THE reason that the pagan population of the Soudan country are so easily drawn into Mohammedanism is, that there is little or no influence to oppose the transition. The adversary of truth would impose all sorts of obstacles in the way of a heathen's accepting Christianity, while no hindrance at all would confront his becoming a Mohammedan. In fact, the experience of missionaries proves that the latter condition is worse than the former so far as access to them with the truth is concerned. Hence there is every reason for energetic effort on the part of Christian missionaries to forestall the Mohammedan emissaries in that country.
The same principle holds good with reference to the recent revivals of Buddhistic energy in various other countries. A wave of great deception is sweeping over the world, because the devil "knoweth that he hath but a short time." Rev. 12:12. Therefore he is stirring up interest in all the anti-Christian religions of the past, in addition to all the new fads of political religion, and "science falsely so-called" by which the Scriptures are discredited; and even the Christian religion is perverted by false doctrine. Yes, the enemy of souls is using every possible means to strew the earth with obstacles to the proclamation of Gospel truth in these perilous times.
All the lethargy and conflicting effort and other causes of delay that are allowed to retard the work of giving the "commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus" to those in darkness, only serve to make the labor more difficult, by causing their hearts to become clogged against the truth because of the increasing accumulations of error. The more the heathen are imbued with the traditions of men, even in the name of Christianity, the more difficult it will be to cause them to understand the true doctrine of Christ and of His soon coming to judge the world by His immutable law.
To those who, by the Spirit through the Word, have been enlightened concerning the Gospel of the kingdom now due to the world, the Lord is saying: "Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people; but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and His glory shall be seen upon thee. And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising. Lift up thine eyes round about, and see; all they gather themselves together, they come to thee; thy sons shall come from far, and thy daughters shall be nursed at thy side. Then thou shalt see, and flow together, and thine heart shall fear, and be enlarged; because the abundance of the sea shall be converted unto thee, the forces of the Gentiles shall come unto thee." Isa. 60:1-5.
What a golden opportunity is just now before those whom God has enlightened with "present truth"—the message especially due to the world in these last days! Shall we truly embrace the opportunity? G.
WANTED FOR MISSIONARY WORK.
(Always prepay postage.)
ENGLISH, Swedish, and Danish literature for use in ship work. Address, Mrs. M. L. Carr, Tuxpam, Vera Cruz, Mexico. Postage on publications to Mexico, one cent for two ounces.
ANY of our denominational literature. Address, Paul Curtis, Box, 428, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
"SAVE THE BOYS."
By Editor
The November issue of this journal, sixteen pages, and illustrated, will be of more than ordinary value as a temperance document, and deserves a wide circulation. To this end it is offered at the very low rate of $1.50 per 100; five cents for single copy. This journal is published by one of our pioneer ministers. Order now. Address, SAVE THE BOYS, Washburn Park, Minneapolis, Minn.
UNION COLLEGE SCHOOL OF CORRESPONDENCE.
THE courses comprise six subjects, namely: New Testament History, conducted by M. E. Kern; New Testament Greek, conducted by Prof. A. Kunze; English Grammar (two courses), conducted by Miss Winnifred Peebles; German Rhetoric, conducted by Prof. A. Kunze; Art, conducted by Miss Elsa Northrup.
The New Testament History is a thorough study of the Life of Christ and Acts of the Apostles, using the same printed lessons as are used in the College.
In the New Testament Greek a knowledge of the Greek is obtained by the inductive method through the study of the New Testament, beginning with the epistle of John.
Of the two courses in English Grammar, one is for the ordinary student who wishes to master the grammar, the other is adapted especially to the needs of teachers, being a thorough review and the study of methods in all grades.
The German Rhetoric is offered to all who are far enough advanced in the language to take Rhetoric.
The Art work is entirely individual work and will be of special value to church and Sabbath-school teachers, or any one wishing to draw or paint from nature in water colors.
Each course, except the Teachers' Course in Grammar, covers the work done in Union College in one school year; fifteen months is the limit in which the work may be finished by correspondence. The Teachers' Course in Grammar covers a half year's work, and seven months is allowed for its completion. Certificates are granted to those who finish the work, and credit on the regular College books is given when the students pass a satisfactory examination at the College.
