The Folk Magic of Mormonism

In spite of what Bruce R. McConkie and Joseph Fielding Smith say later on, early Mormonism is intertwined in knots with folk magic. My understanding is that Brigham Young turned the divining rod into a cane and then used it along with other canes the rest of his life. Would that not be the same thing you've said in the past, which is when the church has to confront the history or science, it often retreats to a place that is indiscernible from a fraud. Is that what you understood, Bill?