AMONG the schemes for raising money easily in these days of feverish generosity is the "chain letter." It was more used ten years or so ago than now. Its exposure then was helpful, and it may be now. In a word, the plan is to conceive a chain of ten, twenty, fifty, or more links, each link of which multiplies itself. For instance, some poor boy or unfortunate man needs help to get an education or support a sick family. He or a friend gives a nickel or a dime, and writes a touching letter to two or three or five or ten others, asking each one of these to give the same sum of money, and duplicate the letter which he received to as many others as the plan contemplates, numbering the letters one in advance of the letter he received. A friend of ours has sent us a letter of this kind which we reproduce, with our friend's reply, for the benefit of our readers, and to discourage such questionable way of raising funds. Here is the appeal:—
No. 1.
Dear Mr. Stockton,—
A desire to aid George W. Fowler, a young man who has been totally blind for three years, is the apology for sending you this letter. Make three exact copies of this letter, signing your own name to each, numbering them one number higher, and send to three of your friends, and they in their turn will do the same. Then return this letter, enclosing ten or more cents and the address of the three friends to
Geo. W. Fowler,
Lower Salmon Creek,
Chapman, N. B.
Canada.
No. 50 completes the chain.
Here is our friend's reply:—
Mrs. John Fowler,—
Dear Madam: Your favor has been received, and before entering into the chain would like some light on the project, and to be sure that I have a clear understanding of it. It looks a very simple thing; but there are some tremendous possibilities in it, if my idea of numbering the letters is right, and the friends respond readily. You will notice on the enclosed slip, that I have calculated up to the 16th number, and if my three letters are numbered each No. 2, and the nine letters of the three friends are numbered 3, and their twenty-seven letters are numbered 4, and so on, then the 16th number will give, when all is added, the somewhat astonishing sum shown on the slip, $2,152,336.
Now if we follow this to the 50th number, we would certainly bankrupt the world, and the Postal Department would be heavily taxed to furnish the stamps and mailing facilities, and yourselves completely drowned under the awful aggregation of letters and dimes. I am a poor man myself, but I shrink from touching the button that would put in motion such a ponderous multiplying machine, even tho I were to be the recipient of its silver showers. I will be glad to do something to aid a worthy fellow Christian, but do not like to enter into arrangements by which my initial impulse might be perpetuated till it includes the world; my plans to do good are on a more modest scale.
E. A. STOCKTON.
The reader can easily calculate the tremendous possibilities which soon, from their magnitude, become impossibilities. The first letter, if successful, would bring ten cents. This multiplied by three, thirty cents; this in the same progression ninety cents; No. 4, $2.70; No. 5, $8.10; No. 20 would amount to $125,226,146.70, and the sum of all these numbers would reach $187,339,220; and there are thirty more multiplications to be made. No. 25, if each letter was successful, would aggregate the enormous sum of $47,069,656,618.80, and 470,696,566,188 persons would have been addressed. If confined to this country, each man, woman, and child would have received on an average over 672 letters each; and if each responded each time, they would pay, besides cost of letters and postage, $67.20 apiece to support this blind man. Mr. Stockton speaks modestly when he says it would bankrupt the world; it would bankrupt the solar system. It is yet true, we believe, that every worthy case of charity will be supported in the community where it is, if rightly made known. Let every reader of the SIGNS discourage all such schemes.
A SIGN OF THE TIMES IN THE PHILIPPINES.
THE defenders of the Roman Catholic faith in the Philippines are growing desperate. A correspondent of the Catholic Mirror, writing from Manila, says, "No one who understands the genius of this people can contemplate without horror the possible Protestantization of these islands." An instance of the manner in which the people are being incited to loyalty to the faith is given as follows:—
Recently the inhabitants of San Juan del Monte made a public profession of Catholicism. A junta was organized pledging active and enthusiastic support to the Filipino Catholic Center, and promising to use all possible efforts to uphold the Catholic faith, and to resist assaults upon it.
The following oath was administered to members of the junta:—
We solemnly promise, through the love of our Lord God, of Jesus Christ His only Son, our Saviour, of the Holy Ghost, and of our Lady, the most holy virgin, to persevere in the religion of our fathers, in which we were born, and at the same time we promise never to prove false to the sacred teaching of the Vicar of our Redeemer Jesus, his Holiness Pope Leo XIII. We also promise to defend our creed with the courage and resolution worthy of the glory of God and of our Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church.
