This great international bugbear to Sabbath-keeping is a very near neighbor to us in Fiji. It may be of interest to many who have heard so much about the day-line to know how it appears at close range. After a number of years spent in Fiji we can say that the day-line is a very harmless thing, and it seems neither to affect Sabbath-keeping nor Sunday-keeping. Denominations both Protestant and Catholic live right by it and have no trouble from it. Natives are easily frightened, but we never knew one to get alarmed over the day-line.
We are satisfied that very few honest souls are worried over the day-line, or thereby deterred from keeping the Sabbath of the Fourth Commandment. In the first place, the Author of the Sabbath knew all about the day-line when He commanded man to observe the seventh day. Had the day-line been a real obstacle to Sabbath-keeping, God could not have been so unreasonable as to have commanded a Sabbath to be kept. He “hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation.” It was no afterthought with the Creator that there must be a day-line. He knew the earth was round when He made it. Man was a long time finding out this fact. Some poor souls were judged worthy of death because they had courage to assert such a fact. Many centuries ago, however, this truth had been written in the Bible. Isa. 40:22. Now that man has found out that the world is5round, he insults his Creator by implying that the Sabbath can not be kept because the world is round, has a day-line on it, or because it has a north and a south pole. In the judgment, how ashamed and confounded will be the man who has such a lame excuse to offer for his disobedience to God’s holy law!
It is often the case that he who offers the day-line objection, is a great stickler for Sunday observance. Having disposed of the Bible Sabbath to his own satisfaction, his brain, confused by the effort, seems powerless to grasp the fact that the world is as round on Sunday as upon any other day. The day-line has as much to do with Sunday-keeping as with Sabbath-keeping.
Where is the Day-Line?
There must be some places where travelers going from the western confines of the continents of America to Asia or Australia, or vice versa, must adjust their reckoning of time. The settlement of the earth by the descendants of Noah indicates the natural location for such a day-line to be in the Pacific Ocean. Some talk of an Edenic day-line, meaning a day-line located where Eden is supposed to have been. This is thought by some to have been in the valley of the Euphrates. A better name for such a day-line would be the Babylonian day-line, for there is more certainty of the location of that ancient metropolis, and it better indicates the nature of a day-line running through populous countries—a day-line truly Babylonian, for endless confusion would thereby result. But the day-line indicated by the migrations of nations is located in the broad Pacific. This will be apparent immediately we remember that the peopling of the earth was east and west, north and south, from the place where the tower of Babel was built. Gen. 11:1–9. “And the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth.” Verse 8. Babel was at the grand center of the continents of Asia, Europe, and Africa. Australia is geographically in close proximity to these divisions of the earth. Then from Europe the Americas were settled by civilized nationalities.
Now that the earth is settled there is not the slightest hitch, there is no confusion in regard to time. This never arose till the Pacific was crossed, when individuals seeking new lands, or gold, or pleasure, crossed this mighty expanse of waters. Then it was found that there was a difference of time. This is explained by the fact that in traveling around the globe from east to west, we are traveling in an opposite direction to the diurnal motion of the earth; or in other words, we are traveling with the apparent motion of the sun, hence each day is thus a little longer to us than if we remained stationary. In traveling around the earth this difference of time will amount to an entire day and must of course be dropped from our reckoning. In case we travel against the apparent motion of the sun, that is, from west to east, each day of ours is shorter than the day of those who remain in one place. This amounts to a whole day when we have encircled the earth, and to adjust ourselves to the time indicated by the great time-keeper, the sun, we must now add a day, just the time we have lost in traveling with the earth or against the apparent motion of the sun.
Were the day-line to run through populous countries, we can at once see that it would work confusion, but as it is naturally indicated to be in the great Pacific, no trouble need arise. There is abundance of water in this ocean so that between the great continents we have ample time to adjust ourselves to the proper reckoning.
The 180th Meridian.
