p. 163 | A FRANK ADMISSION

The Seventh-Day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 20, 1879

A FRANK ADMISSION.

WE find the following in the Christian at Work of Oct. 23, 1879, in an editorial headed, “The European Outlook.” The last paragraph contains a very frank admission, and we heartily indorse the assertion, “Truly the millennium does not seem imminent.”

The European outlook is serious, at the best. Lord Salisbury made a speech at Manchester on Friday which will go far to confirm the impression, already wide-spread, that an understanding exists between England and Germany, looking to unity of action on all matters relating to the East. This, with the fact that a defensive treaty between Germany and Austria has just been signed by the respective emperors, gives a new triple alliance, with England as the third factor. Whether this will result in a second triple alliance, with Russia, France, and Italy as principals, remains to be seen. In any event, the outlook is anything but peaceful. Never before has Europe so bristled with bayonets as now. The Austro-Hungarian empire has accepted estimates for an effective force of 800,000 men, Germany is keeping up an armed force of 1,200,000, France has 1,600,000, and Russia will have 1,800,000 men of all grades in service in the event of war, while Italy has an effective force of 1,500,000.

Of course these immense armies are a fearful drain upon the resources of the people, who have to pay the cost. Probably the burden is the least onerous upon France, which is a nation of small farmers, and is the severest tax upon Germany, which can with great difficulty provide for so large an army, the immense cost of which is doubtless the source of much of the Socialistic troubles of the empire. What the result will be, it is not easy to forecast; there will be fierce conflict, treaties will be torn asunder,—as they often have been,—and the map of Europe will be changed.

While the world is given to boasting of its advanced civilization, the fact remains that gunpowder is still regarded as the great arbiter of the destinies of nations; and these all Christian peoples, whom the Son of God died to redeem! Truly the millennium does not seem imminent, and it sometimes seems as if it were a laggard pace at which “the Cross leads generations on.”