OVERSHOT THE MARK.—The following paragraph appeared in the N. Y. Tribune of Dec. 25, 1867.
“A telegraphic dispatch the other day came from London to Washington in nine and a half minutes. Suppose it to have kept on around the world, the circuit would have been made within an hour. What said Shakespeare? ‘I’ll put a girdle round the earth in forty minutes.’ If the dispatch referred to above had started from London at one minute past eleven on Dec. 20, it would have gone around the globe and arrived at its starting point by fifty-eight minutes past eleven Dec. 19—apparently making the girdle of the earth nearly twenty-four hours before it started. ‘Canst thou send the lightnings, that they may go and say unto thee, Here we are?’”
By carrying the dispatch around to its starting point, the reader will see, upon a moment’s thought, that the Tribune has carried it too far; for the time of its arrival would there be marked by the same clock that gave the time of its departure, and that would certainly mark the time as fifty-seven minutes later, not twenty-three hours earlier. The dispatch would gain time only till it reached the point, wherever that is, where the day begins, and to that point only would the reasoning of the Tribune apply. The transmission of a message from London to Washington in nine and a half minutes, is a telegraphic feat worthy of record in this age of wonders; but the Tribune draws altogether too largely on our credulity in its unfortunate attempt at supposing a case.
THE PERMISSION TO EAT FLESH.
By H. C. Miller
Some people are always sure to finally fall back upon the permission given to Noah, as recorded in Genesis, to eat flesh, when convinced by sound reasoning of its unfitness as an article of food: “If all this is so, then why did God tell Noah to eat of it?” Here they entrench themselves, seldom inquiring why, with a desire to know, or, at least, not pursuing their investigations far. But those who desire truth, and wish to be found in the way of right, rejoice in the testimonies of the Lord, which show that it was permitted for the purpose of accomplishing the same thing in the people then, that it will do now in us, if we stubbornly reject the light and continue to eat flesh, viz., produce disease, and shorten life.
Lately we have read some testimony from the celebrated Dr. Cheyne, late of England, which shows such agreement with the testimony in Spiritual Gifts, that we copy it, not only for its harmony with what is written, but for the good of some who a little prefer the words of men. He says:
“I have sometimes indulged the conjecture that animal food, in the original frame of our nature, and design of our creation, was not intended for human creatures. They seem to me neither to have those strong and fit organs for digesting it, nor naturally to have those voracious and brutish appetites that require animal food to satisfy them; nor those cruel and hard hearts, or those diabolical passions, which could easily suffer them to tear and destroy their fellow-creatures; at least, not in the first and early ages, before every man had corrupted his way, and God was forced to exterminate the whole race by an universal deluge, and was also obliged to shorten their lives from nine hundred or one thousand years to seventy. He wisely foresaw that animal food and artificial liquors would naturally contribute toward this end, and indulged or permitted the generation that was to plant the earth again after the flood, the use of them for food; knowing that, though it would shorten their lives, and plait a scourge of thorns for the backs of the lazy and voluptuous, it would be cautiously avoided by those who knew it was their duty and happiness to keep their passions low, and their appetites in subjection. And this very era of the flood is that mentioned in Holy Writ for the indulgence of animal food and artificial liquors, after the trial had been made how insufficient alone a vegetable diet—which was the first food appointed for human kind after their creation—was, in the long lives of men, to restrain their wickedness and malice, and after finding that nothing but shortening their duration could possibly prevent the evil.” — Veg. Diet*, p. 98.
H. C. MILLER.
A CATALOGUE OF SINS.—
The last N. Y. Tribune, speaking of the death of Mr. Hamilton, M. C. from Ohio, by a railroad accident, says:
The sad death of Mr. Hamilton, Member of Congress from Ohio, adds another item to the flood—we may say the deluge—of crime and accident with which our columns have for days past been overburdened. The telegraph wires bend under their weight of woe; the old earth quivers with throbs of agony from the center to the pole; cities are shaken down, countries are engulfed, fair domains are overflowed with red-hot lava; wife is arrayed against husband, mother against child, son against father; a hecatomb is sacrificed on one railway, half as many on another, and on still another the width of a hair stands between a thousand and sudden death. In social life, our newspapers are smutched all over with reports of divorce and separation trials, of infidelity and disgrace, of gigantic crimes undertaken, half accomplished or completed. What shall be the end of these things?