This has been quite generally chosen by the leading nations as the day-line. For navigators, as a point where they are to adjust their reckoning in their voyages across the great deep, it is perhaps as good as any other meridian. But there is nothing to indicate that the day-line should be an arbitrary one confined to an exact minute of longitude. The 180th meridian passes through habitable parts of the globe, and therefore in those countries through which it passes it is unreasonable to regard it as the day-line. This meridian passes through Taveuni, Fiji, and if it be the true and only place for a day-line, then under the one sunlight there are two days on the one island. This would be unfortunate since Taveuni is a populous island, sometimes called the “Garden of Fiji.” It would cause endless confusion. That it is not indeed the day-line, is shown by the fact that navigators of vessels sailing in the group pay no attention to such a day-line. Neither the Wesleyans nor the Catholics pay any attention to such an inconsistent thing as a day-line on the 180th meridian.
This is all proof that the day-line, or place to readjust ourselves in our migrations from one side of the Pacific to another, should not be regarded at any exact meridian, but in the Pacific between habitable lands. We need not be surprised by the inconsistency of two Sabbaths coming together, nor on the other hand, dropping a Sabbath, and so having no Sabbath for nearly two weeks. O no! the ocean of the Pacific presents plenty of space so that Sabbath-keepers in their traveling may keep the Sabbath as it comes to them, and, adjusting themselves on a day between Sabbaths, they keep the next Sabbath in harmony with Sabbath-keepers in the country to which they are traveling.
It is perhaps true that when the Lord in the beginning gathered the waters together into “one place,” he designed that there should be a body of water separating the continents of Asia and the Americas in which the day-line was to be, and if man had been faithful to God, Eden would have been the place for Sabbath gatherings where all of God’s children would have met for worship from all parts of the earth. This is the way it will be in the New Earth. Isa. 66:22, 23. And if this is the way it would have been had man never sinned, the day-line need never have been crossed by man, for leaving Eden after a Sabbath of rest, they would retrace their steps on every successive Sabbath and hence never cross the day-line.
God’s holy Sabbath, appointed at creation, is a Sabbath for all time, for all places. It was sanctified before sin entered, and it becomes the sign of loyalty in this world of sin, and in the earth made new it will ever be recognized by the redeemed host.
As the day-line has somewhat to do with the Sabbath, we are not to leave it to the inconsistent world to settle as to where it should be. God has indicated where it should be. Consider that the day-line lies in the Pacific Ocean, away from habitable lands, and then the matter is free from all inconsistencies.
It is sometimes said that it is as bad for the Sunday as for the Sabbath. True, but the man-made Sabbath has the “image and the superscription” of man. The Sabbath is divine and can not possibly be hampered by any such inconsistency as having two days under one sunlight, as would be the case in Fiji should the 180th meridian be selected as the day-line. J. E. FULTON. Suva, Fiji.
THE ANTE-MOSAIC ORIGIN OF LAW.
By Wm. Penniman
Both the Ceremonial and the Moral.
In the book of Genesis we have a record of the origin of the heavens and the earth, and also the origin of man, of the Sabbath, of language, of the institution of marriage, of nomadic life, of music, and of some handicrafts. Then why should we not expect to find here the origin of law? The so-called Mosaic laws did not all originate with Moses. In germ and in special form many of them existed in patriarchal times. The records of the book of Genesis clearly prove this, as there are incidental references to laws and usages which afterward became a part of the Mosaic code. The following are examples:—
More examples could be given; but the preceding are sufficient to prove the point.
We next notice the allusions to the moral law. We read: “Where no law is, there is no transgression.” Rom. 4:15. And we know that “sin is the transgression of the law,” and so “by the law is the knowledge of sin.” 1 John 3:4; Rom. 3:20. The law is the looking-glass of which James speaks. See James 1:23, 24. Let us see if they did not have this glass in patriarchal times.
In Gen. 26:4, 5 we read the promise of God that all nations should be blessed through the seed of Abraham, “because that Abraham obeyed My voice, and kept My charge, My commandments, My statutes, and My laws.” Then there were laws in the time of Abraham. We will look into the ten-commandment code given on Sinai, and see what we find that was given before there was a Jew in existence.
