p. 7 | Signs of the Times, Vol. 28, No. 38. (9/17/1902)

Question Corner

1279.—An Indefinite Question. Acts 10.

Here is a sample of many questions we receive: “Please explain the tenth chapter of Acts to me, and oblige. My understanding is that it means the Jews, while some claim it is in regard to eating any kind of meat.” Now the tenth chapter of Acts contains forty-eight verses. Its general subject is Peter’s mission to the Gentiles. He was unprepared to go, because of Jewish prejudice; and God, therefore, gave him the vision and lesson of the chapter to teach him the one thing only, that he “should not call any man common or unclean,” Verse 28. This may meet the querist’s point. Make questions definite and specific.

1280.—Another Day.

Does “another day” in Heb. 4: 8 refer to another Sabbath day? L. A. G.

It does not refer to any Sabbath day at all. When Joshua led the children of Israel into Canaan, God designed to give them rest, rest from sin and all their enemies, but they did not grasp it by faith, and failed to enter the rest. The “another day” was that “certain day,” the only certain day, set forth by David, “To-day, if ye shall hear His voice, harden not your hearts.” Never again will a nation have the opportunity which Israel rejected when God rolled away from them at the River Jordan “the reproach of Egypt.” God is gathering out His people, inviting them into His rest (of which the Sabbath is a perpetual pledge) one by one, and the only time to enter is “to-day.”

1281.—Try the Spirits.

Does the word “spirit” (1 John 4: 1) refer to individuals? This text is used largely in defense of Spiritism. L. A. G.

The word spirit would refer to an individual spirit. There is the Holy Spirit, which God gives to every one of His children, and which He also places upon His holy angels, and so makes them messengers to man. Heb. 1: 14. His Spirit uses men also. These all come to do God’s will. Then there are evil spirits, the angels or messengers of Satan, which he sends in the guise of the spirits of light; and these spirits of evil and darkness possess and speak through men. 2 Cor. 11: 3, 13-15; Rev. 16: 14; 2 Tim. 3: 1-5. There are good and evil; prove them, try them, and never by the sense, but always by the Word. Isa. 8: 20; Matt. 7: 21-23. Another test is given in 1 John 4: 3, 4. Jesus Christ comes by faith into the flesh of every one who wills it in God’s way. Spiritism, and other false systems, make man his own saviour.

ROME IS SATISFIED.

By G.

MANY persons imagined that Roman Catholicism would lose prestige in the Philippines by the transfer from Spanish to American supremacy. But the fact that Rome is satisfied with present conditions is evidence that she has lost nothing by the change. In the first place, the native rebels are much nearer being under control than they have been for many years. Their rebellion was primarily against the rule of the friars, and was continued against the United States because this government opposed their independence, which would have resulted in their confiscating the property of the friars. Their defeat by the United States is a victory for Rome. Tho the friars leave the country, Rome still owns the land they hold, and will get the money which the government will pay for it. Rome will gain about ten million dollars by the defeat of her old-time enemy at the hands of the United States; and even if the friars have to leave the islands because of having lost their influence with the natives, Rome will replace them with other clericals in whom the natives will have confidence. So Rome will be the gainer in the matter of religious influence. Of course Rome is satisfied.

Then some persons thought it was a master-stroke of policy for Governor Taft to go to Rome to negotiate with the pope with reference to the church's interests in the Philippines. Even Catholics have been alarmed lest the church was going to come out with a loss of Philippine prestige. But so well-informed an authority as Archbishop Ireland reprimands them for their fears. In his home cathedral at St. Paul, Minn., he recently delivered a discourse on the subject, from which we take the following, as reported in the Catholic Mirror:—

The interests of the church, it is said, are made to suffer at the hands of the government in its newly acquired dependencies, and the call to arms is sounded from the rostrums of Catholic societies and through the columns of Catholic papers, to the perturbation of the whole Catholic body, and, indeed, of the whole country. The moment has come to say to Catholics—be wise, be zealous unto sobriety.

