The Present Truth, vol. 12

October 15, 1896

“Political and Religious Reform” The Present Truth, 12, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

When Wycliffe saw by the Scriptures how impossible it was that the church of Christ should be intriguing with the governments of earth and working to elevate itself to a ruling place over the affairs of nations, he was quite prepared to denounce the Papacy for its efforts to maintain a temporal power over the English people. This naturally drew to him those who were struggling for political freedom. But this was not the Gospel which God was sending to men. He desired them to know freedom, the spiritual despotism of the Roman Church, and freedom from the power of sin. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 657.1

So it was that Reformer was led along the path of Bible Protestantism to testify against Rome’s claim to dispense salvation to man, and to reassert the truth that Jesus Christ is the only mediator between God and men, and that the Word of God is the rule of life. But here those whose political sentiments had led them for the moment to applaud the principles which Wycliffe taught now forsook him. The King was prevailed upon by the ecclesiastics to withdraw all sympathy from him, and, as Wiley says:- PTUK October 15, 1896, page 657.2

“When this was seen, all his friends fell away from him. John of Gaunt had deserted him at an earlier stage. This prince stood stoutly by Wycliffe as long as the Reformer occupied himself in simply repelling encroachments of the hierarchy upon the prerogatives of the crown and independence of the nation. That was a branch of the controversy the duke could understand. But when it passed into the doctrinal sphere, where the bold Reformer, not content with cropping off a few excrescences, began to lay the axe to the root-to deny the Sacrament and abolish the altar-the valiant prince was alarmed; he felt that he had stepped on a ground which he did not know, and that he was in danger of being drawn into a bottomless pit of heresy. John of Gaunt, therefore, made all haste to draw off. But others too, of whom better things might have been expected, quailed before the gathering storm, and stood aloof from the Reformer.” PTUK October 15, 1896, page 657.3

How many times has this principle been illustrated in history. When one of the German princes wanted to place his sword at the service of Luther to protect him, Luther gave him to understand that the Elector was more in need of his (Luther’s) protection, as a servant of God, than was he in need of a sword as a protector. The mere political reformer considers his chances and the votes at his command, or the swords which the votes represent. He knows how to go to work because he fights with carnal weapons for merely carnal reformation. But in moral reform, wherein the weapons can be only spiritual, he is as much out of his element as a fish is when out of water. He knows not how to use the weapons which are mighty through God, to the pulling down of strongholds; and while he would be full of courage if the battle were his own, and would sell his life in fighting for political liberty, he doesn't understand the moral heroism which leads one to lose this life, battling in spiritual warfare against sin, in order to find eternal life. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 657.4

The world is in great danger, in these days, of confusing the methods of moral and political reform; and those engaged in moral Reformation will frequently meet the temptation which Wycliffe in large measure met successfully,-that of lowering the standard to secure the favour and influence of those whose aims are not spiritual, and whose ideas are merely social and political, impossible to realise in a world where sin makes slaves of all who are out of Christ. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 658.1

The world was full of wrong in Christ’s day. Tyranny and selfishness reigned, and Palestine was sullenly watching an opportunity to throw off the Roman yoke. It was not because Christ disregarded wrongs that He had led no social or political movement to overturn existing conditions. His whole life was one of sympathy for suffering and all His teaching a rebuke of wrong-doing. But His Gospel was of infinitely higher imports than any programme of reform ever conceived by man. It promised the liberty of heaven to the slave with manacles about his limbs, and it promised the infinite riches of heaven to the enslaved toiler who was willing to be saved from wrath and malice and covetousness in this world. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 658.2

People complain of the “other-worldliness” of this Gospel, and men have fought through the centuries to right their wrongs. But the ills that have always afflicted society are still with us, worse than ever; and the world is filling with discontent and a determination to smash something, if need be, to find a remedy. But the disease is in the life, in the heart, of the very one who suffers, and the Gospel alone brings the cure. And it brings the patience to wait until the coming of the Lord, enduring injustice and oppression without malice and without rendering evil for evil, if that is the lot of the one who waits. He can rejoice in tribulation, and glory in His sufferings, for Christ shares them with him. The patient endurance with which Jesus met oppression in the days of His flesh is granted His associates now. This is not the Gospel that the world wants, but it is what the world needs, and it is the only Gospel God has for it. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 658.3

