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Review and Herald, Vol. 31, No. 11.

CHRISTIAN DUTIES
Earlier text: M. J. CLARK

REPORT OF LABOR.

By L. L. HOWARD

WHILE sitting down to write a report of my labors for a short time past, I deem it duty also to speak of my experience in connection with the meetings held of late by Bro. and Sr. White, and Bro. Andrews. When they came to Maine I was in some doubt about the testimonies of sister White. During the progress of those meetings in Maine, I passed through a very great anxiety of mind. I heard numerous testimonies given to different individuals. I looked to see what the result would be; and so far as I could see, the result was good in every instance. But still there was some lingering doubt until I attended the meeting at Washington. The blessed effect of the plain testimonies borne by sister White to certain ones in that place, convinced me that the work was of God. Another thing. A testimony was given me and my family, that if we would take a certain course, I should see my children converted. As soon as I moved in this direction, the Lord began to work for us. Two of our children have taken a good stand to serve the Lord. I thank God for stooping so low as to give us light from Heaven in these last days.
The meeting at Washington was a great blessing to me. I felt a greater union with the brethren in the third message than ever before. I expected to travel with Bro. Andrews this winter, on the New England mission; but at this meeting he decided to go with Bro. and sister White to New York and Michigan. I felt somewhat disappointed in not enjoying the privilege; but the Lord's will be done. I feel very grateful for the privilege I have had in times past of associating with this dear servant of the Lord. We reluctantly parted. I came to Amherst to my appointment. Here is a little body of commandment-keepers who were gathered together by Bro. Gage. There have been some additions since Bro. Gage removed to Battle Creek. Bro. Andrews and myself labored with them some last summer. I found them striving to grow in grace and in knowledge of God. They are young in experience. I had a good season with them in presenting the subject of Spiritual Gifts. I pray that these may be fully imbued with the spirit of the third angel's message. There seems to be some interest to hear among other classes in this place. A course of lectures would probably bring in others.
Jan. 2, I went to visit the church at Dartmouth, Mass. Bro. Rodman joined me the next day. Sabbath eve we commenced meetings with them. Found them very low; some badly backslidden, and some difficulties among them. We tried to speak to them, but were much pressed in spirit. Next morning we called the church together, and exhorted them with plainness of speech in reference to the solemn time in which we are living, the judgment hour, and also their dreadful sin in backsliding from God at this time. A spirit of confession and weeping pervaded our meeting. Brethren and sisters came forward and confessed heartily, and their difficulties at once vanished. The former elder of the church, who has been in a backslidden and discouraged state of mind, was not present at this meeting, but came in a few days. He and his wife took a good stand with the people of God, and made heart felt confessions of their wanderings.
We found this church much behind on the health reform. We tried to show them the importance of this subject. They received our testimony, and seemed to give good evidence of trying to profit by it. We held meetings with them over Sabbath and first-day, also Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, evenings. They were solemn and interesting.
On Thursday, Brn. Rodman and myself took leave of the brethren and sisters there, and came to Kingston, R. I. Here is a church that was raised up by the labors of Bro. M. E. Cornell, some three or four years since. The most of them are striving to live up to the light of present truth. Some are behind on the health reform. Not one of the sisters of that church did I see with the reform dress on. When will our brethren and sisters see the right way? Quite a goodly number came in from other places, and we enjoyed a good season together in conference. We tried to bear a plain testimony in regard to the present truth. We were glad to meet Bro. Haskell from South Lancaster, Mass. at this meeting. He bore a faithful testimony, which cheered and strengthened us all very much.
At the close of this meeting, after consultation, it was decided that Brn. Rodman and Haskell should attend our appointment at Ashaway, and I go back to Dartmouth, and be with the church over Sabbath and first-day. Accordingly, on Jan. 15, I parted with Brn. Rodman and Haskell, and came back to Dartmouth.
I found the pilgrims in good spirits, striving to hold fast whereunto they had attained. We had a good, solemn time with them. One who had never said anything in public before, took up the cross and asked for prayers, promising to submit to the Lord, and keep his commandments. We were all much comforted. We hope to hear a good report from them still, in the future.
Jan. 24, came to South Lancaster to attend our Monthly Meeting. Here I again joined Brn. Rodman and Haskell, who had come from Rhode Island to attend meetings in Mass. and New Hampshire.
At this place we had a good meeting with the scattered ones. Many of the members of the church are scattered, living in other towns, some at quite a distance. It was good to see them together. Most of them have taken hold of the health reform well.
All the sisters who were present have adopted the reform dress. One man who had been in a backslidden state a long time, took a good stand with us; also a young man present, asked for prayers, and seemed very penitent.
At this place I received a second letter from Bro. Canright, asking me if I could not come to New Portland, Me., and aid him in opening a new field in that part of the State. He had become weary in speaking so constantly, so it seemed quite necessary that I should go. After consulting with Brn. Haskell, Rodman, and others, and making it a subject of prayer, I concluded to go, and to leave Bro. R. to visit churches, and attend the appointments in New Hampshire. Very reluctantly we parted, to go to our several appointments.
I wish to say here that I feel grateful for the privilege I have enjoyed of laboring with Eld. Rodman; and I pray that God will give him success in his meetings in N. H. I will say to the brethren in that State that I will come back and labor among them just as soon as the way opens, in the providence of God.
I reached this place the last day of Jan., and found Bro. Canright and Goodrich holding meetings in the village school-house. There is some interest. Quite a number have started to keep the Sabbath, but the churches and ministers have done all they could to scare the people away from our meetings. Still we have quite a good attendance. There are a number of villages near by in which we are intending to give lectures at the earliest opportunity. Pray for us that the word of God may have free course.
L. L. HOWARD.
New Portland, Me.

