Ellen G. White and Her Critics

That “Suppressed” Quotation

The critic asks why the quotation from Mrs. White’s 1896 letter, which is given in the 1897 edition of Healthful Living, was left out of the 1898 edition. We do not know, but we think that the very use to which some have put the quotation provides the best clue as to why it was deleted. It was too brief to place Mrs. White’s words in the proper context. EGWC 390.3

Now those who publish books know that in making a correction on a page, endeavor is always made not to throw the pages out of order. If this quotation from the 1896 letter had been sufficiently lengthened to give its true context, it would have necessitated a repaging of the book from page 97 onward, or else the throwing out of other important quotations. It was not imperative that the quotation be retained, and hence, we presume the two sentences were deleted and another quotation put in its place. But in so simply explained a deletion as this someone discovers a dark, deep plot to suppress Mrs. White’s writings. EGWC 390.4

We wish that the full paragraph from the August, 1896, letter might have been quoted in the 1897 edition of Healthful Living. It would have provided an excellent illustration of a principle that Mrs. White enunciated in 1895, which principle is set forth in a brief quotation further down on page 97 of Healthful Living: EGWC 391.1

“Those who have lived upon a meat diet all their lives do not see the evil of continuing the practise, and they must be treated tenderly.—U. T., June 19, 1895.” EGWC 391.2

It was because Mrs. White had “treated tenderly” some who sat at her table that she was confronted with the problem discussed in her 1896 letter. All reasonable people, we believe, will see in this whole incident only further proof that Mrs. White took no sudden, fanatical positions on the matter of diet, and most of all, was slow to make herself judge of the diet of others. EGWC 391.3