In Ex. 20:3 is given the law against idolatry, which teaches the worship of the true God. Did not Eve first, and then Adam, break this law when they made a god of appetite in partaking of the forbidden fruit? And did not Cain break it by his extreme covetousness in withholding the required offering?6
In Ex. 20:4 is given the law against image-worship. Jacob, moved by the Spirit of God, commanded his household to put away the strange gods from among them. Gen. 35:2, 4.
In Ex. 20:7 is recorded the law against profanity. This law was broken by Pharaoh (Ex. 5:2), and by Mrs. Job (Job 2:9). According to Bible chronology, the law was given B.C. 1491, and the chronology of the book of Job is placed at B.C. 1520.
For man. Gen. 2:2, 3; Mark 2:27. According to the texts quoted, it is plain that the word “God” in Gen. 2:2, 3, means Jesus Christ.
It is also evident from the same texts that Christ gave the example for rest on the first seventh day. He did not give the example of a seventh-portion-of-time rest, but of the particular day.
The Sabbath was not sanctified or set apart for God’s use, but for man’s. No other day of the week was made holy; therefore no other day can be kept as a holy day. God is never weary (Isa. 40:28); therefore the holy rest was an example for man. As God’s rest was a divine or spiritual rest, so man’s should be; and no one but a holy or spiritual person can truly keep it. As God’s refreshment was spiritual, so man’s should be.
The Sabbath is God’s memorial. Ps. 135:13. It distinguishes God as the great creator of the heavens and the earth. The word “remember,” which introduces the commandment, implies that it was an existing institution at the time the law was given on Sinai. God knew man would be liable to forget it, hence the injunction to “remember” it.
The reader will see how highly God regarded and honored His Sabbaths by His act in giving the people a double portion of manna on the sixth day. Ex. 16:4, 5. We learn also that He wished to “prove them” whether they would walk in His law or not. Read carefully all that is said of the Sabbath in Exodus 16, and mark that this is a record of events that occurred in connection with the Sabbath before the re-enactment of the law on Sinai.
There is much said about the “old Jewish Sabbath,” and the “old Jewish law.” With the same propriety we might talk of a Jewish God. We think, therefore, it has been briefly proved that there was a law and a Sabbath before there was a Jew; and that both the law and the Sabbath were for man.
Ex. 20:17 gives the command against covetousness. This law was broken by Laban (Gen. 31:41, 42); also by Jacob and Esau. This command strikes at the root of all sin; for covetousness is idolatry. Col. 3:5; Eph. 5:5; James 2:10. Peter speaks of the unlawful deeds of the people of Sodom and Gomorrah. 2 Peter 2:8. How could they be unlawful, if the law did not exist at that time?
But why multiply words on this subject? Away with the foolish assertion that the law was given only on Sinai to the Jews, and that we are not to keep the “Jewish Sabbath,” because we are not under the law, but under grace. We are not under the penalty of the law so long as we obey it.
May the Lord open the eyes of the people who are willing to have them opened, that they may see the clear sunlight of His truth, is my earnest prayer. Wm. Penniman.
Woodburn, Ill.
