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Signs of the Times, Vol. 7, No. 29.

General Articles. (I)
Earlier text: OUR POSITION AND WORK

AN OLD PILGRIM'S TESTIMONY.

An aged brother in Canada, writing to express his thanks for the Signs, and for the truth it contains, says:—
“My father belonged to the Irish Episcopal church; he believed in the millennial reign of Jesus. He died in 1822. I was then in my eleventh year. He said, though he would not live till Jesus would come, he believed some of his children would. I am yet in hope to see him come, though in my seventieth year. I was converted before I was twenty. I bless God that I find the Saviour still precious; and I bless his dear name that he gives me strength to keep all the commandments. I have trials and temptations, but, praise the Lord, he enables me to ‘hold the fort.’”

Temperance.

By A. H. Lewis

TOBACCO AND SCHOLARSHIP.

The New York Tribune (daily), for May 4, 1880, is responsible for the following significant statement:—
"The anti-tobacco reformers may find encouragement to continue their crusade against the weed, in some statistics lately published concerning smoking at Yale. Each class is graded in divisions according to scholarship, the best scholars being in the first, and so on down to the fourth, where they are, in the slang of the campus, 'not too good' scholars, but 'just good enough' to keep hanging by the eyelids. In the Junior Class it was found that only 10 out of 40 in the first division were addicted to smoking; 18 out of 37 in the second; 20 out of 27 in the third; and 22 out of 26 in the fourth. The proportion of smokers, it will be observed, increases in regular ratio with the falling off in scholarship. The obvious inference is that fumigation does not promote education."
Parents, teachers, students, and all candid men who are tobacco users will do well to respect such facts. It is easy to turn away from them with a sneer, or to read them with indifference; but neither sneers nor indifference will change or avert the facts. When similar facts have been quoted as being shown by similar experiments in the schools of Europe, many men have affected to disbelieve them. "They were too far away to be true."
The above is too near home to be denied, and too important to be disregarded. That such facts are generally disregarded by those who are the victims of tobacco intoxication, is clear proof of the benumbing and blinding influence which the poison exerts on the mental faculties. It is equally well attested that the habit blunts the moral sense in a similar way. Alcohol, tobacco, and opium all hold their victims by inducing the delusion that they are harmless, or at least are necessary, and by blunting and benumbing the conscience that otherwise would rise up against them. In the opium habit, untruthfulness is a prominent symptom; in alcoholism, the characteristic symptom is an unreliable excitability; in tobacco, a quiet, but growing indifference.
These delusions render the work of reform doubly difficult. Being unconscious of the injury which he is constantly receiving, or only partly conscious, the tobacco-user is likely to consider the one who urges the reform either as a personal enemy, whose words are to be resented, or as a mistaken fanatic, whose warnings are to be disregarded, while he is pitied. The writer is not speaking wholly from theory. He remembers well when those who urged that he was doing a sinful thing in being constantly intoxicated with tobacco were deemed to be visionary and hyper-religious. It took some months for the oft repeated truth to reach his smoke-befogged conscience, and awake it to a just conception of the case. It seemed preposterous that anything which gave so much fancied comfort could be sinful.
There are thousands of men who are on the same ground of hesitation and debate. They are weary of their slavery; ashamed of the habit as indecent, they wince under the expensiveness of a habit so much worse than useless, and yet continue the indulgence, dallying with the temptation, and growing weaker each day. The evidence that the better judgment of men condemns the practice, is seen also in the fact that users generally advise boys and the uninitiated not to form the habit. "I wish I had never used it," is the common expression of the smoker, as he lights his cigar for a new indulgence, and of the chewer who empties his much-abused mouth, that he may testify against himself. That many use it, does not lessen the wrong; it rather widens the evil. A father may say every day, "I wish I could stop; I know I ought to," but this does not keep the poison from his blood and brain, nor prevent him from passing both the appetite and its deleterious effects down to his child by the law of transmission. Wishing for freedom does not bring it, and hoping does not manufacture moral stamina and backbone.
Meanwhile, facts are accumulating which will not be set aside. Germany forbids her boys under sixteen to smoke, under penalty, because it unfits them for military service. Paralysis, cancers, and sudden death bear testimony to the increase of the evil. We hope that there is some gain in the matter of reform, but the boys of to-day are sowing the seed of thorns, which will bring measureless evil to the coming generation. It is sad to know that we must wait in dumb endurance the growth and gathering of such harvests of mental and moral evil, when the grace of God and the clear grit of manhood doing what almost all acknowledge ought to be, would soon give freedom.—A. H. Lewis, in Sabbath Recorder.

