Every true philosopher, so far as he understands the principles of truth, has so much of the Gospel, and so far he is a Latter-day Saint, whether he knows it or not...
He does not have to be spiteful or vengeful in order that punishment will come from the breaking of the moral code. The laws are established of themselves.
Joseph Smith … departed from the notion that God is a Being foreign to nature and wholly superior to it. Instead, he taught that God is part of nature, and superior to it only in the sense that the electrician is superior to the current that is transmitted along the wire. The great laws of nature are immutable, and even God cannot transcend them.
I can understand why someone who lacks an eternal perspective might see the horrifying news footage of starving children and man’s inhumanity to man and shake a fist at the heavens and cry, “If there is a God, how could he allow such things to happen?” The answer is not easy, but it isn’t that complicated, either. God has put his plan in motion. It proceeds through natural laws that are, in fact, God’s laws. Since they are his, he is bound by them, as are we.
I recognize for purposes we mortals may not understand, the Lord can control the elements. For the most part, however, he does not cause but he allows nature to run its course.
This people have embraced the philosophy of eternal lives, and in view of this we should cease to be children and become philosophers, understanding our own existence, its purpose and ultimate design...
Help from the Lord always follows eternal law. The better you understand that law, the easier it is to receive His help.
We are acting in all things with reference to eternity. … We believe in eternal principles, in an eternal Gospel, an eternal Priesthood, in eternal communications and associations. Everything associated with the Gospel that we believe in is eternal.
All advice to do things or not to do them is concerned with happiness, and with the things that make for or against it; whatever creates or increases happiness or some part of happiness, we ought to do; whatever destroys or hampers happiness, or gives rise to its opposite, we ought not to do.
Eternalism is the term I would select as the best descriptive word for New Dispensation philosophy; for that term best represents its concepts: an eternal universe, with no beginning and no end; eternal intelligence, working in eternal duration, without beginning or ending, and without ultimates. And hence eternal progression running parallel with eternal lives; and an eternal or ‘everlasting gospel,’ offering eternal opportunities for righteousness; eternal existence of mercy, justice, wisdom, truth and love; all accompanied by eternal relations, associations, unions, eternal youth and eternal glory!
There can be no such thing as power to annihilate element. There is one eternity of element, which can be organized or disorganized, composed or decomposed;
We believe that God is round about all things, above all things, in all things, and throughout all things. To tell about empty space is to tell of a space where God is not, and where the wicked might safely hide from his presence. There is no such thing as empty space.
The peace Christ gives allows us to view mortality through the precious perspective of eternity and supplies a spiritual settledness that helps us maintain a consistent focus on our heavenly destination. Thus, we can be blessed to hush our fears because His doctrine provides purpose and direction in all aspects of our lives.
Eternalism is the philosophy of heaven and earth and can be summed up in three words ... Abide and Abound.
We may say, the works of God and the word of God both constitute the avenues of human information, and that whoever ignores the one deprives himself of much of the benefits which flow from accepting the other; that there are two doors which open to the temple of truth, and they are both indispensably necessary to engage man’s full capacity and to endow him with the principles of knowledge, and with the purposes of his being here upon the earth, together with his origin and final destiny.
The Gospel may be said to be ‘The philosophy of Eternalism.’ The Gospel is immersed in the ocean of eternity.
Permit me to say there are eternal laws that exist with the Gods in the eternal worlds, and from which they cannot depart, and to which they are bound in all their acts.
The earth on which we live, the matter of which it is composed, the elements with which we are surrounded, as well as the planetary system, have certain inscrutable, eternal, unchangeable laws connected with them that can not be departed from.
We understand in part the things of earth; when we see things as God sees them, we shall then understand the philosophy of the heavens: the mysteries of eternity will be unfolded and the operations of mind, matter, spirit, purposes and designs, causes and effects and all the stupendous operations of God will be developed and they will be found to accord with the strictest principles of philosophy, even the philosophy of the heavens...
We say that God Himself is a self-existing being. Who told you so? It is correct enough; but how did it get into your heads? Who told you that man did not exist in like manner upon the same principles? Man does exist upon the same principles.
The mind or the intelligence which man possesses is co-equal [co-eternal] with God himself.
The mind or the intelligence which man possesses is co-equal [co-eternal] with God himself. I know that my testimony is true; hence, when I talk to these mourners, what have they lost? Their relatives and friends are only separated from their bodies for a short season: their spirits which existed with God have left the tabernacle of clay only for a little moment, as it were; and they now exist in a place where they converse together the same as we do on the earth.
I am dwelling on the immortality of the spirit of man. Is it logical to say that the intelligence of spirits is immortal, and yet that it has a beginning? The intelligence of spirits had no beginning, neither will it have an end. That is good logic. That which has a beginning may have an end. There never was a time when there were not spirits; for they are co-equal [co-eternal] with our Father in heaven.
All the fools and learned and wise men from the beginning of creation, who say that the spirit of man had a beginning, prove that it must have an end; and if that doctrine is true, then the doctrine of annihilation would be true. But if I am right, I might with boldness proclaim from the housetops that God never had the power to create the spirit of man at all. God himself could not create himself.
Intelligence is eternal and exists upon a self-existent principle. It is a spirit from age to age and there is no creation about it.
The first principles of man are self-existent with God. God himself, finding he was in the midst of spirits and glory, because he was more intelligent, saw proper to institute laws whereby the rest could have a privilege to advance like himself.
The relationship we have with God places us in a situation to advance in knowledge. He has power to institute laws to instruct the weaker intelligences, that they may be exalted with Himself, so that they might have one glory upon another, and all that knowledge, power, glory, and intelligence, which is requisite in order to save them in the world of spirits.
When His commandments teach us, it is in view of eternity; for we are looked upon by God as though we were in eternity; God dwells in eternity, and does not view things as we do.
The greatest responsibility in this world that God has laid upon us is to seek after our dead. The apostle says, “They without us cannot be made perfect”; for it is necessary that the sealing power should be in our hands to seal our children and our dead for the fulness of the dispensation of times—a dispensation to meet the promises made by Jesus Christ before the foundation of the world for the salvation of man.
For the purpose of this brief discussion, eternalism is defined as that view of man and the universe which not only acknowledges, but exults in, the existence of a Heavenly Father...Eternalism focuses on the individual and on those processes in which the individual is taught correct principles and then is given optimum opportunity to govern himself. For those who believe we are all going to be around forever, it is both natural and wise to concern ourselves with such questions and also with such principles which are also going to be around forever.
Here is the great news of God’s plan: the very things that will make your mortal life the best it can be are exactly the same things that will make your life throughout all eternity the best it can be!
Mortality is a master class in learning to choose the things of greatest eternal import.
Every true philosopher, so far as he understands the principles of truth, has so much of the Gospel, and so far he is a Latter-day Saint, whether he knows it or not...