“‘The Just Shall Live by Faith’” The Present Truth, 12, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

What is the value of corporate Christianity? Is there any saving grace in it? PTUK October 15, 1896, page 658.4

In these days the greater part of the world’s effort is put forth through corporate channels. The immense enterprises undertaken by civilised peoples are only possible of accomplishment through systematically organised and incorporated co-operated means. In this the people of this world are wise in their generation. By such methods, and by such methods alone, is it possible to utilise the natural forces which man is learning to control, and to so bring them under subjection that they may serve his purposes. Without corporate organisation it would be utterly impossible to carry on the enormous traffic of the world over sea and land. Without the great incorporated manufacturing industries it would be impossible to feed and clothe and provide for the multitudes which have gathered in the numerous and populous cities of the world. Indeed, without them, all, whether in city or country, would be deprived of many of those commodities and conveniences which have now come to be thought the necessities of life. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 658.5

But not only are the greater industries of the world incorporated and combined, but the religious effort and expression of professed Christianity is also organised into the corporate form. The thought of the organised corporate church has led to the extended idea of national Christianity, until the phrase “Christian nation” has become current. And active ideality has invested the creations of men, in governmental organisation, with personality and individuality-personified them-until, in the minds of many men these personalities have become endowed with personality and actual, individual responsibility. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 658.6

But the truth is actually expressed in the phrase “corporations have no souls.” Corporate personality is only a fraction of the law. It is entirely of human origin, and exists only by the will of man. Corporations and governments have no responsibility outside of the individual responsibility of those who constitute and control them. Salvation is solely and only an individual question, depending alone upon the personal faith of each person and the works which are the evidence of that faith. Because where faith is works must be. Where the Spirit is there must be the fruits of the Spirit, for the Spirit of God can never be barren and fruitless. Those fruits will be the evidence of faith,-and faith will work the salvation. Faith can be attributed only to a sentient being. No creation of man either material or immaterial ever was or ever will become a sentient creature capable of exercising faith. Upon faith alone depend salvation. The possibility of immortality rests only in and with the individual man. All the creatures of his hand and brain are ephemeral. Their existence is limited to this world, as they are concerned only with the things of this world. There is therefore no saving grace in citizenship in a professedly Christian nation. Neither is there, necessarily, salvation in membership in human religious organisations. They always should be, and certainly are-though not always,-a means toward salvation, but they cannot in the slightest degree assume or detract from their personal responsibility of the individual. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 658.7

The only saving grace which exists in corporate, organised Christianity consists in the fruits of the Spirit, which through the agency of mutual co-operation and organisation its members are enabled to produce; and these fruits are profitable for eternal life only to the individual by whose faith are produced, and do not redound in the slightest to the future benefit of the corporate organisation as a whole. “The just shall live by faith.” PTUK October 15, 1896, page 658.8

“The Horrors of War” The Present Truth, 12, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

The Horrors of War .-“In the Franco-German war,” says a French journal, “the doctors had not finished their merciful works at Mars-la-Tour when they were wanted at Gravelotte. After days of work at Gravelotte they returned to the fields of Mars-la-Tour, where they found men still living in agony with festering wounds. Others had ended a life hateful beyond imagination with their own hands.” Yet we are asked to suppose that a follower of Christ may work such atrocities as these on his fellows at the command of statesmen who choose to declare war upon one another. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 658.9

The German Christian on one side of the line may love his French brother in Christ on the other side, and when they meet together they may claim Christ’s promise to be in the midst of them to bless. But let hostilities be declared, and these same two are supposed, by popular religion, to be bound to hunt each other with the infernal weapons of war! PTUK October 15, 1896, page 658.10

“The Promises to Israel. Life from God” The Present Truth, 12, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

At the close of the wandering in the wilderness, Moses said to the people, “All the commandments which I command thee this day shall ye observe to do, that ye may live, and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the Lord sware unto your fathers. And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldst keep His commandments, or no. And He humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger; and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that He might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live.” Deuteronomy 8:1-3. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 659.1