CAL. STATE QUARTERLY MEETING.

By M. C. Israel

The State quarterly meeting was not held, as it was at a time when the directors of the districts could not well be present, and the sickness of the Secretary made it impossible for her to attend to the business necessary to be done. The report for the last quarter does not show as great an amount of work done as that of the previous one. We find by looking over the mailing list of the Signs that the number taken in clubs has increased nearly three hundred during the last quarter, but the number of periodicals distributed as reported does not show a corresponding gain.
We think there is a failure on the part of the members of the Society to report the labor performed. The number of the Signs taken in clubs would be, for a quarter, 17,186 papers, saying nothing of the clubs of the German paper taken, and other papers of foreign languages, besides the Signs, Review, Instructor, and Good Health taken by single subscriptions, many of which are used for missionary purposes.
From the periodicals taken, at least 20,000 must have been distributed during the last quarter, besides the number in the report of ship work. There is a falling off by the report, of 25,000 pages of reading matter distributed, and considerable in donations to the tract fund. Only about one-half the members of the Society have reported.
We regret very much that we cannot have a report from every member, of some labor performed in a cause that is of so much importance as that in which we profess to believe. If we continue to do as we have done shall we hear the "Well done, good and faithful servant," from the lips of the Master when he comes to reward the faithful? We are all members of a society organized for the purpose of extending the last message of warning and mercy to the world. Our names being on the list of membership will not alone answer. The record of what we have sacrificed and the labor performed will be the only evidence of our faith in, and love for, the cause of present truth, that will appear in the books from which we are to be judged. Shall we not then be active members from this time forward? Let each one get a Member's Pass Book of the librarian, in which to keep an account of labor performed; then look over the list on the missionary report blank and you will find under the headings something that you can do to fill it out; and then go to work, and with the blessing of God, our next report will be larger than that of any previous quarter, and we shall be blessed in trying to do our duty, and the cause of God will be advanced by souls being brought to the knowledge of his truth.
M. C. ISRAEL, Vice Pres. T. and M. Society.

CALIFORNIA T. AND M. SOCIETY REPORT

FOR THE QUARTER ENDING JUNE 30, 1881.

UPPER COLUMBIA T. AND M. SOCIETY.

REPORT FOR QUARTER ENDING JUNE 30, 1881.

REPORT OF THE T. AND M. SOCIETY AT ST. CLAIR, NEVADA.

Number of members, 14; number of reports received, 12; letters written, 3; Signs taken in clubs, 10; new subscribers obtained for Signs, 7; subscribers for Review, 1; pages tracts and pamphlets distributed, 1,152; periodicals distributed, 558; cash received on periodicals, $12.60.
WILLIAM HARMON, Director.
J. W. ALLEN, Secretary.

WHO ARE SLAIN?

CANON FARRAR tells of four hundred miners who were killed by an explosion of fire-damp, caused by a smoker, who opened his safety lamp to light his pipe. To that pipe, he says, were sacrificed these precious lives. All England, he adds, is full of the fire-damp of intemperance, perilous and pestilential. The only safety is total abstinence. On the night of September 19, 1806, in the hospital ward of a London work-house, might have been seen the helpless, speechless form of a man who had been picked up in the street. As this dying man was unknown, an advertisement was inserted in the morning paper, stating that he was a tall gentleman, about forty-five years of age, in blue coat and dark pants, with a gold watch in his pocket, a note-book written chiefly in Greek and Latin, and an algebraic calculation. He was soon identified as Prof. Porson, regarded by the universities as the finest classical scholar of the age. He was taken to his home and died in the prime of life, another victim of intoxicating drink. "Yea, many strong men have been slain by her!" Yet the witty poet, Dr. Holmes, has said it is "the drunkard's shallow skull" rather than the silver cup which is to be feared. But the men of largest brain and noblest culture have sunk to the lowest level by first looking at the wine when red, touching and tasting till self-control is lost. A single county in Texas in one year spends $3,000 for the support of the Gospel, $100,000 for tobacco, and $300,000 for whisky.—Sel.

