The Sun.
London, England, 1861-10-09 00:00:00

THE STORY OF JOE SJIMT.

Never did the search for the lost tribes, that
romance of ingenious divines, lead to stranger re-
sults than when Solomon Spaulding, a clergyman
in the State of Ohio, sat down to compose a
romantic history of the ancient races of the New
World. Spaulding supposed that the lost tribes
of Israel could be identified with the extinct races
of America; and, reasoning it out as divines are
too apt to do, on the obscurum per obscurius prin-
ciple, he came to the conclusion that the one
mystery would explain the other, and so the history
of the Old and the New World could be dovetailed
together. To give greater originality to his
composition he, as far as possible, imitated the
style of the Bible, and called his book " The Manu-
script Found." This manuscript was unfortunately
never printed ; had it been so the world might have
had one more useless book, but would have never
heard of one very mischievous religion. In its
manuscript form it was read and even circulated in
the neighbourhood, and, among other folk, was read
by Joseph Smith, the prophet of Mormonism. Smith
was the fourth child of a small farmer in the State
of Vermont, of whom there is nothing remarkable
known or recorded. He did as most Americans
of his age and class. He made a fortune by one
speculation and lost it by another ; then turned
schoolmaster and farmer ; was converted in 1811
through his wife's prayers, and even saw visions ; and
died in the end, in the year 1840, a fervent adhe-
rent to the religion invented by his son. Smith's
mother was the real progenitor of the prophet.
She was a weak, mystical woman, who saw visions
and dreamed dreams, and went even so far as to
fancy that one of her daughters, named Sophronia,
was suddenly cured, after having been supposed to
be dead for several hours. The example of such a
mother seems to have impressed Joseph Smith with
the vanity and emptiness of religious worship. He
saw his mother swept round and round in a whirl-
, pool of religious emotion, and, finding how easily
others could manipulate minds so impressible as his
mother's, the thought seems to have grown upon
him that he, too, could do a stroke of business in
that way, and set up as a preacher and prophet on
his own account. Mrs. Smith sought for truth; the
son declared that it did not exist, The mother be-
lieved that she sometimes in her visions caught a
glimpse of its radial image ; the son forged imagi-
nary visions, and, constructing out of them a
fiction, offered it as truth to the homage of the
credulous. So he grew to manhood--a mystic on
that perilous brink between deceiving and being
deceived. Lending a willing ear himself to tales
of the supernatural, and then disgusted with
the folly of these impostures, he avenged
himself by imposing on others the same delusions
which had been palmed on himself. Here was hope-
ful material, on which, as a spark on prepared tow,
the romance of the Rev. Solomon Spaulding fell.
The result was Mormonism. The word Mormon
he had coined by an uncritical jumble of the reformed
Egyptian word mon, which means good, and the
English word, more, Mormon thus meaning more
good, or better. It is probable that Joseph in giving
this etymology meant to insinuate that the Book of
Mormon is better than the Bible, but the impostor
had not the wit to see that his cheat carried a con-
tradiction on the face of it.—Dublin University
Magazine.

THIS DAY'S MARKETS.

CORN EXCHANGE.

Fresh up to-day the arrivals of English wheat were
limited. For both red and white qualities the trade ruled
inactive, nevertheless Monday's advance in the quotations
was supported.

The transactions in foreign wheat were by no means on
an extensive scale ; in prices, however, no quotable change
took place. The show of samples was only moderate.

_ -
Floating cargoes of grain were in slow request, at pre-
vious currencies.

The trade for barley was in a sluggish state, and prices
had a downward tendency, more especially as regards
malting qualities.

The demand for malt ruled inactive, at late rates.
Fine oats supported former prices, with a steady inquiry,
but inferior kinds were rather cheaper.

Beans wore a slow sale, and peas changed hands heavily,
at Monday's prices,

For most kinds of flour there was a steady, but far from
active demand, at full quotations.

ARRIVALS THIS WEEK.
Wheat. Barley. Malt. Oats. Flour.
Eng1i5h........ 630 440 1 1,240 270 ; 420
Irish
F0reign........ 2,120 760 ; 3,850 1 sacks
3,440 brls.

BOROUGH HOP.
For fine samples of new hops there is a fair demand at
previous rates ; otherwise, the trade is in a sluggish state,
at drooping currencies. Duty, 4115,000.