we are now living in that holy day? Shame on him who would deceive and tamper with the souls of men! The gentleman who told you this, doesn't believe it.
The gentleman has challenged me to produce anything from the Bible equaling in strangeness the building of a boat like a fish, in which the Nephites crossed the ocean from Asia to America. I call his attention to the first chapter of the Book of Jonah. Here a very strange craft was used for three days and nights, in which to send a missionary to Nineveh. This craft was constructed after the manner of the boat spoken of in the Book of Mormon. If the prophet was correct in the description of his craft, he too scooted through the water in the same way that the Nephites did in their boat. The Book of Mormon is nothing more or less than a book containing the history of a portion of the House of Israel, who left Jerusalem about the time of the reign of Zedekiah, King of Judah, and crossed the ocean to America; containing also the gospel which was preached to them on this continent, which is the same gospel as that preached by' Christ and His Apostles at Jerusalem. The Bible and the Book of Mormon both contain a history of the different branches of the House of Israel, and each contains the gospel of Christ as it was preached unto them, the different branches of the house of Israel, and to all nations. Both testify of each other, and point with exactness to the dispensation of the fullness of time. The Book of Mormon does not contain a new gospel; it is the same gospel as that preached by Christ. It is a mysterious book, just what the prophet said it should be, "a marvelous work, a wonder." But my friend says that it is too mysterious, too wonderful, for human credence, and challenges me to point out anything told in the Bible that seems inconsistent with reason or experience. Now, which is the more reasonable, that Nephi built a boat after the pattern mentioned in the Mormon Bible, being directed by God how to build it, and then crossed the ocean to this continent, or that Jonah was in the whale's belly for three days and three nights, and then made a safe landing? Or would it sound any better if Nephi had said that when he and his company came to the great waters, the Lord had prepared whales, two or more, to receive them and their outfit, and set them over on this side?
Nothing is impossible with God. If He saw fit to send Jonah on his mission in a whale's belly, I have no fault to find with Him for so doing. He has the right to do His own will and pleasure; and if He instructed Nephi how to fashion his boat, or Noah to build an ark against the deluge, or caused Balaam's ass to speak and rebuke the madness of his master, or Moses to lead the children of Israel through the Red Sea, without any boat at all, or the walls of Jericho to fall to the ground, and the people to become paralyzed through the tooting of rams' horns, or empowered Joshua to command the sun to stand still while he slaughtered his enemies, is any of these things more wonderful than the other?