THERE is enough wickedness in every man to make a demon out of him, if Satan can get the job. There is a possibility in every man of making a saint out of him, if he puts himself in the hands of Christ. We are transformed into the image of the one we serve. It is not so much a question what faculties we possess as it is what we are going to make out of them. It is not so much a question where we are as the direction we are traveling.—Central Baptist.
A Kind Word, a Sunny Smile
It was only a sunny smile,
And little it cost in the giving;
But it scattered the night
Like the morning light,
And made the day worth living;
Through life's dull warp a woof it wove
In shining colors of hope and love;
And the angels smiled as they watched
above,
Yet little it cost in the giving.
It was only a kindly word,
A word that was lightly spoken;
Yet not in vain,
For it stilled the pain
Of a heart that was nearly broken.
It strengthened a faith beset by fears,
And groping blindly through mists of
tears
For light to brighten the coming years,
Although it was lightly spoken.
— Epworth Herald.
Confidence and Companionship
HAPPY is the lot of that boy who has found perfect confidence and enjoyable companionship in his mother; and happy indeed is the lot and the prospect of the mother who has brought about that blessed relationship, as the following will illustrate:—
“There’s a tip-top book, Ellis, you can take to read, if you want to. I’ve just read it, and it is a splendid story.”
“Then I should like to read it. I don’t very often get a chance at a new book. But I think books are best of anything, and when I am a man, I mean to have stacks of them. Mother and I read them together, and then we talk over what we have been reading about; so it’s twice as good as if I had read it alone.”
“Is that the way you do?”
“Of course it is. Why shouldn’t I? Mother and I are all the family that is left, and we do everything we can together. I tell you my mother is the best company I ever had. She is just jolly, besides being good as she can be. She goes singing around the house, making a fellow feel rich.”
“Ain’t she old?”
“No; and it wouldn’t make any difference if she was; she’d be my mother all the same.”
“To be sure she would. But if you take this book, you must keep it out of her sight and read it on the sly.”
“Why must I?”
“Because she wouldn’t like it. My mother would make a great fuss if she knew I read such a book.”
“Then what do you read it for? What’s the matter with the book? You said it was splendid.”
“So it is, but your mother wouldn’t think so,”
“Then it ain’t so, for I tell you mother knows. I won’t read anything on the sly. I don’t do business that way. I advise you not to. My mother knows best.”
“If you think so, I don’t suppose it’s of any use to try to make you think differently.”
“No sir, it ain’t.”
You see there was nothing more to say. And this story simply means for you not to do anything on the sly, for be sure your sin will find you out. Don’t read a book or paper your mother would not approve. Don’t look at a picture you would not be willing to show her.
“Evil communications corrupt good manners,” and evil words upon a printed page corrupt both soul and body. Don’t read them.—Round Table.
Is Smoking Injurious?
FROM an article by R. Brudenell Carter, F. R. C. S., in The Grand Magazine, the first section of which is devoted to the poison-producing powers of tobacco and its deleterious effects upon the human system, we take the following paragraphs:—
“But the one great fact concerning disease produced by tobacco is that it is liable to excite a peculiar and quite definite form of inflammation of the optic nerves, which, if the tobacco be not abandoned, leads to blindness. For many years no month passed which did not bring to my consulting room or to my hospital a patient to whom I had to say that he was destroying his sight by tobacco, that he required no treatment but its complete and absolute abandonment, and that if he followed this prescription, he would in all probability get well. Those who had strength of mind abstained and recovered; those whose wills and energies had been sapped by the narcotic continued on their downward path.”
“Such cases are not absolutely numerous, but they are sufficiently so to establish the proposition that tobacco not only ‘soothes,’ or, as I would rather say, ‘stupefies,’ the nervous system generally, but that it also excites destructive changes in certain parts of it. Alterations in the nerves of sight are produced by other drugs as well as by tobacco, and are described generally as ‘toxic,’ but examples from other drugs are rare, and tobacco is responsible for the greater part of the occurring cases.”
“In the return for last year of the patients attended at the great Eye Hospital for the Netherlands, at Utrecht, I find fifteen of these ‘toxic’ cases among 6,823 patients, the great majority of whom were, of course, suffering from maladies of very common occurrence. There were fifty-seven other cases of trouble or wasting of the nerves, and it is probable that a considerable proportion of these were due to the same cause.”
Danger in Kissing Babies
Many Diseases Contracted by Infants Through Osculation
“I NEVER kiss a baby on the mouth. It is criminal,” says a woman physician in one of the women’s hospitals in New York.
“I know of no more injurious thing than the kissing of a baby’s mouth,” she declares, “for from experience I know that many diseases are transmitted to little ones by their parents or others touching their lips.