The adversary of Christ is doing all he can to inculcate the war spirit among professed Christians. Catholicism being a carnal religion, its votaries have always been taught to maintain it by any means, by physical force when deemed necessary. Apostatizing Protestantism is following in the wake of Rome in many respects, and was mainly responsible for the Spanish war, which developed the war in the Philippines. The theory was that by means of war God was placing the islands in the hands of the United States in order that they might be Protestantized. So, from both Catholics and Protestants, the Filipinos are being taught that war is an essential feature of Christian progress. The past four years have been a season of disseminating the principles of religious warfare in the name of Christianity, by teachers professing Christianity, yet maintaining antagonistic positions, through the argument of force. If the poor Filipinos are to be saved, it is time somebody was giving them the Gospel of Christ from the standpoint of faith in His power, rather than in the power of any human government or institution.
G.
THE MOST PROFITABLE INVESTMENT.
"Prepare War."
THE Scientific American of March 29, in speaking of the demand for armor-plate and the recent big shipment to Russia of eighteen car loads, tells us that there is evidence that a third and fourth (there are now but two) armor-plate-making establishment will be demanded. It continues:—
The industry is an extremely profitable one, even at the reduced price at which plate is now being furnished. Indeed, we do not know of any industrial enterprise in which capital could be invested on a large scale with surer certainty of profitable returns. There is not the slightest indication of any slowing up in the rate of growth of the navies of the world, our own included; and if the United States navy is to increase in adequate proportion to the extension of our foreign trade (as it certainly should do), the demands of our navy alone will before long require double the amount of armor-plate that is now being annually furnished by existing works.
And this is just what the prophet of God predicted of this time 800 years before Christ. See Joel 3:9-12. And when all the nations are prepared for war, the great battle of Armageddon, predicted in the "more sure word of prophecy," will result. The preparation may be designed of men to be merely protective and preventive of sanguinary strife, and the nations are being impoverished for the purpose; but the "god of this world" has another object in view; and as sure as the nations are prepared for war will they fight to their final utter destruction. There is peace for all, but it is in Christ Jesus.
VIOLATING SOUND PRINCIPLES.
SUNDAY, April 6, was a "dry Sunday," so called, in New York City. The municipal authorities had determined to close all the saloons in the city from twelve o'clock Saturday night until five o'clock Monday morning. That does not mean that there was no liquor sold in that city on that day, but simply that the recognized saloons were closed during that time. The Raines'-law "hotels" were doing a liquor business, as well as all the regular hotels. It was also hinted that many places that appeared "dry" were not as dry as they appeared, and that in many out-of-the-way places liquor was being sold; and those who must have it had doubtless laid by a sufficient quantity to tide them over the dry spell.
On the whole, it is possible that there was considerable less liquor sold on that day than on previous Sundays. It is even possible that there was a little less liquor consumed on that day than on previous Sundays. But that the liquor sold on the following Monday or on the preceding Saturday was any less harmful than that which had previously been sold on Sunday is not even supposable. That the day was regarded with any more sacredness by the saloon-keepers and bartenders who were forced to observe it is not at all likely; that they improved the opportunity to attend the churches is not likely; and that those who craved the drink felt any more kindly toward the churches, through whose influence largely they were compelled to wait until Monday before seeking to quench their thirst, is highly improbable.
It is good that men should not drink liquor. It is a grand work to induce men to cease drinking it. But it is a fact that being compelled to cease one day in seven but whets the burning appetite, and gives it a keener edge. By such methods the result desired by temperance workers is not attained.
There were police enough in New York City to compel all recognized saloons to close on Sunday. The same policemen under the same orders could keep them closed all the rest of the week just as9well as on Sunday only. The same policemen could compel the hotels to close their drinking establishments. The only thing lacking is the order to do it backed by a law authorizing it to be done. The whole matter is in the hands of the people. If the people want the saloons closed all the week, they can have it done; if they wish them closed only on Sunday, they can have that done; but that the cause of temperance is greatly benefited by the latter accomplishment is something that has never yet been demonstrated.
There is something accomplished in Sunday closing, however. The sacredness of a religious ordinance is recognized by the civil law. The worldling is compelled by the civil law to act as tho he were religious. An alliance is effected between secular and religious things—between the Church and the State, the State compelling its subjects to recognize and observe one of the dogmas of the church.