XXXII
By H. SHULTZ
In the summer of 1873 several Adventist ministers held meetings in our district school-house. I did not go; but the members of the church to which I belonged attended their meetings. One day a couple of my brethren came to see me, and asked me why I did not attend the meetings at the school-house. I said I did not believe in following every wind of doctrine. They replied that unless the doctrine of the Adventists could be proved false, many of the brethren and sisters would keep Saturday; and they wanted me to clear up this matter. I said, “Go to our minister.” They replied, “We have been to him, and he says he can not do anything with it.” I was provoked to think that we had a preacher who did not know enough to show up the error of the Adventists in keeping the seventh day. So I said, “All right, I will clear up the matter.” I did not know what a job I was undertaking. For three weeks I worked night and day to find the texts that taught us to keep the first day of the week holy; but, like Rachel, wept because they could not be found. I searched the good Book, verse after verse, chapter after chapter, but found not the much-longed-for texts because they were not. Alas, it was Sabbath, Sabbath everywhere, and Sunday nowhere. Then I propped myself up on two texts— one of these the text which speaks of Christ as the end of the law. I reasoned that the law ended when Christ came; but when I found the text my hope was gone; for I saw that the law was given as a rule of righteousness; that it could not justify me, because I had broken it. Then it held me as a criminal until I turned to Jesus, found forgiveness and righteousness, when it would let go its hold upon me. Hence Christ is the end of the law’s condemnation of me, because I was made righteous by faith in Him; but it stood ready to condemn me again if I broke it again. When I saw that the law could not be abolished, it left me with but one more prop, and that was, “Behold, I make all things new.” I said that it (the law) was all right, but God had made a new Sabbath. Hope revived in my heart that the Adventists would be proven wrong by this text. Search was made for the scripture, but O, when I found it (Rev. 21:1-7), my heart and last ray of hope for Sunday-keeping sank into my shoes. Here I saw that when God makes all things new, there will be no more death, no sorrow, no pain, no weeping. God will wipe away all tears from all eyes. I saw that the text had no reference to either Sabbath or Sunday keeping, but to a new state of things which does not exist yet. So nothing remained but to obey God and keep His commandments. H. SHULTZ.
“GIVE GLORY TO HIM.”
A PART of the message with which the great God would comfort His people, a part of His Gospel message as given by the “evangelical prophet,” is as follows:—
“All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth, because the breath of Jehovah bloweth upon it; surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth; but the Word of our God shall stand forever.” Isa. 40:6-8.
Surely this is not in harmony with the extravagant expressions of human laudation of the human which one now hears on every hand, among Christians and in religious circles as well as in political. Christians and religious bodies boast of their numbers, their wealth, their great institutions of education, of healing, of publishing; they laud their leaders and worship their wise men. Whatever the intent, the practice is not of God. God uses men. He takes wonderfully insignificant things and with them does mighty work, but the glory must be His.
Man, in himself, has nothing of which to boast. If he proves wise to-day, to-morrow his folly is evident to all. If he seems to possess great knowledge, the uncultured boor may prove him ignorant of simple facts. Is he rich?—In an hour his riches may be in ashes. Is he strong and well, and does he seem immortal to-day?—To-morrow muffled feet and mute lips and downcast eyes and sable garb may wind in slow and sad defile past his pale and lifeless corse. “Thus saith Jehovah, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches; but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he hath understanding, and knoweth Me, that I am Jehovah who exerciseth loving-kindness, justice, and righteousness in the earth: for in these things I delight, saith Jehovah.” Jer. 9:23, 24.
This, like the quotation from Isaiah, is a general statement, applicable to all people in all ages. The Morgan of to-day is no more than the Croesus of yesterday. The Spencer or the Leo X. of the now are no more than the Lokman or the Solomon of the past. A Kitchener may read his end by the grave of an Alexander or a Napoleon. “All flesh is grass,” and all the goodliness of man is as its flower,7more frail and ephemeral. Why, then, should men glory in men, bow to men, worship men? “Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man in whom there is no help.” Ps. 146:3. “Cursed is the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord. For he shall be like the heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh.” Jer. 17:5, 6.
The curse is no arbitrary act of God, no direct punishment sent by Him; it is all in the putting of one's trust on that which can give no help. And the great God tells us all these things that we may not be deceived. In His mercy, in His goodness, He tells us that we are naught apart from Him. That is the negative side of His glad message; and unless we can receive it, we shall never know its blessed positive—“the Word of the Lord endureth forever.” He who learns man's nothingness and places himself in God's power, will learn that His word can make the weakest, frailest, most insignificant thing glorious with the holiness, the beauty, of God. Looking upon Him, they will not glory in men. The language of the heart will be: “Far be it from me to glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world hath been crucified unto me, and I unto the world.” Gal. 6:14. God's everlasting Gospel is, “Fear God and give glory to Him.” Rev. 14:7.
