Fifty Years of War Preparations — Supernatural Power Restraining the Demons of Destruction — A Universal War Never Possible in Any Preceding Age — Direct Prophetic Statements as to the Meaning of All This War Storm
THE preceding article tells of the great war, and the enormous extent to which it has already involved the leading nations of the world.
This war will bring into action the greatest engines of death that have ever been known. It was in the Crimean war, less than sixty years ago, that some of the first experiments were made with the breech-loading rifle and "floating ironclad batteries." But our American rebellion, which came on a few years later, still did not have the breech-loading gun nor the ironclad vessel sufficiently perfected to have them used to any great extent.
Toward the close of the rebellion here, the first battle between ironclads, the celebrated duel of the Merrimac and the Monitor, presented a kind of prophecy of what was coming; and R. J. Gatling invented his celebrated Gatling gun, which was a sort of forerunner of the modern machine gun.
APPALLING PREPARATIONS FOR WAR
Then the great fever of improving guns, war-ships, and other death-dealing implements, started. And what has been accomplished during the half century since the close of our war in 1865 is simply appalling.500
In the naval line, first the coast defense Monitors were built. Then came the sea-going battle-ships of about ten thousand tons displacement, with their four big guns in two revolving turrets, one at either end of the ship.
These battleships of twenty years ago were thought to be the largest things that could be floated; and there was a great deal of speculation concerning the improbability of doing anything with them. But in a few years, battle-ships of sixteen thousand tons displacement, and of greater gun power and rapidity of fire, rendered these first formidable monsters obsolete.
Then at the conclusion of the Russo-Japanese war, England startled the world by building her first Dreadnought. It was of about twenty-two thousand tons displacement, under full load. All the nations of the earth, with feverish haste, began to build these great Dreadnoughts, with their line of monster guns on the center of the ship, all of which could be swung to either broadside, and concentrated in salvo fire on the enemy.
RUSSIAN TROOPS ON THE MARCH
THE DREADNOUGHT NOW OBSOLETE
But the Dreadnought was quickly rendered obsolete by the super-Dreadnought of thirty thousand tons displacement. These modern super-Dreadnoughts have three times the displacement of the earlier battle-ships. And while they have been so enormously increased in size, their speed has also been increased from the seventeen knots of the Oregon type, up to twenty-five knots of the modern ship.
Then there was introduced the battle cruiser, which is in reality a powerful Dreadnought ship upon which every ingenuity has been concentrated to give it the highest possible speed. At the same time, it has great power of guns, and also of protection. One of the latest has a displacement of 27,000 tons, eight of the big 13.5-inch guns, and a speed of 35.7 knots, or about forty miles, an hour.
POWER AND RAPIDITY OF IMMENSE GUNS
While this great increase in the power of the battle-ship itself has been in progress, improvements have been made in armor, and also in rapidity of gun fire. It took about five minutes to fire one of the big guns of the earlier type of battle-ship. Now one of these immense guns can be fired on an average of every half minute. And while, in that famous duel between the Merrimac and the Monitor, in 1863, it was thought to be wonderful that these vessels began firing at each other when they were a mile apart, yet some of the greatest high-power cannon today will hurl a projectile weighing one ton and a quarter, a distance of twenty-three miles. Then there is the rapid-fire gun, which turns a stream of lead upon the enemy, something after the fashion of playing a hose on a fire.
THE SUBMARINE
Mention also should be made of the submarine torpedo-boat, which has come into prominence within the last few years. It has been perfected and increased in size. And while at first the expectation was that it could only be used about harbors, yet it is taken on long voyages across the seas, and can be made to do its deadly work on the high seas as well as in the more quiet waters of the harbors. It can approach under water, and destroy the largest battle-ships without any chance of being observed.
THE NAVIES OF THE AIR
And then the last half dozen years has given us the perfection of the air-ship in all of its varied forms—dirigible, biplane, monoplane, hydroplane, etc. And in this war that has just broken out, there have already been several engagements in the air between these fleets of the sky.
COULD DESTROY ALL THE NAVIES OF THE AGES
It would be no exaggeration to state that an up-to-date super-Dreadnought, if it could step back fifty years, and have all the navies that had ever existed from the beginning up to that time meet it in one great battle on high seas, it could keep out of striking distance of them all, and like a great giant in a kindergarten, break them to pieces with perfect ease. And so the modern army, equipped with modern guns, could stay completely out of range of the armies of fifty years ago, and make sport of destroying them.
Equipped with such terrible weapons of destruction, Germany brings into the conflict an army having a war strength of 5,200,000; Russia, one of 5,500,000; France, one of 4,000,000; Austria, one of 2,000,000; Great Britain, one of 730,000.
