The Signs of the Times, Vol. 11, No. 34 (9/3/1885)

The Signs of the Times

Sep 3, 1885

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Sep 3, 1885

The Impending Conflict.

By Ellen G. White

BY MRS. E. G. WHITE.

Concluded.

THROUGH the two great errors, the immortality of the soul and Sunday sacredness, Satan will bring the people under his deceptions. While the former lays the foundation of Spiritualism, the latter creates a bond of sympathy with Rome. Protestantism will yet stretch her hand across the gulf to grasp the hand of Spiritualism; she will reach over the abyss to clasp hands with the Roman power; and under the influence of this threefold union, our country will follow in the steps of Rome in trampling on the rights of conscience.

Spiritualism is now changing its form, veiling some of its more objectionable and immoral features, and assuming a Christian guise. Formerly it denounced Christ and the Bible; now it professes to accept both. The Bible is interpreted in a manner that is attractive to the unrenewed heart, while its solemn and vital truths are made of no effect. A God of love is presented; but his justice, his denunciations of sin, the requirements of his holy law, are all kept out of sight. Pleasing, bewitching fables captivate the senses of those who do not make God's word the foundation of their faith. Christ is as verily rejected as before; but the eyes of the people are so blinded that the deception is not discerned.

As Spiritualism assimilates more closely to the nominal Christianity of the day, it has greater power to deceive and ensnare. Satan himself is converted, after the modern order of things. He will appear in the character of an angel of light. Through the agency of Spiritualism, miracles will be wrought, the sick will be healed, and many undeniable wonders will be performed. And as the spirits will profess faith in the Bible, and express regard for Sunday, their work will be accepted as a manifestation of divine power.

The line of distinction between professed Christians and the ungodly is now hardly distinguishable. Church-members love what the world loves, and are ready to join with them; and Satan determines to unite them in one body and thus strengthen his cause by sweeping all into the ranks of Spiritualism. Papists who boast of miracles as a certain mark of the true church, will be readily deceived by this wonder-working power; and Protestants, having cast away the shield of truth, will also be deluded. Papists, Protestants, and worldlings will alike accept the form of godliness without the power, and they will see in this union a grand movement for the conversion of the world, and the ushering in of the long-expected millennium.

Through Spiritualism, Satan appears as a benefactor of the race, healing the diseases of the people, and professing to present a new and more exalted system of religious faith; but at the same time he works as a destroyer. His temptations are leading multitudes to ruin. Intemperance dethrones reason; sensual indulgence, strife, and bloodshed follow. Satan delights in war; for it excites the worst passions of the soul, and then sweeps into eternity its victims steeped in vice and blood. It is his object to incite the nations to war against one another; for he can thus divert the minds of the people from the work of preparation to stand in the day of God.

Satan works through the elements also to garner his harvest of unprepared souls. He has studied the secrets of the laboratories of nature, and he uses all his power to control the elements as far as God allows. When he was suffered to afflict Job, how quickly flocks and herds, servants, houses, children, were swept away, one trouble succeeding another as in a moment. It is God that shields his creatures, and hedges them in from the power of the destroyer. But the Christian world has shown contempt for the law of Jehovah; and the Lord does just what he has declared that he would do. He withdraws his blessings from the earth, and removes his protecting care from those who are rebelling against his law, and teaching and forcing others to do the same. Satan has control of all whom God does not especially guard. He will favor and prosper some in order to further his own designs, and he will bring trouble upon others, and lead men to believe that it is God who is afflicting them.

While appearing to the children of men as a great physician who can heal all their maladies, he will bring disease and disaster until populous cities are reduced to ruin and desolation. Even now he is at work. In accidents and calamities by sea and by land, in great conflagrations, in fierce tornadoes and terrific hail-storms, in tempests, floods, cyclones, tidal waves, and earthquakes, in every place and in a thousand forms, he is exercising his power. He sweeps away the ripening harvest, and famine and distress follow. He imparts to the air a deadly taint, and thousands perish by the pestilence. These visitations are to become more and more frequent and disastrous. Destruction will be upon the inhabitants of the world. The beasts of the field will groan, and the earth will languish.

