The Gold Panic by W. C. G.

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 12, 1869

The Gold Panic.

By W. C. G.

COVETOUSNESS is enumerated in prophecy as among the characteristic sins of the last days; and the prophetic portions of Scripture which describe the condition of the world just prior to the coming of the Son of Man, give us to understand that the love of money is to be a ruling element in the nature of the majority. As the prophet says, “From the least of them, even unto the greatest of them, every one is given to covetousness.”

These prophecies are freshly brought to mind by the recent gold and stock panic in Wall street, New York; a place where exhibitions of this insane greed for gold are of every-day occurrence. The spirit of speculation which characterizes those who conduct business in that gambling mart, produced a panic, in which fortunes were made and lost; and in the frenzy consequent upon the discovery of financial ruin, one or two suicides followed.

The New York World thus describes the scene:

The crash in stocks soon after noon set the whole neighborhood in a fury. As stocks had previously stiffened (some quotations being ten per cent better than the closing ones of Tuesday), false, feverish hopes had been engendered, which suddenly collapsed and were smothered in what threatened to be general ruin. Then the long room was the arena of a battle of demons. The men who went in there and swarmed together within the enclosure at the west end, behaved, for half an hour or more, after the manner of utter lunatics; shouts, yells, snarls, yelps, and howls, were emitted from human lungs, until the place resounded like a den of infuriated beasts of prey. Hats were swung aloft, clenched fists were raised, memorandum books fluttered over the heads of the throng, and bids were shrieked out with all the despairing might of the voices of speculators to whom the chances of a minute were worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.

In that half hour of frenzy, the faces of men grew brutal, their hearts turned cold, their lips white, their foreheads red and purple. Out and into the den they rushed, chewing their moustaches, plucking their beards with nervous fingers; biting their cigars in two with savage teeth. They ran against and cursed each other. A few emerged completely exhausted and broken down. Others assumed a haggard hilarity, and emitted occasional reckless jests.

We are informed by those who are familiar with the place, that such scenes are of frequent occurrence. Men who stand high in the world and in the church, under the influence of such excitement become unscrupulous and reckless, and principle and honor are lost sight of.

But while these descriptions are painful, to the watchful student of prophecy they but furnish another link in the chain of fulfilled prophecy, which indicates the near approach of our Deliverer. Oh, may we be ready! W. C. G.