The inquiry with which the Tribune closes this remarkable paragraph, was answered more than 1800 years ago: “As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of Man.” Luke xvii, 26. In the days of Noah, the earth was filled with violence. Gen. vi, 11. “Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot,” who was vexed with the filthy lives and conversation of the wicked around him, 2 Pet. ii, 6, 7, “Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of Man shall be revealed.”
News and Miscellany.
Can ye not discern the Signs of the Times? Matt. xvi, 3.
Close following upon the terrible massacre on the Lake Shore Railroad, comes a frightful sacrifice of passengers at sea. The steamship Raleigh, a well-known coastwise steamship, was burned on the 24th ult. on her trip from this city to New Orleans, while off Charleston. Eighteen persons were picked up and landed at Charleston by a tug; thirteen lives were believed to be lost, but twenty-four of the passengers and crew were still missing, who were last seen in the boat, or clinging to pieces of the wreck.
A new insurrection in favor of Santa Anna has broken out in Yucatan, and appears to be supported by many former officers of the Empire. It seems almost incredible that the ex-Dictator, who but a few weeks ago barely escaped with his life, should once more disturb the peace of his native country. There is, we believe, not the least chance of the success of the movement; and if the old General is caught alive on Mexican territory, he will probably not be let off as easily as the last time. Santa Anna himself, however, denies that he is going to Mexico.
Madness of the Liquor Traffic.—From one of our exchanges we clip the following:
"The Liquor Dealers' Association of New York lately held a meeting and resolved to sell in defiance of law. They formed a pledge to that effect, and agreed to stand by each other to the bitter end. The better to secure this object, the following resolution was passed:
"Resolved, That the pledge be printed on Bristol board in colors and gold, with a medallion of Christ blessing the wine, at the top, that dealers may hang them up beside their licenses." They can be made and sold for twenty-five cents each. A committee consisting of Henry Archerleries, Christopher O'Connor and Theodore Allen, was appointed to carry out the above resolution. Capt. Rynders briefly addressed the meeting, after which it adjourned.
Beware of Cod Fish.—A gentleman in this city reports to the Post the discovery in a sound cod fish, apparently, a multitude of little snake-like worms, some of them more than an inch and a half long, and what is particularly observable, these reptiles were alive even after the fish had been boiled for an hour and served up for dinner, and lived, some of them, for hours afterward. We believe it is not uncommon for worms to be found in all living animals, even to beetles and bugs as well as the human body. But worms that can stand boiling for an hour and still be lively, are rather rare phenomena; though if they can bear being cut up in little pieces and still live, we do not see why they may not outlive other harsh usage. Be cautious and get fresh and sound fish.—Traveler.
Earthquake in N. Y.—The occurrence of distinct shocks of earthquake in the Northern parts of the United States, though an unusual, is not an unprecedented event. The great earthquake which destroyed the City of Lisbon in 1755 was felt along the coast of Massachusetts, where it knocked down chimneys, disrupted houses, and opened great fissures in the ground. The motion lasted about 15 minutes. The waters of Lake Ontario at the same time were severely agitated. In 1812 there was a violent earthquake along the Mississippi, extending all through the country between the mouths of the St. Francis and Ohio Rivers, which are 500 miles apart, and repeated at short intervals during two or three months. The ground rose and sank, lakes were formed, and drained, chasms opened and belched forth jets of mud and water as high as the tree tops, and fissures were left which are still visible. The great internal convulsion of which these phenomena were the preliminary signs, culminated in the destruction of the City of Caracas in Venezuela, on the 26th of March, 1812. In various parts of the country there are indications of the action of earthquakes during forgotten periods, and at Ellenville, Ulster County, in this state, there are some very remarkable ones. The earthquake of Wednesday last, which appears to have been felt from Western New-York to New-Brunswick, is described as traveling from West to East. Whether this account of it is correct or not, we have little opportunity of judging, no scientific record of the movement having thus far been made public; but there can be little doubt that it was part of the same terrible commotion in the hidden forces of the earth which has wrought so much destruction in the West Indies.
