A GREAT RULER GONE

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Feb 6, 1901

A GREAT RULER GONE.

NEVER since the day that the human race was scattered abroad on the face of the earth was there such widespread and sincere mourning over the demise of any person among so many peoples as there is now over the death of Victoria, the great and good queen of Great Britain and Ireland and empress of India, who passed away on the morning of January 22. Victoria was the only child of Edward, Duke of Kent, by Victoria Mary, fourth daughter of the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. She was born May 24, 1819; succeeded to the throne on the death of her uncle, William IV., June 20, 1837; proclaimed queen June 21, 1837; crowned June 28, 1838; married to Albert, Prince of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Feb. 10, 1840. Had she lived to May 24 her age would have been eighty-two.

Queen Victoria came to her end like a shock of corn fully ripe, loaded with years and honors. In the threescore and four years of her reign she has seen marvelous progress in the arts, in science, in education, in the spread of the Gospel. And no ruler of modern times has been more friendly to the heralding of the Word of life than has she. From Greenland’s icy mountains to India’s coral strand she will be mourned.

She was no arbitrary ruler. Recognizing the limitations of a constitutional government, she never transcended her rights. Yet her quiet influence on the life of England and all her colonies was tremendous. She was loved as a queen because she was respected as a woman and revered as a mother, herself a mother of nine children. She has seen kingdoms and empires break and fall, but hers has remained stable. While much of the time of her reign England has been—rightly or otherwise—involved in war, her voice has always been for honorable peace, with sorrow and sympathy for the dead and suffering, even of the enemy; and she has ever been a merciful victor. All who truly appreciate her worth will sincerely mourn what could not have been long delayed.

The Prince of Wales succeeds to the throne as Edward VII., at the age of fifty-nine. All who desire the peace of the world will wish the new ruler of so great an empire well, and will pray that in his reign the “Word of God may run, have free course, and be glorified.”