Contentment With Our Lot

To inculcate contentment with our lot, the eminent John Newton left us this saying: “If two angels came down from Heaven to execute a divine command, and one was appointed to conduct an empire, and the other to sweep a street in it, they would feel no inclination to change employments.”

What Is Time?

WHAT is time? A line that has two ends—a path that begins in the cradle and ends in the grave.

What Next?

Men’s hearts were to fail them for looking after those things that are coming upon the earth. They are looking, and raising this inquiry.
The following is the leading editorial article in the Minneapolis Tribune, Dec. 29, 1867; and expresses the pervading feeling in the civilized world at the present time:
“Our dispatches yesterday brought us accounts of a shipwreck and the loss of four hundred lives. Scarce a day passes but the telegraph or the mail bring their chapters of accidents, murder, and every description of crime; of wars and rumors of wars; of revolutions, plots and conspiracies; of famine and desolation; and in the physical world of mighty upheavings of which language fails to furnish an adequate description. The elements seem to vie with each other as to which can do the most violence or lash itself to greatest fury.—and in the rivalry of earth, air, water and fire, the old earth is racked and shaken until it seems as if it would be torn from its moorings in the heavens and hurled incontinently through space. Nor do these fearful disturbances among the forces of nature stop with inanimate matter. They permeate the dominion of man, and are exciting peoples and individuals to eccentric courses. Even the inventions of science—the elemental forces which men have tamed and applied to their use, partaking of the irregularity of the times, break beyond the bounds set for their action, plunge madly from the control of governing causes, and bring ruin, death and destruction upon those of whom they were wont to be their tractable servants. *”
Let not the reader suppose that we are endeavoring to excite undue alarm. The facts to which we allude are patent to all careful readers of the daily papers. Others besides us have noticed the universal prevalence—the deluge, we might say—of accident and crime. One of our exchanges in a distant part of the country tells us that the telegraph wires bend under a weight of woe; that the old earth quivers with throbs of agony from the center to the pole; cities are shaken down, countries are engulfed, fair domains are overflowed with red-hot lava; wife is arrayed against husband, mother against child, son against father; a hecatomb is sacrificed on one railway, half as many on another, and on still another the width of a hair stands between a thousand and sudden death; that in social life newspapers are smutched all over with reports of divorce and separation trials, of infidelity and disgrace, of gigantic crimes undertaken, half accomplished or completed.
This is a fearful record. Verily these be strange times, and in reflecting upon them, the eternal why? stares us in the face. Why are these things thus? What do they portend? What is to come next? Really, we do n’t know, and we question if anybody else does! It may be the voice of Providence, speaking in tones of prophetic warning to the guilty inhabitants of earth. At any rate, we deem it prudent to repeat our advice given a short time ago, that all take heed to the error of their ways, and prepare themselves to ride securely amid the wreck of a ruined world when the seven vials of wrath shall be poured out, and there shall be voices, and thunders, and lightnings, and a great earthquake; when the islands and mountains shall disappear, and the last great hail storm shall fall out of the heavens upon men.”