Tuition for the Teachers' Course in English Grammar, $5.00; all others, $10.00.
For further information, or for remittances, address the one who conducts the course in which you are interested. The address in each case is College View, Neb.
RESPONSIBILITY.
SOME time ago a good, Christian mother was advised to give brandy to her delicate baby boy in his food. One day the brandy bottle was empty, and no one was in the house to send for a fresh supply, so the mother prepared the food without its usual flavoring spirit. To her amazement the babe spat it out with evident lack of relish. With horror she realized that she had already fastened upon her infant child the deadly alcoholic appetite. Being a woman of quick resolve and firm determination, she said to the little one: "Well, my boy, if you will not take your food without brandy, you can go hungry until you will." How few mothers would have recognized the danger until it was too late!—Selected.
READING NOT FOR CHILDREN.
By Editor
READING not for children includes preeminently the ordinary daily newspaper of the present. Filled at the best with sensational news, made up of half-truths, ill-founded reports, poorly-digested facts, exaggerated statements, it does not possess a simple element which is truly educational to the child, or which helps in the formation of character. Not long ago one of these sensational sheets declared emphatically editorially, in a talk with boys, that no boy ought to read the daily papers. Read the following from the Century Magazine, of May, 1888:
"How much of an improvement have we in Hoe's wonderful presses, in the steam which drives them, and in the electricity which makes the modern newspaper 'the history (?) of the world for a day'? Its reader has his ten (16 to 24) pages a day and perhaps thirty-two (64 to 100) on Sundays; he has hundreds of thousands of advertisements a year, and is himself numbered among hundreds of thousands of readers; he has daily news of the passing illness of crowned heads, the daily happenings of his own and other countries, everything that may be called 'new,' no matter how inane or evil.
He lays his newspaper down bewildered by a phantasmagoria of unconnected facts (?) relating to every part of the universe, with his taste vitiated by slang, bad English, loose information, everything which can dissipate his mental energies, and with his heart, it may be, corrupted by grosser evils. Is he a clearer-headed, a wiser, or a better man than the New Yorker of just a hundred years ago, who, holding up his Independent Gazetteer, and not caring a jot that he had not heard from Boston in two days, or North Carolina in two days, went quietly home to meditate on or discuss an essay of Hamilton, Madison, or Jay?
Does the successful modern newspaper make its readers better critics than were made by its predecessors of years ago? The newspapers of the past gave us, in the fulness of time, a literature whose names, from Bryant to Prescott and Motley, are classic. What sort of literature is our modern newspaper likely to give us?
The typical modern newspaper, to meet the taste which it has created, must surrender whole columns to writers who aim only at being amusing, and often succeed only in being pert, slangy, or scandalous; and it must find or invent 'news'—news which have about as lofty an influence on the minds of readers as the wonders of the fair had on the mind of Moses Primrose. A continual flood of such matter is not to be offset or corrected by an occasional brilliant editorial or a half-column speech by a public man, or a 'syndicate' story by a good writer. And the efforts are cumulative; such newspapers are steadily training a large number of readers to false standards in the only literature of which they have a close and daily experience; and the newspapers themselves are as steadily being forced to an adoption of these false standards."
And how much worse is all this upon a young receptive mind. Take as much pains to secure for your children and for yourself good, pure, true, helpful reading as you would to obtain good food or clean physical environment.
THE SALOON.
Is It a Good Thing?
Yes and No.
YES, for the saloon-keeper.
YES, for the brewer.
YES, for the distiller.
YES, for the gambler.
YES, for the confidence man.
YES, for the hold-up man.
YES, for the criminal court lawyer.
YES, for ward-boss who gets his weekly rake-off.
YES, for yellow-newspaper editor who gets his sensation ready-made there.
YES, for the spoilsman, who at the last moment can always defeat civic reform by buying up the saloon's habitues.
YES, for the trapper who lives by snaring young men and girls at the wine-room supper.
YES, for every brute that, guised in man's garb, goes out to serve his master, the devil, and drags his victims down to the hell he has made for himself.
For these and their like the saloon is a "good thing" eternally.
But—Is The Saloon a Good Thing?
NO, for the man who drinks up his wages there.
NO, for the wife whose home is bare of comfort, because of the wages her husband lost there.
