An Adventist in the German Army

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · May 16, 1907

An Adventist in the German Army

THE following was considered of sufficient interest to the reading public to be cablegraphed from Berlin, Germany, to the press of this country. It was copyrighted by the New York Times Company, and we clip it from the Washington Post:—

BERLIN, May 4.—An Adventist has a rough time in the German army. For the third time Private Mugge, of the Fifteenth Infantry, stationed at Altona, has been condemned to imprisonment for refusing to perform military service on Friday night and on Saturday.

Mugge declares such service to be against the will of God and a violation of his conscience. When condemned before for the same offense, he was sentenced to two weeks in jail, and later to two months. Last night when he refused to clean his clothes, he said: “I can not do it. One should obey God rather than man.”

In vain the president of the court told Mugge that the Adventist preacher had declared that a member of the church could do as he pleased while in the army. Mugge remained unconvinced, and was sentenced to five months’ imprisonment, which was finally reduced to three months and one day.

Private Mugge knew that no Adventist minister would advise him to disobey the law of God. Of course he could “do as he pleased;” God does not force obedience; but it pleased him to obey God; and he knew that no minister could answer for him. He must be obedient for himself, and he chose that obedience even in the face of certain affliction. It is not impossible that through his loyalty to the divine law, God will bring the knowledge of his saving truth to those who otherwise would never have had it made known to them.