As the premier longtime defender of the Book of Mormon, B. H. Roberts's historical investigations had finally directed him to the above indictment of Joseph Smith and the religion which he had founded. Roberts decided not to submit his Studies to his colleagues in the church hierarchy and confined the document to his personal papers until its publication in 1985. If the presiding elders of the LDS church could evince little interest in Roberts's scientific observations about New World civilizations in 1922, it is perhaps understandable that most lay members of the church might also dismiss the discoveries of that period of time.

. . .

Obviously, the Roberts of a half-century of defending the Book of Mormon was sick at heart himself because of his discoveries based on the scholarly developments of his day.