The Value of Hard-Won Victories
VICTORIES that are easy are cheap. Those only are worth having which come as the result of hard fighting.—Beecher.
ASKING
“Ask, and it shall be given you,” says the Saviour, the One who has everything to give. But many are ready to doubt the promise, because, as they affirm, they have asked for many things and at many times without receiving. The disposition to doubt often arises from overlooking the conditions. This promise is modified by the condition that, “all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.”
Another condition is that it be according to the will of God. The prayer of Jesus was, “If thou be willing, remove this cup from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Thine, be done.”
Every acceptable petition is in the Spirit of faith and submission. Then in order to claim the promise, there must be the abiding spirit. “If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.” And this leads to the condition of abiding. “If ye keep My commandments, ye shall abide in My love; even as I have kept My Father’s commandments, and abide in His love.” All these conditions being complied with, the Spirit itself will make the intercession for us (Rom. 8:26), and there will be no disappointment. It will indicate what, and when, and how to ask according to the will of the Father. If these conditions be always kept alongside the promise, there will not be even seeming occasion for doubting.
THE LABORER'S ONLY HELP.
By G.
NOTWITHSTANDING the conceded oppression of the Pennsylvania coal miners by the operators, that is not all their troubles. It is a mooted question whether their condition previous to the great strike was not better than months of idleness, with its consequent train of evils. There is no doubt that a majority of the strikers, if left to themselves, would have returned to their work long ago. Perhaps there is not to be found anywhere a lot of more dependent people than those same miners. At work, they are poorly paid, robbed by storekeepers, and obliged to live in hovels. On strike, they are under command of union bosses, masters who will not permit them to work, and who have nothing to offer them but a dole of “charity.”
The abject slavery of these people is incidentally disclosed by a paper designed to laud the leader of the strikers. In the recital of his good qualities and his powers and prowess as a leader, there occurs this sentence:—
Day after day, night after night, in all the worriments and struggles, and with the thousands of details of the strike to attend to, distressed, harassed, at one time seeing defeat ready to slap him in the face, dreading every minute a rush back to work by the strikers, but never showing it in his face or manner—that is the kind of man —— —— is.
This is an admission by sympathizers with the strike that idle, suffering people are withheld from work by leaders who enjoy fairly good salaries, and are not in want. But this is not all of the glory this man gets from a strike-sympathizing source. Speaking of the hold he has on the laborers, the same article says:
Day by day, like a man dragging himself up a slippery cliff, he climbed, getting a firmer and firmer hold upon the strikers, until he had them where he has held them since, firmly in his grasp, obedient to his command.
And this is why hundreds of needy men with needy families were idle for months, when they wanted to work, and had opportunity to work. O yes, when at work they were sorely oppressed by their employers, but does that make excuse for others to compel them to take a worse position? Surely the lot of the laboring man is hard, when the only employment open to him, the only occupation he knows, is under the lash of cruel taskmasters, and he must have the permission of a tyrannical boss to even engage himself at that work. On either hand he is in somebody’s grasp. No wonder many laborers are inclined to think that it is better to work at any price, even tho the environment is bad, than to remain in the same environment under the dictation of those who have nothing to offer instead. No wonder the boss was “dreading every minute a rush back to work by the strikers,” when his rule would be at an end.
It is sad to note the many stratagems on foot to control the laboring masses, and it is surprising to see the number of men and combinations posing as the friends of labor. In the recent election every political party, and every candidate for office, was posing as the friend of the laboring classes. Yet it is clear that the central ambition is to be able to manipulate these classes for selfish purposes. It is wonderful, too, how easily such masses are led. The flattery, or the smooth promise, or the platitude glibly repeated, gives almost instant hope of better days, under the sway of some oily-tongued candidate for honor or fortune. With it all, evil men and seducers wax worse and worse, and wage laborers become more and more the objects of barter, a ladder on which ambitious, speculating schemers may climb into prominence. When some of these may be profited thereby, labor comes in for a modicum of temporary benefit, otherwise it is subject to the plucking of all who can.