Who are they who complain, and protest, and call upon Catholics to be up and doing? Are they those who might claim to represent the church in its general, or even local interests? Has the Sovereign Pontiff spoken? Certainly he has not complained; rather has he been heard from in very different tones. Have the ecclesiastical authorities in the dependencies invoked our aid? In no instance have they so acted. Where they have been heard from, as in the case of Porto Rico and of Cuba, it was to tell us in plainest words that they have no grievance, altho from irresponsible sources it had been, on several previous occasions, dinned into our ears that the church was robbed and persecuted in both those islands. Bishop Blenck, of Porto Rico, openly rejoices that the American flag, rather than the Spanish, guards his diocese; and the hierarchy in Cuba are thanking God that church interests there were settled by the government at Washington before a Cuban Parliament was allowed to sit down in Havana. The archbishops of the States meet together once a year in Washington—each one representing the whole hierarchy. It can not be said that they are heedless of the welfare of the church; and yet they have sounded no alarm.

Further along in the archbishop's discourse, he shows that in the matter of the conference at Rome the pope took the initiative, and the government followed. And the suggestions for further conference and settlement in the Philippines were also proposed by the pope, and agreed to by the government. Here are his words:—

The logic of the situation in presence of strange complications for Church and State, arising from a change of sovereignty in the Philippine Islands, pointed to a mutual conference between the head of the church and a representative of the State, as the proper and dignified way to a final and peaceful solution.

Leo XIII. saw this; Theodore Roosevelt saw this. Leo took the initiative, proposed the conference, and asked the government to expose frankly and thoroughly its views. The President and his advisers accepted the proposal. What more could have been done by the administration to prove its good will and sense of justice?

If the administration had refused to send a representative to Rome, verily what clamorings there would have been; and now, when it has sent a representative to Rome, and agrees to the further proposal of the Vatican to transfer negotiations to Manila, clamorings are still raised.

In this reprimanding lecture to Catholics the archbishop incidentally shows that the Roman hierarchy is well pleased with the United States as an aid in her political difficulties. When it was first evident that Spain had lost her footing in the Philippines, this journal said that, as far as Rome's interests in the islands were concerned, she was simply swapping horses when the old one had given out. And after three years or more of experience, the younger, stronger steed is giving eminent satisfaction. G.

CRIBBING IN EXAMINATIONS.

Much has been made, and justly, of the twenty-two boys out of thirty-one who were guilty of cribbing in their examination for Princeton University. These youths are said to have come from Christian homes, they studied in a Christian institution, and they were examined with a view to entering a Christian university.

The dishonorable means used have received severest reprobation. Yet that is not the whole of the revelation made. Scholarship, sound education, mental discipline, were not the supreme concerns of the boys, but to get through with their studies and secure an unearned diploma.

The discussion of the affair has brought out other important facts. These twenty-two are not the only sinners in the land. Rottenness at the very foundation of our intellectual thought and life was discovered in other places. Large numbers, so the investigation shows, care nothing for a thorough education; they want only the outward badge of scholarship, no matter how secured.

Perhaps we must go deeper. A teacher testifies that institutions themselves make claims which they

can not meet and which their students know they do not satisfy. “Their claims are not true, their scholarship is not honest.” This at least deserves investigation. How can we expect morality to prevail in political and professional life if the very fountains of education and thought are poisoned?—Homiletic Review.

THE GREAT COAL STRIKE.

By Editor

THIS paper is not in politics, nor are its editors; but they do not need to be to have sympathy with the striking anthracite coal-miners of the Alleghany Mountains.

We do not sympathize with many of the methods which the unions adopt; we do not sympathize with their attacks upon the non-union laborer who has as good a right to earn his bread without let or hindrance as has the union laborer. We do not sympathize with the demagogic men who are endeavoring to make political capital out of the strike, and pluck the workmen in one way or another to feather their own nests, or lift themselves up into a little brief authority. With none of these things nor with some others do we sympathize.

