p. 44 | Signs of the Times, Vol. 41, No. 28. (7/21/1914)

Earlier text: HAVE PROTESTANTS CEASED TO PROTEST?

THE THREE BEST WAYS BETWEEN California and the East

The CENTRAL ROUTE

Less than three days to Chicago

The SOUTHERN ROUTE

All rail or via the palatial Southern Pacific steamers between New Orleans and New York

The SHASTA ROUTE

Via Portland or the North

The best of equipment and service. Protected throughout by automatic block signals.

INQUIRE OF ANY AGENT, OR

MR. C. S. FEE

General Passenger Agent. San Francisco California

SOUTHERN PACIFIC

GREAT TEMPERANCE NUMBER

By Editor

Some Live-Wire Articles on the Prohibition Question

Alcohol and Racial Degeneracy

Truth about the Demon Rum

Back with the Saloon as a “Safety First” Measure

State-Wide Prohibition

National prohibition is one of the live issues now before Congress, and a prohibition amendment may soon be submitted to the states.

Help to build up the moral standard of your community by circulating this great special Temperance Number of Life and Health.

Send $1.00 for 20, or $2.00 for 50. Write for agency to-day.

LIFE AND HEALTH

Washington, D. C.

CHURCH AND STATE,” “PROHIBITION” and “BLUE LAWS” Number of “LIBERTY

Read and Circulate the

“CHURCH AND STATE,” “PROHIBITION” and “BLUE LAWS” Number of “LIBERTY”

A magazine of Religious Freedom; set for the defense of the rights of conscience; opposed to union of church and state, in name and in fact; protesting against religious legislation of all kinds.

Some Live Topics

Religion and the State — Baltimore and the Blue Laws — Blaming the Deity for Blue Laws — The Liquor Business and the Government — Sunday Laws — Are They Religious or Civil? — Religious Proclamations by the Nation’s Executive — Shall Ecclesiastical Laws or Civil Be Enforced at the Nation’s Capital?

The above and many other subjects of vital importance are discussed in the July or third quarter issue of Liberty. Send for a sample copy to-day.

35 cents a year. Sample copy, 10 cents. 20 copies, $1.00. 50 copies, $2.00.

LIBERTY MAGAZINE Washington, D. C.

FAIR, DIGNIFIED, SCHOLARLY

August Number Now Ready

“FAIR, DIGNIFIED, SCHOLARLY”

It will tell you the difference between genuine and so-called Protestantism, why and when Rome will again rule the world, to what extent she is already ruling, which of the contending forces will be finally victorious, and many other inside facts showing Rome’s hand in the political affairs of to-day.

Wages warfare upon the Roman Catholic system, but not upon individuals of any creed. Enjoys international reputation among thinking classes.

One year, $1.00. Sample copy, 10 cents. Write for agency to-day.

PROTESTANT MAGAZINE, Washington, D. C.

Safeguarding Our Boys and Girls

By Eulalia S. Richards

Perils Beset Them—Their Confidence Must Be Held How May This Be Done? How May Lost Confidence Be Restored?

By EULALIA S. RICHARDS, M. D.

Our boys and girls must be guarded from the perils that surround them. This every thoughtful parent knows, though hundreds are either thoughtless or blind to the conditions which prevail in the social world to-day.

The Crime Epidemic

We are living in a remarkable age, an age characterized by wonderful advancement in science and learning. But unfortunately the present age is also marked by an astonishing increase in immorality. A veritable epidemic of crime is sweeping over our land, and the white slave traffic flourishes. Immoral literature and objectionable pictures are doubtless important factors in bringing about this deplorable state of degeneracy.

Shall We Try Keeping Them Out of the World?

No matter how pure the home atmosphere may be, as soon as our boys and girls go out from our own firesides, they are certain to come in contact with evil in its most enticing forms. When our young folks go forth to meet the world, how our mother hearts do tremble! How gladly would we make any sacrifice if only we might guard them from encountering sin and all its allurements! But this is impossible. So long as our youth are in the world and do their share of the world’s work, they will be surrounded by evil. Then let us not pray that they may be taken out of the world, but that they may be kept from the wrong that is in the world.

It is possible for parents so to rear their sons and daughters that as they join the great army of the world’s workers they may be protected by an impenetrable armor—surrounded by a veritable bulwark of defense. This armor is a strong Christian character coupled with a correct knowledge of the difficulties that must be met and conquered. This is a case in which to be forewarned is to be forearmed.