Truth, Not Beauty, in Doctrine

The question is, not whether a doctrine is beautiful, but whether it is true. When we want to go to a place, we don’t ask whether the road leads through a pretty country, but whether it is the right road, the road pointed out by authority, the turnpike road.—Guesses at Truth.

Delaying Repentance

Put off repentance till to-morrow, and you have a day more to repent of, and a day less to repent in.

MICHIGAN CENTRAL RAILROAD.

On and after Monday, Dec 30, 1867, Passenger Trains will run on this road as follows:

GOING WEST.

LEAVE. MAIL. DAY EXP. EVE. EXP. NIGHT EX.
Detroit,..... 7:10 A.M. 11:00 A.M. 5:35 P.M. 10:30 P.M.
Battle Creek, 1:35 P.M. 3:48 P.M. 11:15 P.M. 3:40 A.M.
Chicago, Arrive, 9:00 P.M. 10:00 P.M. 6:30 A.M. 11:00 A.M.

GOING EAST.

LEAVE. MAIL. DAY EXP. EVE. EXP. NIGHT EX.
Chicago,..... 4:30 A.M. 7:00 A.M. 4:15 P.M. 9:40 P.M.
Battle Creek, 11:45 A.M. 1:05 P.M. 10:38 P.M. 4:50 A.M.
Detroit, Arrive, 5:45 P.M. 6:10 P.M. 2:45 A.M. 10:00 A.M.
THESE trains all run by Chicago time, which is fifteen minutes slower than Detroit time.

Obituary Notices.

By A. Stone; C. A. Washburn; Harriet J. Wescott

Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth.
DIED, in Johnson, Vt., Oct. 20, 1868, Mary E., daughter of L. M. and A. M. Savage, in the eleventh year of her age. Disease, typhoid fever. She realized that death was approaching, requested prayer in her behalf and died composed and apparently resigned.
A. STONE. Eden, Vt., Jan. 20, 1868.
DIED in Jefferson, near Waukon, Iowa, Jan. 19, 1868, in the 34th year of her age, Sr. Frances Jennette, wife of Bro. John P. Farnsworth, leaving an infant son 12 days old. Sr. Jennette was among the first to embrace the Sabbath and third angel's message in Paris, Me., and has ever since had faith in these truths that separate us from the world.
Bro. Farnsworth and her kindred friends deeply feel their loss, but they sorrow not as those without hope. As a church, we shall miss her. Her place in the prayer-meeting and Sabbath-school will be forever vacant. May this deep affliction serve to wean us from the perishable things of earth, and drive us nearer to God. Her remains were followed by a long burial train to the Waukon burying-ground, where we left her to slumber till the resurrection morning, when we expect to meet her to dwell in that land where the inhabitants will never say, “I am sick.” A few remarks were offered from Rev. xxi, 4. C. A. WASHBURN.
DIED in Portage, Livingston Co., N. Y., Jan. 23, of consumption, Andrew A. Wescott, aged thirty-eight years and eight months.
“Asleep in Jesus, blessed sleep, From which none ever wake to weep, A calm and undisturbed repose, Unbroken by the last of foes.”
Sermon on the occasion by Rev. Mr. Austin Davis, Wesleyan Methodist. Text, “Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labors; and their works do follow them.”
HARRIET J. WESCOTT.
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