POINTS BY THE WAY by Annie Teague

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Apr 11, 1878

POINTS BY THE WAY.

By Annie Teague

“And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.” Nearly every one will treat with incredulity, or utterly ignore, this mighty prophecy, dark with the doom of a world, and which extends from the then present to the utmost bound of time.

Surely, say the objectors, there have always been just such disturbances of the elements as now, and why regard them now as a sign of the end of the world? True, there have been wars, famines, pestilences, earthquakes, floods, and crime and evil. Then for any of these to be regarded as special signs of some great event they must assume remarkable features, that shall distinguish them from all others of their class. Such has been the order of Providence within the time limited by prophecy to the special signs of the last days, as can readily be ascertained by a comparison of historic records.

Inexcusable ignorance or studied disregard of facts characterizes the statements which accord greater importance to past ages of the world than to this age. When Alexander desired to contract little jobs of conquering other worlds, he did not fight with needle guns and Henry rifles; the courtesies of war were never exchanged with thousand-pound shell as messengers. Krupp’s military salute from a hundred-ton siege gun had not echoed around the globe; and the seas were unacquainted with impregnable floating fortresses of iron. Vast projects of peace or war are now pushed forward by steam and lightning, hurrying on the last mighty struggle in which this world will be an actor.

While red-handed carnage numbers its victims by millions, still other millions perish under the grudging hand of famine. The recent destitution in Persia, British India, and China has thinned the population of those countries to a deplorable degree; and the two latter still continue, that of China being reported as “without a parallel in history;” with a present prospect of millions more dying of starvation.

The whole creation groans, and utters its portentous threats in earthquake mutterings and tidal waves; in the desolating barrenness of fruitful lands; in the shaking of the powers of heaven, when a blackened sun and a darkened moon confound the fool and the wise man alike. The unfortunate multitude out of the ark of safety dream on; and by-and-by the windows of heaven will be opened in wrath, and a deluge of fire will close the appalling record of the increase of crime, that yearly shows a nearer approach to the likeness of Sodom and Gomorrah. “And what I say unto you I say to all, Watch.”

ANNIE TEAGUE.