Innocence and Ignorance

The words “innocence” and “ignorance” are by no means synonymous. We would that this fact might sink deeply into the heart of every parent. An innocent lad from a Christian home may through ignorance plunge headlong into evil on his first contact with the world, and thereby lose his innocence. Correct knowledge is the chief safeguard of purity and virtue.

The task of fortifying our boys and girls should be undertaken in their earliest childhood, and should be ever in our thoughts. We shall be successful in our undertaking only as we maintain the confidence of our children inviolate. What a blessed thing that each parent has the confidence of his child at the beginning! We need not strive to win the child’s confidence. It is already ours, a precious gift, which we should guard most sacredly. We may keep this confidence unbroken by always speaking truthfully to the child. We may not always speak the whole truth to a young child, but we must never under any circumstances speak aught that is not truth.

Would You Answer Truthfully?

“But,” asks an anxious mother, “would you have us answer truthfully the many perplexing questions that baby lips ask us?”—Certainly. Why not? The story of the origin of life, if clothed in chaste language, is one of the most beautiful stories that may be told a child.

Our children must sooner or later learn the facts concerning human life and social relationships. It lies with us to decide whether we will impart this knowledge in chaste words, or whether we will leave our little ones to gain the information from impure sources and in words replete with unclean suggestions.

The burden of training the children in purity and virtue should be shared by the parents; but naturally the mother has, during the earlier years, an opportunity for more intimate association with the children than has the father. Happy the mother who maintains her child’s confidence from its infant days. As the child grows older, there will be no constraint between himself and his mother. Has she not always answered his childish questions lovingly, sympathetically, understandingly? More mature problems may now be discussed by mother and son or daughter, and with no sense of embarrassment. Wisely chosen books may also be called to the mother’s aid, books which impart needful knowledge in pure language that the boy or girl can fully understand.

If Only Begun Early Enough

If only the task of training the children in virtue is begun early enough and is faithfully performed in all sincerity and truth, there is no insurmountable obstacle.

But many difficulties arise to dishearten the mother who has through ignorance or carelessness lost her child’s confidence. A child soon loses confidence in a parent who gives evasive or untrue answers to his questions, and who manifests but little interest or sympathy in his work and play, his reading and associations.

“Have Lost My Daughter”

Not long ago, an anxious mother breathed out the sorrow that had long been hidden within her heart. “My daughter no longer confides in me. She keeps her affairs to herself, or discusses them with her intimate girl friend, but never with me. She never seeks my advice or pays any heed to my suggestions. I seem to have lost my daughter. And she was so affectionate and confiding as a little child.”

Ah! that is it. All little children, almost without exception, are affectionate and confiding. It is natural for them to be so. But in such sad cases as the foregoing, there usually comes a time when the mother’s cheek flushes, and she feels that she can not summon the courage to answer her child’s questions. She thrusts the child away from her, or gives an untruthful answer to a question which the child has every reason to expect will be answered sincerely and truthfully. It is thus the rift begins and widens.

What Shall We Do?

What shall we parents do—we who have drifted away from our children and now tremble at their peril?

First of all, we must study the situation earnestly, not excusing our past neglect or failures. Then by the help of Him with whom all things are possible, we must begin again. We must get close to our children. We must convince them of our loving and sympathetic interest in all that concerns them.

It may be necessary for us to confess humbly our failures and our neglects. Such a confession on the part of a parent often touches the heart of a wandering child. It may require patient waiting, faithful praying, and earnest working to win back a child who has drifted from his parents, for a child is far easier lost than found. But surely we must succeed if we thus earnestly work and patiently wait.

And what a reward when a beloved child comes home to find in his parents the wisest counsel, the deepest sympathy, the truest interest, and the warmest love!

An Earthworm’s Soliloquy

By Mabel Corinne Craker

By MABEL CORINNE CRAKER

An angleworm of low degree, Disconsolate and weary, Retraced his humble lineage Through ages dark and dreary. Said he: “Quite irksome is this toil My fathers long have cherished. Their lot has been to till the soil By which they all were nourished. And yet, not one above this plane The greater heights has risen. Renowned we might have been to-day Had they but only striven.

“Aware that this progressive age Controls the men of action, And woman steps from off her throne To join another faction, Why need I here remain unseen Beneath the feet of mortals? I’ll rise above this lowly place, And enter life’s fair portals.”

