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Perilous Times

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Dec 28, 1869

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 35, No. 1.

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Perilous Times.

By Wm. Penniman

In examining the present time, it is not difficult, even for the careless observer, to notice that many nations are now being shaken, not only by internal, but also by external difficulties.
The increase of earthquakes, terrible storms and hurricanes, and accidents by sea, and by land, has been so great within a few years past as to indicate that some great event is near at hand. But this is not the only sense in which the world is shaken. Is it not true that the nations have been and now are angry? And are not “men’s hearts failing them for fear of those things that are coming on the earth”? It is true that the winds of political strife have been held by the angel who has charge of the closing message. This angel said, “Hurt not the earth, nor the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads.” We may infer from these words that when the sealing work is accomplished, the winds will again be let loose. The sealing time may soon be over, and the winds will again blow with awful fury upon the guilty inhabitants of earth. This event may be much nearer than even Adventists are aware, and prophecies which we may think will be years in being fulfilled, may be fulfilled in a short time. Do not the present signs of the times indicate that even more perilous times than we have yet seen are coming upon the nations, and that no one can consistently cry, “Peace and safety”?
The following is the conclusion of an article entitled “England’s Difficulties,” taken from Harper’s Weekly, of Nov. 27, 1869:
“In looking at the present aspect of things, it would seem that Providence is furnishing the world with additional proof that but little true happiness and repose may be found, at least, when just conditions are neglected. Spain and Cuba are convulsed with revolution. France is disturbed with fear of such an event in case of Napoleon’s death. Some of the South American republics are in arms. China, full, insists on overflow upon others, and England for the first time abandons her colonial policy, fearing that its continuance may embroil her with other powers.”
The United States affords evidence in many portions of it, that our republican system is afflicted with such deep corruption as to produce the apprehensions which draw from the English premier his guarded but ominous admissions. The times call for wisdom, virtue, and prudence there and here, or wide-spread confusion may follow. England must summon all of her resolution to overcome the serious difficulties which threaten her industry and her government.
Wm. Penniman.