[Letter from Bro. Butler]
By E. P. Butler
Dear Brother and Sister White: Your kind and affectionate letters came duly to hand, and we were glad to hear that you were again coming into Vermont, and will hold some meetings. We wish you to hold a conference at our house. Since I have been converted to the shut door, and seventh day Sabbath I have been out in this town, and some of the neighboring towns, and around Lake Champlain, to try to get off some of the prejudice from other minds, which I so deeply felt in my own. Some have been converted to the present truth, and some prejudice (I trust) removed. I have learned from conversation with others, as well as by past experience, that the shut door has been the great shoal on to which the Adventists have run their ship, and foundered. They have been running their small boats this way and that way, to see if they could get around it; but have not been able. So they undertake to cover up the “landmarks” behind them. Some say, we have had the message in Rev. xiv. 6, 7, the one following in verse 8, and the going forth of the virgins, &c., down to Matt. xxv. 5, “while the Bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept;” but have not had the true Midnight Cry. When asked, when, how, and where they can have it, they answer, by Angels sent forth to give it; others don’t know. Some think we have had the first and second Angel’s messages; another thinks we have had the first; but don’t believe any thing in the second; it has been a trial to them that any should call the Protestant Churches, Babylon. Still another believes, that if he acknowledges the first and second, he shall have to the third Angel’s message, and he thinks he can be more consistent to say we have had none. You see how all these have shunned the door. And still there is another class that believe we have had all down to the true Midnight Cry, and that God’s power accompanied all of these messages; but why the Lord has not yet come, they know not; but think probably the 2300 days have not yet run out. They have been looking for light from their papers, where they used to get it, but cannot find it. They are like sheep scattered on the mountains, without a shepherd. Some that had little experience previous to these movements have given up to disappointment, and have said but little upon the subject, and have gone, more or less, into the world. They suppose the shut door would exclude all the unconverted, having had light, or no light; young, or old, from every degree of the Spirit of God. I think if this class could have the true shut door set before them, and the third angel’s message, some of them would see the true line of prophecy, and rejoice again in the light. I have been striving to look up those who have not given up their past experience in these messages, and trying to show them what the Sanctuary is, and what the shut door is, that the Sanctuary spoken of in Dan. viii, 14, is being cleansed.