JOSEPH was greatly afflicted to be separated from his father, and his bitterest sorrow was in reflecting upon his father's grief. But God did not leave Joseph to go into Egypt alone. Angels prepared the way for his reception. Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, captain of the guard, bought him of the Ishmaelites. And the Lord was with Joseph, and he prospered him, and gave him favor with his master, so that all he possessed he intrusted to Joseph's care. "And he left all that he had in Joseph's hand; and he knew not aught he had, save the bread which he did eat." It was considered an abomination for a Hebrew to prepare food for an Egyptian.
WHEN Joseph was tempted to deviate from the path of right, to transgress the law of God and prove untrue to his master, he firmly resisted, and gave evidence of the elevating power of the fear of God, in his answer to his master's wife. After speaking of the great confidence of his master in him, by intrusting all that he had with him, he exclaims, "How then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?" He would not be persuaded to deviate from the path of righteousness, and trample upon God's law, by any inducements or threats. And when he was accused, and a base crime was falsely laid to his charge, he did not sink in despair. In the consciousness of innocence and right, he still trusted in God. And God, who had hitherto supported him, did not forsake him. He was bound with fetters, and kept in a gloomy prison. Yet God turned even this misfortune into a blessing. He gave him favor with the keeper of the prison, and to Joseph was soon committed the charge of all the prisoners.
HERE is an example to all generations who should live upon the earth. Although they may be exposed to temptations, yet they should ever realize that there is a defense at hand, and it will be their own fault if they are not preserved. God will be a present help, and his Spirit a shield. Although surrounded with the severest temptations, there is a source of strength to which they can apply and resist them. How fierce was the assault upon Joseph's morals. It came from one of influence, the most likely to lead astray. Yet how promptly and firmly was it resisted. He suffered for his virtue and integrity; for she who would lead him astray, revenged herself upon the virtue she could not subvert, and by her influence caused him to be cast into prison, by charging him with a foul wrong. Here Joseph suffered because he would not yield his integrity. He had placed his reputation and interest in the hands of God. And although he was suffered to be afflicted for a time, to prepare him to fill an important position, yet God safely guarded that reputation that was blackened by a wicked accuser, and afterward, in his own good time, caused it to shine. God made even the prison the way to his elevation. Virtue will in time bring its own reward. The shield which covered Joseph's heart, was the fear of God, which caused him to be faithful and just to his master, and true to God. He despised that ingratitude which would lead him to abuse his master's confidence, although his master might never learn the fact. The grace of God he called to his aid, and then fought with the tempter. He nobly says, "How then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?" He came off conqueror.
AMID the snares to which all are exposed, they need strong and trustworthy defenses on which to rely. Many, in this corrupt age, have so small a supply of the grace of God, that in many instances their defense is broken down by the first assault, and fierce temptations take them captives. The shield of grace can preserve all unconquered by the temptations of the enemy, though surrounded with the most corrupting influences. By firm principle and unwavering trust in God, their virtue and nobleness of character can shine; and, although surrounded with evil, no taint need be left upon their virtue and integrity. And if, like Joseph, they suffer calumny and false accusations, Providence will overrule all the enemy's devices for good, and God will, in his own time, exalt as much higher, as for awhile they were debased by wicked revenge.
THE part which Joseph acted in connection with the scenes of the gloomy prison, was that which raised him finally to prosperity and honor. God designed that he should obtain an experience by temptations, adversity, and hardships, to prepare him to fill an exalted position.
WHILE he was confined in prison, Pharaoh became offended with two of his officers, the chief baker and the chief butler, and they were put in the prison where Joseph was bound. "And the captain of the guard charged Joseph with them, and he served them; and they continued a season in ward." Joseph made his life useful even while in prison. His exemplary conduct, humble deportment, and faithfulness, obtained for him the confidence of all in the prison, and those who were connected with it. He did not spend his time in mourning over the injustice of his accusers, which had deprived him of his liberty.
