p. 16 | Gratifying-Why?

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Aug 5, 1897

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 23, No. 30.

Gratifying—Why?

“Gratifying”—Why?—Our esteemed contemporary, the Pacific Ensign, the W. C. T. U. organ of California, in its issue of July 15 says: “It was gratifying, however, for us to know that California won the Sunday-observance banner, not for having succeeded in obtaining a law which would secure it, in the letter, but for having made the most persistent effort to have the desire for one take root, blossom, and bear fruit, eventually.” But what is there in this for a Christian to rejoice in? Can civil law make Christians, or make men better? Our heart is sad because of the desire for such a banner, for such a law, for such methods used by Christians. We know what the “fruit eventually” will be,—ruin to both Church and State, a ruin worse for those who are the cause than for its innocent victims.