NO, for the children who breakfast on crusts, and dine on crusts, and go to bed supperless, because their father spent his wages for drink and not for food.
NO, for the butcher, who loses the wages the saloon-patron might have spent for steaks and chops.
NO, for the baker, who would sell a loaf or two of bread every day to every saloon victim if there was no saloon to tempt him when he went home from work at night.
NO, for the shoe-dealer, who would have an average of from two to five new customers for every saloon customer, if the saloon were closed and the drinker spent part of his wages to buy new shoes for his family.
NO, for the father whose son begins to sow his wild oats in the high-license "buffet," goes from15bar to barrel-house, and winds up a physical, mental, and moral suicide.
NO, for the young woman, who marries the man she loves "to reform him," and finds out too late what hell on earth is like.
NO, for the tax-payer who thinks he is getting off easy by making the saloon pay him in license fee from 5 to 10 per cent. of its net proceeds, and forgets to figure up as a part of the debit side:
(1) The cost of the police court;
(2) Jail;
(3) County house;
(4) Fires caused by drunken employees;
(5) Shrinkage in real estate values in saloon districts; and—
(6) The loss to the community of labor of able-bodied men whom the saloon tempts to periodical sprees, or whose drink-undermined health and poverty at length makes a public charge; to say nothing of the boys and girls caught by rum before they are old enough to know better; and the neutralizing of all Christian endeavor by the ever-present, ever-busy influence of its worst enemy.
For these, and for every healthy, wholesome interest of every community, the saloon is NOT a good thing, but a mighty bad thing eternally.
If you believe this, work against it in your town, your state, and your nation every time and in every way.
NOT UNDERSTOOD.
Not understood! We move along asunder,
Our paths grow wider as the seasons creep
Along the years. We marvel and we wonder
Why life is life, and then we fall asleep,
Not understood.
Not understood! How trifles often change us!
The thoughtless sentence and the fancied slight
Destroy long years of friendship and estrange us,
And on our souls there falls a freezing blight,
Not understood.
Not understood! How many hearts are aching
For lack of sympathy? Ah, day by day,
How many cheerless, lonely hearts are breaking,
How many noble spirits pass away
Not understood.
O God! that men might draw a little nearer,
Or judge less harshly when they can not see;
O God! that men might draw a little nearer
To one another. They'd be nearer Thee,
And understood.
—Anon.
INFLUENCE OF EARLY TRAINING.
By Mrs. Mary J. Wooliever
BY MRS. MARY J. WOOLIEVER.
"Train up a child in the way he should go; and when he is old, he will not depart from it." Prov. 22:6.
It is the duty of parents to train their children for the Lord, and He will hold them responsible if they neglect this all-important work.
God said He would judge the house of Eli forever, because his sons made themselves vile and he restrained them not. 1 Sam. 3:13. This impresses me with the idea that the duties of parents are not ended when their children are grown; but that they should ever strive to keep them in the right way. If parents realized this more fully and acted accordingly, they would not be so careless, so neglectful, of their children after they had grown up. The influence of the parents would have held them much more strongly than it has, and they would have been restrained from many crimes and much wickedness, and there would not be so many grief-stricken parents as there are to-day.
Of course, some children will depart from their training. The first children born into this world of ours were a proof of this painful truth. Cain and Abel were children of the same parents, so I presume they had the same training; and yet one was righteous while the other imbrued his hands in the blood of his own brother.
I believe if children are carefully and prayerfully trained, they can not go astray without feeling the strong restraining influence of early training, and that sometimes they will return to the training they received in childhood, and not depart from it.
How essential, then, that we train our children in the right way. In order to do this, we parents must be ourselves walking in the way of righteousness. May God help us to perform our whole duty.
Selma, Cal.
THE LOWER LIGHTS.
"I DON'T believe I'll go to church to-day," said Ruth one Sunday morning at the breakfast table. "Somehow I don't feel like it, and nobody will ever know the difference whether I'm there or not."
"My dear," said Aunt Margaret, "I've often heard you singing, 'Let the Lower Lights Be Burning.' I wonder if you know the story that suggested it?"
"No," answered Ruth, "I never so much as heard that there was one."
