—Some gentlemen of the First Presbyterian Church of Chicago have formed an “Anti-Chinese Sunday School Society.” They deem the association dangerous to young ladies because of the custom of assigning a lady teacher to each Chinese pupil, all of whom are young men. Cases of infatuation and even marriage are cited, and an entertainment given by 100 Chinese to the ladies of the church brought matters to a climax.
—On the strength of the pope’s recent encyclical on the study of the Bible, several works have appeared intended as helps to Bible study from a Catholic standpoint. Prominent among these are a reissue of Vaughan’s “Divine Armory of the Holy Scripture,” with an introduction by Cardinal Gibbons. It is said to cover the whole field of Catholic theology, gathering around each doctrine the passages of Scripture upon which it originally rests.
—A canal boat now on duty on the Erie Canal is named the Good News. It is covered with gospel texts. Services are held three times a day in its cabin as it journeys from one town to the next on its missionary trips. A fish pole with tracts tied on the end is used to reach passing boats, and little floats with cardboard sails covered with texts are sent to do what good they may. The International Evangelical Association has control of this floating mission house.
—Late advices from the City of Mexico say that a syndicate of capitalists interested in the Salvation Army has concluded the purchase from the Mexican Government of 200,000 acres of land in Chiapas, Southern Mexico. A member of the syndicate, C. H. Durst, has sailed for England, where, with the aid of General Booth, plans will be perfected by which 5,000 families from England and the United States will be put on a tract, operating under the direction of officers of the “army.” The plan is the outcome of General Booth’s hope to relieve the congested condition in city poor districts.
—Last year there was much ado made over the Sunday opening of the World’s Fair and wise predictions that such a course would result in financial disaster as a direct judgment of Heaven. A special point was made of the Sunday-closing prestige of the Centennial Fair at Philadelphia in 1876. But in the Engineering Magazine for January is a comparative table of the great expositions of the world, which gives the receipts of the Centennial at $4,700,000 less than the expenditures. Considering the comparative magnitude of the two enterprises, the Sunday-closed Fair was a much greater financial failure than the Sunday-opened one, which fact is rather against the judgment-of-Heaven theory.
—Speaking of “the present agitation for union between Baptists and Disciples,” the Harbinger (Disciple) says: “Our Baptist brethren, as well as ourselves, now claim to take the word of God alone as their rule of faith and practice, and here is the basis on which we may unite.” But the fact that they are not united is evidence of failure on the part of one or both denominations to follow the word of God alone. If that were their “rule of faith and practice,” they would be already united. And each one seems able to point out where the other does not do so. It is true that “here is the basis” on which they “may unite,” but it is also true that the faith and practice must needs precede the union,—that is, if the union is to be a Christian union.
—The Literary Digest makes this significant comment: “The expansion of the British Empire in Central Africa is becoming more and more a religious question. The English have undertaken the task of civilizing and pacifying the country, and they are in duty bound to go on with it, but whether Romanism, Protestantism, or Mohammedanism shall become the dominant religious belief of the people of those regions, is a question which time alone can answer. The Moslems have been fighting among themselves, and their divisions have induced numbers of them to go over to Christianity.” The question naturally arises, What kind of Christians will men be whose espousal of Christianity is induced simply by a quarrel among themselves? Considering their predilection for fighting for their religion, those Mohammedans would no doubt make good Catholics. And as in the prophecy “all the world wondered after the beast” (Rev. 13: 3), we have only to believe the word of God in order to know what will “become the dominant religious belief of the people of those regions.”
SECULAR.
—A fire in St. Louis, on the 22d inst., destroyed property to the value of $250,000.
—An explosion in a mine at Blassburg, N. M., on the 22d inst., caused the death of eight miners.
—U. S. Senator White, of Louisiana, has been appointed associate justice of the United States Supreme Court.
—Owing to the decline in silver, the government of Guatemala has suspended payment on its outside indebtedness.
—Elections in six municipalities of France, on the 26th inst., resulted in the choice of five Socialists to the Chamber of Deputies.
—During a recent storm on the Atlantic Ocean, in the vicinity of the Azores Islands, eight men were washed overboard from the British bark Montgomery Castle.
—The recent trial of twelve Anarchists at Vienna resulted in the acquittal of six, and the sentencing of six to terms of imprisonment varying from two to ten years.
—Owing to heavy rains and melting mountain snows, the city of Stockton, Cal., and surrounding plains suffered considerable damage by floods during the past week.
