Upper Columbia Tract Soc.—312 S. Wash. St. Spokane, Wash.
Utah Tract Society—Box 1058, Salt Lake City, Utah.
Vancouver Island—Box, 23 Pandora St., Victoria, B. C.
Vermont Tract Society—190 N. Winooski Ave. Burlington, Vt.
Virginia Tract Society—501 N. 25th St., Richmond Va.
West Virginia Tract Society—Newburg, W. Va.
Wisconsin Tract Society—Milton Junction, Wis
BIBLE SANCTIFICATION: A CONTRAST OF TRUE AND FALSE THEORIES.
By Mrs. E. G. White.
This is a pamphlet of only 84 pages, but its value is not to be judged by its size. It is just what its title indicates: a faithful presentation of Bible truth on this important subject, and an exposure of the false theories prevailing in regard to it. Every believer in Bible truth should read it. Buy it, read it, and lend it to your neighbor. Price, 10 cents.
Address. PACIFIC PRESS, Oakland, Cal.
SURE WORD OF PROPHECY. A study of the book of Daniel.
A concise study of this important prophetic portion of the Bible. Fully illustrated. Paper covers. 96 pages. Bible Students' Library No. 131. Price, 10 cents.
Address,
PACIFIC PRESS PUBLISHING CO.
OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA
Kansas City, Mo. New York City, N. Y.
Abiding Sabbath and Lord's Day
By Alonzo T. Jones
By ALONZO T. JONES
A pointed review of two prize essays which are, without doubt, the best contributions to the defense of Sunday as the Sabbath. Those desiring to find some $1,000 reasons for keeping the first day of the week will find them in this work. Bible Student's Library No. 2. 173 pages. Paper covers. Price, 20 cents. Address
PACIFIC PRESS PUBLISHING CO.
Kansas City, Mo. OAKLAND, CAL.
New York City, N. Y.
THE TALENTS.
By Milton C. Wilcox
By M. C. Wilcox. A brief essay on “The Parable of the Talents,” showing that the talents represent the various gifts of the Spirit which God bestows as he will upon those who are consecrated to him, with the duties and blessed privileges involved therein. Bible Students’ Library, No. 77; 16 pp., price 2 cents.
Unordered Copies and Advance Payment
By Editor
☞ We send no papers from this office to individuals without pay in advance.
☞ When persons receive copies without ordering them, they are sent by other parties, and we can give no information in regard to them. Persons thus receiving copies of the “Signs” are not indebted to the office, and will not be called upon to pay for them. Please read the papers you may receive, and hand them to your friends to read.
CONTENTS OF THIS NUMBER.
Editorial.
One God, One Disease, One Physician (notes) . . . 1
The Pleasures of the World, CLYDE SCOTT CHASE . . . 4
Family Financiering . . . 9
Casting All Thy Care upon Jesus, E. R. COLBURN . . . 11
General Articles.
The Christ of the Ages, E. HILLIARD . . . 4
Man’s Eden Home, AUGUSTA W. HEALD . . . 6
Christ the Life Giver, MRS. E. G. WHITE . . . 6
Jewish Customs and Traditions (The Sanctuary and Its Services), F. C. GILBERT . . . 7
“A Great Discovery,” J. A. OPPY . . . 7
The Outlook.—A Modern Babylonian Palace—Sunday Legislation in Connecticut—Modern “Christian” Teaching . . . 8, 9
The Fireside.—The Shoemaker and the Little White Shoes—“Noble Sport,” Again—Mrs. Beecher on Marriage—Tobacco and the Sight—Higher Motives—Distilled Water—Difference in People . . . 9, 10
Missions.—Bible Distribution in Nagoya, Japan—Chinese Persecution—Bridge Temples and Idols in China—Our Work and Workers . . . 11, 12
International Sabbath School Lesson.—Parting Instruction (Lesson 4, Sabbath, April 24, 1897) . . . 13
International Sunday School Lesson.—Peter Delivered from Prison (Lesson 4, Sunday, April 25, 1897) . . . 13
News and Notes . . . 14
Publishers . . . 15
Christ the Life Giver
READ “Christ the Life Giver.” It is a blessed message of instruction, warning, and hope.
Paris Temple and Babylon’s Glory
By Editor
OUR Outlook department contains matters of interest to our readers. Compare the description of the prospective temple at Paris with the description given of the glory of Babylon, and the boasting of one of its builders, in Isa. 13:19; Dan. 4:28–30.