France and Italy.—"The Pope needs Rome for his independence. Italy aspires to the possession of Rome, which she considers as an imperative requisite of her unity. Well, we declare, in the name of French Government, Italy shall not take possession of Rome! Never!" These were the words uttered by Rouher, Napoleon's Minister of State, that have had such an effect on the Italian people as to make them almost willing to risk a war with France, even though it be a Monte Rotondo on a large scale, where their bodies will only serve to show "the admirable effect," as Napoleon's chief of ordnance puts it, of the Chassepot rifles. Rouher emphatically described Rome to be all the territory now ruled by the Pope. Menabrea's ministry having been defeated in the Italian Parliament, by a majority of two, he threatens to dissolve the Parliament should he meet with another defeat, and appeal to the people. The question will then come directly up for popular settlement whether Italy shall consent or not to be snubbed and buffeted by Napoleon, who is afraid of Bismarck, and has not even dared to resent the insult of Maximilian's death at the hand of a Mexican Indian.
Fenianism.—It is rapidly becoming as much as one's life is worth to be an Englishman. Fenianism is pursuing more closely and threatens to interfere more constantly with all the acts and conditions of his daily life than Sidney Smith's tax-gatherer. He can scarcely go into the street and feel sure that he is not walking over a mine that shall blow him into eternity. "Were I not a madman," says Sir Roger L'Estrange, "to be putting of nice and impertinent questions when the enemy are mining the tower under my feet and laying the train that is to blow me up?" Yet Englishmen are forced to ask and answer all sorts of questions with a constant apprehension of being interrupted by a keg of gunpowder or a barrel of nitro-glycerine. The latest attempt to call the attention of the English Government to the wrongs of Ireland, consists in sending letters to them through the mail, which explode on opening. One policeman has already been burned, but though several exploded, no government officer has yet been seriously injured. Such a state of things is formidable. Because, if only one in a thousand of these different details for getting a hearing from Ireland fails, yet the ignorance as to what form they may take next and whom they will strike, creates a terrible curiosity and awful excitement on the part of each individual, as to whether or not he will be the next victim. We can think of nothing like it, in this country, except the unpleasant consciousness of danger attendant upon railroad traveling. But the traveling community is but a small portion of the whole people, while in England every man, woman and child are more or less exposed, and the officers of government especially, to the desperate assaults of Fenianism. They may look for torpedoes in their hash and strychnine in their coffee. The English people are evidently looking at the affair in a more serious light than ever before. As is frequently the case, where there is a discontented people, oppressed and deprived of their rights, the festival day was regarded as a probable occasion for a demonstration; and government was armed at every point (except in the post-office department, as it appears) on Christmas. "Ireland for the Irish" will prove a disagreeable cry, if it is to include the explosion of torpedoes, and the detonation of innocent looking billet-doux.—Detroit Post.
Resources of California.—Eighteen years ago, the wealth of California was stated in thousands of dollars; now it is over $200,000,000. Then, little land was cultivated; now, over six millions of acres. Then, the state imported her breadstuffs; in 1866 she raised 12,000,000 bushels of wheat, and 4,000,000 of barley,—shipping large quantities of wheat and flour to New York and to Liverpool. The estimated value of her agricultural yield for 1866 was $54,000,000, exceeding that of her gold crop by several millions. The soil and climate are finely adapted for the culture of the grape, and there are over 25,000,000 of vines now in the state. Besides the inexhaustible gold mines, minerals and metals of almost every kind are found, some of them in abundance. From its sunny valleys to its snow-clad peaks, it has a wide range of temperature, but its climate is everywhere salubrious, and it has already a population of over half a million. Seeds from her giant trees over 300 feet high and 25 feet in diameter, have been planted and have germinated in our eastern soil, and by their rapid growth, promise to become as large as the parent trees—a process which will occupy 2,225 years!
Photograph of a Cannon Ball.—The photographic art is now so perfected, that it is possible to take a picture of a cannon ball as it emerges from the cannon, and to ascertain with precision its path through the air, and the time it occupies in passing from one given point to another. In one picture taken, the front edge of the emerging ball was a little clouded, while the mouth of the cannon, the recoil not yet having commenced, was sharp and distinct.
English Fears and Perils.
THE attempt to blow up the Clerkenwell prison in London to release a Fenian prisoner is but one of a series of events which seem to have aroused a kind of lurking fear in the country remotely akin to that caused by the “Irish night” long ago. It is, however, one of the incidents which illustrate very plainly the character of the present outbreak of the Irish disaffection. Nobody can doubt that there are very earnest enthusiasts among the Irish agitators. There are honest visionaries and scholars, often bearing historic Irish names, who cherish a belief in the final emancipation of Ireland from England, which is suggestive in its romantic intensity of the devotion to these dreams of the older English Republicans.
