John D. Lee, in his "Mormonism Unveiled," mentions the generally used excuse of the Mormons for the professor's failure to translate the writing, namely, that Anthon told Harris that "they were written in a sealed language, unknown to the present age." Smith, in his autobiography, quotes Harris's account of his interview as follows: "I went to New York City and presented the characters which had been translated, with the translation thereof, to Prof. Anthon, a man quite celebrated for his literary attainments. Prof. Anthon stated that the translation was correct, more so than any he had before seen translated from the Egyptian. I then showed him those which were not yet translated, and he said they were Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyriac, and Arabic, and he said they were the true characters." Harris declared that the professor gave him a certificate to this effect, but took it back and tore it up when told that an angel of God had revealed the plates to Joe, saying that "there were no such things as ministering angels." This account by Harris of his interview with Professor Anthon will assist the reader in estimating the value of Harris's future testimony as to the existence of the plates. Harris's trip to New York City was not entirely satisfactory to him, and, as Smith himself relates, "He began to tease me to give him liberty to carry the writings home and show them, and desired of me that I would enquire of the Lord through the Urim and Thummim if he might not do so." Smith complied with this request, but the permission was twice refused; the third time it was granted, but on condition that Harris would show the manuscript translation to only five persons, who were named, one of them being his wife. In including Mrs. Harris in this list, the Lord made one of the greatest mistakes into which he ever fell in using Joe as a mouthpiece. Mrs. Harris's Quaker belief had led her from the start to protest against the Bible scheme, and to warn her husband against the Smith family, and she vigorously opposed his investment of any money in the publication of the book. On the occasion of his first visit to Joe in Pennsylvania, according to Mother Smith, Mrs. Harris was determined to accompany him, and he had to depart without her knowledge; and when he went the second time, she did accompany him, and she ransacked the house to find the "record" (as the plates are often called in the Smiths' writ ings). When Harris returned home with the translated pages which Joe intrusted to him (in July, 1828), he showed them to his family and to others, who tried in vain to convince him that he was a dupe. Mrs. Harris decided on a more practical course. Getting possession of the papers, where Harris had deposited them for safe keeping, she refused to restore them to him. What eventually became of them is uncertain, one report being that she afterward burned them. This should have caused nothing more serious in the way of delay than the time required to retranslate these pages; for certainly a well-equipped Divinity, who was revealing a new Bible to mankind, and supplying so powerful a means of translation as the Urim and Thummim, could empower the translator to repeat the words first written. Indeed, the descriptions of the method of translation given afterward by Smith's confederates would seem to prove that there could have been but one version of any translation of the plates, no matter how many times repeated. Thus, Harris described the translating as follows: "By aid of the seer stone [no mention of the magic spectacles] sentences would appear and were read by the prophet and written by Martin, and, when finished, he would say written'; and if correctly written, that sentence would disappear, and another appear in its place; but if not written correctly, it remained until corrected, so that the translation was just as it was engraven on the plates, precisely in the language then used."1 David Whitmer, in an account of this process written in his later years, said: "Joseph would put the seer stone into a hat [more testimony against the use of the spectacles] and put his face in the hat, drawing it closely around his face to exclude the light; and in the darkness the spiritual light would shine. A piece of something resembling parchment would appear, and on that appeared the writing. One character at a time would appear, and under it was the translation in English. Brother Joseph would read off the English to O. Cowdery, who was his principal scribe, and when it was written down and repeated to brother Joseph to see if it were correct, then it would disappear and another character with the interpretation would appear." 2 But to Joseph the matter of reproducing the lost pages of the translation did not seem simple. When Harris's return to Pennsylvania was delayed, Joe became anxious and went to Palmyra to 1 Elder Edward Stevenson in the Deseret News (quoted in Reynold's "Mystery of the Manuscript Fund," p. 91). 2 "Address to Believers in the Book of Mormon." learn what delayed him, and there he heard of Mrs. Harris's theft of the pages. His mother reports him as saying in announcing it, "O my God, all is lost! all is lost!" Why the situation was as serious to a sham translator as it would have been simple to an honest one is easily understood. Whenever Smith offered a second translation of the missing pages which differed from the first, a comparison of them with the latter would furnish proof positive of the fraudulent character of his pretensions. 1 All the partners in the business had to share in the punishment for what had occurred. The Smiths lost all faith in Harris. Joe says that Harris broke his pledge about showing the translation only to five persons, and Mother Smith says that because of this offence "a dense fog spread itself over his fields and blighted his wheat." When Joe returned to Pennsylvania an angel appeared to him, his mother says, and ordered him to give up the Urim and Thummim, promising, however, to restore them if he was humble and penitent, and "if so, it will be on the 22d of September." Here may be noted one of those failures of mother and son to agree in their narratives which was excuse enough for Brigham Young to try to suppress the mother's book. Joe mentions a "revelation" dated July, 1828 (Sec. 3, "Doctrine and Covenants"), in which Harris was called "a wicked man," and which told Smith that he had lost his privileges for a season, and he adds, "After I had obtained the above revelation, both the plates and the Urim and Thummim were taken from me again, but in a few days they were returned to me." 2 For some ten months after this the work of translation was discontinued, although Mother Smith says that when she and his father visited the prophet in Pennsylvania two months after his return, the first thing they saw was "a red morocco trunk lying on Emma's bureau which, Joseph shortly informed me, contained the Urim and Thummim and the plates." Mrs. Harris's act had evidently thrown the whole machinery of translation out of gear, and Joe had to await instructions from his human adviser before a plan of procedure could be announced. During this period (in which Joe says he worked on his father's farm), says Tucker, "the stranger [supposed to be Rigdon] had again been at Smith's, and 1 "Biographical Sketches," by Lucy Smith, p. 125. the prophet had been away from home, maybe to repay the former's visits." 