Two years longer Joseph remained in his gloomy prison. The Lord gave Pharaoh remarkable dreams. In the morning the king was troubled because he could not understand them. He called for the magicians of Egypt, and the wise men. The king thought that they would soon help him to understand these dreams, for they had a reputation for solving difficulties. The king related his dreams to them, but was greatly disappointed to find that with all their magic and boasted wisdom, they could not explain them. The perplexity and distress of the king increased. As the chief butler saw his distress, all at once Joseph came into his mind, and at the same time a conviction of his forgetfulness and ingratitude. "Then spake the chief butler unto Pharaoh, saying, I do remember my faults this day." He then related to the king the dreams which he and the chief baker had, which troubled them as the dreams which now troubled the king, and said, "And there was there with us a young man, an Hebrew, servant to the captain of the guard; and we told him, and he interpreted to us our dreams; to each man according to his dream he did interpret. And it came to pass, as he interpreted to us, so it was; me he restored unto mine office, and him he hanged."
IT was humiliating to Pharaoh to turn away from the magicians and wise men of his kingdom to a Hebrew servant. But his learned and wise men failed him, and he now will condescend to accept the humble services of a slave, if his troubled mind can obtain relief.
"THEN Pharaoh sent and called Joseph, and they brought him hastily out of the dungeon; and he shaved himself, and changed his raiment, and came in unto Pharaoh. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I have dreamed a dream, and there is none that can interpret it; and I have heard say of thee, that thou canst understand a dream to interpret it. And Joseph answered Pharaoh, saying, It is not in me; God shall give Pharaoh an answer of peace."
JOSEPH's answer to the king shows his strong faith and humble trust in God. He modestly disclaims all honor of possessing in himself superior wisdom to interpret. He tells the king that his knowledge is not greater than that of those whom he has consulted. "It is not in me." God alone can explain these mysteries.
JOSEPH told the king that there would be seven years of great plenty. Everything would grow in great abundance. Fields and gardens would yield more plentifully than formerly. Fruits and grains would yield abundantly. And these seven years of abundance were to be followed by seven years of famine. The years of plenty would be given that he might prepare for the coming years of famine. "And the plenty shall not be known in the land by reason of that famine following; for it shall be very grievous. And for that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice, it is because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass. Now therefore let Pharaoh look out a man discreet and wise, and set him over the land of Egypt."—Mrs. E. G. White, in Great Controversy.
IT is the one duty of the hour that we are to recognize as our duty for the hour. To ascertain that duty, to distinguish the one real duty from the many apparent duties, may require careful balancing of various interests, and of conflicting feelings and relations; but when that immediate duty is ascertained, it must be recognized as above all else, for the time being; as practically standing alone, the only present duty of our lives. Then we must move in that direction, even though we seem to be moving to sure destruction, or to the disregard of interests and of loved ones, dearer to us than life itself. We may seem to be risking our influence, endangering our good name, compromising our position, neglecting important enterprises, causing needless discomfort to others, failing to improve the great opportunities of our life course, bringing discomfort to ourselves, and yielding that which it would be a priceless privilege to enjoy; but there is no proper alternative to us; this is the one thing for us to do. And, so sure as God is true, if we do go forward fearlessly, it will ultimately be found that the doing of this duty is perfectly consistent with every other duty of our lives.—S. S. Times.
Controversy in Defense of Truth
By Alexander Carson
MANY seem alarmed at controversy, and shrink from it as opposed to the spirit of the gospel. It is, no doubt, a grievous thing that controversy should be necessary; but as long as error exists it is impossible to avoid controversy, except we value peace more than truth. Can we forget that the whole life of Christ and his apostles was a scene of never-ending controversy? He who was love itself, contended constantly against the errors of his time. There is not a truth or an ordinance of the gospel that Christians can hold without opposition.—Dr. A. Carson.
FORGOTTEN WORTHIES.
WHILE John Woolman was still a baby in the poor farm-house at Mount Holly, another boy of like spirit, and destined to as noble work, was born in an obscure little hamlet among the Carpathian Mountains.
