plan of redemption, so, too, every child of earth had an
existence in the spirit-state before entering upon this mortal
probation. We hold the doctrine to be reasonable, scriptural and
true, that mortal birth is no more the beginning of the soul's
existence than is death its end.

The time-span of mortal life is but one stage in the soul's
career, separating the eternity that has preceded from the
eternity that is to follow. And this mortal existence is one of
the Father's great gifts to his spiritual children, affording
them the opportunity of an untrammeled exercise of their free
agency, the privilege of meeting temptation and of resisting it
if they will, the chance to win exaltation and eternal life.

We claim that all men are equal as to earthly rights and human
privileges; but that each has individual capacity and
capabilities; that in the primeval world there were spirits noble
and great, as there were others of lesser power and inferior
purpose. There is no chance in the number or nature of spirits
that are born to earth; all who are entitled to the privileges of
mortality and have been assigned to this sphere shall come at the
time appointed, and shall return to inherit each the glory or the
degradation to which he has shown himself adapted. The gospel as
understood by the Latter-day Saints affirms the unconditional
free-agency of man--his right to accept good or evil, to choose
the means of eternal progression or the opposite, to worship as
he elects, or to refuse to worship at all--and then to take the
consequences of his choice.

"Mormonism" rejects what it regards as a heresy, the false