All this is against the spirit of the Constitution of the United States. It is likewise against the vital and real principles of the Christian religion. Temperance must be one of the characteristics of the Christian. He must live it as well as teach it; but the effort to compel a cessation of intemperance by closing saloons on one day in seven is an effort barren of results; and when that one day is a day set apart by the church, and the closing is accomplished because of the supposed sacred character of the day, rather than because of the evil which the traffic is doing, then to the barrenness of the results is added the violation of the fundamental principles of the government and of the Christian religion as well.
S.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN?
By A. R. Ogden
I HAVE been forcibly impressed the past few months with the great preparations for war which we see going on everywhere. After leaving New York City, August 28, 1901, we touched ports in England, France, Spain, Portugal, Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, and finally our stopping-place, Chile. In nearly all these ports, we have seen battle-ships of many different nations. There are now afloat thousands of these great vessels, all built and equipped, not for commerce, no; but for what? There can be but one definite answer. They are preparing for Armageddon. Others are being built as rapidly as they can be turned out. Thousands of men are building these ships, and thousands of others are giving their time and energy to manipulating them. Thus thousands of lives and millions of gold are dedicated to the goddess of war.
But this only includes the naval preparations. Think of the thousands upon thousands and millions upon millions of men to-day in the standing armies of the world, and the others, thousands and millions, who are wholly engaged in the preparation of armaments for these millions who are daily under discipline and drill, all preparing—for what? not for a great religious movement or a movement for the uplifting of society, but for a wild, mad rush to slay their fellow-men, —victims of the goddess of war.
The past few days the U. S. A. battle-ship "Wisconsin" has been in Valparaiso Bay. It was our privilege to go aboard and see the great guns, some great in rapidity, firing several hundred shots per minute, others of great magnitude, hurling a missile weighing a thousand pounds a distance of from ten to fifteen miles. We were glad to see a ship so beautiful and so finely equipped, but made sad when we thought of the object of its existence.
We are truly living in a time of "wars and rumors of wars." John on the isle of Patmos saw the time when "the nations were angry" (not one or a few, but "the nations"). And again, "For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty." Rev. 11:18; 16:14. But the word to the Lord's people is, "Be ye also patient, stablish your hearts; for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh." James 5:8. "And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh." Luke 21:28.
The "blessed hope" for which Paul longed is about to be realized.
A. R. OGDEN.
Valparaiso, Chile.
Current Events and Foreign Affairs
In an election held by the city of Chicago on April 1, the people declared by a heavy majority for municipal ownership of the street railroads and the gas and electric light and power plants.
THE Chinese exclusion bill passed the House on April 7 by viva voce vote. As passed, the bill practically re-enacts all the existing exclusion laws and incorporates with them the existing treaty regulations. It extends these exclusion laws to the Philippines and the other possessions of the United States, and forbids Chinese laborers in these possessions coming into this country. Before its passage, the bill was so amended as to exclude Chinese sailors from American ships whose voyages terminate at any American port.
THE revolution in Venezuela seems to be growing in strength. The seaport of Tucacas and the city of Barquisemito have fallen into the hands of the revolutionists, and government troops have been defeated in several recent engagements with the rebels. At San Agustin on April 3 an engagement occurred in which less than half of the government troops engaged were accounted for at the close of the battle, the rest having been killed or wounded or having deserted to the rebels.
AT last an international question has been referred to the Hague arbitration tribunal for decision. The question to be decided is involved in what is known as the Pius claim. The claim is a dispute between the Catholic Church of California and the Government of Mexico as to the liability of the latter for the interest upon certain church lands which the Mexican Government undertook to hold as trustee for the church. For about a third of a century the matter has been pending.
DURING a foot-ball game at Ibrox Park, Glasgow, on April 5, between teams representing England and Scotland, a crowd, unable to obtain admittance to the grounds, broke down the fences and swarmed upon the field. The police drove the crowd back upon the terraces and seats, with the result that part of the highest portion of the terrace collapsed, precipitating the mass of people to the ground. Hundreds were badly hurt, and 21 have succumbed to their injuries.
CONGRESS will soon be asked for $50,000 to meet the expenses incurred in connection with President McKinley’s injury, death, and burial. A great portion of this will go to the physicians who operated upon him and waited upon him during the time between his injury and death. Strangely enough, the one who performed the unsuccessful operation receives the largest proportion of the money.
A DESPATCH from London states that the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company has sold its American rights and patents to an American company with a capital of $6,150,000. The German Government is preparing to prevent the use of the Marconi system on German ships or the establishing of Marconi stations on the coast of Germany.
