p. 11 | Signs of the Times, Vol. 36, No. 8. (2/24/1909)

Life and Health

A PRACTICAL health journal, published with a view of meeting hygienic needs in every home; teaching how to care for the health and how to preserve life; prescribing simple home treatments to assist nature in throwing off diseases rather than adding more poison by using drugs or unnatural stimulants as remedies; teaching how to avoid disease as far as possible, how to manage in the home when sickness does come, and how to combat the disease by simple remedies which nature provides.

Send for sample copy and special rates to agents. Price 10 cents per copy or $1.00 per year.

Address, LIFE & HEALTH, Takoma Park, D. C.

The LORD'S DAY

A Brief but Comprehensive Treatise covering the History and Doctrine of the Sabbath and Sunday Controversy from Creation to the Present. Truth supported by Scripture, Historical fact, and Argument. A Multum in Parvo on the Sabbath Question. Illustrated; 128 pp; price, 10 cents post-paid.

The LORD'S DAY

The Test of the Ages

PACIFIC PRESS Mountain View, Cal.

UNCLE BEN'S COBBLESTONES

Familiar talks with boys and girls about such common things as air, water, sunshine, fire, smoke, glass, coal, salt, paper, matches, etc. Uncle Ben has a very pleasing way of telling about the origin and use of these things. Profusely illustrated. Contains 221 pages. Price, $1.00.

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The Ideal Home.

By Mrs. L. D. Avery-Stuttle

By Mrs. L. D. Avery-Stuttle.

DIRECTLY or indirectly, all of us who have homes are laboring to establish this very thing. But in this respect as in others, the highest ideal of one person might be the exact opposite of that of another.

For instance, I have known some people to whom the echo of a childish laugh, or the prattle of a childish voice, is productive of great uneasiness and discomfort. To some ultra-nice housekeepers it is as gall and wormwood to find a tidy disarranged, a chair out of the correct angle, or a paper or magazine out of place. For this reason, such people dread the intrusion of any one, especially of children, into their immaculate sanctums, lest a dusty footprint appear on the waxed floor, or an elegant rug be turned up at the corner. But the houses presided over by such natures as these are by no means ideal homes; for the difference is vast between an ideal house and an ideal home. We have but one ideally perfect Pattern,—that is Christ,—and the home where He is an abiding Guest, must be ideal.

My heart goes out in pity for the myriads of little children who are brought up to-day in Christless homes, whose baby lips are never taught to lisp the simple prayer of childish faith, and whose mothers are so busy attending card parties or theaters or clubs that they have no time and less inclination to teach their unfortunate little ones about the love of the Good Shepherd. Such children are greatly to be pitied.

I remember entering a home once which struck me as being the most completely arranged of almost any I had ever seen. It was well lighted and well ventilated, roomy and convenient. No labor-saving device had been spared, no comfort neglected. But after all, something seemed to be lacking. The very atmosphere about the place was cold, formal, and forbidding. Even the little children were nervous and ill at ease in the house in which they spent as little time as possible. The same spirit seemed to dominate their training which would prevail in the management of a hippodrome. I felt sorry for the children, and no less sorry for the parents; neither the one nor the other were truly happy, and I said to myself with a sigh, "An ideal house, but not an ideal home."

Now, if we can solve the secret, and determine the difficulty, if we can discover the element which was lacking, we may be able to avoid the pitfall into which many well-meaning and most excellent people fall.

The lack was most assuredly not a temporal or a physical one, for everything which could in any way minister to the bodily comfort and well-being of the entire household had been carefully and intelligently attended to—the lack was somewhere else.

In contrast with this home, I am thinking of another. These rooms were not nearly so large or so comfortable as the others. Two or three ordinary kerosene lamps did duty for all lighting purposes. And the family cooking was done on a common, old-fashioned cook-stove, considerably the worse for wear. There was not much money in the house, I dare say, but there were plenty of children—and, like the illustrious mother of the Gracchi, the parents counted each child more precious that mines of gold; and the children apparently appreciated the confidence placed in them, and evidently determined, from the greatest to the least of them, that they must not abuse that confidence. They all appeared at the table at meal-time, and right royally did they conduct themselves.

And so it seems to me that complete confidence between parents and children is one of the foundation-stones in the building of an ideal home. Another, which might be called the corner-stone of the building, is unselfish love,—a love which is not too dignified to express itself in tender words and kindly deeds,—a love which will not blush to bestow the kiss of pure affection; a love which betrays itself in gentle words and soft voices; a love which declares that company manners are none too good for everyday wear; a love which is so deep, so tender, so true, so thoughtful, so forgiving, that it is like unto the love which Christ bears for all His children. This, then, is the secret of an ideal home: Confidence and Love. If these are present, never mind if the carpet is old and faded or the curtains worn and dingy; there is an atmosphere of good cheer about the place which makes it lovely; for it is the abode of joy and peace such as the angels in heaven know.

