IN the previous article the chivalrous and romantic story of the birth of the Ottoman empire was traced. In this paper will be shown the rapid and remarkable rise of that people to opulence and power, and also the motive force back of this and all Mohammedan movements.
Perhaps it will be best to take the last feature first. The Turks hold that they are descended from Japheth, the son of Noah. He was the father of three sons. The Turks teach that to his firstborn, Aboul-Turk, he gave the sovereignty of Turkestan.
Again: the Turks profess the religion of Mohammed. The creed of that faith is generally compressed into the well-known formula: “There is no god but God, and Mohammed is his prophet.” But there is another and longer form, which reads as follows:—
“I believe in God, and his angels, and his books, and his prophets, and the last day, and the predestination of good and evil by God, and the resurrection after death. I bear witness that there is no God but God, and I bear witness that Mohammed is his slave and his prophet.” (Cited by Sir Charles Eliot, “Turkey and the Turks,” chap. 6, par. 3.)
From the above it must be perfectly clear that Mohammedanism is very far from being a heathen religion, as some are wont to believe. It teaches belief11in God, angels, the prophets, the last day, and the resurrection of the dead. More than this, “about one half of the Koran is a polemic against polytheism and Trinitarianism.” In fact, the word Allah is an abbreviation of Al-iah, which means the one, true, only God. There is something in the nature of a challenge in the word itself to the dominant Christian church of the period when Mohammedanism arose. For that church was sunk in the mazes of the worship of saints and images when Mohammed came asserting that everlasting truth: “There is but one God.” “And he did not engage in vain metaphysics, but applied himself to improving the social condition of his people by regulations respecting personal cleanliness, sobriety, fasting, prayer. Above all other works he esteemed almsgiving and charity.” See Sir Charles Norton Eliot, “Turkey in Europe,” chap. 6, pages 155, 156; Draper, “Intellectual Development of Europe,” Vol. I, chap. II, par. 10.
And, conquering and to conquer, this Mohammedan religion rolled forth from the East and flowed over the West. Says Draper:—
“From its most glorious seats Christianity was forever expelled; from Palestine, the scene of its most sacred recollections; from Asia Minor, that of its first churches; from Egypt, whence issued the great doctrine of Trinitarian orthodoxy; from Carthage, who imposed her belief on Europe.
“It is altogether a misconception that the Arabian progress was due to the sword alone. The sword may change an acknowledged national creed, but it can not affect the consciences of men. . .
“The explanation of this political phenomenon is to be found in the social condition of the conquered countries. The influences of religion in them had long ago ceased; it had become supplanted by theology—a theology so incomprehensible that even the wonderful capabilities of the Greek language were scarcely enough to meet its subtle demands; the Latin and the barbarian dialects were out of the question. How was it possible that unlettered men, who with difficulty can be made to apprehend obvious things, should understand such mysteries? Yet they were taught that on those doctrines the salvation or damnation of the human race depended. They saw that the clergy had abandoned the guidance of the individual life of their flocks; that personal virtue or vice was no longer considered; that sin was not measured by evil works but by the degrees of heresy. They saw that the ecclesiastical chiefs of Rome, Constantinople, and Alexandria were engaged in a desperate struggle for supremacy, carrying out their purposes by carnal weapons and in ways revolting to the conscience of man. What an example when bishops were concerned in assassinations, poisonings, adulteries, blindings, riots, treasons, civil war; when patriarchs and primates were excommunicating and anathematizing one another in their rivalries for earthly power, bribing eunuchs with gold, and courtezans and royal females with concessions of episcopal love, and influencing the decisions of councils, asserted to speak with the voice of God, by those base intrigues and sharp practises resorted to by demagogues in their packed assemblies! Among legions of monks, who carried terror into the imperial armies and riot into the great cities, arose hideous clamors for theological dogmas, but never a voice for intellectual liberty or the outraged rights of man. In such a state of things, what else could be the result than disgust or indifference? Certainly men could not be expected, if a time of necessity arose, to give help to a system that had lost all hold on their hearts.
