THE ASSOCIATION by Editor

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 25, 1862

THE ASSOCIATION.

By Editor

THE Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association has prospered beyond the most sanguine expectations of its most ardent advocates and friends. Its building is sufficiently large for an increase of business, yet every room is occupied, and the friends of the cause who have visited it say there is none too much room in it for present use. Some few persons who have never seen it, and know nothing of what kind of a building is wanted, and care as little, and have not put one dime into the Association, think and talk otherwise. Let them talk on.

The Association also has at the office, and in the hands of agents, a large amount of publications, just what the cause demands, and which are selling well considering the times. The office is also well supplied with all the facilities necessary to execute its business well and with speed.

The amount paid in on shares and donations, including all the donations for the Review Office from its first establishment at Rochester, N. Y., ten years since, is between ten and eleven thousand dollars. The real value of the property in the hands of the Association is between seventeen and eighteen thousand dollars. This property consists of two city lots on which stand the new building and the old, presses, engine, type, and all the material necessary for first-class printing, the library, six or seven tons of publications, stock on hand, and accounts to the amount of three thousand dollars.

These are all necessary except the large amount in accounts. Should our friends diminish these by paying for the Review, Instructor, and for books, it would greatly assist the Association. Besides these, all that is invested in building, books on hand, printing material, &c., is well invested. It could not now be bettered with the cash in hand. And it is all needed. The amount in publications may seem large to those unacquainted with the business. Some explanation here may be proper.

In order that our publications may come low, large editions are printed. The white paper put into the last edition of the History of the Sabbath weighed one ton and a half, and that put into the last edition of the Hymn Book, thirty-two hundred. Now look at our numerous list of publications, and it will be seen that to keep all these in print, necessarily requires a large amount of publications to be on hand. Some one of these are out of print frequently, when a new edition is printed, and thus the stock is kept good. It requires about $3000 to enable the Association to sell its publications at low prices, and to keep them all in print.

The Association still owes about $3500. A large share of this sum should be paid this spring. A portion is not so urgent. The president of this Association

owes $1000, which he could have paid if he had not put it into the building without interest. This, and one or two thousand dollars of other debts, should be paid before the first of June next. It can be raised with a little effort.

The first of June a catalogue of shares, pledges, and donations will be published and sent to share-holders and donors. We would recommend to all who have pledged, the prompt payment of their pledges, that the ugly word, unpaid, may not appear in connection with their names.

The churches at Monterey, Wright, and Battle Creek, Mich., have donated one hundred dollars each from their s. B. treasuries to the Association, besides individually taking shares liberally, and are ready to do more. Some other churches have been proportionately liberal. Now let all come up to the work in proportion, and the debt is at once lifted. Let the scattered ones come up to the work, and let the donations and the payment of pledged shares, come in from every direction till the debt is paid. Once paid, the Association is free forever, for it will be self-sustaining when once out of debt, and will be able to send donations of its publications into new fields.

Let our preachers take hold of this work in earnest, and help collect the funds to pay the Association debt, until it be paid. Our receipts above traveling expenses shall go to the Association, and we shall use every possible means to have the debt paid as soon as possible. We invite the active co-operation of preaching brethren, and all the true friends of the cause. These are hard times, it is true, but we look for no better, and the sooner the necessary means be raised, the easier, no doubt.

Every subscriber should know that he or she is complying with the terms of our paper, and not fall in debt to the Association under its present struggle. While other small religious bodies are dwindling, and their offices of publication are going down, let us show to the world that we are a living, acting people by prosecuting our greatest enterprise in these times which are the hardest of the hard our country has witnessed for many years. A united effort will do it without any one being burdened.

We say again, let all the pledges be paid before the first of June, that we may present a clean catalogue. And let every s. B. treasury appropriate from $5 to $100, as a donation. Let the scattered friends send a corresponding donation. Let all who are in arrears pay up for the papers and for books, and by the first of June we can have the pleasure of saying, The debt is paid, and our publishing house is free forever.