Neither do we sympathize with the great coal and railway trusts against whom the miners are waging unequal warfare. We have no sympathy with their principles or methods. We do not believe that it is right to squeeze the laborer at one end of a line of operations for the last ounce of blood, and the consumer at the other end for the last ounce of gold. It was demonstrated that all the separate coal companies were making good profit before the trust or combination was formed. It has been shown that within a year after this the price of anthracite coal was raised $1.50 a ton, making millions of abnormal profits to the coal companies. Of this profit the miner has, in the years since, reaped little or no benefit.

The “store” system and “credit” system connected with the mines is conducted on an oppressive basis. A “company store,” rightly managed, ought to furnish better and fresher goods at less cost than any other; but it never does. This, we believe, has been discontinued in the coal districts, but it has its substitutes. Friends and relatives of mine officials conduct the stores, and work to do depends at times on the patronizing of the right store. Work is not continuous on the part of the greater number of men, and the average yearly wage is very low, while rent, and that for miserable cottages, tenements, and hovels, is exorbitant. As soon as a boy can go to work, he is put in the mine. The history of the miners and the hardships and exactions they have endured, make a black picture, as black as the coal they mine. Added to all this, there is probably no more dangerous employment in which so many men are engaged as coal-mining, abundantly attested by the frequent explosions and their sad results.

We sympathize with the miners. We do not wonder that men who do not know the grace of God do violent and desperate things sometimes, as they brood over their wrong. Many of them make as their friends their worst foes, tobacco and whisky. But their employers smoke Havana cigars, and drink costly champagne.

What a grand opportunity is offered these great capitalists to make a right use of their enormous profits? What better homes they could make for their employees, who are men as they! What improvements they could make as regards the education of not only the children, but the adults! How much more satisfactory to a true heart would be moderate profits and a raise of wages, not because any union or labor leader demanded it, but because justice required it! But infamous Greed seems to close the heart to all these opportunities.

God has written of these very things and times, and will hold responsible every man who might have made them better and did not. Read James 5:1-8; Habakkuk, chapters 1 and 2. God also regards the cry of the oppressed poor. He tells them to “be patient,” and trust Him, and He will, in His good time, gloriously deliver. But that excuses no man from his duty here. Great wealth is great opportunity for which God will hold responsible every one that possesses it. If not used aright, its canker will eat away the very soul, and will witness against its perverter before the great tribunal of God.

“THE CONFLAGRATION HAZARD.”

DURING the last six years this country's fire waste has amounted to more than $800,000,000. In this vast sum is represented a relatively small number of losses of $200,000 each, and upward. Two-thirds or more, including these larger losses, have been incurred in sums of $50,000 and upward. Investigation shows that if similar appliances and similar study of the causes of fire which have made textile factories, paper mills, and machine shops almost free from loss, could be applied to those forms of business which have accumulated so vast an amount of losses by fire, the risks would be greatly diminished.

An insurance expert says, “We have forgotten Chicago, Boston, and other great fires in the belief that with the introduction of modern methods of steel construction we have eliminated the possibilities of such horrors;” but he thinks this is a mistake, and says, “A good blaze, given ten minutes headway in the dry goods district of the City of New York, could do more damage in a forty-mile-an-hour gale than the combined losses sustained at Paterson, Waterbury, and Norfolk amounted to.” He states that Broadway, between Canal and Fourteenth Streets, is lined by tinder-box structures, and within that area something like $800,000,000 of insurance values are sheltered.

We believe that many fires result from electric wires of various sorts, and also from leaking gas. The light way of building frame houses in suburban towns is another cause. The walls of chimneys are too thin. Also great carelessness exists in hotels. Lately we stayed in a first-class hotel in which, when a fearful wind was blowing down the chimneys, on several successive days the porter built a soft-coal fire, the grate having no fender or any other protection, and left the same for some hours without attention.