“When, therefore, in the midst of the wrangling of sects, in the incomprehensible jargon of Arians, Nestorians, Eutychians, Mariolatrists, and an anarchy of countless disputants, there sounded through the world, not the miserable voice of the intriguing majority of a council, but the dread battle-cry, ‘There is but one God,’ enforced by the tempest of Saracen armies, is it surprising that the hubbub was hushed? Is it surprising that all Asia and Africa fell away?”—Draper, “Intellectual Development of Europe,” Vol. I, chap. II, pars. 13-16.
From the above it will be seen that Mohammedanism adheres to the belief that both Judaism and Christianity have failed to do the work to which God called them. Mohammedanism arose in A. D. 622. The Papacy was operating full force, and none understood better than the Prophet and his followers the apostasy that had taken place in the Christian church. And because of that apostasy, he claimed divine right and calling to set up a new and purer faith, which should take the place, and do the work, that the so-called Christian church had failed to take and to do.
Once waken in the breast of the Mohammedans of to-day the flame of this their old-time faith, and there is no reason to doubt that they will pull themselves together again and make the fight of their lives to hold their place in Europe and to do the work to which they believe God has called them, and which they claim the Christians have utterly failed in doing.
But let us now turn our attention to the tremendous victories which the Turks gained, and the conquests which they made, spurred on by these motives and principles.
The rise of Othman was alluded to in our last article. His descendants are the Ottoman Turks of the present day. In 1300 A. D., the time of Othman’s rise, the Greek empire was in decay, and one by one Othman and his warriors subdued and possessed the Greek provinces, and made them part of the Ottoman empire. He died in 1326, and was succeeded by his son Orkhan, to whom he bequeathed the “auspicious beginnings of a powerful Ottoman empire.”
Orkhan took Nicomedia and Nicea from the Greeks, and added them to his kingdom. But the great work of his life was the work of establishing the foundations for a military empire in the organization of the famous corps of the Janizaries.
Orkhan was followed by Murad I (1359-1389). He it was who led the Turks across the Hellespont and laid the foundation for an Ottoman empire in Europe by the capture of Adrianople, Philippopolis, and a large part of Rumelia.
The appearance of the Turks in Europe sent consternation into the ranks of the Christian powers. The antagonism between Ottoman and European, which has never abated jot or tittle since, began in good earnest. The military forces of the kings of Hungary, Servia, and Bosnia moved on Adrianople, but Murad won an overwhelming victory over them all. Later he fought the allied armies of Hungary, Bosnia, Albania, Wallachia, and Servia, and by a magnificent triumph in the great battle of Kossova he added Servia to his dominions.
Mohammed II (1451-1481), “accomplished the most significant conquest in the rise of the Ottoman empire—the conquest of Constantinople.” On the twenty-ninth day of May, 1453, the proud capital of the imperial Constantine passed under Ottoman rule. Nearly five hundred years have rolled away since then. And during all that period the Turk has been hated by the European, and viewed as an interloper. Ten times in two hundred years has the might of Russia been hurled against him, but in spite of all this the star and crescent banner still floats from the dome of St. Sophia.
Mohammed II did even more than to possess Constantinople. He annexed Trebizond and Karaman in Asia; established a suzerainty over the Crimea, and captured from Venice and Genoa a number of islands in the Greek archipelago.
Selim the Grim (1512-1520) was one of the greatest monarchs who ever occupied the Ottoman throne. He annexed Persia, Kurdistan, Syria, and Egypt, and doubled the area of what was then the Ottoman empire.
Suleiman I, dubbed the Legislator, the Magnificent, and the Sublime, succeeded Selim (1520-1566). The first event of his reign was a war with Hungary, and the splendid city of Belgrade was added to his domain as a result. He took Rhodes from the Knights of St. John, Tripoli and Algiers he made tributary states. “The reign of Suleiman the Magnificent marks the climax in the rise of the Ottoman empire; for, while Cyprus, Crete, Georgia, and Tunis were subsequently conquered, and the real downward turn in the road was not reached for nearly forty years, the Ottoman empire, henceforth, in all that concerns power, wealth, and prosperity, must look to the past.”—Monroe, “Turkey and the Turks,” page 23.