THE oleomargarine bill recently passed by the House has now been passed by the Senate, tho with some amendments in the Senate. The bill imposes an internal revenue tax of one-fourth of a cent a pound on the manufacture of oleomargarine; but on that which has been colored in imitation of butter a tax of 10 cents a pound is imposed.
IMPORTANT engagements have recently occurred in Colombia between government troops and the insurgents which are regarded by the government party as practically putting an end to the revolution. Governor Salazar reports that there is now only the insurrection on the isthmus to be put down, which will soon be accomplished.
OFFICIALS of the Pacific Commercial Cable Company are now in San Francisco selecting a landing place for a cable connecting San Francisco with Hawaii and the Philippine Islands. These officers of the company state that they do not expect Congress to place any obstacles in the way of laying this cable to the islands.
FOUR army transports are to sail from San Francisco for Manila in the near future for the purpose of bringing home American troops whose terms of service have expired or whose services are not needed in the islands. It is proposed to bring all such home as quickly as possible on account of the outbreak of the plague.
THERE is much excitement now in Denmark over the proposition to sell the Danish West Indies to the United States. The party which is opposed to the sale is bringing every possible influence to bear to prevent its consummation. The party favoring the sale is equally active, and both sides are confident of success.
THE battle over the Cuban reciprocity measure is to begin in the House this week. There will be strong opposition to the bill in its present form; and it seems probable that a substitute bill, providing for reciprocity in case Cuba agrees to adopt our immigration laws, will be passed in its stead.
FORTY-FIVE British soldiers were killed and 39 injured near Barberton, So. Africa, on March 30, by the wrecking of a train on which the soldiers were passengers. The engineer lost control of the train on a steep grade, and the train left the track while running at a speed of 80 miles an hour.
THE State of Washington is now seeking to enter suit against the Northern Securities Company to dissolve the merger of the Northern Pacific and Great Northern railroads. The Supreme Court has promised an early response to the State’s application for leave to file a bill of complaint.
TROUBLE is again threatening in the Balkans. Bulgarian and Macedonian bands are doing what they can to harass the Turkish Government, in the hope that the powers will step in to restore order. Atrocities are reported to have been committed by both the insurgent bands and the troops sent to suppress them. Albanians have captured and are holding as hostages a number of Turkish officials, in order to secure the release of certain Albanians now held at Constantinople. It is even threatened that Austria will attempt to restore order in one of the Balkan provinces, an act which would be likely to result in the partition of Turkey.
SINCE the outbreak of cholera in Manila there have been 127 deaths from that disease up to April 7, out of a total of 157 cases. The city has been quarantined because of the plague; but the natives are much opposed to the regulations, and are trying to break up the quarantine.
ACCORDING to a statement recently issued by the Department of Agriculture, the agricultural products exported from the United States during the year 1901 amounted in value to $952,000,000. During that time the agricultural exports exceeded the agricultural imports by $560,000,000.
SERIOUS rioting is reported on the island of Jamaica, due to an increase in taxation. There has been considerable fighting between the people and the police. The situation is critical, but the authorities expect soon to quell the rising by force of arms.
IN a fight between an armed negro and a posse determined on his capture, which occurred at Tuscumbia, Alabama, on April 6, the negro and three of the attacking party were killed, three men mortally wounded, and four others seriously wounded.
A CENSUS bulletin just issued at Washington shows that the prairie division of the United States contains a greater number of inhabitants than any of the other natural divisions of the country, there being 13,300,970 persons domiciled in that region.
THE British steamer Athena was wrecked on March 22, 220 miles north of Cape Pillar, Chile. Eleven survivors of her crew were landed at Punta Arenas on April 3. The captain and 19 members of the crew were drowned.
THE citizens of Skagway, Alaska, are banding themselves together to resist the payment of a special license tax which they claim is required of no other citizens of the Republic, and is contrary to the Constitution.
THE attempt to end the strike of miners at the mines of the Pittsburg Iron and Coal Company’s mines has resulted in failure, and this strike of 10,000 miners goes on without any prospect of immediate settlement.
SANFORD B. DOLE, Governor of Hawaii, is now in Washington for the purpose of conferring with the President on matters pertaining to that territory. It is understood that this visit is at the request of the President.
AMONG the noted personages to be present at the coronation of King Edward will be the representative of Emperor Menelik of Abyssinia, Ras Makonnen, the general who defeated the Italian army at Adowa in 1896.
THE Secretary of Justice at Havana has abolished the jury system in police courts throughout the island of Cuba. The courts asked for the abolition of the system on the ground that it had proved to be a failure.