“A mother should guard her infants just as closely from kisses as from measles or whooping-cough. Though grown persons do not, as a rule, have any of the diseases to which children are susceptible, and so do not give them to the little ones, such as they frequently have are chronic, and for that reason much worse if contracted through the breath by young babies.
“I had one case where a newly born child died as the result of a kiss. It was only a few days old when a nurse caring for the mother kissed it on the lips, and the next day she developed scarlet fever. I took every precaution to prevent the little one from coming down with the same disease, but to no purpose, for it had a most severe attack, and died in less13than a week from the time its lips were kissed.
“I always advise mothers against allowing their little ones to be kissed on the lips, even by their parents and immediate family. A baby’s mouth should not be kissed, I contend, and if this rule were strictly followed, there would be fewer sick infants, for microbes would not then be transmitted to them. I warn against any kind of caress on the face, head, or hands.
“In fact, I believe that young children should be shown all possible tenderness, but not kissed and caressed. They do not understand it, and frequently I have seen them made most uncomfortable by being squeezed close in a mother’s arms and half smothered by kisses on the lips.
“Grown persons do not often realize how hard they are pressing the little body in their arms until the infants cry out in pain, and then they frighten the youngsters by suddenly kissing them all over the face in an effort to show how sorry they are because the little one cried. I wish I could make mothers, fathers, and nurses realize that they can best show their love for a young baby by touching it as little as possible.”
For His Mother’s Sake
The florist’s boy had just swept some broken and withered flowers into the gutter, when a ragged urchin darted across the street. He came upon a rose seemingly in better condition than the rest; but as he tenderly picked it up, the petals fluttered to the ground, leaving only the bare stalk in his hand.
He stood quite still, and his lips quivered perceptibly.
“What’s the matter with you, any way?” the florist’s boy asked.
The ragged little fellow choked and answered:—
“It’s for my mother. She’s sick and can’t eat nothin’, an’ I thought if she’d a flower to smell, it might make her feel better.”
“Just you wait a minute,” said the florist’s boy as he disappeared. When he came out upon the sidewalk, he held in his hand a beautiful half-opened rose. “There,” he said, “take that to your mother.”
He had meant to put that rosebud on his own mother’s grave, and yet he knew that he had done the better thing. He said to himself, “I know this would please her most if she knew.”—Selected.
Is It Worth While, After All?
“BRAIN fever at twelve—and we are left alone.”
“We pushed her, and God knows how we have suffered for our mistake.”
“She was graduated, but she never recovered, and in two years we had no daughter.”
“I thought more of a diploma than I did of my child. Now I have only the diploma.”
“Everything that love and skill could suggest was done. But our eyes were opened too late.”
“‘Promotion! Promotion!’ was our cry. Then our little girl was promoted. But not in the way we hoped.”
“We placed an education above health, and the life of a promising boy of eighteen is the price which we paid for our mistake.”
“It was music and painting added to a tired brain. Now our house is still—a monument to our thoughtlessness.”
“What would not my husband and I give of our means to-day if we could undo the past and bring back our only child! That is the hardest part to bear—the feeling of what we might have done. From the housetops would we cry out to parents to take care!”—Nine American Parents, in the Ladies’ Home Journal.
Talk It Over With Your Wife
THERE are thousands of families homeless, or living in poverty and wretchedness to-day, who could have been living in comfort, in good homes, if the husbands had confided their business affairs to their wives.
Women are very much better judges of human nature than men. They can detect rascality, deception, and insincerity more quickly.
I know business men who would never think of employing a manager or superintendent, or a man for any other important position, or of choosing a partner, without managing in some way to have their wives meet the man and get a chance to estimate him.
I have known of several instances where a wife had cautioned her husband against having anything to do with a man with whom he was thinking of going into business, but the husband ignored the wife’s opinion as silly, and disregarded her advice to his great sorrow later, as the man turned out exactly as the wife had predicted.
If you are in doubt as to whether you can quite afford a certain thing or not, talk it over with your wife. How many men who have made a failure of life wish they had talked their affairs over with their wives!
Many men think that because their wives have never had any experience in business it would be foolish for them to talk business matters over with them. But, no matter how much experience you may have had, no matter what a great brain you may have, you need the swiftness and the accuracy of woman’s instinct to keep you from making foolish investments, from making alliances with bad men, and from foolish things generally.—Success.
Scales for Weighing Young Men
By E. W. Curtis
1. Has he a good character? Is he a Christian? Has he definite purposes for life or for good? Has he good habits? Has he no bad habits?
