The Lions of the Lord: A Tale of the Old West — Story, Setting & Ideas

The Foreword's Claims vs. the Excerpts' Focus

Wilson's foreword promises a story grounded in historical truth, with 'make-believe' only as 'a cement to join the queerly wrought stones of fact.' The catalog subjects list 'Latter Day Saint pioneers' and 'Western stories,' but the excerpts do not explicitly name the Mormon faith or pioneer community. Instead, they depict a lone man wandering in 'scorching sands,' tormented by 'a mass of yellow hair' and haunted by his own 'arrogance of soul.' The foreword mentions 'a drama of human passions, of love and hate, of high faith and low,' but the excerpted passages focus narrowly on a single character's internal torment and a vision of a cross. Readers should note that the excerpts may not represent the broader historical canvas Wilson describes.

A Protagonist Defined by Pride and Penitence

The protagonist's journey is less about physical survival than a psychological and spiritual reckoning. He 'knew he had passed sentence of death upon himself, knew he had been led to sin by his own arrogance of soul.' His prayer—'God be merciful to me, a sinner'—is repeated 'over and over,' and he weeps for the first time since a night 'on the river-flat across from Nauvoo.' This reference to Nauvoo, a key Mormon settlement, is the only explicit link to the catalog's pioneer subject. The narrative voice shifts between external description and the character's thoughts, as when 'some new, strange peace had filled him' after his prayer. The excerpts suggest a novel more concerned with inner conflict than with action or community.

Vision and Ambiguity in the Desert

The desert setting is rendered with sensory detail: 'the scorching sands,' 'the full glare of the sun,' and the protagonist lying 'with his head on his arm.' Wilson uses the landscape to heighten psychological tension. The protagonist sees 'a mass of light clouds, volatile, changing with opalescent lights,' then a 'miracle of miracles'—a cross in the sky, followed by 'figures about it.' The text leaves open whether this is hallucination, divine vision, or a mirage: 'Some picture was trying to show itself to him.' The foreword's claim that 'the things that are strangest have most of truth' invites readers to interpret this scene as both a realistic symptom of dehydration and a symbolic moment of grace. The excerpts do not reveal the outcome of this vision.

Readers approaching The Lions of the Lord should weigh Wilson's foreword against the actual narrative. The excerpts reveal a novel that may be less a panoramic historical epic than a concentrated study of guilt and redemption. The protagonist's isolation and the desert's symbolic weight suggest a psychological drama, while the Nauvoo reference ties it to Mormon history. Pay attention to how Wilson balances his stated commitment to fact with the interior, visionary episodes that dominate the sampled pages.

I keep thinking about Wilson’s desert wanderer, his pride cracking open against that hallucinated cross. It reminded me, oddly, of how Sanctuary sits with its own quiet brand of reckoning—not the same story, but the same ache of a soul meeting its limits. Sanctuary — Context and Discussion carries that weight gently, like a memory I didn’t expect to revisit.