David Zeisberger's forefathers were peasants, the followers of John Huss. He inherited nothing from them, not even especial intellectual alertness. Unless, indeed, we count as a heritage the drops of blood which ran in his veins from more than one of the noble army of martyrs. When he was five years old, his family fled, to escape persecution, to Herrnhut, where Count Zinzendorf then had gathered the remaining Hussites. David's father and mother were among the Herrnhutters sent by Zinzendorf to Georgia, but the boy was left in Moravia to be educated by the church of the Unitas Fratrum. This church, as we all know, claims to-day to hold the place in an especial manner of a mother to the children in her communion, and no mother's care could be more keen or benignant than it is now. But in Zeisberger's day her rule was that of the typical step-mother. He was a small, delicate lad, with something in his face which attracted the notice of Zinzendorf. He sent the boy to a prosperous community of the church near Utrecht, where education, as in godly private families of the time, was given through the lash. David went through a steady discipline of work, beatings, and fastings.
One day a stranger whom he helped, when he was lost in the morasses near the town, gave him two pieces of gold, bidding him keep them and not give them to the community. David's conscience, however, forced him to give one piece to the brethren, who immediately charged him with having stolen it, and publicly punished him as a liar and a thief.
This was the stroke too much. That night David, with another boy named Shober, escaped from the community and set off to America, with no means but the solitary piece of gold which he had kept. It paid their way to London. There General Oglethorpe met the lads, and, struck by David's sensitive face and singular gravity, procured them a free passage to Savannah.
In the backwoods of Georgia, Zeisberger at last found his father and mother. He set himself to learn to plow, to trap bears and hunt panthers; but scarcely had the winter opened, when the Moravian settlement was broken up by raids of the Spanish soldiers from Florida. The Zeisberger family were carried as laborers by Whitefield farther into the wilderness, up into Pennsylvania. There they, as if guided by God, came to where Nitschmann, a bishop of the Unitas Fratrum, had just arrived, meaning to found a colony of the brethren.
With this handful of men and the Zeisberger family he penetrated the mountains to the head-waters of the Delaware. The place is familiar to us all; but to understand David's story we must set it back a century. The unbroken forest walled them in; the silence was oppressive. There were none of the singing birds which appear with civilization, no dogs, cows, poultry, no cheerful village life. Outside of their tents the world sank suddenly into a gloomy wilderness, tenanted only by beasts of prey and the savages who peered at them from the underbrush, or fled with hoarse cries like a legion of devils. David, who was always neat and finical as a woman, felt an intolerable loathing for their indecency and filthy habits. Yet, back of that, they had a singular power over him. Their souls met him naked as their bodies. They were to him lost creatures of God, knowing not their Father. Yet, he asked himself, what did he, the child of the church, know of God more than they? That winter, working alone in the forest, the boy passed through that hour of wrestling which comes to every young man. "What was he? What was God? Why was he here?"
This little German, always prim and grave, endured strange anguish of soul. At times he heard, like John Woolman, a voice telling him that his work was to bring these lost savages to God. The next hour this seemed impractical folly. He would go back to Utrecht to a trade, to almost certain success. What had he to do with the savages more than with other brutes?
Just at this juncture arrived Count Zinzendorf. He saw the lad, and detected again the same singular hint of promise on his face—a prophecy which he could not interpret.
He told the brethren that the boy must have a chance, and appointed him one of his staff to return with him to Moravia. David came with him to Philadelphia, and embarked with the understanding that a clear road to fortune lay before him in Europe, and that he never was to return to America.
The ship weighed anchor. Bishop Nitschmann, passing down the deck, saw the lad, pale and haggard, gazing at the receding shore.
"Zeisberger," he said, "is it possible that you wish to return?"
"Yes."
"But for what reason?"
"That I may learn to know Christ, and teach him to the Indians," said David, finding speech at last in his extremity.
"Then, if that be your mind, in God's name, even now go back!"
The ship was brought to, and the boy sent back. After this, the Moravians regarded him as Eli did Samuel: he was called of God. His name was entered on the list of the brethren and their trades, as David Zeisberger, destinierter Heidenbote.
