as written in Gen. xxx., and they will not envy Jacob's polygamy. View it as a spiritual matter, and compare the blessings pronounced on the monogamist Joseph, and his two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, and that on Jacob's own head. "Thy blessing is above the blessing of thy father's, even to the bounds of the everlasting hills," Gen. xlix. Jacob practiced polygamy, doubtless true; but Jacob cheated his father, defrauded his brother, and out-maneuvered his father-in-law. If Jacob's example may be urged as an argument in favor of one, it may in favor of all these practices. If the apparent silence of God be construed into approval of the one, then equal silence may be construed as an approval of all. Noah got intoxicated, therefore, I ought to drink. Jacob was a polygamist, therefore, I ought to take four wives. They are both equally forcible, and both equally fallacious!
6. David's practicing polygamy, while being a man after God's own heart, is another powerful Mormon argument in favor of polygamy. "Have I not given thee thy master's wives?" demands Nathan. David was Saul's son-in-law. For David to have cohabited with his father-in-law's wives, would have been incest. Yet David was certainly a polygamist. To say that "David was a man after God's own heart," to be king over Israel, does not involve divine acquiescence in all David's deeds. So far from this, David was severely rebuked and especially cursed, and the Mormons believe that he is still in hell. Viewing his polygamy in a temporal light, it entailed care and misery upon him; it surrounded his life with pain, and shortened his days. Viewed in a spiritual light, it led his heart from God to the gratification of the lusts of the
