Political Alcoholism

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Jan 30, 1912

Political Alcoholism

"Political Alcoholism."—This is what Sir Edward Grey calls the jingoism, the war spirit, of the present time. In his great speech before Parliament in November, in which he outlined England's part in the Morocco question, and intimated how near war was, he said:

There are really some people who seem to take delight in suggesting or forming the opinion, from whatever gossip or information they may get from any quarter, that we were near to war; and the nearer we came to war the greater the satisfaction they seemed to get out of it. I do not say we are peculiar in this respect at this moment. It is really as if in the atmosphere of the world there was some mischievous influence at work which troubles and excites every part of it. We are passing this year through a period of great excitement; it is so still. Some countries are in revolution, others are at war; and in several countries which are neither in revolution nor at war there are people who seem to delight in discussing how near they have been, or are, or are likely to be, either to revolution or to war in the past, the present, or the future. Really it is as if the world were indulging in a fit of political alcoholism.—London Weekly "Times" of December 1, 1911.

Sir Edward Grey speaks truly, not knowing that he is recording the fulfilment of a divine prophecy of nearly 2,000 years ago. Said John "the beloved," looking forward to the last days:

And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. For they are the spirits of devils [demons], working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty. Rev. 16:13, 14.

There is a "mischievous influence at work"—the devil and his angels. It "troubles every part" of the world; for these spirits go to all the kingdoms of earth. And verse 16 declares that they are gathering the world to Armageddon. God's prophet declared it; noted men nearly two millenniums later declare its fulfilment.