In a letter from August 1836, Oliver Cowdery notes that he is "ready to help incorporated bodies to plates and dyes" to print banknotes.

Date
Sep 1836
Type
Letter
Source
Oliver Cowdery
LDS
Hearsay
Direct
Reprint
Reference

Oliver Cowdery, Letter, August 3, 1836, rep. Messenger and Advocate 2, no. 12 (September 1836): 374–75

Scribe/Publisher
Messenger and Advocate
People
Oliver Cowdery
Audience
Reading Public, Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
PDF
Transcription

. . .

New York is a large town I have no doubt but it is as rich, and as poor -- as proud, and as humble -- as lofty, and as low -- as virtuous, and as vile; -- and, it being the largest, no one will pretend it is not -- the most wicked, of any other in the Union. Curiosity had brought me to the conclusion of visiting, at this time, the different parts of this great emporium of fashion and foolery; but the ill state of my health actually forbade. I walked down and took a view of the "burnt district," and saw how easily the wealth and pride of men can be made to vanish before the devouring, consuming element, when the great God so orders in his purpose. Fifteen millions is a large sum to vanish in a night. The great exchange, once the pride and boast of the sellers and buyers of cash, is a heap. There is money yet in Wall street, and "Draper, Underwood," and others, ready to help incorporated bodies to plates and dyes, to make more. Our Government is creating a large Custom House on the corner of Nassau and Wall streets, which, when completed, will be very grand. The hugh marble pillars, already look like the work of a nation. Strangers find it a difficult task to pass the business streets in New York: on the side walks you come in constant collision with balloon sleeves, and off, your life is in danger, in consequence of omnibuses and drays. -- The New Yorkers, with all their other inventions to make, and get money, have contrived an admirable plan -- coaches and omnibuses, to that degree that no one can pass on foot, and of course, necessity compels one to ride. A man with one eye, can see that an omnibus with four horses, occupies more room than the number of passengers it can carry. But this belongs to the march of improvement peculiar to this age, and so long as people rather ride than walk, I presume but few will complain, even if now and then a man gets his neck broken.

You may think strange if I remain silent upon the subject of the religion of this city; for of course, as large a town as this must abound with religion of some kind, if not with all kinds. -- Here are chapels, churches, and meeting houses, people to fill them, and priests to hold forth and tell them what they must believe; and withal, it might be considered uncharitable for me to say there were none sincere in the great body; but the important question is, are they, as societies and congregations, right? And if they are not right, they must be wrong! and if wrong, can they be saved? There may be found a few righteous enough to save it; but, with all its religion, and its righteousness, New York seems to me like a congregated mass of heedless mortals, a sink of corruption, a road to misery a gate to hell!

But I must close for the present, hoping that the glorious gospel of our Lord, which is so little known at this day, may be carried forth to the ends of the earth, and be proclaimed with demonstration and power, till every nation hears and every soul obeys and the glory shall be his.

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