Liquor’s Deadly Consequences

A YOUNG man named Charles Van Iderstein received word and money from his mother, in New Jersey, to come home, and accordingly made arrangements to start Monday morning. Last night he and four others hired a buggy for a ride. They were intoxicated, and the horses became unmanageable and started to run away. Van Iderstein's foot caught in the step and the horses dragged him about four blocks, and then ran into the stable, the young man's head striking the doorpost with such force as to fracture his skull. He died in a few hours, and his body will be sent to his mother Monday morning.
What comment can add force to the above? If liquor hurts only those who drink it, what is it hurts that disconsolate mother when she receives a corpse instead of a son?—Golden Censer.

Tobacco and Academic Achievement

"Within half a century," says Dr. Dio Lewis, "no young man addicted to the use of tobacco has graduated at the head of his class in Hartford College, though five out of six of the students have used it. The chances, you see, were five in six that a smoker would graduate at the head of his class, if tobacco does no harm. But during half of a century not one victim of tobacco was able to come out ahead."

THE PIECE THAT WAS LOST.

By Emily Huntington Miller

THERE was promise of a capital hay-day; so Silas Rogers decided as he stood in the back porch after milking, polishing his face with a coarse towel and noting the weather signs between the rubs. A capital hay-day; but a "spell of weather" might be expected soon; for did not the almanac say "About this time look out for storms?" So all hands were warned to be in readiness to mow the lower intervale in the morning and lose no time in getting it at, for the intervale was swampy after a rain.
The chores were done, the supper eaten; Silas, with his chair tilted against the wall, was sleeping the sleep of the just, while his good wife pattered about the kitchen setting her sponge, beating up some "riz griddle cakes" for breakfast, grinding the coffee, and, in a dozen provident ways, squeezing out of the tired day a little help for the morrow. Reuben went to the store for a new scythe snath; Abner, the hired man, hung over the barn-yard gate with his beloved pipe that tried the house-wife's soul, and pretty Mistress Hetty wrinkled her forehead and pricked her fingers over the new dress she was trying to make in the few leisure minutes snatched from house-work. She made a charming picture in the frame of the vine-wreathed window, her sleeves still rolled up above her plump elbows, the bright hair drawn back from her rosy face which was turned full to the lamp as she threaded her needle, or paused to flirt some poor deluded moth away from the dangerous flame that fascinated him. A charming picture, but no one to look at it; for the great Norway pine held up a screen of solid blackness between the window and the road, even if any belated traveler had chanced to pass that way, and only Hetty's white cat crept stealthily along the top of the garden-fence with murderous designs upon an untimely brood of chipping birds in the current bushes. Only this—ah, beware, Mistress Hetty! evil eyes are looking at you; eyes from which even a heathen mother would cover your face with her hands, and breathe a prayer to break the unholy spell they might cast upon you—a woman's eyes peering from the thick jungle of lilacs and syringas so near it seems as if Hetty must feel them. But Hetty feels nothing, sees nothing, but the troublesome dress; and as the perplexing ruffles are conquered one by one her heart grows light, the little frown smoothes away, and Hetty begins to sing. What a sweet voice she has! It reaches the tired mother's ear, and lightens her heart too. It wakens her father, and then lulls him pleasantly to sleep again. Now Abner hears it and draws his hickory shirt-sleeve across his eyes; and that watcher in the green tangle—who can guess what she thinks or feels as she sinks down with her chin upon her hands, and her face quite in the dark, and listened to the pathetic story of "The Ninety and Nine?" Hetty herself is not half conscious of the pathos with which she bewails the lost one, "Away on the mountains bleak and bare, Away from the tender Shepherd's care," and goes on through the tender story to the final rejoicing when the Shepherd brings back his own. She is still humming it fitfully over and over when her mother opens the door of the keeping-room and bids her go to bed, and not ruin her eyes with sewing by lamp-light.
"Just a minute," says Hetty, "as soon as I finish this sleeve." And the minutes glide on and on, the sleeve is finished, held up and admired, and Mistress Hetty takes off her shoes and slips softly up-stairs to bed. She does not even close the window. What should come into the house unbidden, save the cat and the cool night-air? Everything is silent. The mother bird broods her little ones securely, unconscious of the cruel eyes near by, until Reuben comes whistling along the road, and, boy-like, stops to shy a stone at the tempting white mark on the garden fence; the prowler leaps away with long bounds over the wet grass, and a tragedy is averted with nothing to show for it but dirty tracks upon the piece of "factory" spread out to bleach. By and by there is a little stir in the lilac jungle; a woman comes cautiously out of her hiding, and steals away to the barn. The cows are lying here and there under the long shed, sleeping, perhaps, in a cow's uneasy fashion, but with a certain air of motherliness and content about them. They do not even wonder at the late comer as she threads her way among them, enters the barn, mounts the scaffold already filled with the sweet, new hay, and is soon asleep, hearing now and then a broken twitter from the restless swallows under the eaves, or perchance a faint, sweet voice singing, with lingering pity in its tone, "Sick, and wounded, and ready to die."