The mean and ignoble Selim II, known as the Drunkard, next came to the throne (1566-1579). His reign was inaugurated by the first of a long (and probably still unfinished) series of wars with Russia.12He did better, however, to the south, and conquered Tunis and Cyprus.
The reign of Mohammed III (1595-1603) brings to a close the third century of Ottoman history, “and with it terminates the expansion of Ottoman dominion.” Henceforth the road sweeps downward in giant curves.
And great indeed was the Turkish empire of this time:—
“It comprised all the most celebrated cities of Biblical and classical history, except Rome, Syracuse, and Persepolis. The sites of Carthage, Memphis, Tyre, Nineveh, Babylon, and Palmyra were Ottoman ground; and the cities of Alexandria, Jerusalem, Smyrna, Damascus, Nice, Prusa, Athens, Philippi, and Adrianople, besides many of later but scarce inferior celebrity, such as Algiers, Cairo, Mecca, Medina, Basra, Bagdad, and Belgrade, obeyed the sultan of Constantinople. The Nile, the Jordan, the Orontes, the Euphrates, the Tigris, the Tanais, the Borysthenes, the Danube, the Hebrus, and the Ilissus, rolled their waters ‘within the shadow of the Horse-tails.’ The eastern recess of the Mediterranean, the Propontis, the Palus Macotis, the Euxine, and the Red Sea, were Turkish lakes. The Ottoman crescent touched the Atlas and the Caucasus; it was supreme over Athos, Sinai, Ararat, Mount Carmel, Mount Taurus, Ida, Olympus, Pelion, Hæmus, the Carpathian and the Acroceraunian heights.” (Sir E. Creasy, page 197, edition 1877, quoted by Stanley Lane-Poole, Turkey, chap. 10, par. the last.)
In the palmy days of the Porte her banners waved not only over the insignificant territory now known as Turkey in Europe, but over Hungary, Bulgaria, and Greece, Rumania and Eastern Rumelia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Servia, and the Sanjak of Novibazar, together with the Crimean peninsula and a portion of what is now southern Russia.
South and across the Euxine she was mistress of Asia Minor to the confines of Persia; as well as of Egypt, Syria, Tripoli, Tunis, and Algiers, together with vast inland possessions in the Mediterranean—to say nothing of the great but principally desert tract of Arabia.
The measure of this magnificent domain was over two million square miles,—nearly double the size of Europe, excepting Russia. The population of the above territory which once lay within the Ottoman ring fence is now over sixty million souls.
And all of the above had been acquired by the descendants of Ertoghrul, in three centuries from the day when their forefathers wandered homeless and countryless at the head of his little band of less than half a thousand men.
Madison, Tenn.
The Latin Union and French Conferences
By Guy Dail
GUY DAIL
It is evening after the Sabbath, August 28, on the camp-ground at Vergeze, in southern France, where a joint meeting of the Latin Union and French conferences has been in session since the previous Tuesday, and will close tomorrow night.
This afternoon, during the ordination of Brother Paul Steiner to the ministry, and in the social meeting following, we could realize the presence of God. The solemn manner in which the charge was given, and the simplicity of the service, made a good impression upon both our own brethren and the strangers who were in attendance from the neighboring villages. It has been refreshing to hear the experiences of our workers and the testimonies of the native brethren who came with them from Italy, Roman-Switzerland, Spain, and France. It has done us good to listen to the reports of our laborers from Algeria, Portugal, and Walloon, or French, Belgium. Brotherly love and unity of sentiment have characterized ministers and people in their relations to one another and in the transaction of conference business. It was cheering to see the uniquely clad mountaineer peasant brethren of the district of Tarn as they entered the camp before breakfast the other morning, and, with tears of joy, began to salute those of our people who had arrived on the grounds before them.
It did our souls good to witness the rededication of the whole congregation, the half of whom remained to seek God for a new experience after this forenoon’s revival service. Seven offered themselves for baptism.