“The word of God is living and active.” Hebrews 4:12. Christ said, “The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” John 6:68. Through the prophet He says, “Incline your ear, and come unto Me; hear, and your soul shall live.” Isaiah 55:3. “Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and they that hear shall live.” John 5:25. That time had come in the days when the children of Israel were in the wilderness. In the giving of the manna He was teaching them that men could live only by “every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” PTUK October 15, 1896, page 659.2

Note this well. God was proving them by the manna, whether they would walk in His law or not. But at the same time He was teaching them that the law is life. Jesus said, “I know that His commandment is life everlasting.” John 12:50. They were to keep the commandments that they might live, but they could keep them only by hearing them. The life is in the commandments themselves, and not in the individual who tries to keep them. He can get no life from his own efforts, yet he is to get life through the commandments. Grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. The reason is that the word itself is life, and if we listen attentively to it, we shall be made alive by it. “O that thou hadst hearkened to My commandments! then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea.” Isaiah 48:18. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 659.3

Jesus said, “If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.” Matthew 19:17. But it is not by our efforts to conform to a certain standard, and by measuring ourselves by it to see what progress we are making, that we get righteousness and life. Such a course makes Pharisees, but not Christians. Abraham kept all the commandments of God, and yet not a line of them was written. How did He do it?-By hearkening unto the voice of God, and by trusting Him. God bore witness that he had the righteousness of faith. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 659.4

In the same way that He had led Abraham, God was leading the children of Israel. He had spoken to them by His prophets, and by the miracles that He had wrought in delivering them from Egypt, He had shown them His power to work righteousness in them. If they had but listened to His voice, and believed Him, there would have been no difficulty in regard to their righteousness. If they would only trust God, and not trust in themselves, He would be responsible for their righteousness and life. “Hear, O My people, and I will testify unto thee; O Israel, if thou wilt hearken unto Me, there shall no strange god be in thee; neither shalt thou worship any strange god. I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt; open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.” Psalm 81:8-10. “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness; for they shall be filled.” Matthew 5:6. In the giving of the manna, God was trying to teach them this fact, and in the record of it He expects us to learn it. Let us therefore study it a little more closely. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 659.5

LIVING BREAD

The Apostle Paul tells us that the children of Israel in the wilderness “did all eat the same spiritual meat.” 1 Corinthians 10:4. We have already read the words of the Lord when He promised to give them food, saying, “Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you.” He “commanded the clouds from above, and opened the doors of heaven;” He “rained down manna upon them to eat,” and gave them “of the corn of heaven;” “man did eat angels’ food.” Psalm 78:23-25. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 659.6

The food that they had to eat was not a product of the country through which they were passing. If it had been, they would have had it from the first. But the Scripture tells us that it was rained down from heaven. It came direct from God. It was “spiritual meat,” “angels’ food.” What it was intended to be for them, if they had only believed it, we learn from the words of Christ, when on another occasion He fed a multitude of people in the desert. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 659.7

In the sixth chapter of John we have the account of another miraculous provision of food for a multitude of people in the wilderness. There were “about five thousand men, beside women and children,” and the entire amount of food in the company was five barley loaves and two fishes. One of the disciples said that two hundred pennyworth of bread would not be sufficient for every one to have even a little. Their “penny,” we are told, was a coin equal to about eightpence-halfpenny, so that two hundred pence would be more than seven pounds, which would purchase much more than the same amount now. Yet even that would have afforded but a scanty meal. No wonder that Peter said of the paltry five loaves and fishes, “What are they among so many?” PTUK October 15, 1896, page 659.8

Nevertheless Jesus “knew what He would do.” He took the loaves into his hands, and gave thanks, and then gave the bread to the disciples, who passed it on to the multitude. The same was done with the fishes. The result was that from that insignificant amount which would not ordinarily have given them a taste, they were all satisfied, and there were twelve baskets full of fragments left. There was more food when they had finished than there was when they began. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.1