And then the great deceiver will persuade men that those who serve God are causing these evils. The class that have provoked the displeasure of Heaven will charge all their troubles upon the faithful few whom the Lord has sent to them with messages of warning and reproof. Thus the accusation urged of old against the servant of God will be repeated, and upon grounds equally well established. “And it came to pass when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said unto him, Art thou he that troubleth Israel? And he answered, I have not troubled Israel, but thou and thy father’s house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and thou hast followed Baalim.” As the wrath of the people shall be excited by false charges, they will pursue a course toward God’s ambassadors very similar to that which apostate Israel pursued toward Elijah.

The miracle-working power which is manifested through Spiritualism will exert its influence against those who choose to obey God rather than men. Those who honor the Bible Sabbath will be denounced as enemies of law and order, as breaking down the moral restraints of society, causing anarchy and corruption, and calling down the judgments of God upon the earth. Their conscientious scruples will be pronounced obstinacy, stubbornness, and contempt of authority, and they will be accused of disaffection toward the Government. Are we prepared to stand firm in defense of the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus?

Before his crucifixion the Saviour explained to his disciples that he was to be put to death, and to rise again from the tomb; and angels were present to impress his words on minds and hearts. But the disciples were looking for temporal deliverance from the Roman yoke, and they could not tolerate the thought that He in whom all their hopes centered should suffer an ignominious death. The words which they needed to remember were banished from their minds; and when the time of trial came, it found them unprepared. The death of Jesus as fully destroyed their hopes as if he had not forewarned them. So in the prophecies the future is opened before us as plainly as it was opened to the disciples by the words of Christ. The events connected with the close of probation and the work of preparation for the time of trouble, are clearly brought to view. But multitudes have no more understanding of those important truths than if they had never been revealed.

Our great adversary is constantly endeavoring to attract attention to man in the place of God. He leads the people to look to bishops, to pastors, to professors of theology, as their guides, instead of searching the Scriptures to learn their duty for themselves. Then by controlling the minds of these leaders, he can influence the multitudes according to his will. But God will have a people upon the earth to

maintain the Bible, and the Bible only, as the standard of all doctrines and the basis of all reforms. The opinions of learned men, the deductions of science, the creeds or decisions of ecclesiastical councils, as numerous and discordant as are the churches which they represent, the voice of the majority,—not one or all of these should be regarded as evidence for or against any point of religious faith. Before accepting any doctrine or precept, we should demand a plain “Thus saith the Lord” in its support.

The Protestant churches have rejected the clear, scriptural arguments in defense of God’s law, and they long to stop the mouths of those whose faith they cannot overthrow by the Bible. Though they blind their own eyes to the fact, they are now adopting a course which will lead to the persecution of those who conscientiously refuse to do what the rest of the Christian world are doing, and acknowledge the claims of the papal Sabbath.

Our land is in jeopardy. The time is drawing on when its legislators shall so abjure the principles of Protestantism as to give countenance to Romish apostasy. The people for whom God has so marvelously wrought, strengthening them to throw off the galling yoke of popery, will by a national act give vigor to the corrupt faith of Rome, and thus arouse the tyranny which only waits for a touch to start again into cruelty and despotism. With rapid steps are we already approaching this period. When Protestant churches shall seek the support of the secular power, thus following the example of that apostate church, for opposing which their ancestors endured the fiercest persecution, then will there be a national apostasy which will end only in national ruin.

FOLLOW ME.

By Mrs. M. A. Maitland

“Pilgrim, from the rightful way By the mirage lured astray Till thy feet have lost the track, Till thou canst not on nor back, Turn to yonder arid land; See my foot-prints in the sand; Mark where oft I bent my knee. Wayward pilgrim, follow me.

“Child by poverty distraught, Life a battle daily fought, Chafing, grieving all the while O'er the failing cruse of oil, Left I not, at will divine, Glory's throne for lot like thine, Hungered and athirst to be, Yet repine not? Follow me.

“Chastened one, whose hand would fain Put aside the cup of pain, And whose froward lips would say, ‘Nay, my Father, not to-day!’ Heardst thou ne'er those words of mine, When my Father's hand divine Poured my cup of agony? ‘As thou wilt!’ then follow me.