Who can tell when the summer day begins? One instant a dusky silence, cool, moist, and fragrant, hanging over the hills, the next a burst of song from some tree-top, caught up from a hundred green coverts, swelled and repeated and prolonged in a mad chorus that presently settles again into silence. Then the slow stir of life awakening, the bustle among the poultry, the lowing of some impatient cow, or the steady sound of her companions nipping the short juicy grass, the unwilling creak of a rheumatic pump-handle, and here and there the dull thud of an improvident ax preparing the kindlings for the kitchen fire.
The day was well under way in Silas Roger's household before the majority of his neighbors had reached this point. The cows were milked and turned into the green lane to make their own way to the pasture, the steady "c-r-r-r-r" of the grindstone and the sharp ring of steel told that the moments before breakfast were being made the most of, and even at the table there were few words spoken, and no useless lingering. But after breakfast Silas Rogers took down the leather-covered Bible that had been his old mother's daily companion for eighty years, and all the family sat reverently down to worship. The golden moments might speed as they would, but no day in that household began without its portion from the Bible. It might have been a lingering recollection of Hetty's song, it might have been one of those celestial providences which we call chance, which lead him to read from the gospels the story of the wandering sheep and the lost piece of silver. It is doubtful if any of them were very deeply touched by it. It was a familiar story to the good wife, and she could not keep her thoughts from straying anxiously to the loaves rising perilously in the pans, while Hetty glanced at the clock and secretly hoped her father had not chanced upon a longer chapter. The reading came abruptly to an end with the heavenly rejoicing over one sinner that repenteth, and with an earnest though homely prayer the service was ended. Abner and Reuben almost stumbled over a woman sitting absorbed in the doorway. Silas looked at her but did not stay to question, and when they were gone she rose and said abruptly, "Will you give me some breakfast?"
Mrs. Rogers looked at her. She saw a tall and not uncomely woman of about thirty, with something indefinably evil about her face. The hard mouth, the bold, defiant eyes repelled her, yet seemed at any instant they might break into scornful tears.
"Who are you?" asked the good wife, coming nearer with her pan of bread in her hand. Again the face lightened and darkened, grew hard then yielding, with the sudden declaration:— "I am the piece that was lost."
Martha Rogers had not a particle of poetry in her nature, but she had the most profound reverence for the Scripture, therefore the words both startled and shocked her. But she was not a woman to refuse bread to the hungry, so she placed food upon the table and motioned the woman to a chair, with a brief, "Set up and eat."
All the time the woman was eating, and she did not hasten, her eyes followed the mistress and Hetty, until Martha Rogers grew nervous and sent Hetty to "red up the chambers."
As soon as she was gone the woman turned abruptly from her breakfast.
"Will you give me work to do?" she demanded rather than asked.
"Who are you?" asked Mrs. Rogers again, simply to gain time.
"I thought you knew. I am Moll Pritchett; they have turned me out of my house; burned it over my head," and the eyes grew lurid with evil.
"What can you do?" asked Mrs. Rogers feebly.
"Anything that a woman can do, or a man. I can work in the field with the best of them; I have done it many a time; but I should like to do what—to be like other women."
"Are you a good woman?"
The question came straight and strong, without any faltering. She had heard of this Moll Pritchett, a woman who lived alone in an old tumble-down hut below the saw-mill, and won a meager living by weaving rag-carpets, picking berries for sale, and it was suspected in less reputable ways; but Martha Rogers took no stock in idle rumors. If she had not divine compassion she had something very like divine justice, which is altogether a sweeter thing in its remembering of our frame than the tender mercies of the wicked.
The woman looked at her curiously. At first with a mocking smile, then with a sullen, and at last with a defiant expression.
"Is it likely?" she said fiercely. "A good woman! How should I be a good woman? I tell you I 'the piece that was lost,' and nobody ever looked for me. If I was a good woman do you suppose I should be here I—only twenty-eight years old, well and hearty, and every door in the world shut in my face? I tell you the man that wrote that story didn't know women; they don't hunt for the piece that's lost; they just let it go. There's enough on 'em that don't get lost."