And thus emerged from out the soil This worm of small dimensions. He moved with a gigantic lurch, For he had great intentions.

The heat from August’s tropic sun Fast melted his ambition. He longed for the cool realm beneath His chosen high position.

’Tis but a fable. That is all. Yet note we well the moral— He who contented fills his sphere Deserves the crown of laurel.

The God who formed us knows the place For which we’re best adapted. He’ll soon confer His great “Well done” On work we deem contracted.

TEMPERANCE

Here is a group of leaflets on temperance that is selling by the hundreds of thousands, and will exert a tremendous influence in the prohibition campaign now opening throughout the United States and Canada.

The Demons’ Council

A unique eight-page document, written in allegorical style. It shows how the liquor traffic has grown and fastened its hideous fangs on the souls of human beings, leaving wreck and ruin in its path.

Price a hundred, post-paid ..........$ .50

Prohibition or the Liquor Traffic Which?

This tract in the main consists of admissions from the opponents of prohibition as to the evils growing out of the liquor traffic. Here is one of their admissions: “It deliberately aids the most corrupt political powers, and backs with all of its resources the most unworthy men, the most corrupt and recreant officials. It does not aid the purification of municipal, state, or national administration. Why?—Because it has to ask immunity for its own lawlessness.”

The terrible arraignment of the liquor interests by the liquor dealers themselves makes this one of the strongest documents produced in favor of prohibition.

Price a hundred, post-paid ..........$ .50

Story of a Dry Town

Experience is the best teacher. This four-page leaflet tells an interesting story of a town as it was two years ago, with seven saloons, and the results two years after the saloons were closed.

Price a hundred, post-paid ..........$ .25

Why Does the Saloon Exist?

The liquor dealer argues that from the standpoint of personal rights, he should be allowed to maintain and operate a saloon, and the only obligation is to meet the requirements of the state. Does he have this right? Read what Ex-Governor Patterson and others have to say on this question of personal rights, in this tract.

Price a hundred, post-paid ..........$1.00

Dark Valley Railroad

This document was prepared with special reference to temperance campaigns. Printed in two colors, in the form of a railroad timetable. It contains the names of stations, time of train arrival, and map of the route. It begins with Cigaretville. Some of the stations on the way are Mild Drink, Tipplersville, Bummer’s Roost, Hungry Hollow, Drunkard’s Curve, Deliriumville, Rattlesnake Swamp, and Prisonersburg, and it ends at Perdition.

Price a hundred, post-paid.$1.50

It Doesn’t Pay

Does the liquor traffic pay? This is one of the most vital questions under discussion at the present time. If the individual who argues that it does pay, will read this tract, the candid, truthful answer will come back, No, it does not pay.

The tract contains 16 pages and is well illustrated.

Price a hundred, post-paid.$1.00

The Wine Industry and Prohibition

An unanswerable reply to the claim that prohibition would throw 75,000 people out of employment in California and render valueless 170,000 acres of land.

Contains 16 pages, with illustrated heading.

Price a hundred, post-paid ..........$1.00

Pocket Package No. 4

Four hundred pages of the above tracts in a strong manila envelope, post-paid....$ .25

Address your tract society or

PACIFIC PRESS PUB. ASSN., Mountain View, Cal. Portland, Ore., Kansas City, Mo., Calgary, Alta., Can.

Sanitarium Cooking Oil

“THE OIL OF QUALITY”

Pure Cotton Seed Oil direct from refinery. Sweet, wholesome, and delicious. 4 1-gallon cans, $3.60; 5-gallon can, $3.90; 2 5-gallon cans, $7.70; 30-gallon barrel, $20.80; 50-gallon barrel, $32.75. Cash with order: Sanitarium Cooking Oil Co., Louisville, Kentucky.

The Rich Man and Lazarus

By Mrs. E. G. White

A clear, simple exposition of the noted parable of Dives and Lazarus, given in Luke 16:19-31. Reading it will help you. Price $1.00 per hundred; single copies, 2 cents.

Pacific Press Publishing Assn., Mountain View, Cal.

The Liquor Trust Has Already Done It

ONE of the biggest scares that the whisky people are trying to stir up in California just now is over the idea that if we get prohibition this fall it will put the wine grape industry out of business.

But why not understand the facts? The worst trust, the most lawless and greedy combine, that was ever formed is the liquor trust. And the liquor trust itself, through buying up large vineyards, has been able to supply its wine vats with grapes, so that for several years back the ordinary producer of wine grapes has been able to get only from seven to ten dollars a ton.