And into the naval contest will come, from the five great powers involved, the following:
Great Britain
Germany
France
Austria
Russia
Dreadnoughts
18
13
7
2
..
Pre-Dreadnought battle-ships
40
20
24
6
8
Battle cruisers
9
4
..
..
..
Armored cruisers
34
9
20
2
6
Torpedo-boat destroyers
143
130
81
15
93
Torpedo-boats
49
..
139
36
14
Submarines
72
24
75
6
30
COULD NOT HAVE OCCURRED IN ANY PREVIOUS AGE
These facts are a simple outline, without attempting to go into any detail of what everybody knows to be the conditions in the great field of war. Hence we may state that such war problems as now confront the world have never been seen in any past age.
While we have these terrible engines of destruction built up during the last few years, the world has also been made one great neighborhood, through the telegraph, the printing-press, the railroad, and the steamship. And now a world-wide war is literally possible. Such a thing could not have occurred in any previous age.
But now the world is so situated that the whole of it could be plunged into war. In fact, the war that has broken out in Europe affects the whole habitable globe. There is no nation, whether it is involved in the actual fighting or not, but is affected by it.
The battle of New Orleans, which was fought just about one hundred years ago, was one of the bloodiest of the struggle between this country and England in the war of 1812. That battle was fought a number of weeks after the peace contract had been signed between this country and Great Britain. But all that time was required to get the news to the front and stop the conflict.
To-day, let war break out anywhere, and we read it in our dailies, and their extras hour by hour, as it is passing. A few moments after any great action has taken place, we are reading the details of it, no matter where we are situated. Hence the world is in a position now to have a world-wide conflict, but never did these conditions exist before.5
A WORLD-WIDE CONFLICT PREDICTED
The prophecy of the Bible plainly calls for a world conflict; for we read:
"The sixth poured out his bowl upon the great river, the river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up, that the way might be made ready for the kings that come from the sunrising. And I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits, as it were frogs: for they are spirits of demons, working signs; which go forth unto the kings of the whole world, to gather them together unto the war of the great day of God, the Almighty. . . . And they gathered them together into the place which is called in Hebrew Har-Magedon." Rev. 16: 12-16.
Note that this prophecy calls for the kings of the whole world to be marshaled to the (Concluded on page 7)
Is Europe's War Armageddon?
(Continued from page 4)
great war of Armageddon through the agency of the unclean spirits that will stir up the angry strife. The entire world is to be involved in it. Let this fact be emphasized, and also the fact that this is to come at the time of the great day of God, the Almighty. And let it be repeated again that this prophecy of a world-wide war never could have been fulfilled in any age previous to the one in which we are living.
SCENE IN THE FUNERAL PROCESSION OF ARCHDUKE FERDINAND AND HIS WIFE
IS ARMAGEDDON BEGINNING?
The furious way in which this European war has broken out, and the rapidity with which it is spreading from one nation to another, is causing many people to ask the question, "Is this the beginning of Armageddon?"
To this question we can clearly say, No, the war of Armageddon has not commenced; for it will be observed, in the prophecy already quoted, that that war of Armageddon takes place under the pouring out of the sixth of the seven last plagues, and these plagues have not begun to fall, as every one knows. When those plagues begin, just before the second coming of Christ, the whole world will be thrown into confusion and distress such as has never been known up to that time. It will be the time of trouble prophesied by Daniel, such as has never been on the earth since there was a nation. Thus we know that this is not Armageddon.
THIS WAR WILL SUBSIDE
And furthermore, we may expect, from another prophecy, that this present war will be quieted down, and we may hope that such will be the case before a great while. The prophecy upon which we base this prediction reads: "After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that no wind should blow on the earth, or on the sea, or upon any tree. And I saw another angel ascend from the sunrising, having the seal of the living God: and he cried with a great voice to the four angels to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea, saying, Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we shall have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads." Rev. 7: 1-3.
This prophetic declaration represents the angels holding the winds of strife and war; for in these symbolic prophecies, as we have often pointed out, winds represent strife, war, and bloodshed. These angels are commissioned to hold them. The winds of war that are so divinely constrained, would naturally, when they are loosened for a brief moment, break away in furious gusts. And how literally this is shown in the great war gusts or war storms that break out! With what furies do they blow! This shows that the demons that are pushing them forward are under the restraining hand of the Almighty. But in some of his all-wise purposes, in prosecuting His closing work, He permits them to break loose for a little while; and then His restraining hand takes hold of the situation, and they are quieted down.