"Some years ago a steamer in a terrific gale was trying to make the harbor of Cleveland, Ohio. There were two lights at the entrance of the harbor, one, the upper light on the bluffs of the shore; the other, the lower light on a bar at the other side of the entrance. The pilot peered out anxiously to catch a glimpse of the friendly lights, and presently caught sight of the upper one. But that alone was not sufficient; he must also see the other to know just where to go. But for some reason it was not lighted on time. Beaten by wind and wave, the steamer staggered on as best she could, while the hearts of all on board trembled with fear. If she missed the entrance there was little hope of her escaping the rocks. Suddenly the lower light appeared, but, alas! it was too late—the steamer had missed the entrance, and in the attempt to turn about went down with all on board."
"I suppose," said Ruth with a laugh, "you mean that even if I am the most insignificant member of our church, and sit on the very back seat, it is my duty to be in my place?"
"You remember George Eliot's poem of the violin maker, who said that if he did not make the very best violin possible for him to make, God would miss the music? If we are not each one of us faithfully doing our duty, be it small or great, there is silence or discord where there might have been music. More than that, our lives are bound together—we must needs lift up those about us or drag them down. We are bidden to sow our seed at all times, for we know not whether shall prosper either this or that, or whether both shall be alike good. The cobbler, as I once heard a minister say, could not paint a picture, but he could tell Apelles that the shoe tie was not right, and so might help toward making the beautiful picture perfect."—Zion's Herald.
HINTS FOR THE HOUSEWIFE.
THE tops of wardrobes and cupboards (that do not reach to the ceiling) should have papers laid over them not only to keep dust from sifting down, but to lighten the monthly house cleaning.
A New York woman recommends a novel remedy for cinder in the eye, viz., a loop of horsehair run up under the lid. Of course, the hair should be thoroughly sterilized before being used.
If newspapers are spread on the floor before the stove when ashes are to be removed much work will be saved, for the papers can be gathered up and burned and there will be no necessity for sweeping. The ashes should be sprinkled with water before the pan is overturned.
It is suggested that a bit of wrapping cord be placed around the edge of a buttonhole with the loop to the front and the stitches taken over it. This is recommended for children's clothes that will have hard usage.
A quick-witted woman stopped the flow from a cut artery in the leg by putting the foot in three inches of flour in a large jar and packing the flour to the top of the jar, beating the flour down with a piece of stove wood.
All kinds of leather shoes can be cleaned and polished with milk which should be put on generously, allowed to dry, then polished with dry flannel. Rubber-soled tennis shoes have proved most desirable in which to do housework, as they save both noise and jar. They are also preservers of hardwood floors, and seldom cost over fifty cents.
REWARDS AND PUNISHMENTS.
By Ruth C. Sweet
FEW realize the importance of the relation existing between the proper use of rewards and punishments and good government. Few sense the fact that wisdom and caution are necessary in dispensing each. Let us consider the Lord's way of looking at these important factors in child training.
In Rev. 22:12 we find the words, "And, behold, I come quickly; and My reward is with Me, to give every man according as his work shall be." And what determines what our work shall be? Is it not our motive? Can an evil tree bring forth good fruit? —No; and a good tree can not bring forth evil fruit. God knows what our works will be; for "man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart." Then, to follow the divine pattern, we must praise, reprove, correct, or reward, according to motive, not consequences.
To illustrate: Two little boys, brothers aged three and five, were playing together. The baby persisted in striking those around him with a wire which he held in his hand. The other took the wire away, and struck him with it to teach him not to strike others. Do we ever do the same thing? Later the baby returned the blow with the same wire, and it chanced to hit the eye of the older child. Which should have been punished, the babe, because evil resulted from his action? or both because motives were wrong? By all means both of the children should have received correction, rather than one be petted and the other blamed. Yet how often we see this mistake made. O, consider the Lord's way; study motive, not result.
If your little one throws a dish on the floor and it does not break, why do you let it pass unnoticed? If the act is repeated, the dish broken, why punish? You are looking at the result. And here I would ask, What motive in your own heart causes you to punish the child? Is it not more often your own vexation than a careful and prayerful consideration of the child's welfare? Do you ever stop to think that children understand this,—that if you punish with any but an unselfish motive (that of the future good of the child) the punishment is worse than wasted?