The lad at once left the community and went to the lodge of the great sachem of the Mohawks, and there lived and worked to learn thoroughly the habits and language of the Indians. He was adopted into the tribe of the Onondagas.
Thus begins the remarkable history of a work which extended over sixty-two years. Zeisberger was always, as a beardless boy or a tottering old man, an itinerant among the fiercest tribes then on the Western continent. He made his way through interminable forests, through morasses in which he sank to his neck; he was dragged to jail as a French spy, and as a rebel emissary; he was tortured by the cannibal tribes and barely escaped with life; but he was, through all, the same quiet, prim little man who never was heard to complain, and who seldom spoke except when he was "about his Father's business." So silent was he that when he was in the settlements whole days would pass in which he would not utter a word. Yet his passionate bursts of fiery eloquence had a singular power over his dusky hearers. They held him as one of their kinsfolk. He was Ganonsserachi. They knew him to be as reticent and as unflinching under torture as themselves. He went into tribes where hundreds lay dead from small-pox, and alone nursed the sick and buried the corpses. Again and again he faced a mob of drunken, howling savages, and cowed them with his quiet, indomitable spirit. He spoke the dialects of the principal tribes, he controlled the grand council of the Delawares, and held the rank of sachem among the six nations. He left complete grammars and dictionaries of all the principal Indian languages, with hymnals, the gospels, collections of sermons, etc., in the Iroquois and Lenni Lenape tongues.
No other single man ever did as much to civilize and Christianize the red man in America as Zeisberger. He traveled throughout the United States and Canada, and established forty Christian villages as the nucleus of Indian civilization. In these villages he not only taught them the gospel, but set them to work as farmers and mechanics. If the work begun by this unobtrusive little German had been carried out, there would not be an uncivilized Indian on the continent.
During his sixty-three years of labor, Zeisberger never took a penny from the church for his support.
"I am no hireling," he said quietly. "God set me this work."
In the history of colonial days, set over against the massacres, witch-burnings, and battles of both New Englanders and Virginians with the red devils, there is the figure of this silent, insignificant-looking Moravian, going in and out of the wilderness at his work. It is to our eyes like one of the apostles.
In 1782 a body of militia-men fell unprovoked on the two Christian villages of Salem and Gnadenhutten, driving the inhabitants into inclosures preparatory to killing them. The Indians passed the night in singing hymns and in prayer. In the morning they were butchered like so many beeves. David never recovered from this blow; these dark-skinned martyrs were dear to him as children. He foresaw, too, that the cause of Christianity would be thrown back among the Indians a hundred years by this crime. The work of the Moravians among the Indians stopped.
Zeisberger died at an extreme old age in an Indian village. Bishop de Schweinitz, in his history of the Moravian missionary, tells us that, when the hour of his death drew nigh, the passing bell tolled, and his white friends, the brethren, withdrew and gave way to the189Lenape Indians, who gathered around his bed. They sang the hymns in their own tongue, which he had written for them. "Then," says the chronicler, "the red men fell upon their knees and wept aloud, for they knew that their best friend was gone forever."—Congregationalist.
The Home Circle.
A TWILIGHT THOUGHT.
"When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him?" Ps. 8:3, 4.
I took a walk out in the field at twilight's dewy hour,
And viewed the scenes which nature sketched with more than magic power.
A solemn hush was in the air, the song-birds were at rest,
And a thousand gorgeous sunset hues were glowing in the west.
These faded soon, and in the sky, so deeply, darkly blue,
The moon in her bright majesty crept slowly into view.
And as I, soul-enraptured, her beauty gazed upon,
The stars, to hail their glorious queen, assembled one by one.
And then the quiet twilight scene put on the garb of night,
And the vast area above was all ablaze with light.
The milky way glowed softly white and mingled with the blue,
Above which glowed a million suns that mortals may not view.
I felt a sense of littleness I ne'er had felt before.
"Oh, what is mortal man?" I thought—"a feeble worm, no more!
A million worlds above us shine to mortals here unknown,
Each in itself a moving world, and greater than our own."
Yet he who thus displays to us his wondrous power and skill,
From day to day, as time flies on, is mindful of us still.
