Joseph Fielding Smith

“I have a perfect knowledge of the divine mission of the Prophet Joseph Smith. There is no doubt in my mind that the Lord raised him up and gave him revelation, commandment, opened the heavens to him, and called upon him to stand at the head of this glorious dispensation. I am just as satisfied in my mind that in his youth when he went out to pray he beheld the actual presence, stood in the actual presence, of God the Father and his son, Jesus Christ; in my mind there is no doubt; I know this to be true. I know that he received later the visitations from Moroni, the Aaronic Priesthood under the hands of John the Baptist, the Melchizedek Priesthood under the hands of Peter, James, and John, and that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized on the sixth day of April 1830 by divine command. These things I know. The Lord has revealed them to me, and this knowledge I have had since the day I was baptized” (in Conference Report, Apr. 1951, 58).