We have the plain statement that "more devils are put into a child by beating than are taken out." Why? Because your motive is not a good one. You are not considering the character building of the child, but venting your own feelings in striking.
Where punishment is necessary, let it be along the line of offense; if privileges are abused, let them be refused. Then let this be done at once; do not delay the punishment until the effect will be lost and justice questioned.
I knew of a teacher who kept a boy in at recess a week after he had whispered, without telling him why he was being punished. He never forgot the injustice, and the good of the punishment was lost. Where the same boy would have responded to gentleness and immediate action, the heart was hardened, and a feeling of rebellion entered.
Then by delay we are apt to lose sight of the importance of the offense, and do ourselves and the child an injury by too slight a punishment.
Do not exact promises of future obedience from a child under threats of prolonged punishment.
Repentance to the extent of giving up the sin is required. Do not lower the standard. After a child has once repented do not keep the temptation from reaching him again. Should it come up it will prove the genuineness of the repentance.
After a confession is made treat him as tho nothing had occurred; restore him to favor. Do not use shame or praise excessively as a means of government. The result would be either pride or humility to excess.
Never allow your face to show your vexation, especially at consequences. God is a God of love and not of fear, therefore be like Him. Hearts are as often softened by correction properly given, as by rewards. Let us, for the good of the lives entrusted to us for a season, try these things, and praise, correct, reprove, or reward according to motive.—Ruth C. Sweet.
PURE AIR IN THE SICK ROOM.
THERE is nothing more essential than pure air at all times, both to the well and to the sick; but especially to the sick, as they need all the vitalizing power which can possibly be brought to their aid. But there is nothing more difficult than to properly ventilate a sick-room. In most houses it is impossible to ventilate properly, but every effort should be put forth to give the patient pure, fresh air. Happily, the old-time fear of air and water in sickness is measurably passing away, and blanketing the doors and windows (as we have seen done) for fear a breath of air should enter the room, is not very often seen now.
And it is difficult—almost impossible—for those who are constantly in the room to judge of the condition of the air. A person may not feel any inconvenience, and may therefore think the air is good and pure when it is very foul and impure. In most cases it may be tested by going out into the open air a few minutes, and then entering the room and noting the difference. If the air is foul it can generally be perceived. Of course the difference of temperature must be taken into account. If the room of the sick can not be ventilated directly from outdoors, without exposing to a draught, then adjoining rooms should be often and thoroughly ventilated, and when the outside doors are closed, then open the doors between the rooms.
It seems almost unnecessary to say that smoking tobacco should not be permitted in the house where there is a sick person. It is not sufficient that there be no smoking in the sick room. If permitted in another room in the house, it will fill the sick-room when the door is opened.—Pacific Health Journal.
Devotional Songs
One-half new songs that will never grow old
One-half old songs that will always be new
Devotional Songs
250 pages, cloth, $25.00 per 100; 30 cents each by mail.
A copy for examination will be mailed on request. Returnable. Published by the publishers of the famous "Gospel Hymns."
THE BIGLOW & MAIN Co., New York and Chicago
THE "MODERN" DUPLICATOR
Costs $2.75 to $6.75 according to size
The NEW Method of duplicating, or printing, Letters, Music, Drawings, Lessons, etc. We are spending $100,000 to tell you about it. "Write Now" for illustrated catalog. Durkin, Reaves & Co., Mfgrs., 339 Fifth Ave., Pittsburg, Pa.
TEN DOLLARS A WEEK.
SOME agents are making as high as $10 a week selling E-Z Washing Tablets. Why not you? Sample bar sufficient for a month's washing for 10 cents post-paid. TERMS FREE. Address, Alfred Mallett, Elkridge Sta., Baltimore, Md.
Millennial Text-Book
MILLENNIAL TEXT-BOOK.—Every known reference, over 500 arranged according to events, adapted for instant reference or profound Bible study; result of 12 years search. Mailed for 10 one-cent stamps or a dime. Eugene A. Brown, Phoenix, Ariz.
SUNSET MAGAZINE
DESCRIBES
California
Not only California, but all the great West, is truthfully described in the beautifully illustrated pages of this virile Western monthly. Its fine half-tones make you SEE the country, while its descriptive and industrial articles TELL YOU EXACTLY what is to be found there. It is
"Opportunity"
in visible form, for it shows the wonderful chances for success now open in the new West for wide-awake people.
