AN “OLD CRY FROM NEW THROATS.”
By Editor
A REVIEW subscriber in Swan Lake, Dakota Territory, after giving a description of Turner county, its flourishing county seat, rich lands, and the favorable condition of the people, thus speaks respecting their need of the light of the present truth:— “The year 1877 gave us a great crop; consequently the whole country is full of food for man and beast, and I do not know of one case of suffering from want within Turner county. Yes; I do know of one case of suffering from want in this county. The case, I fear, will be fatal in its consequences if help is not obtained; and there is not only one case but hundreds, thousands of them. “While the inhabitants have their barns full of well-fed stock, and great bins of grain, and houses full of healthy, intelligent children, and conveniences for their comfort and physical well-being, and parents are watching with just pride their growth in strength and intelligence; they are all, parents and children, in want, absolute living want of the truth, the ‘present truth’ as you, dear REVIEW, love to call it. And I do know if you but knew how deep and extensive this destitution of knowledge of God’s law and of his will concerning our duty, is among us, you could not rest quietly nights in your snug Office at Battle Creek, without a thought of us. Of course you weekly send a few copies of yourself among us; but those to whom they come are not the needy ones. ‘Those who are whole have no need of a physician,’ ‘but who will go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel?’ is what I want to know. “I have been reading No. 1 of your new volume, and I never can tell you how much good it did me. Eld. Waggoner’s article on the first page was worth more to me than almost any sermon I ever heard. Then ‘Our Mission and Work,’ on page 4, is worth a year’s subscription. Indeed! yours is a glorious mission to give forth the last message of mercy to a condemned world. But, my dear REVIEW, there are but the few who know you. Can you not devise some wise plan by which an acquaintance may be brought about between yourself and the thousands of Turner Co., Dakota? “The Scandinavians have an active living body here of fifty-two persons, five of whom are the American Sabbath-keepers of whom I have spoken. With myself we thus have three more than half a hundred who are trying to keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus out of these thousands. Will you heed this old cry from new throats, ‘Come over to Macedonia and help us?’” In reply to our correspondent we would say that the REVIEW does not rest so quietly nights in its office here in Battle Creek, as might generally be supposed; for under the pressure of our work to meet the present demands from all parts of the field, our press room and the book-binding department present a lively scene frequently during the entire night, the machinery being in full operation, and busy hands and sleepless eyes, being engaged in putting the matter into shape to send out to the workers in the wide harvest field. We do not forget Dakota; but there are hundreds of other fields in the same condition. We will do our utmost to prepare reading matter, clear in its construction, Christian in its tone, acceptable in its form, and reasonable in its price, and then must look to our friends abroad to be the channels through which it may find its way to hundreds of thousands of new readers. If the fifty-three Sabbath-keepers in the place above named will each procure five new subscribers for the REVIEW, or become themselves responsible for five copies each, to be circulated among their friends and neighbors, they will find 265 copies coming very promptly into their county; and this number would no doubt secure over a thousand readers, and go far toward enlightening the thousands there in regard to the important subjects we have to bring before the people.