“Conflagration hazard” is a term used by insurance men, but whatever it may mean to them it means vastly more to families all of whose treasures are burned, and to stores and offices which lose all their irreplaceable books and documents, as well as to those thrown out of business for several months.

—Christian Advocate.

Mount Kasbek Landslide and Pacific Tensions

News has been received from Tiflis, Transcaucasus, Russia, of a landslide which occurred on August 17 in the vicinity of Mount Kasbek, and which resulted in the destruction of some twenty villages and the loss of about 700 lives. Earthquake disturbances seem to have dislodged a great glacier which swept down a valley destroying everything in its path. Within a few minutes the valley, which is about twelve miles long, had been devastated by a wall of rock, ice, and earth. The valley was completely filled up, in some places to a depth of 1,000 feet, with matter that was hurled into it from the mountain. A fierce hurricane raged at the time, and the bodies of people and animals were hurled to a great height and dashed against the rocks.

There are ominous signs of trouble in the South Pacific between England and France over the possession of the New Hebrides. Some of these islands are now under the French flag, New Caledonia being a French penal colony. Australian immigrants are securing a foothold in the larger islands, and a British cruiser has landed a deputy commissioner of the British Government to look after their interests. The French regard this as an indication of England’s desire to seize the group. Of course, such an attempt would result at once in hostilities. In view of this considerable feeling is being worked up over the matter.

The commander of the United States warship in Haytian waters has declared to the insurgents that he would allow no interference with the business or rights of foreigners at the ports of Hayti. The blockade of Haytian ports by the insurgents has been declared inefficient by the American commander, and therefore void. The German Emperor has sent the thanks of his nation to the State Department for the services rendered Germans by the stand taken by the American commander in Hayti.

Advices from Constantinople indicate that Russia is still planning on the Russianizing of Syria. The governor of this province, according to the agreement with the powers in 1864, must be a Christian, but the Sultan of Turkey has the right of naming him. So far Russia has opposed every name proposed by the sultan, being determined to force the selection of a member of the Russian Orthodox Church, who will be completely dominated by Russian influence.

The war between the cane sugar and the beet sugar interests has been carried into the ranks of the beet sugar men by the officials of the cane sugar interests, represented by Henry O. Havemeyer. The latter and his friends have now secured control of at least one-third of the beet sugar refining plants, with the ultimate purpose of combining them under one management, and thus weakening the forces of the beet sugar men, and strengthening the sugar monopoly.

The game of war being played between the army and navy off the New England coast came to an end on September 6. It has not yet been figured out which came off victorious; but thousands of dollars worth of powder has been exploded and thousands of dollars worth of coal burned. It is probably the best use the powder could be put to, but there are thousands of shivering families who would have been grateful for a few pounds of the coal consumed.

The contest between the miners of Pennsylvania and the coal mine operators has now lasted seventeen weeks, and President Mitchell declares that the miners have no intention of yielding. The strike in West Virginia has ended, the miners returning to work on the best terms they can secure. A movement has been started in Chicago to raise funds for the strikers. Considerable contributions have come from English labor organizations.

A citizen of Winchester, Virginia, was arrested recently for neglecting to put kerosene in his rain-barrels, as provided by the anti-mosquito law. The purpose of this law is to destroy the mosquito before he is born, and rain-barrels are believed to be mosquito incubators. The New York World refers to this matter to remind its readers of the “narrowing range of personal liberty in these days of the public’s rights.”

The terrible treatment of Siberian exiles at Alexandrowski, Siberia, has caused a strike of the convicts, who are refusing all nourishment until they are more humanely treated. Their prison cells are damp and dark, and disease is rife among them. It is said that both the sick and dead remain uncared for to contaminate the living. Revolts of convicts at Saghalien and other settlements have resulted in bloodshed.

