EPIDEMIC OF CRIME by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Mar 19, 1902

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 28, No. 12.

EPIDEMIC OF CRIME.

By Editor

We wish that San Francisco stood alone in the epidemic of crime, but reports from other large cities are of the same import. Of the condition of San Francisco a daily paper of January 22 contains this list of unpunished crimes committed sixty days previous to the date named, and of which the perpetrator in no case had been apprehended:— Murders.......................................... 8 Hold-ups....................................... 65 Robberies...................................... 15 Burglaries..................................... 26 Assaults to murder............................. 13

February 24, Mr. W. C. Morrow, a writer of note, and a special student of criminology, presents this list for the ninety days previous:— Murders........................................ 10 Highway robberies.............................. 85 Other robberies................................ 10 Burglaries..................................... 36 Assaults to murder............................. 14

Not one of these criminals has been arrested. These crimes are known to the public. Mr. Morrow

says, "It is supposed that many others are known to the police, and that knowledge of them is withheld—'for prudential reasons.'"

Such pictures from daily facts, which the lime-light of an indefatigable and ubiquitous press ever and anon flash upon the screen continually before the public gaze, give the lie to the roseate drawings of a glorious future, painted according to the fancies of self-deluded dreamers. Some of these crimes are monstrous in the extreme. Some—like the murder of little Robbie Hyslop—seem to be utterly without motive, done from sheer madness or wantonness. Women are assaulted without number. One act is generally followed by many of the same character.

Such things reveal to the Bible student clear evidence that we are living in the last days. "But," says the objector, "have there not been other times and places when and where crime was prevalent?"—Doubtless. But all this comes in a period of the world's greatest enlightenment, in a country where education is most extended, in a land where the Bible is found in every house, or might be; and it comes as one of a great circle of cumulative evidences that the last days are here, that the only hope of the world is in the second coming of Christ. Some of the crimes which have been committed in San Francisco the last three months would have thrilled the whole nation a few years ago; but they now form a breakfast-table talk, and are forgotten in the mad rush for money, fame, or pleasure. "Out of sight, out of mind," is the almost universal rule as regards the great calamities, sufferings, and sins of the world. We would not have these things dwelt upon, but we would have them considered in the light of the Word of God. They mean something—these signs of the times,—and God wants us to read them in the light of that meaning. He who reads aright will be forewarned. He who fails so to read will be taken unawares. "Whoso readeth, let him understand."