Ellen G. White and Her Critics

Quotation 7 Examined

Quotations 7 to 10 are said to be contradictory to the first six. Here is the context in which quotation Number 7 is found: EGWC 383.3

“Concerning flesh-meat, we should educate the people to let it alone. Its use is contrary to the best development of the physical, mental, and moral powers. And we should bear a clear testimony against the use of tea and coffee. It is also well to discard rich desserts. Milk, eggs, and butter should not be classed with flesh-meat. In some cases the use of eggs is beneficial. The time has not come to say that the use of milk and eggs should be wholly discarded. There are poor families whose diet consists largely of bread and milk. They have little fruit, and cannot afford to purchase the nut foods. In teaching health reform, as in all other gospel work, we are to meet the people where they are. Until we can teach them how to prepare health-reform foods that are palatable, nourishing, and yet inexpensive, we are not at liberty to present the most advanced propositions regarding health-reform diet. EGWC 383.4

“Let the diet reform be progressive. Let the people be taught how to prepare food without the use of milk or butter. Tell them that the time will soon come when there will be no safety in using eggs, milk, cream, or butter, because disease in animals is increasing in proportion to the increase of wickedness among men. The time is near when, because of the iniquity of the fallen race, the whole animal creation will groan under the diseases that curse our earth.”—Testimonies for the Church 7:134, 135. EGWC 383.5

It is hard to believe that any reasonable person can find in this statement by Mrs. White any contradiction of her statement in quotation Number 1. The fact that in quotation Number 1 Mrs. White spoke against butter, as well as against a number of other foods, does not mean that she necessarily put it in the same class as all these other foods, but simply that she considered it on the wrong side of the line that divided between ideally wholesome foods and other foods. In view of changing conditions of sanitation and dairy inspection, and in view of the needs of many families, it is not hard to see how Mrs. White might consistently give a qualified approval to butter and eggs, as she does. In fact her whole statement in Testimonies, volume 7, breathes a spirit of sweet reasonableness. She makes the question of the use of dairy products, and eggs in general, turn largely on the question of “disease in animals.” In other words, though sanitary precaution and dairy inspection may increase, disease may increase also, ultimately the latter outrunning the former. Her words are a rebuke to extremes at either end on the matter of health reform: “Let the diet reform be progressive.” EGWC 383.6