Opportunity.

TAKE heed and listen while I speak A solemn word to thee; Earth's fairest, yea, but swiftest gift, Is opportunity. It far outstrips the fleetest bird That wings the furthest sky:— Lo! all thy flowers to dust have turned If thou dost let it by. —From the Greek.

Ascension Robes

By Editor

The Santa Rosa "Press Democrat" says:

"Florida is having its experience just now with a Sunday-rest law which the Legislature passed in a period of mental aberration. Now it is the most distressful country that ever you have seen—they're arresting men and women there for all sorts of trivial breaches of the law. Merchants and lawyers who have ventured to go to their offices and open their mail have been arrested and fined. Fine business!"

This is the benevolent, gracious law which the San Jose Mercury and others desire in California.

Ascension Robes.

Some one has sent us a clipping from a newspaper without date which tells the old, old falsehood, putting it in a new territory and on a different date, of somebody preparing ascension robes, believing that the Lord was coming. This article says it was in a village in Vermont in 1820. This is entirely new. It may be well to remark again that for years and years there was a reward offered by an Adventist paper for one authenticated case of making ascension robes during the great Advent Movement of 1840 to 1844. Invariably it is always hearsay. No true Adventist ever believes for a moment in any such foolish thing. The ascension robes that will be given God's children when Christ comes will be the glory with which He will invest them and the change from mortality to immortality.

Our hearts are made sad by another fire in Battle Creek, Mich., which occurred at 1:00 A.M., February 5, completely destroying the Haskell Memorial Home for Orphans. For several years the home had been under the control of Dr. J. H. Kellogg. It was built by the gift of $35,000 by Mrs. Jane Haskell as a memorial to her husband, and placed under the charge of Seventh-day Adventists. Saddest of all, two little girls, aged thirteen and five, were burned with the building. Their friends have our sincere sympathy.

CHRIST OUR ADVOCATE

A clear, tho brief, setting forth of the Bible types and symbols, the services in connection with the earthly sanctuary, the effectual sacrifice and priesthood of our Lord, to which all these types pointed, and the great prophetic period of Dan. 8:14. Contains 112 pages and is illustrated. Price ten cents. PACIFIC PRESS Mountain View, Cal.

Second Advent Movement, The Great.

By J. N. Loughborough. A late revision of the old book "Rise and Progress of Seventh-day Adventists."

This book forms a most interesting and instructive narrative on the subject indicated by its title. Commencing with the early experiences of the Advent movement of 1843 and 1844, the writer, who has been actively engaged in proclaiming the doctrine since 1849, here presents a graphic account of the struggles and difficulties through which the pioneers were safely carried by their unwavering faith in God and their unfaltering loyalty to the cause they had espoused. Due attention has been given to those agencies which, in the providence of God, have aided in building up and preserving the work represented by this people. Illustrated, 480 pages. Cloth, $1.25.

Colds.

By G. H. Heald, M.D. A treatise on the causes, prevention, and cure of colds. White leatherette binding. 58 pages, 25c. Address this office.

Christian Science in the Light of Reason and Revelation.

By R. A. Underwood.

"If the claims of Christian Science are founded on the doctrines of Christianity and the facts of science, then every lover of Christianity and science should hail the teachings of Mrs. Mary Baker G. Eddy with delight, and accept the claims of Christian Science. If it is not founded upon the word of truth, it should be rejected and exposed."

With this fair and impartial statement the writer of the pamphlet named above opens a very interesting and instructive discussion of the doctrines set forth in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," the text-book for all true believers in Christian Science. In parallel columns many full and complete quotations from this book are compared with quotations from God's holy word, the only rule of faith for the followers of Jesus Christ.

Such fundamental truths as "The Creation of Man and the Universe," "The Existence of Sin," "The Atonement for Sin," "The Gospel of Salvation," "The Miracles of Jesus," "The Existence of Material Matter," "Sickness and Suffering," "Death and the Judgment," are candidly considered in a way that will please every lover of truth and fair play.

Every one who has any question as to the truth or falsity of the doctrines of Christian Science, in fact, every seeker after truth and light, should give this pamphlet a careful reading.

Fifty pages, printed on fine egg-shell paper, with attractive colored cover. Issued as No. 197, Bible Students' Library. Price, ten cents.

