Men and Things by Dudley Marvin Canright

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Sep 3, 1872

Men and Things.

By Dudley Marvin Canright

John Locke thus briefly states the obstacles which always oppose any reformation.

Every religious and political innovation is opposed by the timidity of some, the obstinacy and pride of others, and the ignorance of the bulk of mankind. All improvement, therefore, in religion and politics, must be gradual.

Another eminent man says, truly too,

Doctrines are of use only as they are practiced. Men may go to perdition with their heads full of truth. To hold the truth and fight for it is one thing. To be sanctified through it is another.

Let us look out, friends, while we are pulling others out of the fire that we do not slip in ourselves.

Here is another rich truth which selfish men should learn by heart.

It is one of the beautiful compensations of this life that no one can sincerely try to help another without helping himself.—C. D. Warner.

CLERICAL DRINKING IN SCOTLAND.

An American gentleman, one month abroad, writes from Edinburgh to a friend in this city:

“Saturday night, Cork and Dublin seem to be given over to one huge drunk—Glasgow the same. I don’t know how it may be here to-night, but if the Presbyterian ministers who are attending the Grand Presbyterian Council here are a fair sample, Edinburgh must be the ‘drunkenest’ place in the world. I saw a number of them at dinner at our hotel yesterday take enough sherry, champagne, claret, brandy, and hot Scotch, to send a great many Yankees under the table.”

One would hardly suppose this possible, but there is too much proof of it to be doubted. This is a sign of the last days. See Matt. 24: 48-51; Isa. 56: 9-12.

Bad men can say some good things as witness the following:

Mohammed once said, “When a man dies, men inquire what he has left behind him; angels inquire what he has sent before him.”

THE CHURCH’S POWER.

The following words most clearly and forcibly point out where our strength as a church must chiefly be found. If we are wanting here, we are but a dead carcass, a sounding brass, and a tinkling cymbal. We ask our lay brethren and sisters to give this a careful reading.

“There is one thing better than being seen. It is good for a church to be visible, but it would be much better that it should be felt; for, after all, it is not the size of the church, it is not even the power of its preachers, or the excellence of its administration, or the emphasis with which it can use its voice on public questions, social or political. It is not in that the true power of a Christian Church consists. It is in the spiritual force by which it propagates the Gospel of Christ. This is a thing which cannot be measured by the multitude of the congregation, the size of its Assembly, or the eloquence of its debates. It consists in the quiet, solitary, and secret working of its ministers and members, by the purity of its teachings from the pulpit, in their enlightened zeal for every good and honorable cause.”

Numbers are to be greatly desired, talent to be coveted, means to be wished for, influence to be sought, learning to be cultivated,—all these and much more, are not to be despised; but they are only the hands and feet with which we are to work. There must be a warm heart, a full soul, and a melting spirit back of all these to give them life and power. We want the power of the Holy Ghost welling up in the heart, running over in our prayers, and watering all in every word we say. D. M. Canright.