Such men do not suppose that a liberating army is likely to march through Ireland. They do not propose to array the Irish population against the trained troops of England. Against foreign foes England is armed. The assault of such foes is a rain of blows upon a shield. But an internal, immeasurable, mysterious conspiracy, intrenched in race and religion, and every where dispersed, is a poison in the blood. It is an immediate and perennial peril. The empire becomes weakened by demoralization, and the speculative enthusiasts would look upon it as the decline of England into a lesser, even a secondary power, which would be but the beginning of the end.
Such men see, too, that this movement is strong in England itself; it is not confined to Ireland. Moreover, it is not led by the priests, but seems to be strong despite them. It asserts itself, too, at a time which is remarkable in English history. A remarkable political reform has just been accomplished; a vigorous blow has been struck at class rule; and a total change of the traditional method of the British Government has been effected; in fact a democratic revolution has occurred under the auspices of the Tory party, led by a political adventurer. The most accomplished of British statesmen, the acknowledged Liberal leader, Mr. Gladstone—the most truly popular chief, Mr. Bright—the most brilliant of Conservative Whigs, Mr. Robert Lowe, have all been outstripped by Mr. Disraeli, who is a very different kind of British minister from Walpole, or Chatham, or Pitt, or Canning, or Peel. Indeed, he seems not to be British at all, and yet, at the head of the most peculiarly British party, he not only carries the extraordinary reform in the suffrage, but the Ministry of which he is the master spirit refuses to resign when it is outvoted in the Commons. He merely smiles and says, “If you will not have my way, I will take yours”—a method which retains him permanently in office, and shocks every precedent of the British system.
While England is spell-bound by the brilliant audacity and Mephistophelian acuteness and adroitness of the minister, the Irish question presses more urgently than ever, and the Irish leaders of the kind of which we have spoken, doubtless see in Disraeli’s prominence and power another sign of the essential national decay upon which they count. Their hope, as we said last week, is not reform, but independence. Their cry is Ireland for the Irish. Their argument is, that although conquered centuries ago, Ireland has never been subdued by England, and that in the nature of things there can be no peace until she has her own again. It is impossible to imagine England yielding to such a demand; but if she should yield it is still more impossible, if we might say so, to imagine the consequences.
Whatever, therefore, is now done—whether, as many of the English papers demand, the most rigorous treatment is shown to every troublesome Irishman, or a milder policy prevails, something must be done for Ireland. Disraeli is meditating a plan, and John Bright in a late letter repeats his. In his judgment it is the land-tenure which is “the desperate malady which keeps your country in a state of chronic discontent and insurrection.” He wishes, therefore, to make the Irish farmer an owner, to give him a better national sentiment, and to show him (hic labor!) that England is truly friendly. He would therefore have a parliamentary Commission to buy large Irish estates of English owners and to sell them in existing farms to existing tenants, and upon easy terms. £5,000,000 to begin with would secure instant good results, and the process would go forward rapidly. In five years, he thinks, it would do much; in twenty it would change the aspect of things in Ireland.
Of course the Fenian alarm, which merely exasperates England, makes the adoption of any reasonable policy more difficult; but every nation seems unwilling to move in radical reforms until it is roughly seized and shaken.—Harper’s Weekly.
Obituary Notices.
By E. O. L.; E. B. SAUNDERS
Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth.
DIED, in Olcott, N. Y., Dec. 29, 1867, of consumption, Elmer L., infant son of Varney B., and Charlotte L. Gaskill, aged nearly eight months.
Think of the grave as his cradle bed,
And call the snow his little spread,
And say that he now is hushed in sleep,
And only for pain that he suffered, weep.
And let bright hopes of the future heal
The pangs of parting which now you feel.
For know when you reach the city fair,
In rosy health he will greet you there,
E. O. L.
DIED, Nov. 7, 1867, in the town of Greece, Monroe Co., N. Y., of injuries received by the running away of his team, Geo. W. Chafin, aged 54 years. Bro. C. has observed the Sabbath for the last fourteen years. He was anxious to live to see the Lord come, and has been trying to purify himself through the health reform, and obedience to the truth. He had gained a complete victory over tobacco. His attendance in our Sabbath meetings was regular, and his last testimony cheering and good. A large concourse attended the services on the occasion.
E. B. SAUNDERS.
War Prospects.