—A Fresno, Cal., dispatch reports the finding of the dead body of an Indian near a foothill winery, and other Indians stated that he had drunk wine until death ensued as the result.
—Ten Anarchists were arrested at Lyons, France, last week, and ten others at Romans. Seventeen Italians were expelled from Marseilles for advocating the assassination of King Humbert.
—The 23d inst. was Examiner children’s day at the Midwinter Fair, San Francisco, and over 30,000 children were in attendance as a result of the enterprise of the great newspaper’s proprietors.
—The unfortunate island of Mauritius, in the Indian Ocean, is said to have been visited by another disastrous hurricane. A telegram says that a train was blown from a bridge into a river, and fifty persons drowned.
—The proposition to form a permanent government in Hawaii, with a republican constitution, calls to the front many complications on account of the various nationalities represented in large numbers in the population.
—Some vandal hunters recently slaughtered a band of buffalo in the Yellowstone Park. While endeavoring to secure the valuable portions of their plunder, they were overtaken by soldiers of the Park guard and arrested.
—There is war between Maryland and Virginia oystermen, on Tangier and Pocomoke Sounds, and the governor of Virginia has called upon the Legislature to build a man of war to defend the State’s oyster beds from their predatory neighbors.
—A Salt Lake dispatch of the 22d inst. says: “Trains are blocked in every direction. Denver trains are stuck in the snow in Colorado. Between here and Ogden both the Union Pacific and Rio Grande trains are stuck. The Oregon Short Line is also blocked.”
—Italy’s finances are in a deplorable condition. The Minister of Finance acknowledges a deficit of 155,000,000 lire. Among new taxes proposed are an increase on salt and on imported wheat. The latter tax is regarded as a blow at Russia and America.
—A British expedition in pursuit of slave traders in West Africa was recently ambushed and compelled to retreat. The attack was so sudden that they had to leave their nine dead comrades in the hands of the enemy. They also left a field piece and 6,000 cartridges.
—At Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y., last week, sophomore students injected chlorine gas into a hall where freshmen were having a banquet. The result was that a number of the sophomores were rendered insensible by asphyxiation, and the colored cook died from inhaling the gas.
—Owing to heavy snows in the Sierra Nevada, on the line of the Central Pacific Railroad, last week, trains were delayed three days. A snowslide near Verdi, Nev., caught five men in its descent, only one of whom was rescued alive. The snow was from twenty-five to forty feet deep.
—A bottle picked up in the Atlantic Ocean, near the Hebrides Islands, contains the statement that the steamer Horn Head, which sailed from Baltimore last August for Dublin, and has not since been heard from, struck an iceberg in mid-ocean and was sunk, carrying down all on board, thirty-five in number.
—Judge Wallace, of San Francisco, is giving footpads a somewhat regular sentence of twenty years in the penitentiary. Convictions are quite frequent since the Fair opened, four being sentenced last week, and all under age. One, being under sixteen years, was sent to the State Reform School until his majority.
—The German Government has assembled a commission to consider the silver question. The imperial treasurer presides over the commission, and on opening its deliberations he said that, despite the government’s gold standard, the subject of the recent depreciation of silver demanded exhaustive examination.
—Paris police report almost daily the finding of bombs and other explosives, deposited with evident intention to destroy property, regardless of consequences to human life. A box of explosives, with a half-burned fuse attached, was found at the door of St. Pierre’s Church, on the 22d inst., and the fire was quenched just in time to avoid an explosion.
—Southern California was greatly damaged by a heavy windstorm on the 22d inst. Heavy loss has been sustained by orange growers, as great quantities of fruit were prematurely plucked by the wind. A passenger train on the Southern Pacific Railroad, near San Bernardino, was blown from the track. However, only the engineer was seriously injured.
—A correspondent, describing the march of Colonel Ellis’ (British) column against the Sufas in Sierra Leone, gives horrible details of the Sufas slave raids. Entire towns were wiped out. The thriving town of Tokiyama, with 3,000 inhabitants, is in ashes. The mutilated trunks of men, women, and children were heaped together and putrifying amid the ruins. The absence of the bodies of young men and women indicates that they were spared to be sold into slavery. Colonel Ellis freed hundreds of slaves.