Order now of your state tract society, or Pacific Press Publishing Assn., Mountain View, Cal.; 61 N. Park St., Portland, Ore.; 1109 E. 12th St., Kansas City, Mo.; Box 656, Regina, Sask., Canada.

Here and Hereafter, or Man's Nature and Destiny.

By Uriah Smith. This work is a thoro canvass of the great questions of a future existence, and the nature of man in the present life. Every text in the Bible which has any possible bearing upon these points is taken up and carefully explained. Cloth, 357 pp., $1.00. Address this office.

Our Work and Workers.

By Editor

NINE members have been added to the church at Charleston, W. Va.

THE church at Addington, Okla., dedicated a new church building January 21, free from debt.

BROTHER ANDREW MEAD reports the addition of eight new members to the church at Feeley, Minn. Five of these were young people.

OUR workers in Mexico have our sincere sympathy in the loss of Brother A. A. Reinke, whose death occurred February 4, as the result of complications which followed typhoid fever.

THE sanitarium at the Mountain Rest Home at Mussoorie, India, has paid its way from the start, Brother H. J. Jewell writes. Regular evangelistic work is carried on by the workers, who are seeing souls accept the truth through their labors.

THE following officers were elected for the Southern New England Conference at a late meeting: President, C. H. Edwards; secretary and treasurer, O. M. Russell; religious liberty secretary, W. R. Andrews; field missionary agent, Charles Dyer.

THE convention of the Young People's Society for California Conference will be held at Lodi, February 24 to 27. This will be followed by one at San Fernando. These ought to be times of stirring interest and mighty uplift in the work of the young people.

A SPECIAL temperance number of our Danish paper, Evangeliets Sendebud, has been gotten out by the International Publishing Association, College View, Neb. It is an attractive number, well-written and illustrated, the cover being in colors. A wide circulation should be given the paper among Danish-speaking people.

A TEMPERANCE number of the Youth's Instructor is to be issued, bearing date of March 16. There will be twenty-four pages and cover. The subject will be treated in a pleasing, instructive style. Prices, single copy, 10 cents; 5 copies, 5 cents a copy; 25 copies, 4 cents; special rates in larger quantities. Address Youth's Instructor, Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C.

THE annual meeting of the stockholders of the Pacific Press Publishing Company was held at the home office at Mountain View, Cal., January 25. Reports rendered show a good degree of prosperity, in spite of the financial depression and other hindrances. The new membership association took over the business of the old stock company, a change which is especially agreeable to all concerned. The following were elected as Board of Directors: H. W. Cottrell, M. C. Wilcox, C. H. Jones, H. H. Hall, H. G. Childs, A. O. Tait, B. R. Nordyke. A resolution was passed to amend the articles of incorporation and by-laws so as to provide for thirteen directors, one from each union conference district, and one from each California Conference, and the following were chosen as provisional directors: W. B. White, W. T. Knox, E. E. Andross, S. N. Haskell, R. A. Underwood, E. T. Russell. The Board organized as follows: President, H. W. Cottrell, vice-president and general manager, C. H. Jones; secretary and treasurer, H. G. Childs; auditor, J. J. Ireland.

Wanted for Missionary Work.

A CONTINUOUS supply of any Seventh-day Adventist books, papers, and tracts. Address A. M. Hardy, Box 155, Salida, Colo.

The twelfth annual meeting of the California Medical Missionary and Benevolent Association, for the purpose of electing four or more members of the Board of Directors, and transacting any other business that may properly come before the meeting, will be held at Sanitarium, Napa County, Cal., on Wednesday, March 10, 1909, at 12 o'clock, M.

W. T. KNOX, President.

H. E. RANDALL, Secretary.

The seventh annual meeting of the Sanitarium Food Company, for the purpose of electing directors, and transacting any other business that may properly come before the meeting, will be held at Sanitarium, Napa County, Cal., on Thursday, March 11, 1909, at 12 o'clock M.

W. T. KNOX, President.

H. E. RANDALL, Treasurer.

Revised Bibles.

By Editor

The American Standard Edition.

Northwestern Christian Advocate says: "There can be no doubt that in this version we are nearer the thought and therefore the Spirit of the Master than in any other version now existing in English."

We carry in stock the following A. S. Revised Bibles — references and maps.

Self-Pronouncing. India Paper. Minion Type. Bold face. 4¾ x 7 x ⅞

No. 150x — Egyptian seal, divinity circuit, leather-lined to square, silk-sewed, round corners, red under gold edges ...$3.00

No. 155x — Best Levant, divinity circuit, calf-lined to edge, silk-sewed, round corners, red under gold edges ...$6.00

Reference Edition. Thin Paper. Bourgeois Type. 5¼ x 8.

