A Comparative Summary of Three Interesting Years by E. R. P.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Feb 17, 1910

A Comparative Summary of Three Interesting Years

By E. R. P.

THE accompanying summary shows the value of orders taken for our subscription books in each conference and union conference during the years 1891, 1908, and 1909.

The year 1891 was by far the most successful year during “the good old times.” With much interest, as well as painstaking effort, we have collected all the items by conferences and unions from The Missionary, in which the general canvassing agent, Elder F. L. Mead, reported the work in full every month.

Since that time several conferences have been divided, or the conference territory has been adjusted, but we have so arranged the subdivisions that they come together in immediate connection with the figures showing the sales for that territory. For example, take the first item in the summary: the territory which was known as the Atlantic Conference is now the New Jersey and Chesapeake conferences; therefore, the orders taken in the Atlantic Conference during 1891 are reported from the New Jersey Conference, with the Chesapeake, immediately following, left blank. This plan has been followed throughout in giving the summary for 1891.

The totals in this summary do not correspond precisely with totals previously published in the REVIEW, as some adjustments and corrections have been made. It will, of course, be understood by our readers that these figures do not give the full sales of literature for the years mentioned. This is a summary showing the orders taken for subscription books only.

Our workers especially will study these comparative figures with interest, and will not overlook the following points which appear on the surface:—

1. The increased territory in which successful work is now being done as compared with nineteen years ago.

2. The even, steady growth in all parts of the field.

3. The success of the work in every field that is well organized.

4. The great work of nineteen years ago in fields where the work was pushed with a will under a strong system of education and organization.

5. When we see the grand work done so many years ago in some of the older conferences, when the constituency was not so great as it is now, we shall certainly feel humbled with the thought of the disintegrating policy which has brought such a reversal in those conferences.

6. The figures showing what a great work was done so long ago in a part of our territory, will give a glimpse of what may be done when we are organized and working throughout all the world, even as successfully as we worked in some portions of the field at that time.

7. This summary will certainly convince all that we are still struggling in the foot-hills, and that the great peaks of success are yet beyond and above us.

Dear fellow workers, let us keep on climbing, looking well to our footsteps, that we slip not by the way. Let us work shoulder to shoulder, and trust in God for help to enable us to attain all the blessed possibilities he has in store for us as a people. E. R. P.