The United States minister at the capital of Venezuela reports the existence of the direst poverty there, due to the continuance of the war. He makes an appeal to the American people in behalf of the poor of that city, offering to distribute any means for relief that may be sent him. His report states that he never has known anything to compare with the widespread and hopeless poverty of the present.

Advices from the North state that the Alaska salmon pack for the present year will amount to two and a quarter million cases.

The bicycle trust known as the American Bicycle Company has failed, and receivers have been appointed for the concern.

Prof. Rudolph Virchow, one of the most noted scientists of Europe, died at Berlin on September 5, at the age of 81.

The reports of railroad accidents for the first quarter of the present year has just been issued by the Interstate Commerce Commission. It shows that during those three months in the United States 665 persons were killed in railroad accidents, and 9,560 were injured. If this record is maintained for the rest of the year, the number of casualties for the year will total 40,900.

There is a deadlock in the Vermont election for governor, Gen. J. G. McCullough (Republican) failing to receive a majority of the votes. The large number of votes cast for the high license candidate occasioned the deadlock. The electing of a governor and lieutenant-governor will be taken up by the assembly next month.

While the Presidential party was driving through the streets of Pittsfield, Mass., on September 3, the carriage in which the President was riding was run into and demolished by a street car. One member of the President’s bodyguard was killed, and the President and his secretary were considerably bruised in the wreck.

Russia has loaned £5,000,000 to the Shah of Persia. Those who are watching the intrigues of the nations see in this the working out of Russia’s purpose of securing a controlling influence in Persian affairs, or at least of obtaining a railway concession which will give her one or more ports on the Persian Gulf.

An international banking trust with a capital of $10,000,000 has been organized in New York, designed to operate especially in Latin-American countries. This combination will be known as the International Bank and Trust Company of America, and will have branches in all the Latin-American countries.

The Japanese consul at Foo Chow, China, reports that in the disturbances there incident to the beginning of collections for the foreign indemnity 1,000 persons were shot down, and a fine of 50,000 yen was imposed on the inhabitants for the destruction of property caused by the rioting.

Near Berry, Alabama, on September 1, a disastrous train wreck occurred, in which thirty persons lost their lives and eighty were injured. A number of the cars left the track and plunged down a steep embankment, turning over several times, and being crushed like egg-shells.

Another Boxer proclamation has been posted in Canton, inciting the people to the slaughter of foreigners. It is supposed to be due to the beginning of work on the Canton-Hankow railway and to the collection of funds for the payment of the foreign indemnity.

Serious and continued rioting is reported from the city of Agram, Hungary, and the troops were called out, the rioting and wrecking and sacking of houses continued. The houses of Servians were sacked and the contents burned in the streets.

The fastest steamer afloat is the yacht Arrow, which, in a speed test on the Hudson River on September 6, covered one mile at the rate of 45 miles an hour. This vessel, altho only 130 feet long, has a boiler capacity of 4,500 horse power.

A decree has been issued by the sultan repealing the strict anti-Armenian laws, on condition that the Armenian patriarch would guarantee that there would be no further outbreaks. The patriarch has therefore withdrawn his resignation.

The White Star Steamship Company has ordered another monster ship constructed, which is to be 720 feet in length, 20 feet longer than the great steamer Cedric, recently completed with accommodations for 3,000 passengers.

Eighteen vessels were wrecked at Port Elizabeth, South Africa, on September 1. Five of these were dashed to pieces and the crews lost. The list of casualties, tho believed to be large, is not definitely known.

President Roosevelt continues his tour throughout the East and South, the principle themes of his discussion being the maintenance of the Monroe doctrine and finding a remedy for the evils of the trusts.

Kentucky has made a law by the provisions of which no one in that State will hereafter be allowed to keep any bird in captivity except the canary. All other caged songsters must be given their freedom.

Owing to the outbreak of the rabies in Bulawayo, South Africa, the authorities have ordered the extermination of between 60,000 and 80,000 dogs and all the hyenas that can be caught.