No. 160 — Cloth boards, red edges ...$1.00

No. 167 — Thin leather cover, limp, round corners, gold edges ...$1.75

No. 173 — Thin leather, overlapping edges, leather-lined, round corners, gold edges ...$2.75

Reference Edition. India Paper. Bourgeois Type. 5¼ x 8 x ⅞

No. 173x — Egyptian Seal, divinity circuit, silk-sewed, round corners, leather-lined to edge, red under gold edges ...$4.00

No. 174x — Persian Levant, divinity circuit, silk-sewed, round corners, leather-lined to edge, red under gold edges ...$5.00

No. 175x — Best Levant, divinity circuit, calf-lined to edge, silk-sewed, round corners, red under gold edges ...$7.50

No. 177x — Sealskin, divinity circuit, calf-lined to edge, silk-sewed, round corners, red under gold edges ...$9.00

Address Pacific Press, Mountain View, Cal.

The Gospel in Chinese Mandarin.

By Percival J. Laird

WHILST few of one’s readers may be able to trace their origin, many are doubtless aware that the written Chinese hieroglyphics are reverenced almost to a point of superstitious worship.

At Changsha, Hunan, it is not uncommon to see small boxes or baskets hung on street walls marked “to receive paper.” One will also notice wads of paper stuck in niches of the wall or between cracks of boards. Men employ laborers who go the rounds tearing down all loose ends of posted advertisements; all of which is to save the written character from being trampled under foot. Paper thus collected is taken to one of the many small pagodas erected for the purpose, and there burned.

When many copies are required for books, etc., the original is written on very thin paper and pasted on a wooden block reverse side up. This brings the characters in clear view of the carver as he chisels them out. Ordinary-sized characters can be carved at the rate of from 100 to 200 a day by a good workman. A dull fluid ink is then rubbed over the slab thus prepared, and the paper placed over it. By rubbing the paper with a soft fiber pad the impression is made. This plan secures an exact copy of the original writing or drawing as the case may be. If it is a trifle slow, it has the merit of dispensing with compositors, and proof-readers are seldom required; above all, it is a very cheap process. We have had tracts prepared in this way which were sold with a tiny margin of profit. Of course the expense of distribution was additional.

Unfortunately, this Chinese method of printing from wooden blocks is not always used for the best purposes. The notorious Chou Han, of this prefecture, who circulated by the million his pictorial descriptions of “foreign devils” and their atrocities, used this device. One of these publications represented two foreigners, previously done to death on the Yangtse in 1891, as being exterminated by government soldiers. And we are told, another placard had a crucified pig to represent the scene at Calvary. There is a play on the words for “Lord” and “pig” in Mandarin. We are at present trying to arrange a meeting with this renowned character who is undergoing a life-sentence at Changsha.

Those Chinese who studied and mastered these hieroglyphics constituted the first of the four classes into which the Chinese, for convenience, are divided; namely, scholars, farmers, workmen, and shopkeepers.

Until more recent years, most of the literature in China was in the classic of ancient style, as represented by the Confucian Classics. This was not spoken unless in apt quotations to give a speaker vivacity. Then there was the official or court language called “Mandarin.” Civil officials are not usually appointed to office in their own province. Hence if a Cantonese were appointed to Changsha, or an Amoy man sent to Kansuh, their speech would not be understood of the people in their constituency. But in order that no misunderstanding should arise from their proclamations, Mandarin was used as the text. But such Mandarin and that used, for instance, in the Bible text, were in a large measure alike in name only.

Lady missionary starting on an itinerary in Si-Chuen.

We are indebted to our predecessors for the translation of the Bible and other works into the most widely spoken of Chinese dialects called “Mandarin.” And inasmuch as it is reputed that more than two-thirds of China’s four hundred millions are acquainted with Mandarin, one may be pardoned for saying it is one of the world’s greatest dialects, if not the greatest. Chinese newspapers are now adopting it, but not altogether. While no two provinces may speak this Mandarin alike exactly, and as one has often found that the people separated by a few miles will differ in their local patois, yet those able to read will readily understand Mandarin, while the majority will obtain a fair idea of your meaning when you engage in conversation with them. Thus it is not difficult to see what an enormous field is covered by the word “Mandarin” when applied to Chinese literature. But let us not forget that the vast majority of men and comparatively few women being unable to read, they must still be reached by the human voice.

Tsoan Tsui, one of the latest helpers in Amoy.

That tracts sell readily will be seen. As a result of an eighteen-days’ trip into a district east of Changsha, nearly 3,000 tracts were sold. Had you been following the distributors, you would have observed little groups of people standing around one who had purchased a tract, and he would be reading aloud, thus giving the contents to many who had not purchased a book for themselves. The number of sales is by no means a criterion of the numbers who gather the contents of books.