The timely instruction from Elder J. N. Loughborough on the rise and progress of the third angel’s message; the teaching of Elder L. R. Conradi and his counsel in the open business sessions as well as in the committee and workers’ meetings; the mutual help rendered by the workers from all parts of the Latin Union Conference; the discussion of the various resolutions offered; the attendance at the open lectures each evening (a tent was pitched here several weeks ago, and about two hundred strangers were on the grounds, attending either the French lecture in the pavilion or the Spanish meeting in the dining-tent); the animated Sabbath-school; the simple yet amply sufficient provision made by Elder T. Nussbaum and his assistants for boarding the campers at a cost of about fifteen cents a day; and the pleasant weather, as the atmosphere had been cooled by copious rains before the camp-meeting began,—these are among the things that make us wish it had been possible for the readers of the REVIEW to meet with us here, in the famous and historic valley of the Rhone, with its wine-producing vineyards, its orchards of fig and olive and orange, its fields of maize and melons, and its mulberry-trees and world-renowned silk-culture.
There is great wealth in France. Her silks, her finely woven woolens, her delicate laces, as well as her olive-oil and white and red wines, are known in all the great marts of the world. “In articles that require taste, power of design, and clever workmanship, she surpasses every other country on the face of the globe.”
As we walked up from the station to the camp, Elder L. P. Tieche remarked to us that if these stones and hills and valleys were suddenly endowed with the power of language, they would reveal a wonderful tale of the past. Not only was it in the territory of the Northern France Mission, which includes Paris, and has a population of about twenty-two million nine hundred thousand, but it was especially within the confines of the French Conference (that is, in southern France, where we find almost sixteen million seven hundred thousand inhabitants) that “heretic” and “orthodox,” Monarchist and Republican, have fallen in great numbers.
Lefevre began the work of reform in the Paris University before Luther had posted his famous theses upon the door of the Wittenberg church. Persecution drove the disciples of the new movement into other parts of France, and in the south of France, where the Albigenses and many of the Vaudois had lived, the Huguenot cause became strongest, making remarkable progress among the nobility. But the wavering course of Francis I, and the formal rejection of the Protestant faith by the nation under his leadership, as he uttered the words: “Let Lutheranism be totally exterminated;” the consequent barbarism which deprived France of hundreds of thousands of her best and most industrious citizens, who were killed by the dungeon, by the scaffold, or by some other of the numerous methods invented by the Inquisition, or who were driven from the country by the intolerance accorded them; the final retribution visited upon the land in the French Revolution; and the end of the struggle for religious liberty,—all these make chapters of history that should be carefully considered by our people, as they are simply foreshadowings of what is yet to come. The believers who took refuge in the caves, in the secret places of the earth, and who called themselves “the church in the desert,” have left us an example of fortitude and faith worthy of our respect and emulation.13
Now, the great and the all-important problem considered at this conference has been the proper development of the native resources of the Latin Union Conference that it may carry on triumphantly the task of bringing the last reform message to the attention of the hundred ten million people within its territory, and also aid in the development and sending forth of carefully tried men, who may become missionaries to lands where the French language or influence predominates. It is claimed that the French colonies contain two thousand times as much land as the mother country, and about nine million more inhabitants; so that our French-speaking brethren have a wonderful field before them in the Asiatic colonies of Cochin China, Tonquin, and Cambodia; in Madagascar, the French Kongo, the French Sudan, Tunis, and Algeria in Africa; and in the islands of the sea which are governed by France. We believe our French-speaking young men and women will make noble soul winners, and that they will become such a strong factor in the evangelization of her colonies as will enable them to enhance the reputation of France for skilful workmanship.
Beginning with Jan. 1, 1909, France was separated into the two fields already referred to, the Northern France Mission being directly under the Latin Union Conference management, while the French Conference will still be presided over by Elder H. H. Dexter. During the year ending June 30, forty-six were received into membership in the republic, its tithe was $3,145, and its offerings amounted to $668, against twenty-two received, $2,518 tithe, and $585 offerings for the previous twelve months. The French Conference has fourteen workers, and two hundred twenty-seven members, while in all France there are two hundred seventy-one members, and seventeen workers. It is planned to open work in Lille, northern France, and that our laborers in Paris shall be re-enforced.