Poor Martha Rogers was sorely perplexed, all the more that her way had lain so smooth and plain before her that she might have walked in it blindfolded. If this was a lost piece of silver it was not she who lost it; but what if it were the Master's, precious to his heart, and a careless hand had dropped it, and left it to lie in the dust? And what if he bade her seek it, and find it, for him? Should she dare refuse? On this very day, when she needed so sorely the help which she had looked for in vain, had not this woman been sent to her very door, and was it not a plain leading of Providence? It is a blessed thing for us that we are usually driven to act first and theorize afterward, even though the after-thought sometimes brings repentance. The bread was ready for the oven and the wood-box was empty.
"You may fetch in some wood," said Martha Rogers, and the woman promptly obeyed, filling the box with one load of her sinewy arms, and then stood dumbly waiting. Hetty came into the kitchen and began to clear the table, but her mother took the dishes from her hands.
"Go up stairs and fetch a big apron and one of your sweeping caps, and then you may get at your sewing and see if you can finish up your dress."
Away went Hetty, her light heart bounding with the unexpected release, and her mother turned again to the woman, furnishing her with a coarse towel and sent her to the wash-house for a thorough purification. Half an hour afterwards, with her hair hidden in the muslin cap, her whole figure enveloped in the clean calico apron, a comely woman was silently engaged in household tasks, doing her work with such rapid skill that the critical house-wife drew a sigh of relief.
"There's a han'ful of towels and coarse clothes left from the ironing; you might put the irons on, Mary, and smooth 'em out."
The woman turned a startled face upon her, and then went quickly for the clothes, but something—was it a tear?—rolled down the swarthy cheek, and mingled with the bright drops she sprinkled over them. When had she ever been called Mary? When had she heard any name but Moll? Not since away among New Hampshire hills a pale woman had laid her hand upon the tangled curls of her little daughter, and prayed that from the strange world to which she was speeding, she might be allowed to watch over these wayward feet lest they should go astray. Had she watched? Did she know? Moll hoped not; it made her shudder to think of it. What would Heaven be worth if she could see and know? and yet, what did she hear about joy in Heaven over one sinner that repented? If there was joy it must be that they knew; or perhaps only good news was carried there.
That night Hetty sang again at her sewing by the lamp, and from the attic window, far above her head, the wanderer leaned out in the dark to listen. The little chamber was bare of ornament; there was not a picture on the cleanly white-washed walls, and the straight curtain was for decency, not drapery; but it seemed to this lost one a very chamber of peace. The great Norway pine almost brushed her cheek with its resinous plumes, balmy with the moist night air; and a bird, hidden somewhere among its branches, sent out a startled, half-awake cry, and then dropped off to sleep again. There was a pale young moon low in the western sky, with black clouds scudding across it, and the dull, steady sound of the river, pouring over the great dam in the valley, seemed to come nearer and nearer, like the tramp of feet. Martha Rogers went out to the milk-room and stood for a moment in the door, shading the flickering candle in her hand. She was only taking a house-wifely observation upon the gathering storm, but it seemed to the wanderer that she might well be the women who had lighted a candle to search for the lost piece of silver, and with a dim comprehension of love on earth and joy in Heaven, she tried to pray, and fell asleep.
Silas Rogers listened to the day's story as he sat mending a bit of harness with clumsy fingers. He may be forgiven if his thoughts sometimes wandered to the hay so fortunately secured from the storm, or ran over the grist to be sent to the mill in the morning if it proved a wet day, or speculated curiously on the superhuman knowledge of almanac men; but, on the whole, he was tolerably attentive, and certainly grasped the idea that his wife had secured a valuable and much needed helper.
"It seems a risk to run," said Martha, anxiously; "and I don't know but it's presumptuous; there's Hetty, and there's Reuben—"
"And there's the Lord," said Silas, stopping to open his knife.
"Yes," said Martha, with a little start, "and I can't quite get rid of what she said about the piece that was lost; though, to be sure, the woman that lost it ought to hunt it."
"She never does; folks are always losing things for somebody else to find; 'tain't many of 'em can say, 'those that thou hast given me have I kept,' right straight along."
"But if you lose your own piece looking after other folks's—"
Silas cut off his waxed end and gave the harness an experimental pull before he answered.
"Well, there's risks, as you say, but I'd rather take a risk for the Lord than agin him."
Martha Rogers took the risk for the Lord, and he abundantly justified and rewarded her faith. For the piece that becomes my piece to the heart that finds it and lays it again in the Master's hand; and locking the story of the wanderer in her own breast it was only to the angels that she said, "Rejoice with me."
And when, years afterward, the woman herself said, before the committee of the church, "I am a woman over whom there is great joy in Heaven," there were not wanting those who thought she was presumptuously claiming to be a saint.—Emily Huntington Miller, in Christian Union.