Where did that bread come from? There is only one possible answer, namely, It came from the Lord Himself. The Divine life that was in Him, which is the source of all life, caused the bread to multiply, even as it had made the grain to grow, from which it was made. The multitude, therefore, ate from Christ Himself. It was His own life that was the nourishment of their bodies that day. The miracle was wrought for the purpose of satisfying their immediate physical wants; but it was also designed to teach them a most valuable spiritual lesson, which Jesus set before them the next day. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.2

When the people found Jesus the next day, He reproved them for caring more for the loaves and the fishes than for the better food which He had for them. He said, “Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you; for Him hath God the Father sealed.” Then they said to Him, “What shall we do that we might work the works of God?” Jesus replied, “This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent.” John 6:28, 29. Then, notwithstanding all that they had seen and experienced, they asked Him for a sign, saying, “What sign showest Thou, then, that we may see and believe? what dost Thou work?” And then, not realising that they had just had the same miracle repeated in effect for them, they referred to the giving of the manna, saying, “Our fathers did eat manna in the desert; as it is written, He gave them bread from heaven to eat.” Verses 30, 31. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.3

Jesus then reminded them that it was not Moses that gave them that bread in the desert, but that God alone gives the true bread from heaven. Said He, “The bread of God is He which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world.” Still failing to see what Jesus meant, they asked that they might evermore have that bread of life, when He told them plainly that He Himself was the living bread, saying, “I am the bread of life; he that cometh to Me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on Me shall never thirst.” Still later Jesus said, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on Me hath everlasting life. I am that bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever; and the bread that I will give is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” Verses 32-51. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.4

Just as the people ate that bread which came from the Lord Jesus, and were strengthened by it, even so they might, if they had believed, have received spiritual life from Him. His life is righteousness, and all who eat of Him in faith must receive righteousness. Like ancient Israel, they were eating bread from heaven, and like them they did not appreciate it, so as to receive the full benefit of it. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.5

“On the Gold Coast” The Present Truth, 12, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

This year has been exceptionally trying for whites on the African Gold Coast, which is so appropriately called “The White Man’s Grave.” One of the workers in our mission there has recently been compelled to return on account of his health. The missionary nurse and his wife have had their hands full of work for the natives. In a recent report he says:- PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.6

“I have at this writing treated four hundred different persons, and have lost only one case. I felt almost sure he would die, and I told his people so; but they wanted me to try the case. I told them that by the help of God I would do what I could for him. I usually send such cases to the hospital. The patient was a young man aged sixteen years. I did what I could for him, and we prayed over him with his people. He said that he loved God, and that he would take him by and by to a better place. I am satisfied that God sent him here that he and his people might know of God and His goodness. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.7

“The government doctor is sending patients to us, mostly women. He says that water treatment is the best for them if they want to get well. Praise the Lord. The Lord has heard my cry to Him for wisdom in treating these patients, for they get better, and send others. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.8

“My boy works well. He gives the treatments to the men with the help of Dick, the washerman. People think that we can cure almost anything. I tell them to go home and pray God to bless the treatment given here; and if it is His will that they should get well, He will hear and answer. Oh, it does my soul good to have a man come in and say, ‘I have prayed to God, and I know I shall get well.’ I say, ‘Yes; now continue to pray every day. God will bless you, and heal you.’ And praise the Lord, He does not fail us.” PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.9

“Who Is Held Responsible?” The Present Truth, 12, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

Who is held responsible? The notion that a man has a dual personality, so that “in one capacity he may do that which is morally wrong in another,” is responsible for much sin. “Religion is religion, and business is business,” is a maxim which many a professor tries to make himself believe when he wants to adopt some method in business which his troubled conscience acknowledges to be not good religion. As Christians men will acknowledge that they ought to love their enemies, but as citizens they will fight them to the death if necessary to defend one’s own or to get somebody else’s possessions. The following, from one of Mr. McNeill’s sermons in Glasgow, shows very nicely how this theory of a dual personality will be found wanting:- PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.10

“He was the Elector of Cologne in the old days, Prince palatinate, an archbishop in the church; and in the open street this archbishop and prince was swearing tremendously. A countryman stood by with open mouth, as the oaths rolled from the swearer’s lips, who turned and said to the countryman, ‘What are you staring at?’ PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.11