Sojourner Truth Was a Woman
Was not Sojourner Truth a woman? And yet under “Pictured Biography” in an enterprising youth’s paper published in the east, the picture of the earnest old soul is given, and underneath the picture the following: “—readers under eighteen years of age are requested to send in the name of the man whose picture appears above,” etc. Was not Sojourner a woman?
The Pope’s Dream
By L. A. P.
“The Pope’s Dream” is the subject of our first-page illustration. Alone in his private chamber, wrapped in meditation profound, sits the aged pontiff of the Church of Rome. The church—past, present, future—her march through the centuries, her reverses, her conquests, her victories, all pass in silent but swift review. Despite the check of a hundred years ago, the lines of the “Mother Church” now extend to earth’s remotest bounds. Her children call from the isles, and nations and kings humbly bow before her “infallible” decrees. No! defeat is but apparent; the greater glory lies beyond. The zeal of a mighty cause inspires anew the head of the church on earth. He hears the tread of a mighty host, and sees unfurled from pole to pole the banner of the cross. Kings with all their power, prelates with all their pomp, together march beneath that ensign. From hill to plain rings the battle-cry, from the mountain to the sea rolls and reverberates the cannon’s holy note, convincing and subduing every foe. Perish heresy; the “true faith” triumphant; kings and kingdoms, principalities and powers, beneath his feet; the cross and the cannon-ball victorious; the throne of St. Peter supreme; the triple tiara, the crown of crowns; the “holy father” arbiter and master of a world. L. A. P.
Know the Message
Know the Message.—The Rev. George D. Thompson, pastor of the Fourth M. E. Church of Millville, N. J., the New York Journal tells us, recently declared in a sermon on Millville’s morality that nineteen out of every twenty marriages in Millville were forced. The result was that his congregation left him, his church council deposed him, and paid him his salary due; the police were called in to protect him, and he finally apologized, and was permitted to leave town in peace. Now if his message was that which God gave him to preach, why should he apologize? His apology at the least showed that he was uncertain as to the source of his message. The moral is that a preacher of the Gospel should know his mission and message, and having proclaimed it, stick to it even tho he suffer.
SABBATHS AND THE SABBATH.
By Editor
There is but one weekly Bible Sabbath, namely, the seventh day. This existed before sin entered (Gen. 2: 2, 3); its law was spoken of God from heaven, and written by him on the tables of stone (Ex. 20: 8-11; Deut. 5: 22). It was set forth as a memorial of creation and a sign of the only true God—Creator and Redeemer. Ex. 20: 8-11; Eze. 20: 12, 20. It is declared to be the Lord’s day (Isa. 58: 13), made and observed by Jesus Christ, the Son of God (Mark 2: 27, 28). It is based on the eternal facts of God’s creative power, man’s relation thereto, and his needs; and is as eternal as the Lord’s creation. There were other sabbaths, yearly, typical, shadowy, which fell on certain days of certain months and feasts. They naturally fell on all days of the week. They were typical of certain events in the work of redemption, and expired by limitation when the thing typified was reached. Then the shadow reached the substance and the shadow ended. This expiration of type in antitype is set forth in Col. 2: 16, 17. These yearly sabbaths and feasts were seven in number, and are set forth in Lev. 23: 4-37, not as connected with the weekly Sabbaths of the Lord, but “beside the Sabbaths of the Lord.” Verse 38.
We note these facts in reply to readers who have sent us copies of papers contending that “the first-day sabbath” was warranted (1) by types of yearly sabbaths “which came on the first day of the week;” (2) by the prophecy of Ps. 118: 22-24, a prophecy relating to the whole period of the day of salvation and triumph of Christ, not to a day of the week; (3) by “the fact that the change from the seventh day to the first took place under apostolic recognition and authority,” a “fact” of which the Scriptures are silent. The only Bible Sabbath is the seventh day. Jesus knew no other. His apostles were to teach what he commanded, and to walk as he walked. Matt. 28: 19, 20; 1 John 2: 6. They record no change of the Sabbath. Why not, then, take the Bible Sabbath and Christ’s example?
ADMITS OUR CONTENTION.
By W. N. G.