If your news dealer doesn't carry SUNSET, send us his name and address and write for sample copy.
HOME OFFICE: 431 California St.
San Francisco, California.
ABIDING SPIRIT.—By the late Mrs. S. M. I. Henry. The object of this book is to show the necessity of having the help of the Holy Spirit in the performance of the common and every-day duties of life. Plain, cloth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40c.
Gilt edges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75c.
Address PUBLISHERS OF THIS PAPER
Healdsburg College
By Editor
Healdsburg College.—We had the privilege of a brief visit to Healdsburg College a few days ago. We were glad of the opportunity. From all that we saw, from all that we heard, from conversation with students and teachers, we are sure that the school is doing splendidly. The one thing lacking was students. There are a goodly number of bright young men and women, but the school could accommodate many more. And there are many young persons who need the instruction, the discipline, of heart and mind and body, which the college is giving. Of course, it will cost a young man something to go, but let him enter the college, improve his time, economize in means, and come out as poor as the proverbial "church mouse," and still he will be richer than when he entered. His money and time expended in getting the right kind of an education pays. Therefore we say, Young man, young woman, go to Healdsburg College. It is a better investment than United States bonds.
The Continental Sunday.
By Editor
A correspondent of the Christian Advocate sends the following extract from a letter, written by his son, in Heidelberg, Germany:
O, these Continental Sundays! All the stores open; and more business done than on any other day of the week. Every one is on the streets; all the public gardens are full. Two or three bands playing all the time. Cafés crowded (the people eat all day long) and the castle an absolute impossibility on account of the crowds that swarm about the old ruin. One or two Sunday evenings ago, coming down the Philosophian Way on the hill across the river, where a Chicago boy and I had gone for a quiet walk, we passed a crowd of drunken revelers returning from "a big day"—men and women in each other's arms, and very profusely decorated with leaves and vines twined about their heads and bodies, singing and dancing; and a large wagon full of baskets and empty kegs bringing up the rear. Here among these beautiful hills, where everything is so peaceful in nature, and so worshipful, these Germans make the day a perfect desecration.
But this correspondent should not find fault. All this has been characteristic of Sunday-keeping from ancient, idolatrous times. The Germans are merely keeping alive the ancient traditions. That can not be desecrated which is not sacred. When did Sunday become sacred?
Headache Powders
Headache Powders.—The Medical Record says: “The death of a woman in Philadelphia as a result of taking a popular headache powder, and the occurrence of a death from a like cause in Chicago, call renewed attention to an evil for which there should be a ready remedy.”
Name or Title?
Name or Title?—Was "Melchizedek" the name of the priest of God Most High who met Abraham, or was it his title? If what is said in Heb. 7:3, "without descent," "without genealogy" (R.V.), pertains solely to his office, by parity of reasoning, the term Melchizedek pertains to the order of priesthood. And this is also made clear. Melchizedek is composed of two words, Melchi, king, and zedek, righteousness, just as Pharaoh is a general title of Egyptian kings, meaning the representative of the sun god. Every priest in that order bore the title Melchizedek, King of Righteousness, and was both priest and king.
It Has Not.
By Editor
In a recent issue of a temperance paper we find these words, used in discussing the Sunday-closing of saloons:
Violators of our Sunday laws seem to forget that the Fourth Commandment of the Decalogue has never been repealed.
Yes, and Sunday-law promoters seem to forget it, too. What has Sunday-closing to do with the Fourth Commandment of the Decalogue? That commandment enjoins the seventh day, the day upon which the Creator rested, which He hallowed, upon which and within which He placed His blessing, and which He commanded forever. That precept pertains not merely to proportion of time,—that is incidental,—but to the particular time, the day. What right has man to set it aside, put himself in the place of God, and declare that God means what He does not say? How much of the spirit of Sabbath violation is fostered by these self-constituted interpreters of Jehovah's law the judgment alone will reveal. We are not referring to those who are observing Sunday ignorantly, supposing it to be of divine institution; God will lead every honest soul of them into the light. We refer to those who interpret, construe, God's law contrary to His express words, and then seek to enforce their construction contrary to the Spirit of the Gospel and His own direct instruction. And the worst thing we wish them is that they may see God and His law as it is. If temperance people would disconnect from all religious legislation whatsoever, they would do far stronger work. Those who seduce them to work for Sunday-closing, are working for Sunday and not for temperance.