The one thing that the dependent laborer needs to learn is, “Vain is the help of man.” Temporary and uncertain indeed is all that can come in that way. Listen to Him who alone can give permanent help, and who gave His life that He might help all who are oppressed. His invitation is: “Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light.”
G.
Question Corner
1295.—Day-Line. H. R.
See the article “The Day-Line” on another page.
1296.—J. W. G. asks if Rev. 13:11-18 does not have reference to labor unions in buying and selling.
Doubtless the principle of the boycott will be a factor in the operation of such a law as the prophecy indicates. That passage will be more fully considered in our studies on the Revelation.
What is the true translation of Job 19:25, 26, especially the phrase in our Common Version, “in my flesh shall I see God”? T. B. S.
The American Standard Revised Version reads:
“But as for me I know that my Redeemer liveth,
And at last He will stand up upon the earth;
And after my skin, even this body, is destroyed,
Then without my flesh shall I see God.”
This may mean apart from this corruptible flesh. The margin reads: “Yet from my flesh [that is, in it] shall I see God.” There is nothing in the original to indicate the preposition, which is shown by the great variety of translations. Young renders:—
“I have known my Redeemer,
The Living and the Last,
For the dust He doth rise,
And after my skin hath compassed this body,
Then from my flesh I see God.”
Spurrell translates:—
“For I know that my Redeemer liveth;
And shall at last rise up upon the earth;
So that after worms have encompassed this skin,
Yet in my flesh shall I gaze upon God,
Whom I shall look upon for myself,
And my eyes shall behold and none others.”
The Septuagint makes the deliverance temporal:—
“For I know that He is eternal who is about to deliver me, and to raise up upon the earth my skin that endures these sufferings; for these things have been accomplished to me of the Lord; which I am conscious of in myself, which mine eye has seen and not another, but all have been fulfilled to me in my bosom.” Verses 25-27.
Boothroyd, the eminent Hebraist gives the following rendering and note:—
“For I know that my Redeemer liveth,
And shall at last stand upon the earth.
If after my skin this body be destroyed,
Yet in my flesh shall I see God.”
“Yet in my flesh, etc. If the former line means the dissolution of the body, this can convey no other sense than that of the body, or flesh, new-formed, or raised again.”
And he further tells us that both Schultens and Peters have shown that the words naturally and obviously offer this sense, and that the attempt to get anything else out of it, leads to variance and contradiction. The margin of the American Revised Version is the nearer correct. The text is wrong, as shown by these other translators and the general tenor of the Scriptures, unless “flesh” be understood as referring to this dying, corrupt flesh. Job’s hope was that in his resurrection body he will see God.
1298.—Death and Hell.
What is the meaning of “death and hell” in Rev. 20:13, 14? What is the meaning of the word “hell”? and where is it located now? N. G.
Death is the completed state of dying, and “hell” the abode of the dead, elsewhere rendered “grave.” See 1 Cor. 15:55. The word hell in our Common Version comes from three different Greek words, as follows: (1) “Tartarus,” occurring only in 2 Peter 2:4, meaning the aerial regions surrounding this earth. See Eph. 2:2. (2) “Gehenna,” from the Hebrew, Valley of Hinnom, a place just outside of Jerusalem, noted for idolatry, afterward degraded as a place where the offal of the city, the dead bodies of animals, and the carcasses of malefactors were cast. (See Jer. 7:31-33; 19:10-13.) Upon these worms constantly preyed, and to avert pestilence, and utterly destroy all corruption, constant fires were kept burning. Gehenna thus became a type of utter and complete destruction of all wickedness. This destruction will take place at the close of the millennium, when all sin and all who are identified with sin will be destroyed. Revelation 20. “Hell” comes from Gehenna nine times as follows: Matt. 5:22, 29, 30; 10:28; 18:9; 23:15, 33; Mark 9:43, 45, 47; Luke 12:5; James 3:6. In all these cases the reference is either to the type or final place of punishment. (3) “Hades,” meaning the abode, place, or condition of the dead, whether good or evil, on this earth, sometimes rendered “grave.” It occurs in the following places: Matt. 11:23; 16:18; Luke 10:15; 16:23; Acts 2:27, 31; Rev. 1:18; 6:8; 20:13, 14,—ten times. In the end death and hades will both be destroyed in Gehenna, in the purifying fires of the last day. 2 Peter 3:10, 13.
