REMARKABLE FULFILLMENTS OF THE VISIONS.
There have occurred within the cognizance of those who have been acquainted with the visions from the commencement, many remarkable fulfillments of their predictions, and striking instances of their supernatural foresight and knowledge. Vol. ii, of Spiritual Gifts, which gives the “Christian Experience, Views, and Labors” of the author, “in connection with the rise and progress of the Third Angel’s Message,” gives many such instances. In addition to these we refer to the remarkable instances given in REVIEW, Vol. 29, pp. 32, 62, 104. The following lame effort to nullify the overwhelming force of the facts as there presented, betrays some trepidation on the part of the objector in view of them, and a conscious inability to account for them. He says: “It is nothing remarkable for clairvoyants to correctly tell things that have transpired, or to discover the state of a person’s mind; and since this is a well-known fact, something more than such items should be adduced to prove the visions of divine origin. . . . My hand is now upon a work by A. J. Davis, the celebrated clairvoyant; but shall I conclude that he is one of Heaven’s seers because he has told some things correctly that were not within the range of his natural vision? When the mesmerized man correctly tells the situation of a family one thousand miles away, how many are sick, and what the well ones are doing, can I ignore the fact that the same principle can exhibit itself in a clairvoyant of a religious order? We say, ‘To the law and to the testimony;’ if they contradict this, they are to be repudiated, even if they can tell a few such things as other clairvoyants tell.”
But this writer knows, or might know, that there is nothing in common between the things seen by a clairvoyant, and the things shown in the visions. Matters are not shown to Sr. White simply as a test that she sees things “not within the range of the natural vision.” “The situation of a family a thousand miles away, how many are sick, and what the well ones are doing,” which he says the mesmerized man can correctly tell, are not matters in which the visions deal at all. Their testimony is to reprove sin and correct wrong; and by their fruits, says the Saviour, we shall know them. This writer has such miraculous discernment that he can even see facts which do not exist; but this plain principle he could not possibly perceive. Now we have yet to learn of the first instance in which a mesmerized subject, even once, much less uniformly, as in the case of the visions, has brought to light hidden iniquity, and exposed sin and wrong. This would be Satan against himself, which is not the policy he pursues. This is just the difference between the two manifestations; and the trouble with those who find trouble with the visions here is that they are not able to discern between the true and the false. Ever bear in mind that the work of the visions is to correct errors, restrain from sin, expose hidden evils, and tear self-deception from the sinner and the careless professor, and then say if you can that they are the work of mesmerism, or of demons. In this case, again we say, it is Satan divided against himself; which we can assure our friends, on the authority of Christ’s own words, is something which never has been, and never will be.