“He replied, ‘I was staring in wonder and amazement to hear you swear.’ PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.12

“‘But why should you stare at me swearing?’ PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.13

“‘Well, I never heard an archbishop swear before.’ PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.14

“‘But I am not swearing as an archbishop, I swear as a prince.’ PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.15

“‘Well, I stare the more, because when the prince goes to the devil, where is the archbishop going to?’ PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.16

“Ay, and whatever your office, whatever your dignity, you cannot cleave asunder the individual responsibility before God-you cannot by church connection, and you cannot by ecclesiastical denominationalism get rid of your responsibility to God for your individual sin.” PTUK October 15, 1896, page 660.17

“Items of Interest” The Present Truth, 12, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

-Since 1875 London’s Board Schools have increased from 192 to 448. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.1

-In Norway the average length of life is greater than in any other country. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.2

-The capital of Ecuador, Guayaquil, has been almost totally destroyed by fire. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.3

-Little is heard of Nihilism now, but a Russian correspondent says that it has recently been more active. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.4

-On October 5 the hills of northern England were covered with snow, and storms of hail swept over portions of Wales. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.5

-There is a lock-out in the Penrhyn quarries, 8,000 quarrymen being idle. It is understood that Lord Penrhyn is fighting the Quarrymen’s Union. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.6

-On the east coast of England where hook and line fishing is most extensively carried on, immense lines are used. Some of them are about eight miles long, and carry nearly 5,000 hooks. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.7

-China has given Runts permission to run the Siberian railway through Manchuria to Viadivostock, but refuses to let a branch run down to the Gulf of Pechill, where Russia desires to find a port open all the year round. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.8

-The India Government is making preparation to deal with wide-spread distress in North India, and it is said that relief work is to be organised on a large scale to employ thousands on railway and other improvements. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.9

-Trouble is feared again in Crete, as the populace in the interior is armed and race hatred keeps up the attitude of hostility between Moslem and “Christian.” Distress is being acutely felt owing to destruction of houses and olive groves. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.10

-The political event of last week was the resignation by Lord Rosebery of the leadership of the Liberal party, owing to his differences with what he considers to be the opinions of a largo mass of the party on the Eastern Question, he being strongly opposed to separate action by England. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.11

-The Blackwall tunnel under the Thames has been completed without the loss of a single life throughout all the hazardous labour of its construction. The cast-iron tunnel itself is 8,088ft. in length, exclusive of the approaches. The outside diameter is 27ft. The sifted roadway is 16ft. wide, including two footpaths. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.12

-October the Czar and Czarina, on their royal tour through England, Prance, and Germany, were received in Paris with extravagant demonstrations. The ornamentation and illumination of the city of Paris in honour of the royal guest’s is said to have been on a grander scale and more beautiful than anything ever before attempted. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.13

-Egypt, Spain, and Holland send us over a million bushels of onions each every season. Large quantities are also imported from France, Portugal, Belgium, Germany, and the United States. We import ?166,000 earth of vegetables weekly. It is said that in Lincolnshire the price for potatoes is ?1 per ton, but in London the poorest quell of potatoes are retailed at ?4 5s. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 670.14

“Back Page” The Present Truth, 12, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

Many lines of business are said to have collapsed in Turkey owing to the terrible scenes that have been enacted there, and the coming winter promises to bring intense suffering to all classes of poor people. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.1

The early church lived in times when militarism was the ruling passion in the earth, and Paul’s injunction then-that prayer should be made “for all men; for kings, and for all that are in authority”-is especially applicable to our day, when the same spirit fills the world. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.2

In the discussion of the labour question at the Church Congress last week one speaker said his intimate knowledge of the situation “led him to believe that the clouds are gathering rather than dispersing, and that the next few years will see more bitter strife between capital and labour than has ever been known before.” PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.3

A current magazine prints photo-reductions of the thrones of various sovereigns. Amongst them appears the papal throne at the Vatican, gorgeous in its crimson and gold, no doubt an object of pride to the loyal Catholic. But its appearance alongside the thrones of earthly kingdoms presents to the eye a striking testimony to the fact that the Papacy has no part or lot in Christ’s kingdom, which is not of this world. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.4