“Mourner, of thy friends bereft, Lonely and in sorrow left, On thy lips, ‘I am undone!’ In thy heart no benison, All forsook me once and fled; E'en my Father's face was hid. Mourner, what of Calvary? Take thy cross and follow me.”

—Mrs. M. A. Maitland, in Christian at Work.

Properties of Matter.

By Dudley Marvin Canright

Is anything too hard for God? Is he not almighty? Certain persons limit the power of God, when they claim that matter cannot be organized by the Almighty so as to be able to think and reason. They take up a stone, they weigh it, measure it, and divide it, and then ask if that thing can think. Of course not. Examine that piece of wood. Can it think? Take a handful of the dust of the ground, from which all things grow—is there anything here able to think? They analyze a dead body, and find that it is made up chiefly of water, nitrogen, a little phosphorus, a little sulphur, and some lime, with a few other earthy materials. Go farther, and analyze a man's brain. It is found to be composed of eight-tenths water, with a little albumen, a little fat, phosphorus, sulphur, etc. Then they ask us if these elements can think. Can sulphur reason? Can water love? Can oxygen hate? No. Hence they conclude that no matter, in whatever form or organization, can be made to think. And, therefore, all intelligences, whether men, angels, or Deity, must be immaterial. So Heaven is fancied to be a vast region entirely void of matter. God who dwells there has no body, no form, no visible parts, but is a mere essence pervading all space. The angels are the same in essence, having no bodies, being nothing that can be felt, or handled or seen. The souls of men are the same also in kind, bodiless, intangible essences. All matter is incapable of thought, and all intelligence proceeds from immateriality. One more assumption, and the hard-labored conclusion is triumphantly reached; namely, Whatever is immaterial is undestructible and therefore immortal. Hence the thinking part of man is immortal.

But let us examine this pretentious fabric. If God is without body, parts, or shape, a mere essence filling all space, and if angels and the souls of men are the same, only smaller, then how can either be a person, or have a separate existence from the other? But waiving this, where is the proof that an immaterial being cannot be destroyed? Has God said so? No. Do they know it by experience? No. Then it is a mere groundless assumption. This theory of the immateriality of the soul is a modern invention to sustain the tottering notion of the soul's immortality. But the most noted theologians now confess that immateriality does not prove immortality. That which had a beginning can have an end. What God has made, he can destroy.

But to the question, Can God organize matter so that it can think? we answer, Yes. But our opponents say, “A stone, a stick, dust, water, iron,—these are material. They have no intelligence; hence matter cannot think.” True, matter in these particular forms cannot think; but it does not follow that it cannot in a different form, or when differently organized. A ball of snow is very white and very cold. It is material. Shall I therefore conclude that all matter must be white and cold? A piece of coal is just as material as the snow-ball; and yet it is very black, just opposite in color from the snow. Again, burning coal is very hot, just the opposite of the cold snow. Has it ceased to be material? Lift that block of lead. How very heavy! Now handle those feathers. How light! They seem to be just the opposite of each other, yet both are matter. One form of matter is sour, as a lemon; another is sweet, as sugar.

Indeed, the various combinations of matter may be said to be almost infinite. Yet it takes only a very few original or primary elements to make all these. “The number of the elements, or simple substances, with which we are at present acquainted, is sixty-four. These substances are not all equally distributed over the surface of the earth; most of them are exceedingly rare, and only known to chemists. Some ten or twelve only make up the great bulk, or mass, of all the objects we see around us.” But God has so variously arranged and organized these few elements that many forms seem the very opposite of others, as we have mentioned; as heat and cold, black and white, light and heavy, sour and sweet, and yet all are material.

It is objected that no combination or organization of material particles can give to matter any new qualities it did not possess before. But nature furnishes a thousand illustrations contradicting this statement. One of the characteristic properties of steam is its remarkable elasticity; but when it is condensed into water, this property of the matter almost entirely disappears, and is replaced by an exactly opposite property called incompressibility. So hardness and brilliancy are distinctive properties of the diamond, yet both these totally disappear when the gem is converted into a gas, though not a particle of the matter is lost. So a cold piece of steel is hard and brittle, but when heated, is soft and ductile. Here is a cold lump of lime. I pour upon it a quantity of cold water, and immediately both become extremely hot. Who has not seen two colorless liquids when poured together become of a bright color, as red or pink? A candle is burning in a room. I blow out the blaze, and all is total darkness. Have I destroyed a particle of that matter? No; yet I have destroyed the light which was a property of that matter in that condition. A change of condition in matter, then, does change its properties. So it is reasonable that by the organization of particles in the brain, thought may be produced when none of those particles separately could think.