—The latest news from the Brazilian rebellion is quite favorable to the insurgent cause. Three or four States are under control of the rebels. The new government navy has done nothing as yet, and insurrection is reported on board some of the new vessels. The rebel armored ship Aquidaban runs in and out of Rio Harbor at will, despite the combined attacks of the various forts. It is also reported that material aid is being rendered to the insurgent cause by the British fleet. And Bolivia is said to be taking advantage of the embarrassment of Brazil, and is entering her Western territory with an army.
—Nearly thirty years ago the steamer Brother Jonathan was sunk in the Pacific Ocean, off the extreme northern coast of California, carrying to the bottom 147 persons and about $1,000,000 in gold. Several attempts were made to find the wreck, all to no avail. But now, at this late day, Captain John F. Ryan, a noted deep-water diver, has located the hull, and, as proof of his find, exhibits a ship’s bucket on which is the name of the steamer in brass letters. He reports the hull in good condition, lying below the range of any destructive agents. In the spring he expects to raise the long-sunken vessel and reap his reward.
—Dr. Kemp, a young surgeon at Long Island College Hospital, has suddenly become famous by risking his own life to save that of a patient. A young woman who had been asphyxiated was brought to the hospital, and all ordinary means adopted for her restoration without avail. The surgeon then insisted that a transfusion of his own blood into her veins would save her life. After a discussion with the other physicians, and a plain assertion of the danger of the operation, a vein in the doctor’s arm was cut, a tube inserted, and the blood turned into a like incision in the patient’s arm for a space of about five minutes. The lady immediately revived, and it is thought will fully recover.
THE GEORGIA SUNDAY CRIMINALS.
IN our issue of December 11 we told how Elder W. A. McCutcheon and Prof. C. E. Keck were arrested on Sunday, November 19, at Gainesville, Ga., on charge of “disorderly conduct,” their specific offense being the arranging of seats in a building where the next day they designed to open a school. They were in nowise noisy in their work, and the man next door, though a Sunday keeper, was in nowise disturbed. The “disturbed man” lived on the other side of the village. They were each fined $50 and costs, or the option of ninety days’ work in the chain gang. They were also bound over to the county court for “sabbath breaking,” which is a State offense.
By telegram from Elder R. M. Kilgore we learn that their trial for sabbath breaking came off the 21st instant. No counsel was employed, the brethren conducting their own cases, relying upon the promise of God, as given in Matt. 10 : 19, 20. The result of the trial was that the jury disagreed. A new trial has been ordered on May 21. We will, the Lord willing, give our readers the result of it.
All this persecution, be it remembered, is in Protestant America, against Protestants upon whose character rests no stain of immorality.
Not Force but Love
Not Force but Love.—Just now the professed Christian world is putting forth strenuous efforts to make the world Christian by law. The kingdom of Christ, say these reformers, must “enter the realm of law through the gateway of politics.” But this is not Christ’s way. He could have obtained the kingdoms of the world in this way; at least, he was so offered them, but, in the words of Geikie: “Deliberately rejecting the thought of basing his empire on force, with a lofty grandeur of soul he chose to found it on love, rather than on the fears or compelled submission of mankind. Having come not to destroy men’s lives, but to save them, he would use his miraculous power only for good to man, and for the glory of his Father, trusting himself to Him, without other defense or care than His unfailing wisdom and love.”—Life of Christ, chap. 27. Are we Christ’s followers?—we will never seek to support or promote his cause by physical or legal force or power.
Come unto Me
“Come unto Me.”—How blessed is this invitation of the world's Redeemer in these days of unrest, strife, and turmoil! All the science of the ages, all the man-made religions the world has known, all the theories of Church and State, all the Utopian schemes of social reformers, all the panaceas offered by the world's dreamers, all the discoveries of modern times, cannot give rest to one human soul. Unrest is evidence of sin. Sin separates from God, and takes away the peace and rest for which so many aching hearts are longing. To all these comes the invitation of Him who has purchased our pardon with his life, who “is our peace,” “Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” Yea, precious rest amid all the strife and care and turmoil of the world. As the young Hebrews in the fiery furnace were not burned, so those who accept Christ's invitation are not harmed by the surging billows around them. Christ is to them as a rock in the midst of the sea. “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee; because he trusteth in Thee,” says the prophet to our God; therefore “trust ye in the Lord forever; for in the Lord Jehovah is the rock of ages.” Jesus is all of this and more. In these evil days he is a “hiding place from the wind,” “a covert from the tempest,” “a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm,” “the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.” Sinner, reader, do you not long for such a friend? Such is the Lord Jesus Christ, the Word of God, to all those who will yield to bear his yoke, to accept his service. And why not come to Christ? Why not come now? “Behold, now is the accepted time.”
