Ellen G. White and Her Critics

Resolution Exonerates Elder and Mrs. White

It is true that a beginning had been made on the “large building,” though only a beginning. All work was stopped. But not because James White wanted to build it another way, but because he, and others with him, believed that it should not be built at all. It was the overextended financial situation of the Health Institute and the inexperience of the management ^* that led to the stopping of the construction, and not James White’s overextended sense of pride and importance. The echo of all this is found in a resolution passed at the second annual meeting of the Health Reform Institute: EGWC 503.3

“Resolved, that we consider it due to Bro. and Sr. White, and to our brethren abroad, that we make a statement of the following points: 1. That they have acted a noble and generous part toward the Health Institute; and that the errors committed in its management are not to be in any wise laid to their charge, Bro. White being unable at that time from sickness to have any part in the business. Those, therefore, who attribute blame to them concerning it, act unjustly and without any ground for such censure. On the contrary, they are entitled to the thanks of all our people for their efforts in sustaining the Institute, and for counseling a course of sound wisdom in its management. Nothing therefore can well be more unjust and cruel than to hold them responsible for the errors of others.”—The Review and Herald, May 25, 1869, p. 174. EGWC 503.4

Here are the facts as they stand out on the yellowed pages of the old volumes of the church paper, and out of the writings of Mrs. White, when the full text of those writings is given. The most charitable way to explain the erroneous charges of the critic is to say that when he sat down to write almost half a century after the events, he consulted a dim and hostile memory rather than the documented record. EGWC 504.1