Religious Persecution and Moral Reform
By Editor
AMONG the time-setting Adventists we are glad to note that the Atlanta Constitution does not class Seventh-day Adventists. Regardless of truth, some journals class them all together in one body. They are as distinct, and more so, as Roman Catholics and Presbyterians. THAT the spirit of religious persecution is not dead is shown by the following item from the Christian at Work:— “Persecutions of dissenting Christians seem to be increasing in all the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. Their rapid progress has alarmed the clergy of the established churches, and they are putting forth every effort possible to suppress them.” The same spirit is showing itself in our own country in the demand for laws which can be used more or less effectively to coerce the masses into a semblance of Christianity. ENGLAND has recently passed a very stringent law against indecent advertisements, including advertisements relating to nervous debility, etc. We would that the States of our own land would follow the good example. No one can calculate the amount of harm that is done by the cigar and tobacco advertising pictures, the theater show-bills, and the low, lewd suggestions which meet the eyes of the young and innocent almost everywhere, sowing in their minds seeds which will surely (but for the grace of God) bear baneful fruit in after years. Nude and lewd art, both in sculpture and painting, ought also to come under the prohibitions of such a law. THE Pan-American commissioners in their recent excursion were taken first of all to the Military Academy at West Point. “But we thought that peace and arbitration was the great object of our coming!” exclaimed a delegate. Next, the commission was marshaled to the Boys’ High School in Boston to see a thousand youngsters in their military drill. “That’s curious,” said another South American, “we did not know you were training your very school-boys to a love of arms.” And it is just so all over the world; everybody says that arbitration is to take the place of war, but never was there so much preparation for war as now. The leading nations of Europe are little more than armed camps, and the nations of the Western Continent are catching the infection. THERE is no greater deception and snare in this country than the Louisiana State lottery. It is surprising, too, to see what an amount of free advertising it gets through the newspapers. For instance, when a winning happens to fall in any town or city, all the papers of that locality make conspicuous mention of the fact, and the winner is for the nonce a hero to an extent proportionate to the amount. This naturally leads the unwary aspirants for quick fortunes to suppose that there is a great chance for them in a lottery ticket. If it were possible for the papers to report a tithe of the amounts invested in the game, especially in the large cities, it would be demonstrated that nearly every community, as a whole, is largely loser by the swindle, notwithstanding occasional stool-pigeon winnings. This may be illustrated by the fact, as stated by a Nevada paper, that the Louisiana concern is willing to give the Sage-brush State $50,000 a year not to start a similar enterprise. IN an extensive and severely critical review of the new Protestant Episcopal Hymnal, in the Churchman of September 14, the writer refers to a well-known Sabbath hymn, by Joseph Stennett, in the following words:— “Joseph Stennett, head of a line of Baptist preachers, published hymns of some merit before Watts began. The original of No. 153 (‘Another six days’ work is done’) appeared posthumously in his complete works, and is one of the best of the early dissenting lyrics. What we have is but a small part, considerably altered, of a long piece.” Joseph Stennett was a Seventh-day Baptist. One reason why it is good is that the truth inspired it. A LEAFLET written by Mrs. J. C. Bateham, who is the head of the Sabbath Observance Department of the W. C. T. U., is entitled, “Bible Thoughts about the Sabbath.” Barring a couple of merely technical misspecifications of Scripture, it is a good summary of the Sabbath question from a Bible standpoint. It is worthy the wide circulation it is receiving on one account, namely, it shows that this leading advocate of a national Sunday law finds no Scripture authority for a change of the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week. Certainly Mrs. Bateham, in so labored a search in both Testaments for Sabbath points, would not have omitted a reference to the change had she been able to find any. IN THE SIGNS of September 30, we noticed the blasphemous “prayer to St. Joseph,” which the pope, Leo XIII., has sent out into the world to all the faithful, to be recited by them throughout the month of October. An indulgence of seven years was granted to those who would repeat this throughout October, etc. And now the “holy father” has deigned to “enrich the same prayer with another indulgence, applicable to the souls in purgatory, of three hundred days, which may be gained once a day at any season of the year by all the faithful who shall recite it even privately, with at least a contrite and devout heart. The decree to have force in perpetuity without the issue of a brief; all things to the contrary notwithstanding.” What a pity it is that Catholics cannot procure all the blessings offered by the church! A life-time would not suffice to even utter all the prayers. But know this, O ye deluded souls, nothing can enrich a prayer but the truest faith in the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ. WE noticed not long since in that rank infidel sheet, the New York Truth Seeker, a cartoon intended to cast a slur on Christianity on account of the fact that so-called Christian lands send both rum and missionaries to Africa, and because the rum destroys more souls than the missionaries save. In the same line the Golden Gate (Spiritualist) of San Francisco has the following:— “Twenty missionaries sailed from this city one day last week for Siam, China, and other places in the Orient, to teach the people of those lands something about Jesus. ‘What a waste of good men and women! Missionaries, from a country that licenses rum selling; from a people far less honest, or moral, in a general sense, than those to whom these missionaries are sent!’” Alas! the facts stated in this item are also true. But is Christianity responsible for it? Who is responsible for the manufacture and sale of rum?—Not the Christians but men of the Truth Seeker’s ilk. And shall true Christians do nothing for the heathen because infidels send them rum? Shall real Christians do nothing in the way of teaching their religion to the Chinese and Japanese because the ungodly of this land deal in liquors? Those who rail at Christianity ought not to charge it with the very crimes against humanity which it is doing all that it can to prevent, and which infidelity is endeavoring to perpetuate.