The Signs of the Times, vol. 23

December 16, 1897

“Editorial. The Lesson of History” The Signs of the Times, 23, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

We do not say “a lesson from history,” but “the lesson of history;” for there is but one great lesson that history teaches, yet it is one that is rarely learned. For want of learning this one lesson, thousands study history in vain; while he who learns the simple, fundamental lesson in the beginning of his study will read to profit. SITI December 16, 1897, page 768.1

The reason why the lesson referred to is so almost universally overlooked, is that the records that are usually studied are so crowded with details that the mind becomes confused; history becomes to the student only a mass of occurrences, in which the underlying truth taught by history is lost. This melancholy result would be avoided if people began at the right place to study, taking the simplest history first and afterwards that which is more complex. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.1

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,” and the Bible is the book that teaches the fear of the Lord; therefore it is in the Bible that the beginning of wisdom is found. It is the simplest book in the world, as would naturally be expected of a book of beginnings. That it is really a book very easy to be understood is proved by the fact that it teaches the way to the kingdom of heaven, which can be entered only by children and those who become like children. See Matthew 18:3. It is manifest, therefore, that the Bible can be understood by children, and consequently must be an easy book. It is the first book that children should study. But the whole of a thing is found in the beginning, just as the entire tree exists in the germ; and so the Bible, which teaches the fear of the Lord, contains the sum of knowledge, and may be studied by the gray-haired sage as profitably as by the little child. Its treasure of wisdom is inexhaustible. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.2

Now for the first lesson in history. Very fittingly it begins with the beginning of time. We will quote a page from it, that we may clearly see what is the simple, underlying truth taught by all history since the creation of the world. Here it is:— SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.3

“This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him; male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created. And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth; and the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years; and he begat sons and daughters; and all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years: and he died. And Seth lived an hundred and five years, and begat Enos; and Seth lived after he begat Enos eight hundred and seven years, and begat sons and daughters; and all the days of Seth were nine hundred and twelve years; and he died. And Enos lived ninety years, and begat Cainan; and Enos lived after he begat Cainan eight hundred and fifteen years, and begat sons and daughters; and all the days of Enos were nine hundred and five years: and he died.” Genesis 5:1-11. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.4

Thus the record continues to the end of the chapter, of which we have quoted just one fourth; yet the chapter covers a period of more than fifteen hundred years. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.5

What is the sum of history, as indicated by this record?—Simply this, that men lived a certain number of years, and then died. With this first historical record agree all that have been written since. The whole of history can be summed up in the words, They lived so long, and then they died. The one thing, therefore, that history teaches, is that a man’s life is but “a vapor, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.” Yet this is the thing that is seldom thought of in reading history. Histories written by man are so filled up with accounts of the incidentals,—the things that people did, the battles fought, the kingdoms established, the cities built, and the “glory” gained,—that unless one has begun the historical study with the primary book, that is, the Bible, he will lose the main point. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.6

Secular history alone is sufficient, if one reads it thoughtfully, to show that it is utterly impossible for man to inherit or possess this earth. “For he seeth that wise men die, likewise the fool and the brutish person perish, and leave their wealth to others.” Notwithstanding this, “their inward thought is this their houses shall continue for ever, and their dwelling places to all generations; they call their lands after their own names. Nevertheless man being in honor abideth not: he is like the beasts that perish. This their way is their folly; yet their posterity approve their sayings.”Psalm 49:10-13. Each generation imagines that it is an exception, and that its works will stand forever. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.7

Dull Students

People refuse to learn the lesson of history, even when it is spread out before their eyes. They contemplate the ruins of former greatness, and even while looking, think: “How superior we are to those who lived in ancient times! Their empires have all vanished, and their cities are in ruins, or utterly extinct.” But that is most short-sighted reasoning. A man might as well claim to have more vitality than Methuselah, because he himself is living, in the possession of full strength, while Methuselah, forsooth, is long since dead! Ah, but wait, my friend, and time will tell a different story! You will not have to wait one-tenth the length of Methuselah’s life, to learn your mistake. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.8

So with the works of which men boast to-day. There are now no structures so massive and so strongly built as many of those of ancient days, that have been utterly demolished by time. Should time continue as much longer as it has already continued, nothing would remain of the glory of the nations that now inhabit the earth, and their names would be forgotten unless some new fragments of stone preserved them. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.9

No; this earth is under a curse, and unsuited for man’s dwelling-place. He can not live here. Do what he will to establish himself here, he is swept away before he can fairly get a foothold. The princes of the earth are brought to nothing, and the judges of the earth are as vanity. “Yea, scarce are they planted, scarce are they sown, scarce hath their stock taken root in the earth, when He bloweth upon them, and they wither, and the whirlwind taketh them away as stubble. Isaiah 40:24, R.V., margin. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.10