Teach me, O God, while pondering thy glorious works above,
To thank thee with an humble heart for all thy grace and love.
—Selected.
Health and Temperance.
By Christian at Work
CIGARETTE SMOKING.
ONE of the saddest, and at the same time most exasperating sights witnessed nowadays at the watering-places, is the habit of cigarette smoking by half-grown boys and silly young girls. It is utterly senseless in itself, besides being deeply injurious to the health of immature youth. It will probably avail little, however, to point out the poisonous, debilitating, and disease-producing effects of these vile cigarettes, which, as exposed for sale in the market, are made often of stubs of cigars literally picked from the gutters, and from the refuse matter of tobacco manufactories. Such effects are sneered at by the reckless youngster who thinks it manly to twine a smoke-wreath around his lofty head. It would be useless to remind him that Dr. Douglas said with all the authority of a medical man, who knows whereof he speaks, that General Grant's cancer was caused by smoking, or of other conspicuous cases. Catelain, the famous caterer of Paris, died of smoker's cancer, and so did four learned men, in the course of a few years, who were connected with a theological seminary not a hundred miles from this city. Dr. Loza describes many cases within his own knowledge and practice caused by smoking. Dr. Barker, in the British Medical Journal, gives an account of seventy-five cases of epithelioma, and in only one case of the seventy-five was there an inherited predisposition to cancer. Almost every physician has had occasion to cut out lip cancers which came as the result of drawing nicotine through a pipe-stem. But if 100,000 cases of the direst agony, followed by the most wretched of deaths, could be marshaled to enforce the reasonable exhortation against the cigarette, it would do nothing to deter the brainless and pert young miss who is determined to play the role of a cigarette heroine. The only weapon against this outrage on human nature is to ridicule it. Voltaire said that in France ridicule kills; it is so in America as well. When common sense was impotent against the vagaries and eccentricities and absurd ideals of knight-errantry, Cervantes set all the world to laughing at them by picturing the follies of Don Quixote. It is time to bring the laugh and the sneer united against this intolerable nuisance of cigarette smoking by young men—and especially by young women.—Christian at Work.
SLEEP IS A MEDICINE.
By Medical Times
THE cry for rest has always been louder than the cry for food. Not that it is more important; but it is often harder to obtain. The best rest comes from sound sleep. Of two persons otherwise equal, the one who sleeps the best will be the most moral, healthy, and efficient. Sleep will do much to cure irritability of temper, peevishness, and uneasiness. It will restore to vigor an overworked brain. It will build up and make strong a weary body. It will cure a headache. Indeed we might make a long list of nervous and other maladies that sleep will cure.
The cure of sleeplessness requires a clean, good bed, sufficient exercise to produce weariness, pleasant occupation, good air and not too warm a room, clear conscience, and avoidance of stimulants and narcotics. For those who are overworked, haggard, and nervous, who pass sleepless nights, we commend the adoption of such habits as shall secure sleep; otherwise, life will be short, and what there is of it sadly imperfect.—Medical Times.
EXTRAVAGANT ECONOMIES.
Do you not know many homes where the supply of cooking utensils is so unnecessarily limited that a good deal of time is daily wasted, and much extra labor expended in preparing the meals, by having to wash one saucepan in which to cook a second dish that could as well have been cooked with the same fire, and watched at the same time as the first? Or a towel must do duty as strainer or colander, no account being made of the time required to wash the towel, nor of its becoming worn and stained? Or a silver spoon is used to stir or lift food for lack of iron or wooden ones? Why not afford such kettles and pans as are really needed for advantageous cooking, and "save" in some other department?
Have you ever seen some busy housewife hanging out clothes on a cold, windy day, taking off a clothes-pin each time a garment is added to the line, trying to make one pin hold two and sometimes three articles? Since good clothes-pins can be had for five cents per dozen, it seems rather far-fetched saving to stand on the icy ground double the time really required to shake out and hang the clothes, and run the risk of taking cold while so doing.