The Home Circle.

DECREED.

Into all lives some rain must fall, Into all eyes some teardrops start, Whether they fall as a gentle shower, Or fall like fire from an aching heart. Into all hearts some sorrow must creep, Into all souls some doubting come, Lashing the waves of life's great deep From the dimpling water to seething foam.
Over all paths some clouds must lower, Under all feet some sharp thorns spring, Tearing the flesh to bitter wounds, Or entering the heart with their bitter sting. Upon all sorrows rough winds must blow, Over all shoulders a cross be lain, Bowing the form in its lofty height Down to the dust in its cruel pain.
Into all hands some duty thrust, Unto all arms some burdens given, Crushing the heart with its dreary weight, Or lifting the soul from earth to heaven. Into all hearts and homes and lives, God's dear sunlight comes streaming down, Gilding the ruins of life's great plain, Weaving for all a golden crown.

ITEMS OF NEWS.

  • Fresh outrages against the Jews in Prussia and Austria are reported.
  • Lieutenant Schwatka, the distinguished Arctic explorer is a teetotaler.
  • Justice Clifford, of the U. S. Supreme Court, died at Cornish, Maine, July 25.
  • From some unknown cause the fish in Donner Lake are dying in great numbers.
  • Hon. John J. Bagley, ex-Governor of Michigan, died in San Francisco, July 27.
  • The President's recovery is now considered by his physicians as absolutely certain.
  • The Governor of Arkansas has placed Perry county under martial law, because of desperadoes.
  • A mother and six children living near Lacrosse, Wis., were carried away by the flood in a recent storm.
  • The Japanese Colony in Paris are about to have a pagoda built in which to perform their devotions.
  • Sixty-three persons in eleven fishing boats from the Shetland Islands, perished in a gale, recently.
  • The emigration returns from Bremen, show that 77,303 persons left there for America, in the first half of 1881.
  • Prof. Eastman of the naval observatory, Washington, D. C., discovered another comet on the morning of July 25.
  • A lighted cigar stump thrown into a wheat field near Petaluma, Cal., recently, caused the loss of fifty acres of wheat.
  • The cotton crop for 1880 was fourteen and a half million acres, which yielded five million seven hundred thousand bales of cotton.
  • A chair of diplomacy has been established in Michigan University. Instruction in political economy and international law will be given by President Angell.
  • Bishop E. O. Haven, of the M. E. church has had a serious relapse, and is now lying dangerously ill at Salem, Oregon. His physicians think his recovery doubtful.
  • July 30, an explosion occurred in a distillery in Peoria, Ill., scalding sixty men, ten of them fatally. Unlike Samson, the number killed at the close of its existence was less than at any other time.
  • Midhat Pasha and the others convicted of the murder of the late Sultan, except the two actual assassins and Izzet Pasha and Slyd Pasha, who were implicated in the crime have been exiled for life to El Hedjaz in Arabia.
  • A New Orleans dispatch says that the steamer Cornie Brandon, loaded with railroad iron and supplies for the Northern Pacific Railway, sunk on Monday evening, July 25, near Cotton Point, and will, it is thought, prove a total loss.
  • The Deseret News, the Mormon paper at Salt Lake City, states that the praying circle of the Mormon church is praying unceasingly for the death of President Garfield. And this because in his inaugural-address the President condemned their vicious practices.
  • The Ameer of Afghanistan has been completely defeated by the forces under Ayoob Khan. The telegraph says the defeat of the Ameer of Afghanistan implies the complete overthrow of the only remaining representative of British influence in Afghanistan.
  • The German Government quite recently informed the Russian Government, that another plot to assassinate the Emperor was known to be on foot among the officers of the household, and reminded Russia that Germany had vainly given a similar warning just before the explosion in the winter palace.
  • A dispatch from Tucson, Arizona, July 26, says;— "A flood occurred here this morning, doing many thousands of dollars' worth of damage. Several houses were washed away. The mud roofs peculiar to this town, let the water through like sieves. Several wash-outs on the railroad are reported, and the trains necessarily are considerably delayed." At Tombstone all the mill-dams in the San Pedro river were carried away. Many miles of the Southern Pacific railroad have been washed out.
  • Lord Granville has stated to the French ambassador, that in view of the unquestioned incorporation of Tripoli in the Turkish Empire as well as its proximity to Egypt, the English Government could not regard any interference with it on the part of France in the same manner as they viewed the occurrence in Tunis. In return, the French foreign minister stated that France regarded Tripoli as an indisputable part of the Ottoman Empire and had no intention whatever of invading it.
  • Now that France has captured her treasure in Africa, the trouble is to hold it. A telegram from Tunis says that the Arabs can be seen within four miles of Tunis. Great alarm continues and many shops are closed. Crowds of fugitives are coming in from the direction where the Arabs have been seen. At Sfax the French are only masters of the ground they stand on. It is unsafe to venture outside of the gates. The French commander in Algeria sent a confidential report to Paris that a serious insurrection might be expected to break out in September.
  • The Cardinal and Arch-bishop of Toledo and Primate of Spain, in his letter, read in every church of his diocese, has most violently attacked the Italian people and Government, including all the Catholics—even princes, statesmen, politicians, and journalists—urging them to combine, and if necessary, use force of arms to restore the independence and temporal power of the Pope in Italy. The Italian Minister at Madrid immediately protested, and the Spanish Cabinet declared that it severely blamed the Primate’s language, and would cause a strong remonstrance to be made to him.
  • On a recent Sunday, at the church of the Immaculate Conception, in Oakland, Rev. Father King gave notice to his parishioners that he would deny absolution and admission to the Sunday-school to all the children of his parish who attended the public schools instead of the Roman Catholic school recently built upon the corner of Grove and Seventh streets. The announcement has caused a considerable stir among the Catholics of Oakland, all of whom are sending their children to public schools. Father King says in explanation, that he is simply acting in accordance with the Pope's encyclical letter.