The various forces that have advocated Sunday laws have in one way or another suggested and urged “civil Sunday” laws in places where there are none, especially in California, in the District of Columbia, and in the Territories. It used to be their policy to deny that any religious observance was contemplated, or that religion was in any way involved in “civil Sunday” legislation. We have many times shown that a “civil Sunday” law was an absurd proposition, the baldest deception, and designed only as an opening wedge for an outright religious enactment. And now the Christian Statesman, organ of the National Reform Association, etc., etc., makes a clean-cut admission of our contention. Here it is:—
“The American Federation of Labor has taken the ground that ‘there is no necessity for Sunday work.’ Apart from all other considerations they demand as a civil right that they should have the Sabbath for their own use. They are right so far; but they will learn sooner or later that no civil right can be secured to any citizen on any other than a religious basis.”
Yet in the face of such broad claims as this, the National Reformers, Christian Citizenship Leaguers, et al., will deny that their multitudinous so-called reforms by means of political religion are simply the vanguard of Church and State union. W. N. G.
The Pope’s Dream
By C. M. S.
“The Pope’s Dream,” on our first page, is worthy of notice. The lower right-hand corner of the picture represents Leo XIII. sleeping in his easy-chair. As in dreams are frequently mirrored the real thoughts and the ambitions of mankind, the artist shows us in the larger sketch a graphic picture of the dreamland product of this sleeper’s brain. In his chair of state he sits upon the circle of the earth, its solitary sovereign, while his triple-crowned head is exalted above the stars of heaven. The cannon-ball in his left hand illustrates the means by which he seeks to exalt the emblem which he clutches in his right,—the means by which he was enabled to place himself where in his dreams he sees himself, the sole intermediary between humanity and divinity, the sole arbiter of the destinies of men and nations. C. M. S.
A Noble Institution.
By W.
Reference is made to the Colorado Sanitarium, Boulder, Colorado. The writer had the privilege of spending part of two days there on his return from General Conference. Altho not at the mildest time of year—mid March—the days were pleasant, and continually deceived one into believing that they were warmer than they really were. The climate is good, the air pure, clear, bracing, just such as is needed by a certain class of consumptive, asthmatical, and dyspeptic patients. The water is clear, cold, and of remarkable purity, fresh from the mountain snows. The scenery is rich and varied, with plenty of opportunity for hill and mountain climbing. The buildings and appointments in the way of treatment rooms, baths of various kinds—among which is the electric-light bath, superior to Turkish or Russian—the best of diets and doctors, and managers, matrons, and helpers, render the institution a pleasant home to the sojourner. One thing the writer would like to emphasize for the benefit of the readers of the SIGNS throughout the great central west, who need the benefits of such an institution: It is not specifically a sanitarium for those suffering from pulmonary complaints. While it is especially favorable to this class above many other institutions, it is equal to other institutions in the treatment of other diseases, maladies, and infirmities. It ought to be a Beth-shan, a house of rest, for the overworked business and professional men of Denver, less than thirty miles distant. It is open for all classes. For particulars, terms, circulars, etc., write the superintendent, W. H. Riley, M.D., Boulder, Colo. W.
Come in a Troubled World
Come.—Truly the world is not at rest; one boasted “millennium” of peace is not here, tho arbitration treaties be discussed by Senates and societies. War in all its dire aspects ravages the fairest spots of earth. Abyssinia, and other parts of Africa, Armenia, Cuba, South and Central America, and lastly little Crete and Greece facing the combined powers of Europe, are the pictures of peace which 1896 and 1897 hold before our eyes. Cholera, the Black Death, gaunt Famine, and hollow-eyed Want have stalked for months almost unchecked among the millions of India, China, and some parts of Africa. And yet there was never so much plenty in the world as now. Truly 2 Esdras, whether canonical or not, predicts the truth of these times when it declares of the latter days: “Behold, victuals shall be so good cheap upon the earth, that they shall think themselves to be in good case, and even then shall evils grow upon earth, sword, famine, and great confusion. For many of them that dwell upon earth shall perish of famine; and the other that escape the hunger shall the sword destroy.” 2 Esdras 16: 21, 22. Cyclones and floods unprecedented have visited America, and financial difficulties and oppression of the poor are worse than the floods. Where is the ground for earthly hopes? But over all and through all the strife and wo and misery wrought by the red horse of war and its rider, the black horse of corruption and calamity, and the pale horse of death in its varied horrible forms, comes the fourfold merciful, loving, strong, and constant voice from the throne of Infinite Love, Come, come, come, come. (See Rev. 6: 1–8.) Hopeless of earth, God bids you come. Christ says, “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” In the world is tribulation; in Christ alone is peace and rest. Come.