The price in human lives which England paid for the conquest of South Africa is now stated to be 21,942. Those who received wounds but survived number 23,029.

The price of coal in the East has increased to such an extent that shipments of coal destined for New York have been contracted for in England.

The public debt of the United States at the present time amounts to $1,327,582,821. During the month of August the debt was decreased $5,818,646.

Dr. Edward Eggleston, preacher and author of a number of popular juvenile works, died at his home at Glens Falls, N. Y., on September 3.

SOME COURT DECISIONS.

[These epitomes of cases are furnished by the West Publishing Company, St. Paul, Minn. Full reports of any case will be furnished for 25 cents.]

Insular Cases.—

By far the most important of the recent cases are the so-called “Insular Cases,” decided by the United States Supreme Court on May 27 last. In brief, the prevailing opinions decided that Porto Rico was territory of the United States from the date of the signing of the treaty of peace; that prior to that event, during the military occupancy, the President, as commander-in-chief of the army, could levy such taxes as he deemed expedient; that, being territory of the United States, and not being one of the States, Congress had power to levy such taxes as it saw fit; and, last, that between the time of the signing of the treaty and the passage of the Foraker tariff act no tariff duty could be legally levied. The majority and dissenting opinions in all of the cases may be found in 21 Supreme Court Reporter, pages 742 to 827, inclusive.

Dissenting Opinions.—

A unique procedure provided for in the State of South Carolina has recently been put into effect by the Supreme Court of that State in the case of Wilson v. Southern Ry. Co., 38 Southeastern, 865. In cases where there are differences of opinion among the members as to the question under consideration, they may call in all the judges of the Circuit Courts for aid and advice in order to finally determine the question involved. We are hardly prepared to suggest that the Supreme Court of the United States resort to this procedure, and call to their assistance all of the Circuit and District Court judges for consultation, whenever they are hopelessly divided in the settlement of an issue, but some such step might happily tend to avoid the cheapening influence of the dissenting opinion.

Use of Return Coupon of Railroad Ticket.—

In the case of Tiedy v. Erie R. Co., 49 Atlantic Reporter, 427, the plaintiff, who was riding from Newark to New York, was arrested for refusing to pay cash for his passage after the conductor had refused to accept his ticket marked “New York to Newark.” The court holds that he is entitled to prove the custom of the company to honor such tickets, and that he might reasonably and honestly believe that the ticket so written was a lawful payment of his fare, and that, having this belief, he did not incur the penalty or subject himself to the arrest sanctioned by the statute.

Deprivation of Liberty.—

The Supreme Court of the United States has ruled, in the case of Simon v. Craft, 21 Supreme Court Reporter, 826, that a person is not deprived of his liberty without due process of law by being adjudged a lunatic in his absence, where the sheriff has served a notice to have the person present, if consistent with his health and safety, and a certificate of a practicing physician is produced by the sheriff at the trial, showing that in the opinion of the physician it would not be safe to produce the alleged lunatic.

Courts of Hawaii.—

The Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has held that under the Act of April 30, providing for the government of the territory of Hawaii, suits in admiralty pending in the courts of the republic when the Act took effect must be continued to final judgment in such courts, and are not appealable to the Circuit Court of Appeals, but can only be reviewed by the Supreme Court of the United States. This point was held in the case entitled Wilder S. S. Co. v. Hind, 108 Federal, 113.

Cruel and Unusual Punishment.—

It has been held in the case of Territory v. Ketchum, 65 Pacific, 169, recently decided in the Supreme Court of New Mexico, that the law prescribing death as the penalty for assault upon a railroad train with intent to commit murder, robbery, or other felony, does not prescribe a cruel and unusual punishment within the meaning of the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The court said: “The provision of the Constitution was never designed to control the legislative right to determine upon the adequacy of the punishment, but is merely applicable to the modes of the punishment.”