2. Does he keep good company? Does he shun bad company? Is he a member of the church? Does he attend the services of the church with enjoyment? Does he help in supporting the church? Does he shun the places of vice?
3. Has he made the most of his school privileges, or has he neglected them? Does he enjoy reading and study? Does he choose the best books and papers, or does he prefer those that are immoral and sensational?
4. Has he employment? Is he industrious? Does he know how to make money? Does he save money? Does he give a portion of his income to worthy purposes? Is a portion wasted or expended for unworthy purposes? Has he property? Does he exercise forethought, or is he shortsighted? Is he likely to ever have a home of his own, or will he always be a tenant? Is he likely to help build up the community in which he lives, or will he always be a drawback?
5. Is he kind? Is he cheerful? Is he careful? Is he patient? Is he friendly? Is he frank and unsuspicious? Is he persevering? Is he courageous?
6. Has he good health? Has he a strong body? Is he well balanced? Is he well-endowed with common sense? — E. W. Curtis.
The Book in a Korean Village
THE following incident appears in the report of the annual meeting of the British Bible Society, held in London:—
“Mr. Ritson roused intense interest by exhibiting a copy of St. Matthew's Gospel in Korean, which he had received a fortnight ago with a letter from a missionary in Korea. This missionary wrote from a village near Songdo, where he had gone to receive fourteen Christians into the church. No missionary had ever worked in that village, but seven years ago a native Korean named Pak had bought that identical Gospel at the Songdo depot. He had kept his accounts on the back of the volume; and afterward it lay hidden in dust and dirt for five years, until it was brought out and read and lent round the village. And through the reading of that single copy of the Gospel, fourteen persons had given their hearts to the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Prohibition Tested
Prohibition by constitutional amendment has been in force, more or less, in Kansas for twenty-one years, which is time enough to test its value. The statistics which have been gathered are full of interest. In five of the one hundred and five counties the prohibitory law is not enforced. These five counties have seventeen per cent of the population, and furnish over thirty per cent of the crime. The population in these twenty-one years has increased from 996,616 to 1,470,495, while the number of prisoners has decreased from 917 to 788. That prohibition is generally enforced appears in the fact that the United States collects in Kansas only $7,700 for each 100,000 inhabitants, while in Nebraska, not a prohibition State, it collects $252,000. In the last ten years Kansas has gained three cities of over 10,000 inhabitants, while Nebraska has lost three. Kansas, while not a populous State, is one of the most prosperous in the Union, and can afford to spend $2,000,000 annually on her schools. She saves it in beer and whisky.—Independent.
Being and Doing
MANY persons are possessed with a desire to do or to say, while they forget that what they are is far more important than what they do. Doing is the result of being. God sees what a man is, men see what he does. There are persons who wonder that their words have no power. They need not wonder. When Napoleon was asked which was the best style of rifle, he replied, “It depends a great deal on the man that stands behind it.” The same thing might be said of a sermon, an exhortation, or an admonition. A thought largely derives its importance from the character of him who uttered it. Our first duty is to be what we should be; then comes the obligation to say and to do things which God requires at our hands. Being must go before doing, as thinking precedes saying.—Selected.
The West Indian Training-School
By GEO. F. ENOCH
GEO. F. ENOCH
We are sure that the readers of the REVIEW will be interested in a new educational institution that is being started in the West Indies. The progress of the third angel’s message in this island field forms an interesting chapter in the history of our missions. The workers sent there were firm believers in the circulation of our literature, and the continued, faithful, persistent distribution of the printed page has borne its fruit. At the present time there are more than three thousand baptized believers in these islands.
The School Constituency
In such a mission field as the West Indies, a large industrial school like the one proposed should come as a matter of growth. The investing of a large sum of money in such an enterprise where there is no constituency for a school is unwise. But among the more than three thousand believers in the West Indian Union Conference there are many scores of young men and women who are hungering for an education. With longing eyes they have looked toward our schools in the States, yet but few have been able to reach them. Some have hoped and waited for years, until they have well-nigh given up in despair. Many of them are drifting to-day—where, we do not know. Unless something is done for them quickly, they will be lost to the cause, and may lose their own souls. We can not afford to leave them thus unfitted for the work of God while the needs of this field are so pressing.
In the REVIEW of August 9 the writer reported a trip through Jamaica and Central America, in the interest of that school. At our conference meeting in Trinidad, in June, the action of the Jamaica brethren was ratified. The following petition sent from that conference to the General Conference represents the unanimous voice of the West Indian young people, and is worthy of our consideration:—
“Dear Brethren in Christ, Greeting:—
“We come to you with this petition, knowing your deep interest in the work in the West Indian field.