The fox declared the grapes sour when he couldn't get them, and certain Anglican speakers and writers who a few months ago plainly intimated that they were prepared to accept even papal infallibility, if it would decide in their favour, now give us to understand that the opinion of “an Italian prelate” amounts to very little. Before they spoke of him as the chief bishop of Christendom, now they defy him. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.5

A New York despatch says that the American Board of Missions, the Congregationalist mission agency which has done most of the mission work in Turkey, has appealed to the President to take peremptory steps to secure indemnity for mission property destroyed and the punishment of the guilty. This represents the latest edition of foreign missions. The notion of appealing for gunboats to aid in mission works is becoming common. If the churches at home use force, by the means of religious laws, to compel people to keep Sunday, etc., why should not missionaries call for soldiers and ships of war. But this field of Asia Minor is one in which Paul and others suffered persecution in early days. Does anyone read that he demanded the punishment of his enemies? PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.6

The English Churchman is certainly well advised in attaching little importance to the protests of the High Church party in the matter of the Anglican orders and the Pope. Some think this is an evidence that Protestantism is reviving in England. But our contemporary says:- PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.7

If the Ritualists consistently protested against the claims and the doctrines of the Papacy, we should rejoice. But a protest which may set up a rival Pope or Patriarch at Canterbury, and can accept all the doctrines of Rome except the authority of the Pope, is of no value. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.8

In all the controversy as to the attitude of the great Powers towards Turkey, now agitating politicians, on one thing there is unanimity, for the first time in this century, namely, that not one will lift a finger to preserve the Turkish power, though as before it is not sure that any one power can take over the coveted possession of Constantinople without fighting a combination of the other powers. The situation is very different from what it has been in the past. What a significance attaches to this change viewed in light of the prophetic words, “He shall come to his end, and none shall help them.” Daniel 11:45. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.9

Now that the Princess of Montenegro who is betrothed to the Crown Prince of Italy, has been “converted” from the Greek to the Roman Church for political reasons, the latter church is even with its Eastern rival for having “converted” the baby Prince Boris to the Greek persuasion. These farces so often enacted show that the idea of religion held is purely pagan. Who that knows the religion of Jesus Christ could think of hiring or forcing or persuading, save by moral teaching, anyone to profess it? PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.10

The visit of the Czar to France, and his declarations regarding the indissoluble friendship between the two countries is generally taken as marking the opening of a new era in European history. The French journal Debats says:- PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.11

If, but a little while ago, anyone had ventured to predict that the chief of the most powerful and absolute Autocracy in the universe would visit Republican and Democratic France, and be acclaimed by a tempest of enthusiasm-that the Catholic clergy would chant a Te Deum in honour of the chief of a schismatic Church-that the revolutionary Town Council would offer him a f?te eclipsing the most splendid monarchical pageants, he would have been set down as a visionary. And yet those anticipations fall short of the reality. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.12

“Work for Women” The Present Truth, 12, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

Work for Women .-Last week a notable company of missionaries, sent out by the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society, sailed for their various stations in India, China and Ceylon. The company consisted of forty-five ladies, and among them was Miss Codrington, who was the sole survivor of the murderous attack made upon the mission station at Hwa Sang, China, last year, and who now returns to her labours in China. It is God’s missionaries, who carry His Gospel of peace and love to every kindred, nation, tongue, and people, both at home and abroad, who, having given all of this world to follow Him, will be rewarded in the world to come, as Christ Himself has told us, “And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for My name’s sake, shall receive a hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life.” PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.13

“The Spread of Romanism” The Present Truth, 12, 42.

E. J. Waggoner

The Spread of Romanism .-The Archbishop of York declared that the Church Congress that “so far as statistics went, Romanism was making no headway whatever in England.” It depends upon what kind of statistics are taken. Every year sees an immense increase in the introduction of purely Romish practices in the English Church. The Protestant party in that church has had to complain more during recent times than before of the action of the bench of bishops in encouraging sacerdotal pretensions and frowning upon Protestant activity. The name matters not at all. Romanism is growing and increasing in England with startling rapidity as it is in all nations. For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her abominations. PTUK October 15, 1896, page 672.14