TEACH THOU.

By Lillian Otis McPherson

HERE am I and the children whom thou hast given me.” “Those that thou gavest me I have kept,” are the words with which our Saviour presents to the Father His redeemed children, the purchase of His blood—presents them “faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy.” “The Saviour’s joy is in seeing in the kingdom of glory, the souls that have been saved through His humiliation. And the redeemed will be sharers in this joy, as they behold, among the blessed, those who have been won to Christ through their prayers, their labors, and loving sacrifice.”

But of what avail for His fallen children would have been the humiliation of our Redeemer, His prayers, His loving sacrifice, if He had not given them His Father’s Word, and lived a perfect life, that His children might learn how to live, and how to rise above the low level to which they had fallen; for are we not “saved by His life?” By a fragrant life of faith, by an effective teaching of His Father’s Word, did Christ reach and save those for whom he suffered humiliation and agony.

His First Teacher.

Since he gained knowledge as we may do, His intimate acquaintance with His Father’s Word shows how diligently His early years were given to its study. His mother was His first human teacher. From her lips and from the scrolls of the prophets He learned of heavenly things. The very words which He Himself had spoken to Moses for Israel, He was now taught at His mother’s knee. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart; and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thy house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.”

“With deep earnestness the mother of Jesus watched the unfolding of His powers, and beheld the impress of perfection upon His character.” Realizing her responsibility to God for this Child entrusted to her care, she sought and received wisdom through the Holy Spirit to co-operate with the heavenly agencies in His development. Not only did she realize her responsibility but also the wonderful privilege granted her of training this bright, receptive mind, unmarred by sin. She did not find it an irksome task, which she was desirous of intrusting to others, but sought faithfully and with joy to bear the responsibility laid upon her.

“From her lips, and from the scrolls of the prophets, He learned of heavenly things.”

Did each parent in this day fully realize that he is largely responsible for the physical, mental, and spiritual development of the children given him of God, would there not be a more earnest seeking at the throne of grace for wisdom and help in the training of those children? The words “Here am I, and the children whom Thou hast given me,” and “Those that thou gavest me I have kept,” pre-eminently apply to Christ as He presents His redeemed children to His Father, but certainly each true parent desires to say these same words when Jesus comes in the clouds of heaven,—desires to present his children to Jesus as the first-fruits of his prayers, his labors, and loving sacrifice. Can he present them without fulfilling the same conditions which make it possible for Jesus to present His redeemed ones to His Father? The parent too, must live a fragrant life of faith and diligently teach them the Word of the Lord, for it is by the Word that they must be “kept.”

The fact that we ever teach by precept and example, whether we will or not, makes it a grave matter what and how we teach. It is important that we teach the words commanded of God, the whole revealed Word of the living God, for this Word is but a drawing out of the true precepts given through Israel for all. It is, too, important that His words be taught in harmony with His Spirit. Do our own lives reveal the beauty of the indwelling Spirit? Are our words fragrant and pure, our acts upright in the sight of the great Teacher, who ever stands ready to instruct us? Hear His word to each of us; “O that there were such an heart in them, that they would fear Me, and keep My commandments always, that it might be well with them, and with their children forever.” Deut. 5:29.

We can not teach aright, either by precept or example, until we fear this glorious name, Jehovah, thy God. “The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him,” fear to disobey His least command. It is the “secret of the Lord” we should desire to teach our children; the deep things of the Spirit, that they may grow and wax strong in spirit, filled with wisdom; and the grace of God be upon them. We may do this if by faith we can say,—

“I foresaw the Lord always before my face, For He is on my right hand, that I should not be moved; Therefore did my heart rejoice; and my tongue was glad.”

Let us live ever in the presence of Him who is Spirit and life, and the deep things of His Spirit will daily be revealed, that they may be taught to our priceless jewels. LILLIAN OTIS MCPHERSON.

Los Angeles, Cal.

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