THE SEALING MESSAGE MUST BE GIVEN
We will see that that will be the case in this war. The prophecy just quoted, tells of a sealing message that must go to all the world. Matt. 24: 14 also says that "this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world for a testimony unto all the nations; and then shall the end come." So we may expect that the sealing message of God will be made an issue in all the world. This message proclaims the second coming of Christ; it proclaims great reformatory truths in connection with the proclamation of His coming; it proclaims protection for all those who will enlist under the banner of the infinite Jehovah. It proclaims every one of the promises of God, and is based on His divine prophecy.
In order that that message shall be carried to the ends of the earth, God can not permit Satan to do his awful work of plunging the world into a universal war, until, as in the language of the prophecy, all the servants of God are sealed in their foreheads, preparatory to the joyful climax of receiving immortality at the second coming of Christ.
THE WAR SPIRIT AND THE JUDGMENT HOUR
This message announces that the hour of God's Judgment is come. And while that message is in progress, God's guiding and restraining hand will hold the demons of war within bounds. Although this present war, in the very nature of things, will have to quiet down soon, yet we may know that the intervals of peace will be interrupted more and more frequently by the violence of war, revolution, and insurrection throughout the world; for we have this wonderfully clear prophecy, that:
"The seventh angel sounded; and there followed great voices in heaven, and they said, The kingdom of the world is become the kingdom of our Lord, and of His Christ: and He shall reign forever and ever. And the four and twenty elders, who sit before God on their thrones, fell upon their faces and worshiped God, saying, We give Thee thanks, O Lord God, the Almighty, who art and who wast; because Thou hast taken Thy great power, and didst reign. And the nations were wroth, and Thy wrath came, and the time of the dead to be judged, and the time to give their reward to Thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and to them that fear Thy name, the small and the great; and to destroy them that destroy the earth. And there was opened the temple of God that is in heaven; and there was seen in His temple the ark of His covenant; and there followed lightnings, and voices, and thunders, and an earthquake, and great hail." Rev. 11: 15-19.
Note that this prophecy tells of the Judgment-day, of the great time when the kingdoms of this world are to become the kingdoms of our Lord and His Christ, through His mighty power that will destroy them that destroy the earth. And at that time, when these all-absorbing issues are before the world, observe that it is said specifically that "the nations were wroth."
JEREMIAH SAW IT AND FORETOLD IT
Among the other prophecies of the war conditions that will prevail in the last days may be quoted these words: "My anguish, my anguish! I am pained at my very heart; my heart is disquieted in me; I can not hold my peace; because thou hast heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. Destruction upon destruction is cried; for the whole land is laid waste: suddenly are my tents destroyed, and my curtains in a moment. How long shall I see the standard, and hear the sound of the trumpet? For my people are foolish, they know me not; they are sottish children, and they have no understanding; they are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge. I beheld the earth, and, lo, it was waste and void; and the heavens, and they had no light. I beheld the mountains, and, lo, they trembled, and all the hills moved to and fro. I beheld, and, lo, there was no man, and all the birds of the heavens were fled. I beheld, and, lo, the fruitful field was a wilderness, and all the cities thereof were broken down at the presence of Jehovah, and before His fierce anger." Jer. 4: 19-26.6
Is Europe's War Armageddon?
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Observe how plain is this prophecy from Jeremiah. It shows us of the destructive conditions that will prevail throughout the world, as we reach the time when the presence of Jehovah is to banish sin from this earth. The prophet is stirred to the very depths, he cries out in anguish, his heart is pained, he can not hold his peace, because of the intense emotions that stir him as he hears the sound of the trumpet and the alarm of war that breaks forth in these last days when destruction upon destruction is cried.
THE CHEERING PROSPECT
The words of God's divine prophecy place us where, if we are studying them, we will make no mistake in regard to the meaning of the conditions that are now before us in the world. And if the situation looks dark and foreboding to you, it is because you have not learned to know the blessed Jesus, whose coming is foretold through these prophecies.
O that every individual might know the joys that set the heart to palpitating with indescribable delight as he looks forward to that near-by day when Jesus of Nazareth will appear in the clouds of heaven; when His glorious voice shall resound throughout the earth, to wake the righteous dead, and to immortalize the righteous living; and when He will lead them on their triumphal march through His great dominions to the capital of their eternal home, the great city of God, the New Jerusalem.
If you do not know these things, take your Bible, as you have never taken it before, as the most precious treasure that has ever been given to man. Learn its promises, study its clear prophecies, and get ready for that glorious day of eternity, for it is right upon us.
