p. 171 | The Power of a "No" by T. L. Cuyler

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · May 30, 1878

THE POWER OF A “NO.”

By T. L. Cuyler

THE most tremendous word in the English language is the short, yet mighty word NO. It has been the pivot on which innumerable destinies have turned, for this world and the next. Spoken at the right moment, it has saved multitudes from disgrace, from ruin. The splendid career of Joseph turned on the prompt “no” spoken at the very nick of time. Had he stopped to parley with that wanton woman (as too many young men stop to talk with a bright-eyed temptress in the street), he would have been lost. “How can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?” saved him from the dizzy edge of the precipice. Daniel might easily have said to himself, “Oh, everybody about the court here drinks wine, and lives high on the king’s meat. I do not want to be thought queer or Puritanical.” He dared to be singular. At the end of two weeks he had a clearer countenance and a sweeter breath than any of the fast-livers in the palace. “So did not I,” was the motto of this sturdy young teetotaler. If he had yielded to the current of temptation, and drifted with it, we never should have heard of such a man as Daniel.

All the people who make a marked success in life, and who achieve any good work for God, are the people who are not ashamed to be thought singular. The man who runs with the crowd counts for nothing. It is when he turns about and faces the multitude who are rushing on to do evil that he commands every eye. Then by a bold protest he may “put a thousand to flight.” So the young monk Luther turned about and faced the hosts of the papacy. His heroic “No,” nailed up on the church door of Wittenberg, aroused Europe from its delusive and deadly dreams. Standing alone, he was re-enforced by the Almighty.—Rev. T. L. Cuyler.