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LELAND & WHITING, 71 WASHINGTON ST.
NEW YORK: BRADBURY, SODEN, & CO., 127 NASSAU STREET.
CINCINNATI: E. S. NORRIS & CO., 247 MAIN STREET.

1842.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1842, by

JOHN C. BENNETT,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts.

PREFACE.

I HAVE been induced to prepare and publish the following work by a desire to expose the enormous iniquities which have been perpetrated by one of the grossest and most infamous impostors that ever appeared upon the face of the earth, and by many of his minions, under the name and garb of Religion, and professedly by the direct will and command of Almighty God.

My facilities for doing what I have undertaken are as great as could possibly be desired. For eighteen months I was living with the Mormons at their chief city, and possessed the confidence of the Prophet himself, and of his councillors. I was, indeed, from an early period, one of their First Presidents, who, after the Prophet, are the rulers of the Church. This gave me access to all their secret lodges and societies, and enabled me to become perfectly familiar with the doings and designs of the whole Church.

This book contains a full and accurate account of my motives for joining them, and of the discoveries which I made among them, illustrated and confirmed by a variety of documents, both public and private.

I have not, I can fearlessly assert, exaggerated the facts I have here presented to the world, though I have, as they richly deserve, shown them up with an unsparing hand.

I have been obliged to insert much personal matter, and many testimonials respecting myself, in consequence of the violent and scurrilous attacks made upon me through the public papers by the Impostor and his emissaries. This, I trust, the reader will not impute to egotism, but to its real cause a desire to strengthen my statements against the opposition which I am certain they will en

counter.

In conclusion, I would commend to the candid and earnest attention of every patriotic and religious person the statement I have made; and, with the assurance that I have told the truth, and nothing but the truth, though by no means the whole truth, entreat them to use all their influence and exertions to arrest and quell the Mormon Monster in his career of imposture, iniquity, and treason.

The haste with which I have necessarily written my book will be my apology to the critics for its defects of style and arrangement. I have been more solicitous about the matter than the manner of it.

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