1 Two matters were decided on in these consultations, viz., that no attempt would be made to retranslate the lost pages, and that a second copy of all the rest of the manuscript should be prepared, to guard against a similar perplexity in case of the loss of later pages. The proof of the latter statement I find in the fact that a second copy did exist. Ebenezer Robinson, who was a leading man in the church from the time of its establishment in Ohio until Smith's death, says in his recollections that, when the people assembled on October 2, 1841, to lay the corner-stone of Nauvoo House, Smith said he had a document to put into the corner-stone, and Robinson went with him to his house to procure it. Robinson's story proceeds as follows: "He got a manuscript copy of the Book of Mormon, and brought it into the room where we were standing, and said, 'I will examine to see if it is all here'; and as he did so I stood near him, at his left side, and saw distinctly the writing as he turned up the pages until he hastily went through the book and satisfied himself that it was all there, when he said, 'I have had trouble enough with this thing'; which remark struck me with amazement, as I looked upon it as a sacred treasure.” Robinson says that the manuscript was written on foolscap paper and most of it in Oliver Cowdery's handwriting. He explains that two copies were necessary, "as the printer who printed the first edition of the book had to have a copy, as they would not put the original copy into his hands for fear of its being altered. This accounts for David Whitmer having a copy and Joseph Smith having one." 2 Major Bideman, who married the prophet's widow, partly completed and occupied Nauvoo House after the departure of the Mormons for Utah, and some years later he took out the cornerstone and opened it, but found the manuscript so ruined by moisture that only a little was legible. 1 "Origin, Rise, and Progress of Mormonism," p. 48. 2 The Return, Vol. II, p. 314. Ebenezer Robinson, a printer, joined the Mormons at Kirtland, followed Smith to Missouri, and went with the flock to Nauvoo, where he and the prophet's brother, Don Carlos, established the Times and Seasons. When the doctrine of polygamy was announced to him and his wife, they rejected it, and he followed Rigdon to Pennsylvania when Rigdon was turned out by Young. In later years he was engaged in business enterprises in Iowa, and was a resident of Davis City when David Whitmer announced the organization of his church in Missouri, and, not accepting the view of the prophet entertained by his descendants in the Reorganized Church, Robinson accepted baptism from Whitmer. The Return was started by him in January, 1889, and continued until his death, in its second year. His reminiscences of early Mormon experiences, which were a feature of the publication, are of value. In regard to the missing pages, it was decided to announce a revelation, which is dated May, 1829 (Sec. 10, " Doctrine and Covenants"), stating that the lost pages had got into the hands of wicked men, that "Satan has put it into their hearts to alter the words which you have caused to be written, or which you have translated," in accordance with a plan of the devil to destroy Smith's work. He was directed therefore to translate from the plates of Nephi, which contained a "more particular account" than the Book of Lehi from which the original translation was made. When Smith began translating again, Harris was not reëmployed, but Emma, the prophet's wife, acted as his scribe until April 15, 1829, when a new personage appeared upon the scene. This was Oliver Cowdery. Cowdery was a blacksmith by trade, but gave up that occupation, and, while Joe was translating in Pennsylvania, secured the place of teacher in the district where the Smiths lived, and boarded with them. They told him of the new Bible, and, according to Joe's later account, Cowdery for himself received a revelation of its divine character, went to Pennsylvania, and from that time was intimately connected with Joe in the translation and publication of the book. In explanation of the change of plan necessarily adopted in the translation, the following preface appeared in the first edition of the book, but was dropped later : 66 “As many false reports have been circulated respecting the following work, and also many unlawful measures taken by evil designing persons to destroy me, and also the work, I would inform you that I translated, by the gift and power of God, and caused to be written, one hundred and sixteen pages, the which I took from the book of Lehi, which was an account abridged from the plates of Lehi, by the hand of Mormon; which said account, some person or persons have stolen and kept from me, notwithstanding my utmost efforts to recover it again — and being commanded of the Lord that I should not translate the same over again, for Satan had put it into their hearts to tempt the Lord their God, by altering the words; that they did read contrary from that which I translated and caused to be written; and if I should bring forth the same words again, or, in other words, if I should translate the same over again, they would publish that which they had stolen, and Satan would stir up the hearts of this generation, that they might not receive this work, but behold, the Lord said unto me, I will not suffer that Satan shall accomplish his evil design in this thing; therefore thou shalt translate from the plates of Nephi until ye come to that which ye have translated, which ye have |