I hold in my hand two kernels of corn. I plant one, and it has the property of appropriating to itself the particles of matter which surround it, and of building up a stalk of corn. The other kernel I break up fine, and carefully bury every particle of it together. Can it sprout? Can it grow? Will it now build up a stalk? No. Why? Simply because I have broken up the peculiar arrangement of its particles which gave it the property to do that. The particles are all there, but differently arranged. In crushing that kernel to meal did I drive out a living, immaterial spirit entity which now goes off to live somewhere else? No one claims such a thing. Organization, then, does give to matter qualities which it does not possess unorganized. Now take a higher organization,—a living man. He is thinking. A timber falls and crushes him to death. Can he think or reason now? No; and why not? That organization which gave him this attribute is destroyed, and hence thought ceases.

We utterly deny the distinction between matter and spirit which is claimed. We believe that everything is material, and that these diversities previously mentioned are only different conditions of matter. No man can successfully deny this. The wisest and most scientific men freely admit that they know but little about matter. The more they study, and the deeper they search into it, the more they are convinced that its different attributes and capabilities have been but partially understood. Because a certain fact is true of matter in one condition, it is argued that it must be true of matter always and everywhere. But this is illogical and false, for matter is capable of infinite diversity.

Matter in one form may even seem to be the opposite of the same matter in another form. For instance, I have before me a piece of ice. I put my hand upon it; it is exceedingly cold. It is a square block; I can cut it with a knife, or saw it with a saw into blocks. It is solid. But I put this ice into a vessel and warm it. It soon becomes water,—a liquid. It now looks very different from that piece of ice which I held in my hand a few minutes before. I closely confine this water in a tight vessel, and heat it very hot. It now becomes steam, a vapor, and is invisible. Says Mr. Wells, “Steam, which is the vapor of boiling water, is invisible, but when it comes in contact with air, which is cooler, it becomes condensed into small drops, and is thus rendered visible.” It is so hot it would burn your hand in a moment. It can neither be cut, nor poured from vessel to vessel. It now seems to be precisely the opposite from that piece of ice, and yet it is the very same material, only in another condition.

If a man had never seen ice thus converted into steam, he would pronounce such a change impossible. Let him examine a piece of ice, put his hands upon it, and then let him examine steam in its most heated condition; let him try it with his hand, then tell him that they are both the same material, and he would pronounce it the greatest absurdity imaginable. Yet we all know by actual observation that ice, and water, and steam are only different conditions of the same material.

There is apparently as great a difference between steam and ice as is claimed by our opponents between spirit and matter. We claim, therefore, that they cannot show that a spirit is not one form of matter.

So because matter in one form does not reason, it is no evidence that it cannot when organized in some other way. Look at that coarse, filthy mud in the road. That is matter. Shall we conclude that all matter is like that? How absurd! for here lies a beautiful gold watch, measuring off the seconds, minutes, and hours in exact time! The watch is as material as the mud, but how different! Again, there is a piece of black charcoal, hardly worth picking up. Here is a diamond of priceless value, one as large as a thimble being worth millions. Two small diamond ear-rings sold for $75,000. One diamond owned by Napoleon was worth $1,000,000. The king of Portugal has one worth $28,000,000. Now, that charcoal and that diamond are not only both material, but, wonderful to tell, they are both of exactly the same material, only differently arranged. The contrast between senseless matter and thinking matter would not be greater. D. M. CANRIGHT.

The Raid on Genesis.

By W. N. Glenn

SATAN is determined to disarm the servants of God. He knows that the Christian’s defensive weapon is the word of God—the Holy Scriptures. He knows, too, that his wily assaults are futile against the man who keeps his weapon ever at command. He tested and proved that point when he tempted the Saviour in the wilderness. Hence his aim in the great controversy is to either totally disarm those whom he cannot otherwise deceive, or so mutilate their “two-edged sword” that it will be ineffective in their hands.