As a consequence many vineyardists have not been picking their grapes at all, or have been planting their vineyards over to other kinds of crops.

We should be able to see through the thin screen the liquor trust is hurriedly pulling around itself. We must impress upon the voters of this state the fact that if California carries prohibition this fall, it will not hurt any wine grape growers excepting those belonging to the great liquor trust itself.

The liquor trust is very solicitous all at once for the people, and afraid for the vineyardists; but do not make the mistake of thinking that great soul and body destroying combine to be the people.

The wine grape industry in California has already been destroyed by this combine. If prohibition carries this fall, it will not change that fact in the least. The thing is already done.

Socialism a Failure

IN an address recently, Ex-President William H. Taft is reported to have said, among other things, the following, concerning a socialist experiment:

“The plan was based on the assumption that man was a different being from what he is. If he were so perfect that his love of humankind would banish from every one in human form selfishness, and retain in him the same energy, self-sacrifice, and industry in behalf of others that he now manifests in behalf of himself and those near to him, then there would be no need for the organization of a socialistic community, because we would have it at hand.

“Until men are perfect beings of this kind, socialism must either constitute a tyranny so rigid as to destroy not only the right of liberty and to interfere with the pursuit of happiness or it must be a failure.”

Some of the most well-meaning people that have ever lived may, without doubt, be found among the socialists. They see the grievous wrongs and the oppressions by the rich and powerful, who are grinding millions of poor beneath the wheels of oppression, and they are seeking for a solution for these problems. They set forth ideal doctrines, and conditions that they are seeking to obtain; but they should not lose sight of the perversity of the carnal human heart, which stands in the way of the realization of such ideals.

The power of the gospel through the Lord Jesus Christ Himself is the one thing that can so change men that they will attain to the ideal standards and ideal conditions. These will be reached in this world, but not until the second coming of Christ, which will destroy all sin.

Eugenics and the Moral Uplift

The Swiss “Society of Public Utility for Women,” said to be an influential body with branches throughout Switzerland, has issued a “eugenics appeal,” urging every young woman of marriageable age to undergo a medical and physical examination. “The aim of the society,” it is stated, “is to obtain healthy wives and children for betterment of the race.”

The Greeks and the Romans may not have called it “eugenics,” but nevertheless they were possessed with many great fads and various plans for the “betterment of the race.” They even went so far as to destroy defective children, for the purpose of propagating only the best. But regardless of all their plans and ideals, their civilizations went to pieces, under a mass of accumulated vice, corruption, and social depravity.

History further shows that these ancient nations not only had their plans for social betterment, but they had high ideals of morality; also that while they taught those ideals, they were not able to attain to them.

While beautifying their homes and their cities with everything that is offered in the field of art, architecture, and the like, and while holding to and talking in favor of these “high ideals,” yet their luxurious dissipations hurled them headlong to ruin. All of which shows that man must have a moral power apart from and outside of himself if he is lifted up in reality, and there is nothing outside of the gospel of Jesus Christ that will furnish this. “There is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.”

In all parts of the world, this age is going wild over every conceivable kind of reform organization, and the people are talking great things, and seem to be hoping great things; but they are all doomed to disappointment. Jesus Christ has power to save; and every one who will, may come to Him and receive His salvation. But the eugenics fad, and every other kind of reform that leaves Christ out of the plan, must end ultimately in ignominious defeat. The Bible plan of salvation was devised by the infinitely wise and loving God, and offered to sinful men for their “social betterment and moral uplift.” The history of all the world, in all ages and climes, testifies to the wisdom of the divine plan. No other one has ever succeeded. None of these plans of to-day will succeed.

Air-Ship Stabilizer

ELMER A. SPERRY has invented an aeroplane “stabilizer,” for which he has been awarded the first prize, of fifty thousand dollars, that was offered by the French war department for such a device. Orville Wright, the great pioneer in air-ship building, has also announced his successful completion of a stabilizing device for air craft. He says it will make the flying-machine as safe as an ordinary wagon or a rowboat.

The air-ship is one of the speediest mediums of travel yet invented. No roads have to be prepared over which it is to travel. There is a possibility that its development will make it as common a few years from now as the automobile is to-day. And there is a possibility, also, that it is one of the means of rapid communication through which God designs to hasten the close of His work in the earth. It will certainly be used in an awfully destructive way in the great war of Armageddon that immediately precedes the second coming of Christ.

