Earlier text: The Christian Endeavor Convention

Large Camp-Meeting at Friedensau

ELDER CONRADI reports one of the largest camp-meetings ever held in Europe just closed at Friedensau, Germany. There were about twelve hundred on the grounds. Sixty-three were baptized. At the same meeting plans were being laid to form four new local conferences, and one new union conference. These are truly evidences of a healthy growth of the message in that part of the world field.

Death of Sister Davis

We are made sad to chronicle the death of Sister Davis, wife of Thos. H. Davis, who is laboring in Ecuador. Brother Davis is thus left without a companion, with three young children to care for in a strange land. While his courage in the Lord is good, let us remember this dear brother in prayer, in this hour of his grief and affliction. Blessed day when there shall be no more death!

Southern Training-School Calendar

One of the neatest school calendars that has come to this Office this season is that issued by the Southern Training-school of Graysville, Tenn. For a calendar of this school, address the President, J. E. Tenney, at the address given above.

Special Number for Southern Mission Schools

ELDER S. N. HASKELL, who is attending an institute for colored workers at Huntsville, Ala., reports excellent progress being made there. Their new school building is nearing completion. Colored teachers who have labored hard, receiving small wages, entered enthusiastically into a plan to raise means to assist their Huntsville institution. It seemed to Elder Haskell—and rightly, no doubt—“that all heaven was interested in that little company of colored workers;” and he adds, “We felt that we would stand by them and do all we could to see an advance move made that would disappoint the enemy, and bring light to many darkened minds in this neglected field.” They have, therefore, arranged for a special number of the Bible Training School, the proceeds of which are to go to help build up the mission schools in the South, on the same general plan that help was provided Brother and Sister Burgess for India. This is a worthy enterprise, and many in the North should be glad to help on the good work.

The Message in Iceland

WE have before us continual evidence that the third angel's message is being proclaimed in the far corners of the earth. That evidence comes in more ways than one. But one of these lines of evidence is the multiplication of our publications in the obscure portions of the earth in languages seldom heard. We have before us the first copy we remember of having seen of the little journal that is proclaiming the truths of this message in the far, cold island of Iceland. It is called Frækorn, and is published weekly at Reykjavik. We can not read the articles, nor even be sure of the proper pronunciation of the letters of which the words are composed; but we do know that this is one of the “tongues” to which the bearers of the third angel's message were commissioned to go with that message. They have gone there, and the message is being proclaimed there by voice and pen and printed page. Lands obscure and forbidding, lands populous and inviting, and lands where priestcraft has made the pure gospel an outlaw—all are hearing God's last message; and in every land that message is finding some wheat, some gold, some pearls of great price. It is truly a finishing work, a harvest ingathering, and we are nearing its completion.

Foreign-Language Literature in New York

The urgent need of bringing the knowledge of the third angel's message to the thousands of persons in our own country who speak foreign tongues led to the establishing of a branch office of the Review and Herald Publishing Assn. in New York City. This office is located at 32 Union Square East. One of the special purposes of this branch office is to secure literature suitable to circulate among those who do not understand the English language. This branch office was opened about April 1. Orders for books and tracts in foreign languages were promptly placed, but it takes considerable time to get all orders filled.

The New York Office has in stock at present books and tracts in the following languages: German, Danish, Swedish, Holland, French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian. An addition to the above stock will soon be in, of such literature as is issued in Russian, Slavonic, Polish, Bohemian, Servian, Hungarian, Bulgarian, Rumanian, and Chinese.

A list of the Italian literature will be found on page 2. Other lists will be furnished from time to time. Let all our brethren and sisters take hold with a will and get the truth to these people among us who have been so long neglected.

The Idolatry of Nature and Self

The August number of one of the most widely circulated magazines in this country printed in bold type on its front cover page this sentence: “Commune with Nature whenever and wherever she speaks or sings or paints for you, and your divine being, thrilled into intoxication, will mold the physical into sweeter graces.” This is one of the tenets of that new religion which is now taking a strong hold upon a large portion of the people of this country. It creates a god of its own — Nature — and communes with that, and bows down to that. But it does not stop with that. The creator is never less than the thing created. So the creator in this case — man — takes to himself divinity. Then, with eyes turned in upon that divinity, he finds himself the object of his own worship. With this new conception he is necessarily “thrilled into intoxication,” and finds within himself the power to “mold the physical into sweeter graces.” This makes him his own counselor, his own leader, his own savior, eliminates Jesus Christ from the present life and future destiny of man, and abolishes even the Creator himself from the heart and mind thus “intoxicated.” It is one of the most seductive teachings of the times, and because it satisfies the cravings of the natural heart, the secular press is promulgating it far and wide. The idolatry of nature and the idolatry of self go hand in hand.

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