There were fourteen changes of laborers suggested. New help is to be furnished Italy, and Elders L. Zecchetto and P. A. Fant are hopeful because of the outlook there. Twelve new members are reported during the past year, and there are forty-nine believers in that field. We have been much pleased to meet the laborers from Italy, and to hear them speak in their beautiful mother tongue. There is no lack of work among the thirty-three and one-half millions in Italy, where civil and religious liberty is granted us by the laws, so that we may preach the truth there with more freedom than in some Protestant countries.
Brethren Walter and Frank Bond, with a good delegation from Spain, reported encouragingly of their experiences in that land. We have thirty-six members there now, but that is only a beginning among the nineteen and one-half millions of people of this once powerful Castilian kingdom. We are pleased to learn that none of our brethren have been hurt by the revolution in Spain, although much shooting and rioting went on in their immediate neighborhood, and hundreds were killed near by. The Spanish press are reporting terrible things that are said to be coming to light, as the doings of the Jesuits are being exposed, and there has been a strong movement on foot to drive from the country these followers of Loyola. It is of great importance that our literature and our message be brought before the people of this land just now. We have six canvassers and two Bible workers, native Spaniards, who are helping the Elders Bond in scattering the truth.
Of our nineteen members in Portugal, only Brother C. E. Rentfro was present. They have recently had a good baptism, and there is an increasing interest to hear. The circulation of the Earthquake special, in the Portuguese, comes in timely after the recent earthquake experiences of that land. Seeing it was the Lisbon earthquake that ushered in the sixth seal, this small kingdom of Portugal, with its nearly five and one-half million inhabitants, has a special interest to the student of prophecy,—to say nothing of the great navigators, Vasco da Gama and Magellan, whose dauntless spirit commanded the admiration of their day, and should inspire us courageously to launch out and fearlessly to proclaim our message in unentered fields.
Brother G. Roth, in charge of the Walloon Belgian Mission, is also to receive further assistance, as is also Brother Augsbourger, who is at work in Algeria. Both of these brethren had good reports to render of the past year’s work, and of an encouraging outlook for the future. It must not be forgotten that in our work Belgium is divided into two parts, and that the Flemish-speaking district belongs to the Holland division of the German Union Conference, while the French-speaking, or Walloon, division is under the management of the Latin Union Conference. In Walloon Belgium, or that section of the country toward the more hilly and rugged south and southeast, there are fifty-three believers, scattered among the three million six hundred thousand inhabitants. Algeria has nine members. It is a country nearly as large as France, and contains over five million people, of whom perhaps a quarter of a million are Frenchmen. Tunis also belongs to the Algerian Mission. In Belgium, with her Kongo district, and in Algeria and the neighboring Barbary states, there are vast and undeveloped fields into which the triumphs of the third angel’s message must be carried within the next few years.
The Lake Geneva Sanitarium at Gland is so well patronized that it has been voted to enlarge it. Brother J. Robert and the local committee will look after the details in the erection of the new building. This is one of the most important steps taken in Europe during the summer. We are glad that the blessing of the Lord is with the faithful helpers and physician in charge, so that this institution is an important factor in building the cause of health reform, and disseminating the message of truth.
The Latin Union School, of which Elder J. Vuilleumier is principal, will be much benefited by having its own quarters in the future, as the chalet is to be fully taken for school purposes. This institution has a worthy ambition before it—providing trained workers for the great fields we have been considering. It is the young people that we need, and such youth as were sent forth by the Waldensians and the persecuted church of God in the wilderness to carry the word of truth amid the greatest of dangers and the most bitter opposition.
During the year that closed June 30, the Latin Union Conference received 152 new members, $10,506 tithe, $2,619 offerings. For the twelve months ending June 30, 1908, the tithe had been $9,387, the offerings $2,246, and the number received into church membership, seventy-three. The membership June 30, 1907, was 849, and at the close of the second quarter of 1909, it was 1001. Two years ago we had thirty-four workers, and now there are forty-five workers in this union.