A certain class of so-called scientists, especially of the votaries of geology, have long boasted that science proves the world to be millions of years old, and therefore the book of Genesis can be but fiction, or at best but an allegory of the truth. Although professional scientists are continually conflicting with each other in many essential points, any of their theories are deemed sound as compared with the doctrines of the Bible. Some years ago quite a number of leading theologians and their mimics, supposing the objections of “science” to be insurmountable, undertook to make the Bible harmonize with the claims of the geologists.

Instead of maintaining that the word of God was immutable, they supposed that science could not err; and in their zeal to save the Scriptures from utter annihilation at the hands of infidel scientists, they set about propping up the inspired word. To do this they advanced the theory that the days of creation were indefinitely long periods of time, and by fanciful constructions they endeavored to show that the order of creation corresponded in some mystical way with the order of the earth’s growth as set forth in the theory of the geologist.

This mode of exposition met quite extended favor. But, although it compromised the word of God in the matter of the time of creation, and tended to establish the infallibility of science, it did not fully answer the purpose of Satan. There were other points of more importance to his cause. Genesis was slightly dulled as a weapon of defense on the point in question, but as it contained a record of the archdeceiver’s true character, it could be still used against him. His success required that it be taken out of the hands of men altogether.

The next move was to utterly eradicate this portion of sacred history. And men of great reputation as theologians and preachers of the gospel were soon secured to undertake the task. These wise men are professedly willing to preach the rest of the Scriptures, but Genesis “must go.” And this raid upon the book is becoming quite popular. Its very nature is such as to rapidly gain favor in these days of “strong delusion” to which men are given over “because they received not the love of the truth.” 2 Thess. 2:9. It is a twin sister of that other phase of “new theology” which gives the sinner another probation after death. It is being nursed in the same arms and rocked in the same cradle. They go to the world hand in hand, and their work is destruction.

The sinister effect of expunging Genesis from the Bible is made apparent by noting a few points. With this elimination the inspired volume would begin with Exodus, which is introduced as follows: “Now these are the names of the children of Israel, which came into Egypt; every man and his household came with Jacob.” What an intelligible introduction to the origin, history, and destination of the human race! What a field for speculation! What a morsel for the skeptic! Instead of the silly quibble about where Cain got his wife, there would be ground for intelligent query as to, Who was Jacob? Who was Israel? and, Whence came they to Egypt? Without the book of Genesis these legitimate questions could not be answered. Passing on from Exodus through every succeeding book, we look in vain for an intelligible starting-point, or any place that purports to be a beginning. We are told in the twentieth chapter of Exodus that “in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day.” But how long were the days? We have to turn to Genesis to find each day of creation specifically marked off by an evening and a morning.

We are incidentally informed that “the first man Adam was made a living soul” (1 Cor. 15:45); that “the first man is of the earth” (verse 47); and that “by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin” (Rom. 5:12). But what tangible instruction do these statements impart without the detailed facts contained in the book of Genesis? Paul says that “as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.” But who was Adam, and how do all die in him? The answer can only be found in Genesis. We learn in the Revelation that the Archangel is to bind “that old serpent” a thousand years. What old serpent, and what about him? If “by one man sin entered into the world,” for what is the “old serpent” bound? Turn to Genesis and all is made plain.

As the reward of obeying the gospel the apostle tells us, “If ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” Gal. 3:29. But who was Abraham? and what promise was made to him that constitutes an inducement for us to come to Christ? Genesis must solve the problem, for there is recorded the everlasting covenant made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

The genealogies recorded in the gospels of Matthew and Luke are traced through the book of Genesis to the very beginning, and cannot be verified without it. Stephen’s reference to Abraham in Acts 7 would be unintelligible without the record in Genesis. So also Peter’s allusion to Noah and the ark (1 Pet. 3:20; 2 Pet. 2:5–8), and Jude’s assertion regarding Enoch’s prophecy of the coming of the Lord. Verse 14.

And the Lord Jesus, in giving his disciples instructions concerning his second advent, said: “As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man” (Luke 17:26); “Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot.” Verse 28. We turn to Genesis to learn the lesson which the Master designed to teach, that we may “discern the signs of the times,” and “take heed lest that day come upon us unawares.”

