record gave a history of the nations that had of old inhabited
the American continent, and an account of the Savior's
ministrations among them. He further explained that with the
plates were two sacred stones, known as Urim and Thummim, by the
use of which the Lord would bring forth a translation of the
ancient record. Joseph further testifies that he was told that
if he remained faithful to his trust and the confidence reposed
in him, he would some day receive the record into his keeping,
and be commissioned and empowered to translate it. In due time
these promises were literally fulfilled, and the modern version
of these ancient writings was given to the world.

The record proved to be an account of certain colonies of
immigrants to this hemisphere from the east, who came several
centuries before the Christian era. The principal company was
led by one Lehi, described as a personage of some importance and
wealth, who had formerly lived at Jerusalem in the reign of
Zedekiah, and who left his eastern home about 600 B.C. The book
tells of the journeyings across the water in vessels constructed
according to revealed plan, of the peoples' landing on the
western shores of South America probably somewhere in Chile, of
their prosperity and rapid growth amid the bounteous elements of
the new world, of the increase of pride and consequent dissension
accompanying the accumulation of material wealth, and of the
division of the people into factions which became later two great
nations at enmity with one another. One part following Nephi,
the youngest and most gifted son of Lehi, designated themselves
_Nephites_; the other faction, led by Laman, the elder and wicked
brother of Nephi, were known as _Lamanites_.