RELIGIOUS PUBLICATIONS,

By Editor

Published and for sale at this Office, and by "Review and Herald," Battle Creek, Mich.
History of the Sabbath and First Day of the Week the period of 6,000 years. By Eld. J. N. Andrews. 528 pp. $1.00
The Sanctuary and the 2300 Days of Dan. 8:14. By Elder U. Smith. This work explains the past Advent movement, and makes plain the present position of those who wait for the Lord. 352 pp. $1.00
Thoughts on Daniel, critical and practical. By Elder U. Smith. An exposition of the book of Daniel, verse by verse. 384 pp. $1.00
Thoughts on Revelation. By Elder U. Smith. This work presents every verse in the book of Revelation with such remarks as serve to illustrate or explain the meaning of the text. 352 pp. $1.00
Life of Wm. Miller, with portrait. This work gives interesting sketches of the Christian life and public labors of this pioneer in the Advent movement in this country. 416 pp. $1.00
Life of Elder Joseph Bates, relating his experience of twenty-five years on ship-board, with incidents of his rise from cabin-boy up to master and owner. The closing chapters relate to his labors in the ministry and in the cause of temperance and other moral reforms. Fine tint paper, 352 pp. $1.00
Life Sketches of Elder James and Mrs. E. G. White. The early lives and Christian experiences of both are given in this volume. Their subsequent history is so connected with the cause, that this book gives an outline of the rise and progress of our people and our cause. $1.00 With fine steel portraits of both. $1.25
Thrilling Incidents in the political Life of Francesco Urgos, while a soldier with Garibaldi, including his perilous escape from the tyrants of Rome, and his subsequent travels in Africa and Syria. 328 pp. $1.00
The Biblical Institute. This work contains a synopsis of the lectures given at the Battle Creek College by Elder U. Smith, and at Biblical Institutes. 352 pp. $1.00
The Nature and Destiny of Man. By Elder U. Smith. This work treats on the great questions of the condition of man in death, and his destiny beyond the resurrection. 356 pp. $1.00
The Spirit of Prophecy: or, the Great Controversy between Christ and his angels, and Satan and his angels, in four volumes. By Mrs. E. G. White. These volumes cover the time from the fall of Satan to the destruction of sin and sinners at the close of the one thousand years of Rev. 20. Each, 400 pp. $1.00 Vol. I. Old Testament Facts to Christ. $1.00 Vol. II. Life and Ministry of Christ. $1.00 Vol. III. The Death, Resurrection and Ascension of Christ, with the Lives of his Apostles. $1.00 Vol. IV. (In preparation.) $1.00
The Constitutional Amendment: A discussion between Elder W. H. Littlejohn and the editor of the Christian Statesman, on the Sabbath. 384 pp. $1.00