Could any arithmetician compute the number of hours spent, in rearing a family of half a dozen children, in untying "hard knots" in shoe-strings that are too short, or are so worn as to require tying in more than one place, and must again be untied before the little shoes can be taken off? Shoe-strings cost, it may be, ten cents per dozen pairs. Could not the hours which some mothers spend, during one year alone, in managing worn-out shoelacings in order to save a few cents, better be utilized in doing some sewing, or other useful work, by which enough could be earned to stock the family with shoe-strings for life?
Neat hemp carpets of neutral tints can be bought for thirty-five cents per yard. These are simple, durable, and easy to wash or clean; and yet, in farming districts, how many an over-worked wife and mother wearies hand and brain alike by the slow manufacture of rag carpets—heavy to handle, difficult to clean, and seldom of any esthetic value! The shocking mosaics made by cutting up large bits of colored calico and sewing them together into "blocks," to be joined together for quilts, are not yet unknown to American homes, although good, strong, white counter-panes can be bought as low as one or two dollars each. If fragments of calico that have accumulated are put together with little reference to size or shape, and then simply fastened over cotton batting to the cloth taken from a half-worn dress, possibly the labor required for this might be worth the while, especially if one of the family were reading aloud while others sewed. But to buy new cloth with intent to cut it up for the fun of sewing it together again, is certainly worse than foolish.—Christian Register.
Mexico’s Extensive Sulphur Deposits
ALTHOUGH four-fifths of the world's sulphur supply comes from Sicily, the deposits of Popocatepetl, in Mexico, are much more extensive and of better quality. A tunnel is to be built to facilitate mining the Mexican sulphur.—Selected.
The Courtesies of Life
By Bover
The small courtesies sweeten life; the great ones ennoble it.—Bover.
Diet and Disease
By Seneca
In the simpler times there was no need of so large a supernumerary force of medical men, nor of so many surgical instruments, nor of so many boxes of drugs. Health was simple, for a simple reason. Many dishes have induced many diseases. Note how vast a quantity of lives one stomach absorbs—devastation of land and sea. No wonder that with so discordant a diet, disease is ever-varying. Count the cooks; you will no longer wonder at the innumerable number of human maladies.—Seneca.
IMPURE WATER.
By Dr. E. F. Mack
It is a common belief that when a well is dug pure spring water, oozing from the ground, is obtained; that is true in the case of artesian wells; but, although possible, is rarely the case with ordinary surface wells, and under this name are embraced all wells not more than fifty feet deep. The water obtained from these wells is merely the water which has fallen on the surface of the earth in rains, and has percolated the soil and become collected in this excavation. It is called ground water. Even granting that some of the water may be spring water, some of it must be drainage, and the amount of this will depend upon the rainfall, and the character of the soil.
A moment's reflection will show that wells must act as drains to the surrounding soil. Just as a wet field may be drained by digging one or more trenches into which the water may flow and be carried away, so, when a deep trench or well is dug, the water in the surrounding soil will necessarily tend to drain into it. This is not only a matter of reasoning, but a matter of experience. The following case is reported: "In consequence of the escape of the contents of a barrel of petroleum, or benzine, which had been buried, a circuit of wells, sixty feet below, and two hundred and fifty or three hundred yards distant, became so affected that the occupiers of fifteen houses, containing eighty-two inhabitants, were for ten days unable to use the water for cooking or drinking."
When wells are first dug in rural districts, the water is pure and may remain so for a long time. Fortunately, the soil possesses some power of purification, and although the water may receive polluting matter on the surface of the ground, some of this matter is detained, mechanically, by filtration, and other portions may be decomposed and taken up by growing plants and trees. But this power of the soil is limited. When the sources of pollution are constant and numerous, as in cities, from privies, cess-pools, slop-water, offal, and the manure of domestic animals, and, sometimes, from leaky and imperfect sewers and drains, the soil becomes "filth sodden," and the filth is carried deeper and deeper, until finally it appears in our drinking water.