A YOUNG man of Tucson, Arizona, has invented a method of lighting ordinary incandescent electric lamps without the use of wires, and a California man has discovered a new method of telephoning without wires.
THE State Department has begun an investigation of the charge that a British army camp is being maintained in Louisiana, from which supplies are regularly shipped to the British army in South Africa.
THE first American mail steamer direct from San Francisco to Manila reached the latter port on April 5. A celebration under the auspices of the Chamber of Commerce was held in honor of the event.
THE Government of Argentina has decided to maintain the most powerful navy of any South American State, and has recently given orders for the construction of several new warships.
AT a director’s meeting of the United States Steel Corporation held at New York on April 1, it was announced that the profits of the concern for the year had amounted to $111,067,195.
A REPORT from Washington states that the President has ordered an investigation into the methods of the great beef trust with a view to correct the abuses complained of.
AMERICAN farmers seeded last autumn 32,000,000 acres of winter wheat, an excess of 4,000,000 over the acreage reaped in the summer.
A GREAT fire occurred at Atlantic City, N. J., on April 3. It is believed that the loss will exceed $750,000.
THREE thousand men are on strike at the Amalgamated Copper Company’s mines at Butte, Montana.
There are now 8,650 miles of inland waterways, or canals, in Germany open to traffic.
UNIVERSITY SPORTS.
Not long ago Dr. Minton, Moderator of the Presbyterian General Assembly, was reported to have said that this country is "university mad." As he is an educator of national repute, his opinion, tho expressed in strong language, is based on observation and experience. Be that as it may, however, there are others who have observed that universityism is becoming a fad with many young men, rather than a medium of procuring a good practical education. The Chicago American, in December last, had this to say:—
Dr. William Rainey Harper, of the University of Chicago, is sorely troubled. The class of 1905 has proved a wayward one in many respects since it entered the university last October. First, several of its members incurred the displeasure of the head of the school by precipitating the fiercest and most destructive flag rush in the history of the school. Now it has fallen once more under the ban—this time because of the scholarship standing of its members. Lured away from the straight and narrow path of scholastic duty by the enticements of foot-ball games, theater parties, banquets, dances, and other social functions of university life, two-thirds of the members of the class have fallen below passing grade in one or more of their studies.
Now, with the quarter so near an end, and the Christmas examinations only a week away, the deans assert that the condition of affairs is well-nigh hopeless. There is not sufficient time remaining before the close of the quarter for the delinquent students to make up their work, if they had the inclination to do so, and hence it seems unavoidable that over half of the freshmen will receive unwelcome Christmas presents in the shape of notices of failure from the university recorder.
Members of the faculty and upper class-men at the university ascribe the low scholarship record of the freshmen to the injurious effects of "rushing" tactics on the part of the Greek letter fraternities. A regulation of the university which was formulated by Dr. Harper when he issued his permission to the national fraternities to establish chapters at the university, prohibits a student from joining any secret society until he has completed three months' work. This rule, however, does not prevent the fraternities from "rushing" the new men whom they desire to pledge and initiate after the Christmas holidays, and consequently throughout the autumn quarter a merry competition is waged by the different fraternities in bidding for the favor of desirable members of the freshmen class. The same thing is true of the competition of the sororities for the first-year "co-eds."
It is expected that the numerous failures this year will lead to more stringent rules governing the number of social affairs. The secret-society men, however, have gained more confidence in the stability of their existence at the university since the announcement that Dr. Harper has joined the Masonic Order.
THE WORD OF GOD.
By Frederick Griggs
GOD'S Word is given to us in two different forms—the spoken and the written. The spoken was before the written, and man in his Edenic purity could read from the spoken Word or the works of God spiritual lessons, which, when he lost this purity, he failed to see. Then God in His mercy gave him the written Word. The lessons of God are still in nature, but man will rarely ever see them except as his vision is enlarged by the telescope of the written Word. Now, the laws of God may be clearly known without the written Word, for they appeal to the senses; but when that faith which comes by hearing and that hearing which comes by the Word of God, enter into man's study of God's works, then may he come to know fully the "invisible things of Him from the creation of the world, even His eternal power and Godhead." No man has a just excuse for his ignorance of the law and ways of God.
The Word has much to say concerning the laws of nature. Not only so, but it has been saying it for many generations and long ages. Wise men of the world who lived at the time when the Bible was written, placed in their teachings many ideas which have been proved false by recent discoveries; but it is to be noted that under the direction of the Holy Spirit, the writers of the Bible avoided all such errors in their writings.