ITALIAN affairs continue so entirely to absorb the public attention that the public mind is occupied with nothing else. The vote of the Corps Législatif, although not unexpected, and although a less decided majority was obtained than had been anticipated, has not failed to direct the thoughts of every one to the consideration of the new phase which political events have assumed. The government, after much double dealing, has declared that it will protect the Pope and defend his territory. And on this declaration the entire Chamber, with the exception of an insignificant minority of Senators, has ratified and approved the policy of the government. The gauntlet is now thrown down on both sides of the Alps, and it would appear that the result must be either a war between France and Italy, with Prussia for an ally, or, what is still more probable, the dissolution of Italy.
Paris, and in fact all Europe, are occupied with Italian affairs. Vesuvius is in a state of eruption, an eruption which as yet is very partial, and which does not endanger the neighboring villages, but it is an eruption. What, with a political volcano and subterranean volcanoes, Italy is a country in perpetual agitation, especially in the South; and it is there where probably the future system will begin. Is there, then, between the earth and man, between nature and our passions, some strange connection, as between two beings whose sympathies are so strong that they are fatally attracted to each other? Are the volcanic eruptions the precursors of the political commotions of the inhabitants?
Finally, Denmark, constantly mindful of her lost provinces, is awaiting the time when she may be able to do, as regards Prussia, that of which Italy has been guilty in regard to France, regain the lost provinces and take the revenge which she is planning with all her feeble force.
Russia is looking at the same time, toward the Swedish provinces on the north, the Danubian provinces on the west, and Turkey on the south. If Sweden is carried away with her Scandinavian affinities and her family and historical relations toward France, her old ally, Russia will cast her eyes toward Stockholm, considering that ancient Scandinavia, as well as Finland, is a geographical dependence of Russia. If Austria, allied to France by the new interests in Italy and a feeling of revenge toward Prussia, becomes engaged in a movement, Russia will turn her attention to the Danube, considering that there are many Slavs in the Danubian principalities, and that Russia is the natural defender of the Sclavonic race. If Turkey does not cede to Greece all the Christian subjects which she is no longer able to maintain—that is, Crete to-day, Epirus or Thessaly to-morrow—Russia will turn her attention to Constantinople, in that she is the natural protector of the Greek Christians, and without avowing her immoderate desires for conquest. And, finally in order to attain this triple end, Russia will join hands with Prussia, strengthen Pan-Sclavism, marry its daughter to the King of Greece, and for the thousandth time, as it has recently done, seek a quarrel with Turkey by the use of an old Russian Consul, at Adrianople, who claims that the Russian flag has been insulted in his person by a Turkish officer.
Spain is about to convoke the Cortes, and meanwhile has assumed a pacific prudence. Spain is too much rent with internal dissensions, too sick in politics and in finance to take any active part in the agitation of the Roman question. All her desires are in favor of the Papacy—but, as long as there is not open war, her support will consist only in vows. However impotent the Italian marine may be, it is tenfold more powerful than the marine of Spain. A contest between Spain and Italy is not possible except in the event of a French invasion. However great may be the desire of Isabella to have a quarrel with her cousin and enemy, the King of Italy, the quarrel is at all events postponed.
As far as England is concerned, she has desire and interest enough to intervene in the affairs of Italy. But how? Her immediate interest and friendship incline her to the side of France. She has the Fenians, Abyssinia and reform on her hands. Her Catholics are using all their influence in favor of the Papacy. England will probably enter her protest, but will not enter upon hostility either open or avowed.
In short, the grandeur of the contest will probably prevent the contest itself. If, then, any thing comes of all this agitation, it will not be before spring. And who knows what may take place in Italy between this and spring? But at all events it is in Italy that the tempest is, and it is from Italy that we shall hear the first thunder, if the cloud that menaces the horizon is a thunder cloud.
Paper from Corn Fibre.—At the Imperial Printing and Paper-making Establishment at Vienna, Austria, the process of making paper from corn fibre has been brought to great perfection. It is claimed that the paper thus made, is stronger than cotton or linen paper of the same weight; that in hardness and fineness of grain it exceeds the best hand-made English drawing paper; that it is more durable than any other paper, and is not, like parchment, subject to be destroyed by insects, thus rendering it peculiarly valuable for documents, records, etc.; that it is unsurpassed for tracing-paper, and can be made extremely transparent, and is specially adapted to photography. It is also claimed that all papers ordinarily made from cotton and linen rags can just as well be made from this material; that it can be easily converted into the finest writing and printing paper, and almost as advantageously into superior stout wrapping-paper. It readily receives any tint of color.