Increasing Liquor Advertisements

THERE seems to be an unusual amount of space in the big daily papers occupied these days by the liquor interests. In some instances a whole page will be taken with just two or three words on it making mention of some particular brand of beer or other alcoholic drink. And it is no uncommon thing to see a quarter or an eighth of a page given to an advertisement of this kind. While observing this great activity in the way of taking advertising space, it is also to be noted that the big dailies, as a rule, are not joining in the fight for prohibition. Many of them are talking on the other side of the question.

Can there be any connection between the advertising dollars they are getting, and the coloring matter they are putting into their consciences in this great struggle for the uplifting of humanity by the prohibition of the liquor traffic?

Special Temperance Number

By Editor

THE work on our special temperance issue is progressing splendidly. It will be packed full of valuable facts and convincing arguments for the abolition of the liquor traffic. The front page, for instance, will contain a striking illustration that will give at a glance the enormous wastes of the drink evil. We expect to be able to mail sample copies within a few days.

Hundreds of thousands of copies of this paper should be circulated in the various states where the people will vote on prohibition this fall. And in all the other states, it can be circulated to aid in creating the temperance sentiment that will bring this great evil of the use of intoxicating liquors to an issue before the people, and in strengthening sentiment for enforcement of the law where prohibition has already won the day.

The prices for this special Temperance Number, as noted last week, will be: five cents a copy; five to thirty copies, three cents each; forty or more, two and one half cents each.

A Little Pamphlet of Value

By Editor

WE are sure you would like one, if you had it, and we are going to enable you to get it easily. It is a little pamphlet prepared for the SIGNS Bible Band in 1911. Its title is “Facts Regarding the Bible.” It treats of the Scripture canon, its divisions, Bible writers and languages, its inspiration, early manuscripts, punctuation, various versions, queer names of Bibles, peculiarities and statistics of the Bible, tables of weights and measures and money, Bible societies, memorizing the Bible, books of the Bible, authors and dates, with a chronological schedule of readings for the year. Nothing is out of date but the calendar for 1911 on the last page. It sold for ten cents that year. Its helpful facts are just as good now. To close out what we have we will send them singly or in quantities for two cents each, postage paid. Get a dozen at a time and hand them to your Bible-reading friends or Sabbath-school class. Address SIGNS OF THE TIMES, Mountain View, California.

Prohibition Battles in Idaho and Ohio

The Republican, the Democratic, and the Progressive party of Idaho have placed in their respective platforms, planks favoring state-wide prohibition. And in Ohio the temperance people are circulating a petition for the purpose of initiating a constitutional prohibition amendment, and the whisky forces are circulating one forbidding state-wide prohibition. Thus these two states are added to the columns of those where the temperance issue will be strongly fought this summer and fall.

Evangelical Christians Under Servian Rule

The extension of Servian territory since the recent Turkish war, has brought many little companies of evangelical Christians under that flag. The Servian constitution gives liberty of belief, but forbids proselyting, or restricts it to the established Greek Church. Whether or not these Christians can obey the command to let their light shine, without repression by the civil authorities, remains to be seen.

Relief for Flood-Stricken Chinese

In the last six years, the American Red Cross Society has expended approximately $750,000 in affording relief for the thousands of starving Chinese who are subject to the periodic floods that lay waste vast stretches of their agricultural lands. The society is now at work on a plan for reclaiming that territory, so that the damage from these floods may be minimized as far as possible.

America Airship's Planned Atlantic Flight

Experiments with the new air-ship America, which is soon to attempt the flight across the Atlantic Ocean, are said to be very successful. It rises easily and gracefully out of the water; and while it has two engines, it has been operated with one, to see if it could meet emergencies. From present prospects it will make the flight successfully.

International Irrigation Congress at Calgary

The International Irrigation Congress will convene at Calgary, Alberta, Canada, October 5-9. It will be a meeting of great importance to those interested in agriculture, for irrigation is coming to be considered more and more as an essential in securing good crops.

Three War Aviators Killed

THREE war aviators were killed on July 3, in Europe. The development of the air-ship is taking a terrible toll of lives; but men are going on just the same, making it more and more of a success.

Twenty-Six Children Killed in New York Streets

DURING the month of June, in New York City, twenty-six children were killed on the streets by passing vehicles, principally automobiles and motor-cycles.