Sanitary literature is full of instances of the outbreaks of epidemics of diarrhea, typhoid fever, and cholera, which have been traced to the drinking of well water thus polluted; and, even though the city may go through one or more years' epidemics, it is not a pleasant thought for the inhabitants to indulge in, that they are drinking the drainage of their privies and cess-pools. And yet they must realize the idea that their wells are, and must be, drains for the surrounding grounds, with all its contents that are capable of solution in water. Science cannot tell us that in a given water is charged the poison of a definite disease, but it can tell us that it has received the product of decaying matter from animal sources, and, again, that such water is dangerous to health.
News and Notes.
By Editor
RELIGIOUS.
—Tunis has a population of 1,500,000, of whom 45,000 are Jews.
—It is said that there are but two Baptist churches in Wyoming Territory.
—Of the 408 members of the last Congress, 125 make no profession of religion.
—Sam Jones is to hold a six weeks' series of meetings in the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, beginning about the middle of April.
—Some of the members of the Glasgow Free Presbytery are desirous of having the Westminster Confession of Faith modified on some points.
—Archbishop Ryan has issued an order that "hereafter only music composed expressly for divine worship shall be sung in the churches" in his bishopric.
—At the annual meeting of the Connecticut Congregational Club at Hartford, a Chinaman named Yung Wing was elected president for the ensuing year.
—The New Jersey Sabbath (Sunday) Union has commenced the publication of a paper, in the interests of first-day observance. The name of the journal is The Pearl of Days.
—The American United Presbyterian Church has in Egypt 21 organized congregations and 1,842 communicants. Only a few of their converts are from among the Moslems.
—It is now denied that the Pope sent his blessing to Dr. McGlynn. The blessing, it is claimed, was for the members of McGlynn's congregation who remained loyal to "the church."
—The Connecticut Legislature has passed a bill prohibiting the running of excursion trains in that State on Sunday, and placing certain other restrictions upon Sunday railway traffic.
—A movement has been set on foot by "the better portion of the Knights of Labor" in Chicago, the object of which "is the emancipation of some twenty-five hundred persons from Sunday labor."
—Dr. Justin D. Fulton, who has been connected for ten years with the Centennial Baptist Church in Brooklyn, has tendered his resignation, and proposes to devote himself to the conversion of Roman Catholics to the Baptist faith.
—It is rumored in New York that Dr. Parker will be asked to succeed Henry Ward Beecher in Plymouth Church. Dr. Parker is a man of the Beecher stamp, and is certainly the most popular preacher in London as he is fantastic and theatrical in style.
—At a recent meeting of the Evangelical Lutheran Synod at Philadelphia the use of unfermented wine at the sacrament was approved; but it was decided that the fermented article is preferable, except in cases where it is likely to stimulate thirst for liquor.
—At a conference of the sect known as the Mennonite Brethren in Christ, held at Reading, Pa., recently, a vote was passed that preachers be prohibited from riding on railroads on Sundays. One minister declared that he walked eighteen miles every Sunday.
—It seems that 1887 is the fiftieth anniversary of the Pope's ordination as priest, as well as Queen Victoria's jubilee, and it is rumored that letters and presents will be exchanged between the Vatican and St. James's. The Queen is personally acquainted with the Pope.
—In a recent lecture Hon. John Bright, of England, said: "Since Queen Victoria ascended the throne there has been a war in New Zealand, three wars in China, one in Zululand, two in India, two in Afghanistan, and three in Burmah, all of which caused great loss of life, and misery, and were incapable of justification."
—Speaking of mummies, the Christian at Work says that the most interesting feature about them is that "they reveal the belief of Egyptians in the resurrection of the body." It is then suggested that as "the heathen, however enlightened and philosophical, were without the least faith in this doctrine," the Egyptians must have learned it from the Hebrews, "to whom God had immediately revealed it."
—The Catholic Mirror says: "The church in California is now receiving back from the Mexican Government the two million dollars known as the 'pious fund,' which was confiscated by Santa Ana in 1842. The record of the fund was lost for fifteen years, when Archbishop Alemany found at Monterey documents which established the claim of the church to the money. The fund had been deposited with the Mexican Government in trust for the proper management of missions."
