In 1899 Lily Dougall published a
novel about Joseph Smith entitled, The
Mormon Prophet. In the preface to her book, the writer explained her views
of Joseph Smith as portrayed in her fictional tale. Rejecting earlier attempts
to attribute the Book of Mormon to outright “conscious invention,” she offered
what she felt was a more sympathetic explanation. “Smith,” she reasoned, “was
genuinely deluded by the automatic freaks of a vigorous, but undisciplined
brain, and that, yielding to these, he became confirmed in the hysterical
temperament which always adds delusion to self-deception, and to self-deception
half-conscious fraud.” Anticipating subsequent psychological explanations of
more recent critics, Dougall attributed the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith’s
religious experiences to unspecified mental maladies of which the Prophet may
have been either partially or completely unaware (Lily Dougall, The Mormon Prophet, 1899, vii).
Brigham H. Roberts, a Latter-day Saint leader, and one of the seven Presidents of the Church's First Council of Seventy, reviewed Miss
Dougall’s book for the New York Times
Saturday Review.
He characterized Dougall’s theory as an attempt to find a psychological “middle ground” that avoided the prophet/fraud dichotomy. While appreciative of the kindlier tone of her work, in comparison to others, Roberts explained that Dougall’s position was “utterly untenable.”
“The facts in
which Mormonism had its origin are of such a character that they cannot be
resolved into delusion or mistake. Either they were truth or conscious
Simon-Pure invention. It is not possible to place the matter on middle ground.
Joseph Smith was either a true prophet or a conscious fraud or villain. Had his
religion found its origin in the visions of his own mind, without any
connection with material objects, as was the case with Emanuel Swedenborg, then
there would have been room for Miss Dougall’s theory; but the facts in which Mormonism had its
origin had to do with quite a different order of things.”
Why is this? The Book of Mormon
“was no visionary book–no mere creation of an overwrought brain–but actual
substance, sensible to touch as to sight, consisting of golden plates, with
length breadth and thickness. Each plate was about seven by eight inches in
dimension, and somewhat thinner than common tin; the whole bound together by
rings made a volume some six inches in thickness.” Joseph Smith claimed to have
handled these plates and others (the three and eight witnesses) saw and handled
them also. “It cannot be said that Joseph Smith and these men were self-deceived
in such things: not even the `automatic freaks of a vigorous but undisciplined
brain’ could delude itself in such matters. The Book of Mormon plates had an
existence, and Joseph Smith and others who testified to the fact saw and
handled them, or they were conscious frauds and lied and conspired to deceive.”
This physicality was just as true with other revelatory experiences associated
with the restoration. Resurrected personages actually laid their hands upon the
head of Joseph Smith. “There was no chance for self-delusion or mistake to
enter into such transactions, and no theory based upon the idea of Joseph Smith
being confirmed in hysterical temperament can explain away these stubborn
facts, however well-intentioned or skillfully worked out.”
B. H. Roberts,
“`The Mormon Prophet’: Congressman Robert’s Views of Miss Dougall’s Novel,” New York Times Saturday Review 23
(September 1899).
