Ellen G. White in Europe 1885-1887

Chapter 23—Will France Receive The Light?

The visit to Paris, Nimes, and Valence

As one of the dominant powers of Europe, France had known periods of greatness and glory. The centuries following the Reformation were marked by civil war, the tyranny of absolutism and revolutions, the Napoleonic wars of expansion, and the vicissitudes of several forms of government. EGWE 226.1

During the time of Mrs. White's visit the country was under a political system known as the Third Republic. According to the light Ellen White received from God the history of France might have been more salutary if the nation had received fully the teachings of the Reformation in the sixteenth century. (See The Great Controversy, 211-236; 265-288.) EGWE 226.2

Even so, the light of the gospel shone brightly in France for years under the teaching of LeFevre and Farel and Berquin, and the valiant Huguenots—until persecution nearly silenced the voices of God's messengers. EGWE 226.3

In vision the cause-and-effect relationship in these historic developments in church and state were opened up to the mind of the Lord's servant. She saw the French Revolution as a harvest reaped more than two centuries after the fateful seed sowing in the time of the Catholic King Francis I and Charles IX and the St. Bartholomew's massacre. EGWE 226.4