THE WEST-THE EAST by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, Cal. · Jun 13, 1906

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 32, No. 23.

THE WEST—THE EAST.

By Editor

LET us say in the beginning that we believe the West to be as safe a place to live in as the East. At the same time we do not propose in the interest of real-estate dealers, or anybody else, to minimize the mighty earthquake and its effects. We felt its terrible tremor, its relentless grip. We have no remembrance of fear. We knew it was an earthquake; the sensation was not wholly strange, but uniquely terrible. As it gripped the strong two-story house in which we slept, foundation and superstructure, it seemed that no house ever builded by man could endure. It rocked and twisted and rotated and pounded; but, thank God, it stood. Plaster was somewhat cracked, chimney broken, but neither plaster nor chimney fell.

Earthquake effects are seen outside of fire limits, as well as inside. They are seen on made land and over old sloughs; they are also written on highlands. Over the mighty shaking, wood and brick and stone structures collapsed like cardboard houses. Yet, again, some of the frailest structures were hardly damaged. The earthquake was as freaky as a middle-West cyclone.

Yet notwithstanding all its violence we have no desire to change to the East. We would advise no one to go East because of earthquakes, or to stay in the East because of earthquakes. We would as quickly risk California to-day, as regards earthquakes, as New York, Michigan, Illinois, or any other state.

In 1811 a mighty earthquake occurred in Missouri. In 1886 a quake shook South Carolina, and nearly ruined Charleston. The next one may occur in Chicago, Detroit, or St. Paul, all scientific supposition to the contrary.

All these increasing evidences of uncertainty in the old earth ought to turn men's minds to the “continuing city” of God and the new heavens and new earth, which abide forever, because founded in everlasting righteousness. Till then, wherever duty calls is the safest place, and no brave and devoted Christian will choose any other.