—There are in New York City 500 places of public worship, including thirty Jewish synagogues and sixty-one Roman Catholic churches. The total number of sittings is 400,000, divided among twenty-eight denominations. The Protestant church organizations number 285, with a total membership of 94,467.
—The Protestants of Germany, alarmed by the partial repeal of the May Laws, and the prospects of still farther concessions to Rome, have formed an alliance and issued a call to the various church parties to keep their differences in the background and "firmly unite for the protection and defense of Fatherland and of the German Evangelical Church." The call recites that the Protestant factions must unite if they would combat successfully the "powerful unity of Rome." It declares that the Jesuits are at work, and that "Romanism is more and more degenerating into Jesuitism." And Jesuitism the world over is opposed to religious and civil liberty.
SECULAR.
—San Jose, Cal., is to have an electric street-car line.
—A village near Prague, Austria, was destroyed by an earthquake, March 12.
—In Tonquin the country is being ravaged by the rebels, and there is fear of famine.
—A plot has been discovered to blow up the czar of Russia; all classes of society are implicated.
—Dr. H. D. Cogswell has given $1,000,000 to the public for the establishment of a polytechnical institute in San Francisco.
—A disastrous explosion of dynamite occurred March 16 at Levositz, Bohemia. All the men at work in the quarry at the time were blown to pieces.
—The Maharajah Dhuleep Sing has issued proclamations saying that he is now an enemy of Great Britain and a claimant of the throne of his ancestors.
—Destructive floods prevail in Montana and Dakota. Great damage has been done to the towns and farms. At Bismarck, the Missouri River is more than six miles broad.
—The Canadian War Office authorities have made arrangements for the transportation from Canada to London, during the coming season, of 3,000 horses for artillery trains.
—A new explosive called "carbonetsa glycerine" has been invented, possessing ten times more destructive power than nitro-glycerine, while it may be handled with more safety.
—Near Parkersburg, W. Va., on the 16th inst. an engine fell off a trestle into a chasm ninety feet below. The engineer and fireman were instantly killed; three men were so severely injured and scalded that their recovery is very doubtful.
—It is said that in Russia there is room for only 10,000 lunatics in the asylums and they are brutally treated. About 90,000 others roam at large without any care, and are met with on all the country roads, where they revenge ill-usage by maiming little children.
—There is great and widespread consternation in Georgia over the prevalence of rabies. It is said that there is scarcely a community in that State that has not been visited by mad dogs. In Cherokee County not less than fifty are at large. Many deaths from hydrophobia have occurred. The strange disease seems to affect the cattle as well as the dogs.
—The Sultan of Morocco has prohibited the sale or purchase of intoxicants of all kinds, and has abolished the State tobacco monopoly. Many shops have been closed and quantities of tobacco burned, and several Moors have been stripped and flogged through the streets for smoking in defiance of the Sultan's order. The people of Morocco are very angry at this interference with their habits.
—A railroad accident occurred March 14 at what is known as Bussey Park Bridge, between Roslindale and Forestville, Mass. A heavily-loaded passenger train consisting of seven passenger coaches and a baggage car broke the bridge and five cars fell through onto the road beneath, a distance of thirty feet. The police report twenty-three persons killed outright, and as many more will die. The train was crowded with working people, and the most intense excitement prevails.
—On March 13 an incendiary fire occurred in Howell, Mich., in the hardware store of Mr. Monroe, chairman of the Prohibition party committee. The fire spread and burnt down several blocks. A few months before the fire Mr. Monroe received the following letter: "SIR: We wish to inform you that you must stop your work in the prohibition cause or we will burn you out, root and branch. You may prepare for the worst, as we are on your track."
"MANY SALOON-KEEPERS."
—The Zeitung, of Berlin, publishes a letter from Strasburg, stating that it is proposed to divide Alsace-Lorraine between Prussia and Baden, Alsace to be incorporated with Baden and Prussia to absorb Lorraine.
—Further news has arrived in regard to the plot to murder Premier Baker at Tonga; it is attributed to the intrigues of the Wesleyan missionaries. Six natives arrested for complicity in the plot were shot by order of the king, and five more have been condemned to death.