The Human Cost of Intoxicating Liquor
The barbarian custom of placing a number of human sacrifices under the foundations of their chiefs' residences and council houses is not without its counterpart in "civilized" enterprises. One of the greatest difficulties connected with the Panama Canal is the fearful sacrifice of human life among the laborers. From first to last, a life for every rod is not deemed an extravagant estimate. And when the isthmus railroad was built, the sacrifice was hardly less, if not more. But none of these things are as bad as a prominent "industry" that is fostered and licensed, and thus made to appear legitimate, in all the "civilized" nations of earth. In the United States alone the people sacrifice a hundred thousand human victims every year in order to uphold the intoxicating liquor structure. This in addition to the betrayal of unnumbered souls and the squandering of untold millions of dollars in money and property.
Righteousness
Righteousness.—Many professed ministers of the Gospel are extensively engaged in preaching a so-called "civic righteousness." That is, they make it their business to see that officials execute the civil laws, and also to conjure new laws for enforcing their ideas of conducting worldly affairs. The result of such work is the display of their own self-righteousness. In ancient Israel it was called tradition, which Christ said made of none effect the law of God. When Paul became a Christian, he discarded that kind of righteousness, and sought the righteousness of Christ, which is of God by faith, Phil. 3:8, 9. The Gospel of Christ is the proclamation of righteousness by faith, not by human law. How much more effective would be the work of reformation, if the ministry would hold aloft the commandments of God, which constitute "the whole duty of man" (Eccl. 12:13), and the faith of Jesus, by which we are enabled to perform that duty. "It shall be our righteousness, if we observe to do all these commandments before the Lord our God, as He has commanded us." Deut. 6:25. "The fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace" (James 3:18)—not of them that wage carnal warfare upon their fellows by means of civil law.
Life and Health for November
By Editor
"Life and Health" for November, is a number that ought to interest parents especially. It really is upon not only a question of interest but it meets a need. One of the great problems in this country has been the health of school children, and warnings innumerable have been heard from physicians. The November number of Life and Health gives large consideration to this question. The first article is "The Health of School Children from a Physician's Standpoint." There are articles on "The Necessity of Play," "The Daughter in the Home," "Foods at a Boarding-place," "School Lunches," "At What Age a Child Should Begin School," "The Primary School Teacher," and an article on the school girl and her relation to the other sex. The editorial department deals largely with the school question from the health standpoint also. To use a conventional, hackneyed term, the various departments of the journal are well sustained, and the price is only five cents. No family could make a better investment than to send fifty cents to the Review and Herald Publishing Association, 222 N. Capitol St., Washington, D. C., and obtain the Life and Health for a year.
A Worse Than Useless Life
By Editor
A Worse Than Useless Life.—The news comes from Munich, Bavaria, that a fortieth anniversary of an employee of a hospital has just been celebrated. The ones who celebrated it were beer saloon-keepers. The reason for the celebration is that that one man, in forty years, had drunk at that one saloon the enormous quantity of 43,800 liters of beer. A liter is a little more than a quart. This is an average of three gallons a day, and it had cost him over four thousand dollars. It would make a tank of beer twenty feet long by ten feet wide by seven and one-half feet deep. This is the record that one man leaves to posterity, by which he shall be remembered! Surely it would seem that the very object-lesson itself would turn any young man who had ambition away from it with loathing.
A New Bible Dictionary
A New Bible Dictionary.—Funk & Wagnalls Company, the originators and publishers of the great "Standard Dictionary," are about to publish a new Bible dictionary. Professor Melanchthon W. Jacobus, dean of Hartford Theological Seminary, recently made a successful trip to Europe to arrange for collaborators among the most eminent European scholars, in this great undertaking. The editors of this work are Professor Jacobus, Edward E. Nourse, Professor of Biblical Theology in Hartford Theological Seminary, and Andrew C. Zenos, Professor of Ecclesiastical History in McCormick Theological Seminary. The work is being rapidly pushed to completion. It will be a large single-volume work, and will be published during 1906.