The critics differ. It is quoted by Irenaeus in the second century, but Jerome in the third century says that nearly all the Greek manuscripts in his time did not contain it. But those which did not may have been copies of one in which it was lost. Alford says, “It seems to me . . . an authentic fragment placed as a completion of the Gospel in very early times, . . . coming to us with very weighty sanction, and having strong claims on our reception and reverence.” The Gospel would be incomplete without it, and it is in harmony with the other Gospels.
What is our correspondent’s authority that the books of the New Testament were chosen by lot? Who chose them? and when?
1300.—Sabbath in the Northern Regions.
How do people keep the Sabbath where the sun is seen, or is not seen, for three months, as in Hammerfest, Norway? O. C. G.
Those who have been in the northern regions tell us that each day is clearly marked in both winter and summer, and the Lord asks only that man obey as best he can. We never hear that the people in those regions who keep Sunday are troubled; neither are the Sabbath-keepers there. The simple fact is that all these objections come, not against a denomination or a theory, but against the Bible. Now God knew that the earth was the shape that it is, and that men would scatter over it as far as they could. In the light of that read the two following scriptures:—
“The Sabbath was made for man.” Mark 2:27.
“God that made the world . . . hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation.” Acts 17:24-26.
A MARTYRS’ MEMORIAL.
By S.
During the terrible uprising against the foreigners in China in the year 1900, thirteen missionaries sent out by the American Board were massacred by the deluded people. Seven of these martyrs were graduates of Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio, and two had resided there while waiting for their husbands to complete their preparatory studies. In view of this fact the American Board has decided to erect at Oberlin a martyrs’ memorial, bearing the names of these brave souls who laid down their lives for the cause of Christ. The memorial at Oberlin will be a constant reminder to those in training there of the serious business of witnessing for Christ. He gave His life for the world. These have followed His example, and paid for their profession with their lives, as thousands in the past have done, and as others yet may do. But let none count that the lives of these have been wasted, tho their blood was shed before a jeering rabble. There is nothing lost to them, and their sacrifice will yet bear glorious fruit for China. The cause of Christ is not buried when the clods of the burial mound are heaped over the bodies of martyrs. He will yet bring a ransomed host out of the land of the green dragon. S.
ALL EUROPE RUNNING INTO DEBT.
An ominous feature in world politics is the large deficit of revenue now confronting nearly all European countries.
In France the financial situation is the worst for many years. Reckoning the deficit for the year 1901 with that estimated for the current year, M. Leroy-Beaulieu says the government will be confronted with a total deficit of $79,000,000.
In Germany the deficit for 1902 is $14,750,000 and that of 1903 is estimated by the secretary of the treasury, Baron von Thielmann, at $37,500,000. While this is not so large as that of France it is enough to cause perplexity in finding ways and means to balance the budget.
It is noticeable that neither in France nor in Germany is there any support for the old-fashioned idea of getting rid of deficits by reducing expenditures. The rivalry of armaments alone forbids any such retrenchment, and it is only a question of how long the people will be able and willing to stand the strain of an armed truce that is almost as wasteful as war itself.
Moreover, Germany and France are not alone in this matter of annual deficits. Every leading nation in Europe, Great Britain heading the list, has been facing a deficiency of revenue every year for three years. The United States is the only great nation whose income has steadily and largely exceeded expenditures for many years past.—Thrice-a-Week World.
