General News Items

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 14, 1867

General News Items

An approximate estimate of the grand total of the Methodist centenary fund, contributed in 1866, gives the sum of $3,166,906.84.

—A fresh coolness has sprung up between France and Prussia. Count Bismarck has discovered that a treaty offensive and defensive has recently been concluded between France and Sweden, and then a new fortified camp has been formed at Nancy, a point nearer the Prussian boundary than Chalons.

—London has ten Mormon congregations, 93 elders, 54 priests and 1,030 members. Liverpool is, however, the headquarters of Mormonism in England.

—A great number of priests and monks in Sicily have not only adopted the new law for civil marriages, but have availed themselves of its advantages. At Syracuse, a priest named Rizza has married a nun, and among the monks who have become husbands, is a Jesuit, Perrez de Verra.

—The authorities at Havana hesitate to finally condemn the American bark seized some months ago for alleged infraction of the custom regulations, evidently feeling that the government of the United States would seek reparation.—South American items are that President Prado will soon declare himself dictator of Peru, as revolution is rife all over the republic; and Peru and Chili mistrust the United States and will refuse the offer of mediation with Spain. Mosquera has given up his intended movement against Panama. Three American and two British vessels arrived there May 4, and had an attack occurred, and the transit route been interfered with, the United States forces would immediately have seized and occupied the town.

—In Louisville, Kentucky, a young lady of piety, refinement and culture, was refused permission to unite with the Baptist church of that city, in accordance with the advice of the pastor, solely because she had been a teacher in a freedmen’s school. They evidently need missionaries in Louisville.

—Paris, June 4.—Evening.—It is understood that as the result of a meeting between the emperor Napoleon and the Czar, they have agreed upon a plan for settling the Cretan difficulty, which will be proposed to the other great powers, and it is hoped, adopted by them and urged upon the Sultan with their united influence.

—Latest advices from Mexico indicate that Maximilian will certainly be shot or be hanged by order of President Juarez.

—A terrible plague is raging in the island of Mauritius, formerly known as the Isle of France, an island in the Indian Ocean eastward from Madagascar. The number of deaths up to the 13th of April was estimated at 13,564. The disease is an epidemic fever.

—In England and Wales there are nearly a million of paupers. The number of parishes supporting them is 14,880.

—The work on the fortifications at Luxemburg has ceased, but rumor says the Prussians are about reproducing them at some point on the river Moselle, commanding the Rhine country.

—Dr. W. W. Hebard, who lectured upon the effects of alcohol on the human system, at Boston, on Sunday night, said he thought the time would come when legislation would restrain the sale of opium, tobacco and pork, as well as liquor.

—The population of London is over 3,000,000.

—A convention, to consider the proposition to so amend the Constitution of the United States that it shall recognize “God the moral governor of the universe, as the source of all rightful authority among men, and his will revealed in the Holy Scriptures, as the supreme rule in civil affairs,” was held in the Fourteenth street Presbyterian church (Dr. McElroy’s), on Thursday evening, May 16. The call, was signed by a number of theological professors and distinguished clergymen.

—A religious fancy party was the last novelty in New York. All present assumed Scriptural characters or those of pious celebrities, and the exercises opened with prayer. Queer times, these.

Hard Times in Germany.—A communication from Manheim, in the Europe, of Frankfort, Germany, says: “The price of corn continues high, and the situation is considered as very unsatisfactory both by the Baden population and by our neighbors the Palatinate. The increase of our ordinary war budget is estimated at from two and a half to three millions of florins per annum (the increase in the wealth of the whole country was between eleven and twelve millions in 1866, according to official statistics); moreover, the interminable agitations connected with religious subjects do not leave any hopes, as yet, of a durable peace at home.”

The Impeachment Question.—The house Judiciary Committee adjourned June 4, to the 26th, when they will meet to be ready for a July session of Congress, with their report. The final vote on impeaching the President stood four in favor and five against. A resolution of censure declaring the President to have been guilty of acts which merit the condemnation of the people, passed, seven to two.

Sunday Law.—The following items on the Sunday law question we find in the last Sabbath Recorder:

Boston is exercised on the Sunday Law question. A large number of barbers petitioned the Legislature for a law to close barbers’ shops on Sunday, and the House passed an act complying with their request, but the Senate rejected it. Possibly the matter may be reconsidered. There is no law compelling the barbers to work on Sunday, but their desire for moral edification or out-doors recreation on that day is not strong enough to overcome the determination to get their fair share of Sunday custom. Each barber petitions that his neighbor may be made to shut up shop—that is the amount of it.

James Gopsill, the Republican Mayor elect of Jersey City, in response to a serenade, on Friday evening, declared that he would use all the power of his office “to protect, preserve and defend the sanctity of the Christian Sabbath, and circumscribe the fearful vice of rum selling.”

The perils of Sunday labor in Baltimore have just been illustrated. Frank Smith, having no regard for the “Christian Sabbath,” undertook to paint a barber’s pole on Sunday. He did not finish, and had to pay $5 and cost for what he had done—more than he would make by the job.

One of our exchanges says that another attempt will soon be made to stop the Boston horse cars from running on Sunday.

Anecdote of Rowland Hill.—The popularity which Rowland Hill, during a long series of years, enjoyed as a preacher, was partly owing to his eccentricities. He once commenced a sermon, by shouting “Matches, matches, matches!” You wonder,” he continued, in a loud voice, “at my text; but this morning, while I was engaged in my study, the Devil whispered me, Ah, Rowland, your zeal is indeed noble, and how indefatigably you labor for the salvation of souls! At that very moment a man passed under my window crying ‘Matches!’ very lustily, and conscience said to me, Rowland, Rowland! you never labored to save souls with half the zeal that man does to sell matches.”

Cholera in New York.—Two cases of cholera are reported in Roosevelt street, New York.

Causes for Divorce.—The following clipped from a Chicago paper, is a startling comment upon the state of these times. How utterly hollow and heartless must society be, governed by such motives! Men by misfortune become so reduced in circumstances that they cannot support their wives in all their former extravagance and luxury, and the latter, so wedded to fashion that they cannot brook such deprivations, seek a separation from those to whom they have pledged their affections, instead of standing by their side when of all times they ought most to do it, in their afflictions. Do not such persons come into the catalogue of those whom Paul speaks of in the last days, as “without natural affection?”

“Chicago is a good place to live in in some respects, but something—is it the air or water, or both, or lack of either in a state of purity?—makes it a terrible place for matrimonial infelicities. In no other city in the country are so many divorces granted and sought, and a correspondent gives the following as some of the reasons presented by ladies for separation from their lords:—

“One of our leading city clergymen, in his pulpit this morning, in commenting upon this alarming matrimonial demoralization, related a case that came under his own observation. During the past week, a lady, hitherto regarded as highly respectable, came to him and wished to consult him, as her pastor, in relation to getting a divorce from her husband. The clergyman, greatly astonished, asked for what cause she sought a divorce. She replied that her husband, when she married him, was quite wealthy, but had lately become so reduced in circumstances as to be unable to supply her with the luxuries to which she had been accustomed, and this was the whole ground for seeking a divorce. The clergyman dismissed her with a sharp admonition. Another lady, a few days since, went to a lawyer and sought his advice as to the quickest way of getting a divorce from her husband. When asked for a cause, she replied that her husband was so cross she could not tolerate him. She acknowledged that he never showed any signs of violence toward her, and that he supplied her with every necessity. Another quite well known lady, some time since, sought by letter the protection of a well known banker, because her husband was unable to gratify her fashionable tastes.”