“From the very beginning the General Conference has liberally maintained the work in this territory. Quite a large number of men have been sent to this field, some of whom have laid down their lives, while others have continued in the work with a greater or less degree of success.
“We have in the territory embraced in the West Indian Union Conference about three thousand Sabbath-keepers. A large per cent of these brethren and sisters are poor in this world’s goods, and have no more than is sufficient to supply their daily needs. However, they love this truth, and as far as their ability goes, are really earnest in supporting and maintaining the cause. Among this constituency of three thousand Sabbath-keepers there is a large number of young people from the age of fourteen to twenty-five, who are in dire need of educational advantages. The public schools in these islands are largely denominational. These schools are not adapted to the training and educating of workers for our cause. In the West Indian Union Conference there is a large number of bright and intellectual youth, who need the advantages of a school where they can be taught the dignity of labor, the economical use of their time and means, as well as the usual literary branches.”
“ABBY PALM,” IN THE YARD OF OUR WEST INDIAN INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL
“We believe that, owing to the depressed financial condition of the West Indies, very few of the youth from this field will ever be able to pay their transportation to the States, or the larger expenditure of maintaining themselves while attending school there, and therefore the majority will never enjoy good school privileges unless a school is provided in this field.
“We assure you that we will use the utmost economy in the handling of the funds, and will endeavor to keep out of debt. The Jamaica Conference has already raised cash and pledges to the amount of fifteen hundred dollars for this enterprise. Other conferences will do all they can to assist, and yet we find ourselves wholly unable to bring this work to a completion, without assistance.
“We shall be grateful to you for all that you do in behalf of this school, and trust that you will be free to give us counsel and advice at any time concerning the same.”
Now, what shall your response be to this petition, my brethren and sisters? The message preached by those who have gone out from among you to labor in the West Indies and Central America has been greatly blessed of God. Many have believed through their word. These turn now to you, saying that the message which you have sent has separated them from the world, and kindled in their hearts the desire for an education and a training for their youth and children, who are dear to them. We can not now turn a deaf ear to the cry that comes from their hearts as a result of the message which we have sent them.
Need of Workers
Within the borders of the West Indian Union Conference there are more than fifteen million people, scattered over thousands of square miles, speaking eight different languages. Swallowed up in this great territory, we have a handful of workers. Their numbers must be increased, for the work will be finished in this generation. Now that the Lord has given us hundreds of bright young men and women right in the territory itself, is it not right that an educational center should be established there, so that an army of workers may be developed on the ground?
We need an educated native minister. Our hundreds of children plead most eloquently for an army of church-school teachers; a great door is opened for the Bible worker; and we must have a multitude of canvassers and colporteurs to lead out in the work of covering the field with our literature. The homes of our people in the field need the uplift that such an educational institution may be in their midst. Not only will our field be benefited by this school, but the Southern States have already drawn on us for workers. Without a training-school, we have seen thirteen of our young men in the West Indies enter the gospel ministry. Five of them have already had sufficient experience to warrant their being set apart by ordination.
But away to the east of us, in the same latitude, lies tropical Africa, with15its millions in heathen darkness. Already the hearts of our young men and women are yearning to carry the gospel message to their brethren in that dark continent. The Young People’s Societies are now saving their donations for the Sudan. Some are preparing to go. Our workers on the Gold Coast are already pleading for the first delegation.
And why should it not be so? England conquered and holds in subjugation her possessions in tropical Africa, by her West India regiment. The Anglicans, Baptists, and Wesleyans have missionary colleges here, where their recruits for tropical Africa are trained for service.
Here in this beautiful “Isle of Springs,” surrounded by the wealth of tropical vegetation, the Lord has led us to a quiet retreat, where our young people may be trained to bear their part with us in the finishing of this work. We feel sure that our brethren everywhere will esteem it a privilege to have a part in establishing this work. Next week we shall describe some of the unique features of this proposed school.
The German Union Conference
By Guy Dail
GUY DAIL
Our sixth annual session was held at Friedensau, near Magdeburg, July 19-29. The more than two hundred and sixty-nine million souls living within the borders of the eight conferences and nine mission fields composing the European, Asiatic, and African territory of this union conference were represented by ninety-four delegates and nine hundred of our own people, occupying the one hundred and thirty tents on the ground, or lodging in the school, the sanitarium, the three dwelling-houses, the two barns, the two workshops, the mill, and the food factory, which constitute the small settlement of Friedensau. Brethren from Germany, German Switzerland, Flemish Belgium, Holland, Austria-Hungary, the Balkans, and Russia were present, as well as visitors from the States, from Africa, from Brazil, and from Palestine. This was the largest and the best meeting the German Union has ever held.
