The pre-existence of souls underlies polygamy. The sexual passions exist in gods, as in men: to whom, therefore, countless millions of spirits are born in the eternal world: and these spirits anxiously await the physical process by which they may enter into earthly tabernacles, ever seeking to connect themselves with human bodies, and for this purpose haunting even the vilest habitations of lust and crime. To furnish these bodies, and thus introduce souls to their earthly residence and probationary state, which is essential to their highest development, constitutes the chief glory of woman, and her exaltation in eternity will be in exact proportion to the number she has furnished. Those spirits which "kept not their first estate," are never permitted to inhabit fleshly tabernacles, or propagate their species. Those which reach the earth are in their second estate, and if faithful, will pass to their third estate, that of celestial men, from which they afterward graduate to that of Gods. "There are gods many, and lords many," dispersed throughout all worlds, which they rule as their respective dominions. There is but one god, however, reigning at any time, in any world; but every god has a "first-born son," so that there is to every world "one God and one Christ." The God of this world, who is "the father of our Lord Jesus Christ," just as one man is the father of another, was himself once a man, and advanced to his high position by successive degrees. All the gods have many wives, and they become the fathers of human souls by divine generation. There is a grand council of Gods, directed by one supreme God; as there is a grand council of saints, presided over by Saint Brigham Young. All faithful saints will at length become gods, and have worlds to govern, and power to create other worlds. Each man's wives and children will constitute the beginning of his kingdom, and he will rule over his increasing posterity forever. The patriarch and prophet Brigham will be a god after death. Joe Smith has already attained to that dignity. Next above him, Adam; then Jehovah, the creator and governor of the earth; and the last step carries us up to Elohim, the supreme God of the universe, who resides in the planet Kolob, near the centre of our system. Kolob revolves on its axis once in a thousand years, so that "a thousand years is with the Lord as one day, and one day as a thousand years."