p. 1 | How Much Longer!

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Feb 26, 1894

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 20, No. 17.

How Much Longer!

How Much Longer!—Between 1878 and 1891 the national debt of Austro-Hungary increased from $1,710,000,000 to $2,850,000,000. Between 1879 and 1892 the national debt of the German Empire increased from $44,000,000 to $436,000,000. Between 1878 and 1892 the national debt of Italy increased from $1,950,000,000 to $2,395,000,000. The increase in these three States was $1,977,000,000, or 53½ per cent. Between 1879 and 1893 the national debt of France increased from $3,750,000,000 to $5,681,000,000. Russia's national debt has increased since 1878 from $1,750,000,000 to $4,386,000,000. The increase of the debt in the two last-named States amounts to $4,941,000,000, or about 90 per cent.

These are chiefly expenses for war purposes. The figures are cold and dry, but they mean almost insupportable burdens to millions of struggling men and women. Disarmament, bankruptcy, or war must inevitably follow. Italy is already on the verge of bankruptcy, with commerce and industry paralyzed. But there will be no disarmament till the struggle for supremacy is over. How long will it be before this great battle of Armageddon is fought? And then?—the kingdom of Christ.