Ellen G. White and Her Critics

20. Autobiographical Article, “Experience and Views”

FIRST PRINTING

In Review and Herald Extra, July 21, 1851, pages 1, 2. (This is a brief autobiographical sketch. It is immediately followed, on page 2, with the narration of the first vision.) EGWC 642.1

SECOND PRINTING

In Experience and Views, pages 3-9. (Early Writings, 11-13, 20-24. In Early Writings, Mrs. White’s first vision is inserted in the running text of her autobiographical sketch—pages 13-20—where it naturally comes. Experience and Views follows the text of the Extra and inserts the first vision immediately after the biographical sketch.) EGWC 642.2

With the exception of a slight rearrangement and rewording of sentences in the description of a storm at sea, the text is essentially unchanged. EGWC 642.3

Summary and Conclusion

The reader now has before him the total deletions in Mrs. White’s earliest writings. It is clear beyond all question that most of these deletions could not possibly have been prompted by a desire to “suppress” some belief, which fact leads to the conclusion that deletions, as such, affect in no way Mrs. White’s honesty or her claim to the prophetic gift, and are to be explained as an endeavor to “prevent repetition” or to save space or because the deleted passage was of only local or personal application. And that should lead us to the reasonable assumption that in the absence of incontrovertible evidence of evil intent, the rest of the deletions, which are supposed to prove “suppression,” should be viewed in the same light as we view all other deletions. We leave the reader to judge, after examining the chapters on the shut door and suppression, as to whether incontrovertible evidence of suppression has been offered by the critics! as to whether the critics have presented even plausible evidence! EGWC 642.4

Thus collapses the whole edifice of indictment that has been reared from the various passages that were dropped from Mrs. White’s writings. With the cement of insinuation and implication the builders of the critical edifice have sought to hold it together. But as with other poorly built structures, exposure reveals its weakness and produces its collapse. EGWC 642.5

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