Brother Spicer’s counsel and spiritual assistance were greatly blessed of God. The Lord helped Brother Conradi in his efforts to set before the people, the colporteurs, and the gospel and medical workers the principles of love and self-denial that should characterize our service for the Master. I never saw a more tender spirit manifested in the committee meetings of any field than was to be seen in the sessions of the German Union Committee. The business of the conference, the reports of the laborers concerning their fields, and the statistics rendered by the various union institutions, did not appear as a lifeless, spiritless recitation of dry facts, but the power of God was mercifully granted to his servants as they witnessed to what he had done for them the past year. So far as I was able to learn, there was no discordant note struck during the whole ten days we were together; but true to its name, the union conference was a conference where all were able to work together in unity and harmony and brotherly love. Drs. Leadsworth and Byington, who happened to be on the grounds, expressed their appreciation of the work that God is doing here.
A rich harvest of souls was gathered, forty-one being baptized. Two men were ordained to the gospel ministry—Brother Sprohge, who labors among the Lettonians in Russia, and Brother Hinter, who has nearly mastered the Rumanian language, and is working in Bucharest.
A VIEW IN NUREMBERG, BAVARIA
“Forward, advance,” seemed to be the watchword in all reports, and in laying plans for the future. It was decided to erect an old people’s home at a cost of about fifteen thousand dollars, ten thousand dollars of which is already in hand; the work will go forward at once, and ere the building can be completed, we expect to have the remaining five thousand dollars needed. The maintenance of the home has also been carefully provided for. This building will help still more in the improvement of Friedensau, with the progress of which every one seems pleased. Toward the material fund for the German ‘Ministry of Healing,’ which is to be off the press this fall, two thousand dollars was raised. Our Sabbath-school collection amounted to one hundred and fifty dollars, the First-day offerings to one hundred and thirty-five dollars, and one hundred and fifty-seven dollars was given toward the tent fund. It was voted to organize two new conferences in Germany by the first of next year. We selected an additional missionary to join the six laborers in the German East African Mission the beginning of next September; we plan to secure further help for Asiatic Russia; so great is the dearth for workers that each of the twelve young people who had completed their training at Friedensau was needed in three or four places. The Friedensau School showed a good year, with a gain of about twenty-five hundred dollars. Fifty new students were accepted for admission the coming year. The school must soon be somewhat enlarged. The sanitarium has had by far its best year; it, too, needs additional room. The Hamburg House is also outgrowing its quarters. It gained about eleven thousand dollars last year, and printed 35,499,248 pages of literature in thirteen languages; besides that, it put out 1,131,115 periodicals in the German, Hollandish, Hungarian, and Russian languages; the first number of the new Bohemian paper appeared during the meeting. Sister White’s new book, “Education,” has recently appeared in German, and it found great favor with the people; they also took a deep interest in the plans formulated to clear out the remaining forty-five hundred copies of German “Christ’s Object Lessons.”
There was a marked change in some of the field reports, if compared with former years. Most noticeable in this respect were the cheering words spoken by our brethren from Russia, showing how wonderfully God has at last heard the prayers of his children, and granted religious liberty to the one hundred and thirty million living in that mighty empire. For three days the decree carrying the glad news of liberty of conscience was duplicated and scattered, and read from police headquarters and from pulpits. Universal joy was caused by the act of the czar, April 30, 1905, and he is looked upon as having conferred a greater boon upon the Russians than was granted by the beloved Alexander II, in freeing the serfs. In God’s hands, this decree has been of great benefit to our people.
In Bavaria, Germany, we are still troubled some, as we are not recognized or tolerated. We have again filed a new petition for recognition, and we hope this time it may be successful. However, the work continues to grow, in spite of the difficulties. Many of the particulars reported at the meeting will appear in later issues of the REVIEW, as they have been written out for publication.
Practically the same officers were16chosen as for the previous year. Credentials and licenses were granted to fifteen ministers, eleven licentiates, twenty-three Bible workers, three ship missionaries, five missionaries, two missionary teachers, and two missionary nurses, who are employed in the German Union mission fields.
The special children’s meetings, and workers’ meetings, and meetings with the canvassers and with the candidates for baptism, together with the business sessions and the devotional services and sermons, kept the people busy from six in the morning until half-past nine at night.
With the exception of quite a severe storm the first day, the weather in general was fair, and it was the universal testimony of all who I heard comment in any way upon the meeting, that God had been with us in a special manner, and we could return to our homes and to our work with a better preparation for the severe conflicts before us than ever before. May God grant us his continual blessing, and give us fruits for our labors.
