and I am the only man that can read it,' which he then proceeded to do!
In the course of a few years the scenes of violence which had occurred in Missouri were repeated, and with still more fatal results, in Illi-nois, and the Mormons were driven from the State by armed and organized bodies-not ac-ting however, with any legal authority. We do not, by any means, justify or palliate the manner in which the Mormons were treated either in Missouri or Illinois. It was illegal and cruel, and this without any reference to the character and conduct of the Mormons. What credit is to be given to the reports which circu-lated to their disadvantage we have no means of knowing. They were believed to be guilty of the grossest imoralities; it has been constant-ly stated that they professed and practised on the doctrine of community, or plurality of wives; and it was believed in their neighborhood that they made up their separate and peculiar organ-ization to screen each other in a general viola-tion of the laws of the land and of good morals. Whether that is true, false, or exaggerated, we have no knowledge; but it seems scarcely pos-sible that, unless there had been some founda-tion for the prejudice, they should in so short a time have become the object of such bitter hos-tility in Missouri and Illinois.
In the conflict between the Mormons and the neighboring population of Illinois, Joe Smith was murdered in the prison to which he had been committed, His followers fled from the Slate and formed the resolution to emigate to California, not then known to abound in gold.-Having reached the region of the Great Salt Lake, they halted there, and established a set-tlement, which has prospered, and is now said to contain twenty thousand persons, one-half of whom are unnaturalized foreigner, princi-pally English. It is probable that their settle-ment has received a good many recruits from emigrants who had started for California. Their pretended theocratic government is still kept up, and revelations are as regularly announced to them as the orders of the day by a commanding general in time of war.
Such is the people who, having thus founded a few straggling settlements on the public land of the United States-of which they do not own an inch; of which the Indian title has not been extinguished-have formed a constitution or government, chosen a Delegate to Congress, and asked admission into the Union as an or-ganized Territory by the name of Deseret. As far as we can judge, the region modestly inclu-ded within the boundaries which they have granted themselves is about as big as all New England and New York. This is 'vote your-self a farm' with a vengeance. If Congress ad-mits the pretensions of these people, they allow them to vote themselves to each adult male, a domain about as big as Rhode Island; or rather, Congress will, in so doing, grant its sanction to this most monstrous and unexampled appropriation, which has already been made by the Mor-mons.
Had the Mormons addressed a memorial to Congress praying for a small tract of land, say five or six townships-a quarter section for each head of a family (?)-our individual feeling might have been in favor of complying with their request, and thus allowing them a place of asy-lum from persecution. We very much doubt, however, whether Congress would have grant-ed such petition. It is entirely against the large organized sects. It never has done, and it may be doubted whether it ever ought to be. There are about twenty thousand Shakers in New York and the Eastern States; they own valu-able tracts of lands, honestly bought and paid for, or acquired by gift. Suppose they should (with or without reason) becomes odious to their neighbors, be the subjects of a general persecution, and finally be driven by violence from their present homes; does any man sup-pose for a moment that Congress would grant them an ample tract out of the public domain? Would such a grant be made to any sects-to Mennonities, Moravians, Rappists, to Trinitari-ans or Unitarian, Orthodox or Liberal!
Is there any part of the hundred sects that fill the dictionary of denominations, to which Con-gress would grant an acre of land, or even a charter of incorporation? We think not.
But Congress is asked to make to this sect not of Christians but of Mormons, of believers not in Jesus Christ but in Joe Smith, a more than imperial grant; to bestow upon them, not a township, but a region as large as great Bri-tain; not an act of incorporation, but an act of admission, on terms of equal membership, to this Union of States!
The name by which the Mormons have begun to call their new settlement, and propose to call their new State, is Deseret; and if there were were no other objection to this name, it would be sufficient and fatal objection that its adoption by Congress would be a direct recognition of the wretched fraud called the Book of Mormon. The following is the account which we find ci-ted from the Frontier Guardian; "The name selected for that country is borrowed from the Book of Mormon, where a description is given of a voyage of the ancient Jaredites, from the tower of Babel to the American Continent, more than four thousand years ago. It is said that they brought with them seeds of all kinds, and also "Deseret," which by interpretation is the “honey bee." The bee and the hive being emblems of industry, the citizens here, wishing ever to exhibit those qualifications, have chosen the above name, as being adapted to the char-acter which they ever wish to sustain."
It is unnecessary to state that this whole at- attempt to connect the history of the Mormons-a sect of fanatics formed in our day-with the dispersion of mankind at the tower of Babel is pure fiction. It is a part of a romance to which we alluded above, and which Joe Smith adopted as his revelation. There is not the slightest reason for thinking that the word De-seret means Honey Bee in any language ever spoken by man. We have seen it stated, and that in a respectable journal, that Deseret is the ancient Egyptian word for Bee. Of this we have seen no proof. Sir Gardiner Wilkinson does not appear to have known the ancient Egyptian name of the bee, (see his Manners and Customs, second series, vol. 1, p. 81) and if not known to him, it is not likely to have been known to any one else. In fact we understand that the Mormons do not themselves pretend that Deseret is the Egyptian word tor Bee; but that a certain ancient race called Jaredites (ex-isting only in the imagination of Joe Smith and his followers.) brought from the Tower of Babel a something which they called Deseret, and which is, by Mormon interpretation, honey bee. The entire Book of Mormon being a for-gery out of the whole cloth, it is of course idle to discuss the meaning of any thing contained in it. But we protest against the incorporation of any of this jargon into the statute book of the United States.
We have lately seen in the Washington pa-pers handsome testimonials to the moral char-acter of the Mormons in their present location; to their thrift, good conduct, and consequent general prosperity. How far these testimonials are well founded we do not know. We do not at all enter into the question of the morality of the Mormons, nor in the slightest degree apologise for the treatment they received, in Missouri and Illinois. At the same time, however, there is reason for believing that they hold som dangerous principles of practical mo-rality which should make Congress pause be-fore they constitute them a co-equal sovereign member of this Union. If their future history is to resemble the past, Congress, in taking steps to organize them into a permanent politi-cal community, will be laying the foundation of convulsions of a most dangerous character. If they were, or were believed to be, a community which neither Missouri nor Illinois would tole-rate, even to the number of a few thousands, is it likely that they can live in peace and harmony with neighboring States, when they themselves have grown into a powerful State, wielded by artful chiefs who pretend to add Divine to human power?
It has been publicly stated by seceding mem-bers of the Mormon body that their leaders al-ready threaten vengeance for the wrongs they have suffered; and among the wild visions of Joe Smith's heated brain was that of acting over again the part of Mahomet, and founding a new Mormon caliphate on this continent. We may smile at the egregious absurdity of these delusions, and yet not think it prudent to assist his followers, already boasting of their tens of thousands, to plant themselves on the high road to California, and give them complete control of our line of communication between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
FRANKLIN.