Nothing could more effectually advance the cause of the adversary than the blotting out of the book of Genesis. With that record expunged, his powers of deception over the human race would be almost unlimited. His origin and nature would be completely veiled from the knowledge of his intended victims. So also the necessity and the plan of redemption would be obscured, and the gospel nullified. Without the facts recorded in Genesis, the remainder of the sacred word would be scarcely intelligible.

W. N. GLENN.

Theater-Going.

The Rev. C. H. Spurgeon recently made use of the following vigorous language with reference to theater-going: “I see it publicly stated by men who call themselves Christians that it would be advisable for Christians to frequent the theater, that the character of the drama might be raised. The suggestion is about as sensible as if we were bidden to pour a bottle of lavender water into the great sewer to improve its aroma. If the church is to imitate the world in order to raise its tone, things have strangely altered since the day when our Lord said, ‘Come ye out from among them, and touch not the unclean thing.’ Is heaven to descend to the infernal lake to raise its tone? Such has been the moral condition of the theater for many a year that it has been too bad for mending; and even if it were mended it would corrupt again. Pass by it with averted gaze; the house of the strange woman is there. It has not been my lot ever to enter a theater during the performance of a play, but I have seen enough when I have come home from distant journeys at night, while riding past the play-houses, to make me pray that our sons and daughters may never go within the doors. It must be a strange school of virtue which attracts the harlot and debauchee. It is no place for a Christian, for it is best appreciated by the irreligious and worldly. If our church-members fall into the habit of frequenting the theater, we shall soon have them going much further in the direction of vice, and they will lose all relish for the ways of God. Theater-going, if it become general among professing Christians, will soon prove the death of piety.”—Sel.

Respectable Sins.

BEWARE of respectable sins! Not that any sin, however garishly arrayed or socially dignified, is in itself respectable; but that some sins are so countenanced by certain classes that they are held to be respectable. Mrs. Browning spoke truly when, with epigrammatic force, she said: “The devil is most devilish when respectable,” because he is then most dangerous. His seeming respectability throws unwary souls off their guard and beguiles them by begetting the thought that their objection to certain profitable or delightful courses of conduct is based, not on reason or on Scripture rationally interpreted, but on a squeamish or morbid conscientiousness. Hence, for example, when young men see social honors paid to rich financiers whose overflowing coffers were filled by means of transactions which involved lying, deception, and speculative trickery, they are disposed to think such dishonest practices are not so bad as they have been taught to believe. So when members of churches drink wine, play cards, visit skating rinks, or indulge in any other ungodly practices, they throw the cloak of their respectability over deeds which are in themselves injurious both to the moral and spiritual life. Thus they enable the devil to do his most devilish work of luring young and feeble souls into the pit of destruction. How needful, then, is the caution—Beware of respectable sins! for beneath the masks they wear, is the grinning head of death, yea, of that “second death,” from which no resurrection unto life is possible. Beware, therefore, of respectable sins!—Zion’s Herald.

Petty Personalities in Local Newspaper Reporting

A NEEDED crusade in journalism is against the recording of such petty personalities as the following, all clipped from local exchanges, many of which give from one to two columns weekly to this kind of mental pabulum: “Our friend Jones is building a hennery.” “Mrs. B. has just completed a crazy-quilt of 676 pieces.” “The minister went to Boston last Wednesday.” “Mrs. E. P. B. has been absent in New Hampshire a week, visiting friends.” “Some fine puppies were recently shipped from this port.” “A sudden death in this office, last week, caused much sorrow among the compositors. Thomas, a favorite cat, shuffled off his mortal coil.” Even worse is the chronicling of children’s doings. Little Sadie Smith is vain enough now, doubtless, without feeding her vanity by reading in the public print that she “gave a lawn party on her sixth birthday, and wore a lovely dress of pink silk and white muslin.” Master Jones and little Miss Brown, also, are not likely to have their reverence for God’s house and for sacred things very strongly developed when the report of a Sunday-school concert elevates their personality in the proceedings above the moral lessons embodied in the exercises. Next to the demoralizing influence of really vicious literature, we doubt if there is any kind of reading more belittling, for the youthful mind particularly, than the sort herein indicated.—Congregationalist.

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