men who administered them stood in the way of getting a favorable
hearing from the powers of government that alone could authorize a
compromise. It was necessary to break this circle; and my father went
over the names of the men in Washington who might help us. I could
marvel at his understanding of these men and their motives, but we came
to no plan of action until I spoke of what had been with me a sort of
forlorn hope that I might appeal to President Cleveland himself.

My father said thoughtfully: "What influence could you, a Republican,
have with him? It's true that your youth may make an appeal--and the
fact that you're pleading for your relatives, while not yourself a
polygamist. But he would immediately ask us to abandon plural marriage,
and that is established by a revelation from God which we cannot
disregard. Even if the Prophet directed us, as a revelation from God, to
abandon polygamy, still the nation would have further cause for quarrel
because of the Church's temporal rule. No. I can make no promise. I can
authorize no pledge. It must be for the Prophet of God to say what is
the will of the Lord. You must see President Woodruff, and after he has
asked for the will of the Lord I shall be content with his instruction."

Now, I do not wish to say--though I did then believe it--that the
First Councillor of the Mormon Church was prepared to have the doctrine
of plural marriage abandoned in order to have the people saved. It is
impossible to predicate the thoughts of a man so diplomatic, so astute,
and at the same time so deeply religious and so credulous of all the
miracles of faith. He did believe in Divine guidance. He was sincere in
his submission to the "revelations" of the Prophet. But, in the
complexity of the mind of man, even such a faith may be complicated with
the strategies of foresight, and the priest who bows devoutly to the
oracle may yet, even unconsciously, direct the oracle to the utterance