The canvassing work has not been so encouraging; for the sales of 1907 amounted to over $7,000, while last year they were only $6,660. More must be done to circulate our French books and papers. We trust our friends in other parts of the world who read this, and who have French-speaking neighbors, will try to get acquainted with them, and in whatever way the Lord may direct, put them in touch with our French literature, which can be secured from the New York branch of the Review and Herald Publishing Association.
The workers and people already feel grateful to the American brethren and to others who have been giving for the Latin Union Conference work. They have expressed their gratitude. Nor would we forget such of our young people as have assisted in the educational work in this union conference by sending donations through the Mission Board.
As we leave this place, we can not but wish for Elder Tieche, who has been re-elected president of the Latin Union Conference, and for all of his fellow workers, the rich blessing of the Lord, that the development of the field may be more marked than ever, and that the good omens before them may be realized in an abundant harvest of souls the coming year; for after all it is the souls saved that will cause joy in heaven among the angels, as well as on earth in the assembly of his saints.
Hamburg.
Overcoming Sin Through Good Principles
By Andrew Fuller
SIN is to be overcome not so much by maintaining a direct opposition to it, as by cultivating opposite principles. Would you kill the weeds in your garden, plant it with good seed; if the ground be well occupied, there will be less need of the hoe.—Andrew Fuller.
Abide in Christ
By Theodore L. Cuyler
WOULD you come off more than conqueror over all the powers of hell? Abide in Christ. And one of the surest ways of abiding in Christ is to strive to bring everybody else to him that you can get hold of. Working Christians are seldom troubled about their own assurances of salvation.—Theodore L. Cuyler.
Harvest Ingathering for Missions
By A. J. S. Bourdeau
“Thy people offer themselves willingly in the day of thy power, in holy array.” Ps. 110:3, A. R. V.
Special Campaign Week, Nov. 1-6.
Full Campaign Period, Nov. 1 to Dec. 31.
As before stated, all orders are being filled in the exact order of their receipt at this office.
All should carefully peruse the “Instruction Leaflet” and the “Official Solicitor’s Card” before beginning work.
Every day the presses of the Review and Herald deliver a large truck full of printed sheets of the Missions REVIEW for the bindery to fold, stitch, and trim during the night.
Doubtless many will be able to devote more than one week to this good work. All who can should continue the campaign at favorable and convenient seasons until the close of the year.
Those intending to solicit donations by correspondence should provide themselves with not less than two copies of the “Official Solicitor’s Card,” one for local use and the other to enclose in correspondence.
Remember that the Harvest Ingathering campaign begins Monday morning, November 1, but does not end until December 31. You thus have an opportunity of joining in the ranks at even the eleventh hour.
We are just in receipt of an order from the Southern New England Conference for 3,375 copies of the Missions number of the REVIEW to be sent to forty-one different persons, mostly church officers.
Numerous telegrams are being received from distant States calling for papers and other campaign supplies. Immediately upon their receipt, these telegraphic orders are placed in line with the many other orders received the same day.
All of the churches in the District of Columbia Conference gave special consideration to the Harvest Ingathering campaign October 2, or one week earlier than our other conferences. The large orders already received from these churches indicate a good interest.
If you receive more copies of the Missions REVIEW or other supplies than you can use, kindly pass them on to some other member of your church. In so doing you may be the means of enlisting the services of one extra worker who was not planning to engage in this work.
Something of an idea of the work of making and handling an edition of five hundred thousand copies of such a paper as the Missions number of the REVIEW may be gained by merely stating that the half million copies will weigh ninety-two thousand five hundred pounds, or over forty-six tons.
During the past few days we have been taking to the post-office wagon-loads of mail-sacks filled with the Missions number of the REVIEW. We have been obliged to stack these sacks up in great piles on the three floors of the large Review and Herald building, partially filling the halls and vestibules.
On Sunday, October 17, we were obliged to place an additional order for one hundred thousand copies of the Missions number of the REVIEW, making a total edition thus far of six hundred thousand copies. At the rate the orders are coming in, it will be necessary to place another large order within a few days.