Let me mention some of the scientific truths which the Bible taught for ages before they were discovered. The written Word affirms that light existed before the sun. Men did not believe it, and said that the Word was not inspired because it taught this. Now it is known and very generally accepted that light did exist before the sun, and men now are praised for so teaching. For many ages men held that the world was flat, while God in the Word kept saying, He "sitteth upon the circle of the earth." During these many years they were searching for some support for the world, and in their imagination placed it upon the backs of turtles, elephants, or strong men; but the Maker of the earth declared plainly that He had hung it "upon nothing." Now men have shown the Word true, and we call them wise.
Astronomers were continually endeavoring to count the stars. Hipparchus counted 1,022 and Ptolemy 1,026. They could count only those visible to the naked eye. All this time the Word was saying that these stars were as innumerable as the sands of the sea. Men would not believe it until science, coming along with the telescope, revealed the fact that indeed God alone could number all the stars, or could call them by their names; for the telescope revealed that something over 18,000,000 were to be found in a single system, and that there are systems beyond count. And where the telescope fails to reveal anything, photography discloses myriads.
In the realm of meteorology the same experience has been met. Men scouted the idea that the air had any weight, little dreaming that this weight was necessary to propel ships, or that by it their works were overturned; hundreds of years ago God said through Job, "He maketh a weight for the wind." The Word has been saying for centuries that "the wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits. All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full: unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again." During nearly all these centuries men have thought that the wind moved by caprice—it happened to blow as it did; but by careful observation the very laws here spoken of by God have been discovered. The earth's revolution on its axis is clearly recognized in the Bible, when, in speaking of the dayspring, God says that the earth is turned to it as clay to the seal. Even the fact that the earth had an axis was not believed by men for ages after God inquired of Job, "Whereupon are the sockets of the earth made to sink?" If they did not know that the earth turned, they could not well conceive of the sockets necessary to its axis.
Men have been studying the proper lines upon which boats should be built for many generations, and they are just now reaching the observation that the lines which the Lord gave to Noah in the building of the ark were correct; and the most seaworthy boats of to-day are being built in the same general proportion as this bark which rode the most tempestuous seas of all time. If men had taken the Word simply as it said, there would indeed have been far greater advancement in science than there has been. God intends that faith shall go before sight. There are indeed many scientific truths to which the Bible gives a leading-string, and which, if men would believe and follow them out, would result in a greater understanding of the workings of nature's laws.
We have now come to the conclusion of this series of articles. I have enjoyed writing them; for there have been opened to my mind, as I have studied these subjects for this series, many ideas concerning God's laws and their application to our lives which I had not seen before. The more closely we come in touch with God in nature, the more closely can He reveal Himself in our lives; but it is through the Word first, last, and always, that we are to know and see Him in all of His manifestations to the saving of our souls and the souls of our children.
His wonderful power is nowhere more strikingly revealed than in our bodies. The laws of health, which are but God's laws working through us, may not only be an increasingly delightful study, but one than which there is none more important. Look at the wonderful work of the heart, its immense lifting power, doing a work equal to the lifting of one pound 434,112 feet from the earth's surface in a day. We eat food. It passes through various changes, and reveals itself in the energy with which we walk and think. The energy manifested in growth is beyond our comprehension. Professor Clark, of Amherst College, Amherst, Massachusetts, found that even a squash, soft and pulpy as it is, has the power of growth to such an extent that it lifted and held up 5,000 pounds day and night for months. To do this marvelous work, its substance became compact like an oak as it grew and labored under its heavy load. All over the earth this wonder-working power goes silently on. We wonder at it. It passes our comprehension; yet it is but one letter of the alphabet of God's power.
We stand by thunderous Niagara, as with a mighty power that will grind to powder the solidest substance it pours its immense volume of water over the great precipice. Whence came all this great amount of water?—From the power of God, that lifted the tiniest drops from the sea, wafting them over land, condensing them until they fell in little rain-drops upon the land, and, collecting, wended their way from rill, creek, and lake onward to the mighty river, brought by main force perhaps even from the far-away Pacific. So we might go on, ever enumerating some new manifestation of this marvelous power. God is love, and every manifestation of His power is a manifestation of His love, which is His law.
"Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it; that it may be well with thee, and that ye may increase mightily, as the Lord God of thy fathers hath promised thee, in the land that floweth with milk and honey. Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord; and 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 thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up."
