1 Ne. 2:23-24; 2 Ne. 5:25; Mosiah 11:20-25; refer in this text to Alma 53:8-9
“I apprehend no danger to our country from a foreign foe… . Our destruction, should it come at all, will be from another quarter. From the inattention of the people to the concerns of their government, from their carelessness and negligence… .” (Daniel Webster, June 1, 1837; Works 1:403; as quoted in An Enemy Hath Done This, Benson)
“In his book, Caesar and Christ, Will Durant, in summarizing the causes of the destruction of the Roman Empire, stated: ‘A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself within. The essential causes of Rome’s decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars… .” (Ezra Taft Benson, An Enemy Hath Done This, p. ix)