Up to Tuesday noon, October 19, the total number of orders received for the Missions number of the REVIEW called for a grand total of 348,942 copies. This, of course, does not include thousands of sample copies that have been sent out. The orders received each day are consuming, on an average, from thirty to forty thousand copies.
The usual “three days’ grace” has been allowed on all orders for campaign supplies received at this office after Friday, October 15. Orders received after October 18 are entered as “late” orders, and will be filled immediately after those which came in on time. If the label on your package of Missions REVIEW is marked “MRL,” you will know that this was among the late orders. If your label is marked “MR,” your order was received on time.
Remember the “second campaign week” (November 7-12); also the “second missionary rally,” to be held Sabbath, November 13. If for any reason your order for the Missions REVIEW and other supplies does not reach you in time to enable you to join in the first effort during the first campaign week (November 1-6), do not feel anxious concerning the matter, for you can arrange individually, or as a church, if necessary, to devote the second campaign week (November 7-12), or any other week before the close of the year, to this enterprise.
A. J. S. BOURDEAU.
Christ Will Come
CHRIST came to this earth as a helpless infant in a lowly manger. The humble shepherds were the messengers to publish the news of his first advent to the inhabitants of the town where he was born. The Saviour spent his early life offering salvation to a thankless world, which at last turned upon him and crucified him.
The Saviour’s second coming will be “in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” Matt. 24:30. Instead of being humble and unknown, “every eye shall see him.” Rev. 1:7. In place of the “swaddling clothes,” he will be arrayed in royal vesture. Luke 2:7; Rev. 19:16.
He who once came a helpless babe, will ride forth a mighty conqueror, with all power in heaven and earth at his disposal. Matt. 28:18. Instead of a lowly manger for a resting-place, and the beasts of the stall for spectators, the Saviour appears seated upon a white cloud, attended by all the holy angels. Rev. 14:14; Matt. 25:31.
When he comes the second time, he will no longer plead with the wicked to turn from their wickedness; for he comes “to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds.” Jude 15. A golden crown rests upon the head once pierced by the crown of thorns. Rev. 14:14.
At the Saviour’s first advent, a very few people were expecting him; but when he appears the second time, scattered all over the earth there will be individuals anxiously watching for tokens of his coming who will hail his advent with joy; while at his word a countless multitude will spring from their dusty graves to meet him, with a shout of victory upon their lips. Isa. 25:9; 1 Cor. 15:51-57.—Selected.
The Benefits of Good-Nature
HALF the misery of human life might be extinguished would men alleviate the general curse they lie under, by mutual offices of compassion, benevolence, and humanity. There is nothing, therefore, which we ought more to encourage in ourselves and others than that disposition of mind which in our language goes under the title of good-nature, and is more agreeable in conversation than wit, and gives a certain air to the countenance which is more amiable than beauty. It shows virtue in the fairest light, takes off in some measure from the deformity of vice, and makes even folly and impertinence supportable.—Addison.
Blessings on the Man Who Smiles
By George L. Perin
BLESSINGS on the man who smiles! I do not mean the man who smiles for effect, nor the one who smiles when the world smiles. I mean the man whose smile is born of an inner radiance, the man who smiles when the clouds lower, when fortune frowns, when the tides are adverse. Such a man not only makes a new world for himself, but he multiplies himself an hundredfold in the strength and courage of other men. — George L. Perin.
He That Lacks Christ Lacks Everything
By T. L. Cuyler
I OFTEN recall the solemn words uttered by the great John Owen before the British Parliament: “A man may want liberty, and yet be happy, as Joseph was. A man may want children, and yet be happy, as Job was. A man may want money, and yet be full of comfort, as Micah was. A man may want friends, as Paul did in Nero’s judgment-hall, and yet be full of joy. But he that lacks Jesus Christ lacks everything.” He that is not in Christ has no beginning of good and no end of sorrows. He that is not born again had better never have been born at all. It will be the hell of hell to have shut ourselves out of Christ; and it is the beginning of heaven to come humbly and gladly unto Jesus, the invincible stronghold, and to abide in him. When he shall appear, we shall appear with him in glory.—T. L. Cuyler.