May I close with an illustration which has ever been an encouragement to me? A missionary once knelt beside the emaciated body of an Oriental whose life was fast ebbing away. Every now and then the man would beat his breast with his hand clenched tightly as tho containing some prized treasure. When he had breathed his last, the missionary gently opened the clenched hand and a piece of very dirty paper fell out. After some trouble he eventually made out the translated text, “The blood of Jesus Christ . . . cleanseth . . . from all sin.” Somebody had made it possible to provide that little silent messenger. Was that “somebody” you?

We are grateful that our S. D. A. Mission Press is in operation, and trust our friends will rally to support it by prayers and offerings.

PERCIVAL J. LAIRD. Changsha, Hunan, China.

Great Things to Expect.

“Is this the time, O church of Christ, to sound Retreat? to arm with weapons cheap and blunt The men and women who have borne the brunt Of truth’s fierce strife, and nobly held their ground? No! rather strengthen stakes and lengthen cords! Enlarge thy plans and gifts, O thou elect, And to thy kingdom come for such a time! The earth, with all its fulness, is the Lord’s; Great things attempt for Him, great things expect, Whose love imperial is, whose power sublime.”

Witnesses Unto the Uttermost Earth

“Ye shall receive power, when the Holy Spirit is come upon you: and ye shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judæa and Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.” Acts 1:8.

The Hardest Fortune

“THE hardest fortune of all is to find fortune easily.”

Honor to Images.

By Editor

A Deception.

THE Catholic press are feeling sorely stirred because the Associated Press agent of Messina describes the people of Messina as being "superstitious." The Western Watchman calls him "an escaped lunatic;" and then we are told that "all the cities of Italy have a patron saint who is supposed to watch over them and protect them from evil. In southern Italy these patron saints are held in high honor, because of the prevalence of earthquakes and other ills consequent upon seismic disturbances. On certain days in the year the statues of these saints are carried through the streets, and in times of great distress they are exposed to the veneration of the people. In Naples they have St. Januarius; in Messina they have St. Agnes; in Reggio they have St. Agatha. We are told that after the late terrible earthquake in the last-named city the bishop carried the statue of the saint through the streets. This is a corollary of the honor the church pays all the saints of God. If it is right to honor them, it is proper to honor their images. If we can address them, our prayer puts on new meaning and force when we are inspired by the image of the blessed one before our eyes."

We have no ridicule to offer of our Catholic friends. We are willing to accept the declaration that the design is not the worship of the images, but the saint it represents. Yet it is true that many use the image as a native African uses his fetish. Think of it! Here is a devout Catholic in San Francisco praying before, say, an image of Saint Peter. Does the apostle Peter hear his prayer? There is at the same time another in Rome, another in St. Petersburg, another in Calcutta, another in Buenos Aires praying before similar images—not at all improbable cases. Does the apostle hear them all? If so, he is omnipresent, made equal to God. If he is not omnipresent, four of these at least are praying to dumb images. The same would be true of any other saint. It may be said that God hears these earnest prayers and He will deliver them to the saint. If so, why not pray direct to God? Why plead with the intermediary? Why not use common sense? Too, the Scriptures say, “The dead know not anything.” “Till the heavens be no more, they shall not awake nor be raised out of their sleep.”

—*—

Back to the Land.

That country is not prosperous which is preparing for war or engaged in war and neglecting agriculture. Sometimes defeat brings blessings. Spain has been sadly and sorely defeated in her wars of the last two centuries, and her last defeat from the United States was very humiliating indeed, but she has turned from her misfortunes and is building up her home industries, with the result that Spanish stocks which sold at 60 before the Philippine war now sell at par. At all points of the peninsula land is being bought up and cultivation of ground long abandoned is resumed. We are told that the plains of Galicia and Extremadura, so long near desert, are now loaded with crops; that the plow is turning up the high plateaus of old Castile and the barren soil is being enriched with generous mold and costly fertilizers. In places where the traveler formerly saw nothing but sterile wastes, he to-day may contemplate, not without astonishment, fields of wheat, villages, and gardens. Cattle-raising in the south, especially in Andalusia, has made prodigious strides; emigration has slackened, almost ceased in fact. In 1901 17,000 emigrants left Spain; in 1907, 2,950. In the working of the mines, the same progress is manifested. What a mighty blessing it would be to the whole world if the people would turn from the arts of, and preparations for, war and give themselves to the cultivation and production of the riches which God has stored in the earth, under just and equitable laws.

Continue reading: The United States Navy in 1909