Unbalanced Minds
35
by giving attention to every minute point. Much ground is covered;
but the work upon which so much labor is expended is not calculated
[36]
to do the greatest amount of good, by awakening a general interest.
In this age, when pleasing fables are drifting upon the surface
and attracting the mind, truth presented in an easy style, backed up
with a few strong proofs, is better than to search and bring forth an
overwhelming array of evidence; for the point then does not stand so
distinct in many minds as before the objections and evidences were
brought before them. With many, assertions will go further than long
arguments. They take many things for granted. Proof does not help
the case in the minds of such.
Opposing Adventists
Our most bitter opponents are found among the first-day Adven-
tists. They do not engage in the warfare honorably. They will pursue
any course, however unreasonable and inconsistent, to cover up the
truth and try to make it appear that the law of God is of no force. They
flatter themselves that the end will justify the means. Men of their
own number, in whom they had not confidence, will commence a
tirade against the Sabbath of the fourth commandment, and they will
give publicity to their statements, however untrue, unjust, and even
ridiculous, if they can make them bear against the truth which they
hate.
We should not be moved or disconcerted by this unjust warfare
from unreasonable men. Those who receive, and are pleased with,
what these men speak and write against the truth are not the ones who
would be convinced of the truth or who would honor the cause of God
if they should accept it. Time and strength can be better employed
than to dwell at length upon the quibbles of our opponents who deal
in slander and misrepresentations. While precious time is employed in
following the crooks and turns of dishonest opponents, the people who
are open to conviction are dying for want of knowledge. A train of
senseless quibbles of Satan’s own invention is brought before minds,
while the people are crying for food, for meat in due season.
[37]
It takes those who have trained their minds to war against the truth
to manufacture quibbles. And we are not wise to take them from their
hands, and pass them out to thousands who would never have thought