“The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up.” Matt. 4: 16. It has always been the policy of Christ, as the Leader of his people, to cause light to rise and shine upon them when they sought it from him in every-time of darkness and perplexity. The pillar of fire by night was a guide to Israel when they desired the Lord to lead the way. The disciples thought that all their hopes were ignominiously buried in the tomb of their crucified Lord. But Peter gives expression to the experience of the disciples, at that time, by saying, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” 1 Peter 1: 3. This accords with the promise made by the psalmist, ages before: “Light is sown for the righteous, and gladness for the upright in heart.” Ps. 97: 11.4 An experience similar to this was accorded to the Adventists, in their hour of bitterest trial. When the adventist hope was presented to them, and they were invited to take the little book, and eat it up, it was said to them that it should be in their mouth as sweet as honey, but afterward it should become exceedingly bitter. Rev. 10: 8–10. The thought of the blessed hope was the honey-sweetness of the little book. The expectation of meeting him whom their soul loved, of seeing him coming in his glory, and being made like him, was almost too much for human nature to bear. And after all the trials, ills, and disappointments of this mortal state, to feel that the warfare was ended and the victory gained, made them impatient for the day to arrive. But they did not then understand their situation. They did not know that the greatest disappointment that ever fell to the lot of man lay right before them. But so it was. Though in the mouth the little book was as sweet as honey, in the stomach it was to be, as some translations read, like picra. The day passed by. Their hope was not fulfilled. Instead of entering the joy of their Lord, they were left still in this mortal state, to meet the jeers and scoffs of bitter enemies. Unbelievers, meeting the crushed and dispirited Adventists on the morning after the tenth day of the seventh month, would pause, and in the most grotesque and taunting manner, exclaim, “O, where did you come from? I thought you were going up. O, you haven’t gone up yet?” etc. With the “midnight cry” the loud voice of the first message to the world ended. Meanwhile the second message, “Babylon is fallen,” coalescing with the first message, came to an end also. The earnest work under the “midnight cry” brought a crisis in the religious world on the question of the second coming of Christ, and though the evidence was so apparent that a work of revival would follow the proclamation of the advent doctrine, and would remedy the low spiritual condition the world was in, had it been freely and fully accepted, it was shut out by the popular churches of the land, which said, by word and action, We will have no more of that doctrine preached to us. This was under the state of the church called Sardis. Rev. 3: 1–6. And because they could not freely talk of their blessed hope, in the churches to which they belonged, about fifty thousand members withdrew from those churches, not from any animosity of feeling against the members, but because they could not cherish and speak of their new hope. It was therefore rejected. Adventists felt that they were shut out from those who so persistently rejected the doctrine. This was the origin and occasion of what is called “the shut-door doctrine,” or no mercy for sinners since 1844, over which such an ado has been made. The churches shut the door against themselves, and consequently met with a moral fall. The development of the prophecy in this line, and the action of believers upon it, tended to strain still more the relation between Adventists and other professors, and increase the antagonism between them. It now remains that the passing of the time be explained, and why the “midnight cry” ended as it did, and on what ground the preaching of this gospel of the kingdom is still going forth to all the world with increasing power, urged forward with more hope, confidence, and courage than it ever has been before. The great pillar in the time movement in the advent doctrine was the statement of Dan. 8: 14: “Unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.” The objective point to which the prophecy looks is the cleansing of the sanctuary; the time is twenty-three hundred days. This time was carefully figured out by both friend and foe; and it was agreed that the days would end in 1844 A. D., beginning in 457 B. C. But why did Adventists expect the Lord to appear at that date? — Because it had been too hastily assumed that the sanctuary which the prophecy said was to be cleansed, is the earth. Naturally enough, Adventists said this earth is to be cleansed by fire. To be sure, the earth is reserved unto fire, and the elements are to melt with fervent heat, but when Christ destroys this earth, he is revealed from heaven in flaming fire. Therefore it was held with all confidence that when the days ended, the Lord would appear to judge the world. Granted, then, these premises, could any conclusion be simpler and more direct than that, at the end of the days, the Lord was to appear in the clouds of heaven? The trouble is the premises in this argument are sufficiently far enough from the truth to turn the whole conclusion aside from the facts; to cause an apparent failure of the argument, and bring a great and grievous disappointment to the most devoted class of Christians in the land. The simple fact is that the earth is not the sanctuary, nor any part of the earth, as, for instance, the land of Palestine, nor the church, nor any other object except a definite object, plainly called “the sanctuary,” in the great majority of the instances of its use in the Scriptures. So there was no failure of the prophecy in the matter. Adventists were not warranted to expect the coming of the Lord to this earth at the end of the days. With all the study that was bestowed upon the subject, it looks to us strange, now, that it was not discovered that a mistake had somewhere been made. They were not mistaken in the time. The time has been repeatedly re-calculated, but no flaw has yet been found in the argument on that point. But in the minds of some the mistake still is retained, and they do not come to the light. The mistake was in the event to take place at the end of the days, not in the time. It is strange that any one who was in that movement does not, or will not, see that the mistake was simply in the nature of the event to take place, not in what we mistakenly supposed was to take place. But truth is still going forward. Some First-day Adventists went so far as to admit that probably all that we were warranted to expect to take place, did occur on the tenth day of the seventh month. But they have not reached the light yet. Seventh-day Adventists alone can explain it. U. S.