THIS NUMBER! THIS NUMBER!!
By Editor
Dear reader, this number of the SIGNS is of eternal importance. The truth which it contains should be put into the hands of every Protestant family in the United States. It has not been written for the sake of argument, to prove somebody in the wrong, but to lead all to the truth of God as it is in Christ Jesus, especially upon that world-wide and increasingly important question, the Sabbath and what it stands for.
Read it yourself. Compare it with God’s word and the testimony of history and fact. Interest others in it. Scatter it widely. It ought to reach many more than its 30,000 to 50,000 weekly readers. Price of extra copies at $1.50 per hundred. Its number is 18; order by number. Address SIGNS OF THE TIMES, Oakland, Cal.
Protestantism, True and False
THE article “Protestantism, True and False,” will be published as a future number of the Religious Liberty Library.
Changes in Paper Departments
By Editor
IMPORTANT matter in our General Articles department necessitated the expanding of that part of the paper by more than two pages; but as we have but 16 pages in our paper, this also made necessary the contracting of other departments. This space has been yielded by the departments of Home and Health, Our Work and Workers, and News and Notes. We also omitted advertisements, and literary and other notices. We are sure our readers will not complain.
Abyssinia and the Sabbath
READ the article on Abyssinia in our Mission Field department. It ought to stir the hearts of Sabbath-keeping Christians, and it ought to rouse to inquiry Sunday-keeping Christians. The Abyssinians are a living witness to the perpetuity of the Sabbath of the Lord, as well as to the corruptions existing in the early church. They were corrupted in the fourth century, when both the Sabbath and Sunday were held as holy days in the church, when paganism was supplanting Christianity. They have kept both days ever since.
Condoning Heathenism
By Editor
IN our Mission Fields department is an article which merits special attention. The writer of “Condoning Heathenism” well asks, “Whither are we drifting?” It contains valuable testimony right in line with the greater part of this paper. When Protestants adopt an institution heathen in its origin, and, in the face of God’s word to the contrary, persist in forcing it upon others by methods equally unprotestant and unchristian, we see no reason why they may not adopt other heathen customs and heathen practices. Is not ancestral worship—invocation of saints—as respectable as “the venerable day of the sun”—the papal Sunday? If not, why not?
PUBLICATIONS ON THE SABBATH QUESTION.
READ the following and see if there is not some publication among them which you desire to read, or which will benefit some friend:—
The Abiding Sabbath. By A. T. Jones. No. 9 of the Bible Students' Library. This is a review of two Sabbath “prize essays,” one of $500, and one of $1,000. It contains mighty arguments on the Sabbath question; 174 pages; price, 15 cents.
Is Sunday the Sabbath? No. 24 of the Library. A brief consideration of New Testament texts on the first day of the week; 8 pages; price, 1 cent.
Nature and Obligation of the Sabbath of the Fourth Commandment. By J. H. Waggoner. No. 54 of the Library. Clear and strong in argument; price, 10 cents.
Sunday; Origin of Its Observance in the Christian Church. By E. J. Waggoner. No. 80 of the Library. The testimony given with reference to Sunday is wholly Protestant. All Protestants should read it; price, 15 cents.
Who Changed the Sabbath? No. 107 of the Library. What God's word predicted; what Christ says; what the Papacy says; what Protestants say. A most convincing document; 24 pages; price, 3 cents.
The Christian Sabbath. No. 113 of the Library. A reprint of four articles in the Catholic Mirror, the organ of Cardinal Gibbons. What Catholics have to say to Protestants on the subject; 32 pages; price, 4 cents.
Christ and the Sabbath. By Prof. W. W. Prescott. The spiritual nature of the Sabbath, what true Sabbath keeping is, and the relation of Christ to the Sabbath in both creation and redemption. A most important tract. No. 14 of the Religious Liberty Library; 38 pages; price, 4 cents.
The History of the Sabbath. By John N. Andrews. A complete history of the Sabbath and first day of the week in religious life and thought, from the earliest ages to the present time, and especially during the Christian dispensation; 550 large octavo pages; price, cloth, $2.00; library binding, $2.50.
Any of the above may be obtained post free on receipt of price by addressing Pacific Press, Oakland, Cal. Works on all phases of Bible truth. Send for catalogue.