Faith of the Church. [No. XIV]
That part of the work of the work of the Holy spirit in the salvation of men, which consists in giving them vision, forms one of the most important parts (of the Spirit's work) in the salvation of men, and it is one that was always performed by the Spirit, as far as we have any account of the people of God in his revelations. There is no society of which we have an account in the revelations of God, that he acknowledged as his own, except they had visions among them, and that as long as they continued to walk according to the directions of the Holy Spirit: indeed it was essential to their character as saints; it would be a marvelous thing to find a body of saints on earth and yet there would be no visions among them; we will venture to assert that such a thing was never seen since the world began. We readily admit that a corrupt religion can exist, and false prophecies exist, and sectarian dogmas abound; men-made worshipers increase, and the world abound in a religion that the Lord was not the author of, and yet no visions be among them; but wherever the truth of heaven abounds, there will visions abound also; for it is a part of heaven's scheme to save men, and without it, we are not authorized to say there is salvation; for all the people who were saved of whom we have an account, were of the number who saw visions; and such was the importance which the sacred writers attached to the seeing of visions, that Solomon says, in Proverbs, chap. 29: ver. 18, that where no vision is, the people perish. But in direct opposition to this, the people of this generation say, that where no vision is, there truth reigns and prevails; and where vision is there error and delusion abounds; but whether we should believe God or man, judge ye.
It requires but a limited acquaintance with the Bible to see that, the highest degree of knowledge which was among the former day saints was by reason of their seeing visions. It was by visions by which they were made acquainted with the deep things of God, and visions was a part of the work of that spirit which searched all things—"yea," as says Paul, "the deep things of God," 1st Corinthians, 2d chapter, 10th verse. No person can reflect on the great priviliges [privileges] which the saints enjoyed in receiving visions without being filled with desire: there was no end to the knowledge which they acquired; there was no bounds to their discoveries; they reached far into futurity and comprehended the things of both God and man for many generations; they looked to the things within the veil, and saw the things of God, of angels, and of men in the unseen world. It was visions which gave them the greatest confidence in their religion, and which enabled them to endure as seeing him who is invisible. They knew their religion to be true; for, through visions they had seen with their eyes, heard with their ears, and understood with their hearts. In their visions they conversed with angels, the spirits of just men made perfect; were made acquaint-ed with the glories of the eternal world, and obtained the most perfect knowledge of future things. By reason of this they became exceedingly bold and testified of the things of God without fear; seeing, hearing, and handling of the word of life, and became swift witnesses against the generation in which they lived; for no man can be a witness for God until he can bear testimony of what he has seen and heard; no man can bear witness of what another has seen and heard; but of what he has seen and heard himself. So that all the witnesses that God has ever had on earth were those who had obtained visions; for without them, they could not be witnesses for God. Nor did the ancients ever pretend to be witnesses of any thing but of what they saw and heard themselves. When God went to raise up witnesses for himself, he did so by giving them visions.