Spiritual Songs. A book of hymns and tunes. 537 hymns, 147 tunes, 416 pp. $1.00 Morocco, gilt. $1.50
The Song Anchor. A proper collection of songs for the Sabbath-school and praise service. 164 pp. 35 cts. Bound in muslin. 50 cts.
The Bible from Heaven. By Elder D. M. Canright. An argument to show that the Bible is not the work of men, but is in deed and in truth the work of God. 300 pp. 80 cts.
The Soul and the Resurrection, showing the Harmony of Science and the Bible on the Nature of the Soul and the Doctrine of the Resurrection. By J. H. Kellogg, M. D. 75 cts.
The United States in the Light of Prophecy: or, an exposition of Rev. 13:11-17 By Elder U. Smith. Dealing with our own land and applying to our time. Of surpassing interest to every American reader. 200 pp. 40 cts.
Thoughts on Baptism. By Elder J. H. Waggoner. The subject viewed in the light of the Bible and History. 186 pp. Bound in flexible cloth. 35 cts. Paper covers. 25 cts.
A Word for the Sabbath; or false theories exposed. A poem, by Elder U. Smith. 60 pp. 30 cts. Glazed paper covers. 15 cts.
Bible Lessons for Little Ones, No. 2. Flexible cloth. 15 cts.
Bound Volumes of Review and Herald. Each $3.00.
The Youth's Instructor for 1879. Firmly bound. $1.00.
Bible Lessons for Little Ones. A Sabbath-school book designed for the use of beginners, and prepared with special regard for the wants of very young children. In flexible cloth, 84 pp. 15 cts. In paper covers, 84 pp. 10 cts.
Gems of Song. A vest-pocket song book containing hymns only. A choice collection. 96 pp., 119 hymns, bound in flexible cloth. 15 cts. In paper covers. 10 cts.

TEMPERANCE TRACTS.

By Editor

TEN CENTS will secure a select package of stirring Temperance Tracts, containing one hundred pages of facts, figures and pointed arguments against intemperance in all its forms. The following constitute the package:—
Alcohol, What is it?—True Temperance.—Tobacco-Poisoning.—Tobacco-Using a Cause of Disease.—Tobacco-Using a Relic of Barbarism.—Evil Effects of Tea and Coffee.—Ten Arguments for Tea and Coffee Answered.—The Cause and Cure of Intemperance.—The Drunkard's Arguments Answered.—Alcoholic Medication.—Principles of Health Reform.

TWENTY-FIVE CENT PACKAGE.

A larger package, costing 25 cents, contains 248 pages in eighteen tracts. In addition to the above eleven, it has the following Health and Temperance Tracts, which are larger:—
Wine and the Bible.—Alcoholic Poison.—Moral and Social Effects of Alcohol.—Pork; the Dangers of its Use.—Tea and Coffee.—Healthful Clothing.—Dyspepsia.

ONE DOLLAR PACKAGE.—HEALTH BOOKS.

In addition to the above, we will send the following valuable Health Books for one dollar:—
Diphtheria (new edition illustrated), price 30 cents.—Healthful Cookery, 25 cents.—Proper Diet for Man, 15 cents.
Address, PACIFIC PRESS, Oakland, Cal.
Continue reading: STATE OF THE CAUSE