In spite of this truth which is the one thing that is most evident in all history, men go on planning for this earthly life as tho they were to abide here forever. We see them throwing all their energies into a political struggle, fiercely excited over the outcome, scrambling and crowding for a place, perfectly oblivious to the fact that even if they succeed in attaining the coveted object, it will disappear, and they themselves with it, almost as soon as they seize it. So it always has been, and so it will be to the end. They are as foolish as children on the beach, fighting over the sand houses they have built, which the next wave of the incoming tide will wash away, and at the same time overwhelm them. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.11

What hope is there then for man?—Much, every way. Go back again to our elementary history book. Surely we can believe a record that is so conclusively substantiated by facts. That tells us that God created the earth not in vain, but to be inhabited (Isaiah 43:18), and that when he had completed it, with man upon it, he “saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.” Genesis 1:31. The critical eye of the Master could detect no flaw, nothing that could be improved, either in man or his condition and circumstances. Everything was as good as God himself could make it. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.12

Now we know that “whatsoever God doeth, it shall be forever.” Ecclesiastes 3:14. Therefore the condition of the earth in the beginning, and of man as well, is that which is to be through all eternity. God did not place men on the earth in order that they should be swept away like gnats, but that they should possess it forever, even forever and ever. Therefore, “we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.” 2 Peter 3:13. Even tho there were not many repetitions of that promise, the fact that in the beginning God placed a perfect man in a perfect earth, is sufficient promise that so it will be. In view of this promise we can confidently say, even when about to be carried away by the flood of time, “God will redeem my soul from the power of the grave; for he shall receive me.” Psalm 49:15. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.13

Who will begin to read history from the beginning, and learn the great lesson that it teaches? Who will cease to chase the bubble that collapses as it is grasped, and begin to plan and live as citizens of a better country, that is, an heavenly, whose capital is a city that has everlasting foundations, whose builder and maker is God? E. J. W. SITI December 16, 1897, page 769.14

“What War Is” The Signs of the Times, 23, 49.

E. J. Waggoner

It is a most singular thing, yet it is a fact, that the loudest calls for war that have been heard within the last two or three years, have come from the ministers of the Gospel. From thousands of pulpits appeals have been made for any or all of the Powers to proceed to annihilate the Turks, in the interest of the Armenians; later, the Cretans have been encouraged in their efforts to throw off Turkish rule, and Greece has been applauded for taking the part of Crete in order that she might get the whole; while many of the same preachers unsparingly berated the English Government for not joining the Greeks in their war with Turkey. SITI December 16, 1897, page 771.1

What a strange spectacle,—professed ministers of the Gospel of peace, to say nothing of thousands of church members, clamoring for war! Do they know what war is? Let us just take the barest glance at it, as it really is. One of the war correspondents with the Turkish army, in the course of his description of the battle of Mati, says:— SITI December 16, 1897, page 771.2

The guns were already clouded in smoke and dust. Now and again a dot came traveling up toward us with painful slowness-a wounded artilleryman; now moaning convulsively; now silent, and swallowing an invisible lump, with twitching eyes. SITI December 16, 1897, page 771.3

Who cannot see the picture of the strong man striving to repress any expression of the pain that was nevertheless overmastering him? Later on, the correspondent says:— SITI December 16, 1897, page 771.4

The ambulance drove forward to pick up our wounded, and Edhem Pasha pushed on behind his victorious troops. I passed a Tutish soldier who lay with both legs broken, sobbing piteously with pain. And then I hated war. SITI December 16, 1897, page 771.5

And who would not? For war means those same scenes magnified, and multiplied a thousand times. It means men helpless and suffering with wounds, lying in some spot for hours and even days in the heat and cold, famishing for water. In short, it means wholesale murder, aggravated by the fact that many of the victims are not killed outright. SITI December 16, 1897, page 771.6

We are charitable enough to believe that most of this call for war, from the lips of professed Christians, would cease if those who do the calling could be placed for a season in the front ranks. Not that they are cowards, but that they do not stop to think what they are talking about. The fact is, that every man who shouts for war is simply an aider and abettor of murder. One famous general declared that “war is hell,” and it is fact that the spirit of war is the spirit of Satan. An officer in the Franco-Prussian war said that if he had led a regiment of angels into the battle they would have come back devils. How can Christians be in any way whatever accessories to such fiendish work? SITI December 16, 1897, page 771.7

It is for the purpose of warning, not of condemning, that we write. We know that there are thousands of sincere Christians who “know not what manner of spirit they are of “when they call for war, to avenge wounded honor or even outrage, and some with whom we have talked have been shocked, on having their attention called to the matter, to find that they were unconsciously being inspired by the spirit of the devil, for it is the spirits of devils, that go about to stir up war. See Revelation 16:14. The man who shouts for and applauds murder is at heart a murderer. In this time when the nations are preparing war, “great plainness of speech” is necessary, in only that some at least may be awakened to their danger, and may for ever break loose from the fierce, murderous, Satanic spirit that is benumbing the senses of the world’s millions, and carrying them to everlasting destruction. E. J. W. SITI December 16, 1897, page 771.8