The following are excerpts from:
Utah
Pioneer and Apostle Marriner Wood Merrill and His Family: Material Obtained
from the Autobiography, Diaries, and Notes of Marriner Wood Merrill and from
Record Data and Textual Contributions by members of the family, ed. Melvin Clarence Merrill (1937)
September 24. [1890]—We had 187 for
endowments today. I went to Salt Lake and met in council with President Woodruff,
George Q. Cannon, Joseph F. Smith, F. D. Richards, and Moses Thatcher, where President
Woodruff had an article read he had prepared for the press of the country
declaring to the world that we did not celebrate plural marriages now in the
Church and that he counseled the members of the Church not to break the law in relation
to plural marriage. The article was approved by all the brethren present,
including myself, which seems the only way to retain the possession of our Temples
and continue the ordinance work for the living and dead, which was considered
more important than continuing the practice of plural marriages for the
present. Came back to Logan same day, arrived at 10:20. (p.127)
July 12. [1893]—At a Quorum meeting in
the Salt Lake Temple today President Woodruff and President Joseph F. Smith,
after Temple ordinance matters were discussed, ruled that the Endowment House
and St. George Temple practices should prevail in all the Temples, viz., that
those persons male or female, who had not been sealed for themselves could
represent the dead in being sealed for them. I demurred against the ruling as I
do not think it right, but will adopt it in the Logan Temple on the responsibility
of the Presidency. It was moved by President Joseph F. Smith, and carried
unanimously that Lorenzo Snow and M. W. Merrill, Presidents of the Salt Lake
and Logan Temples, should be the judges and decide whether women in the Church
having husbands deceased out of the Church should be sealed to said husbands.
(pp. 168-69)
November 14. [1894]—Wednesday. I went
to Salt Lake today and returned in the evening. Met with the Apostles in our
room in the Temple at 10:30 a.m. Discussed the propriety of educating our
Elders before sending them on missions, as suggested by John W. Young, who had
lived in London the last 3 years. The suggestion was repudiated; it was decided
to select the best Elders we could and let them depend on the Lord as formerly.
(p. 182)