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them to the Most Holy place, and those who had an experience in the
past messages were pointing them the way to the heavenly Sanctuary.
Many saw the perfect chain of truth in the angels’ messages, and gladly
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received it. They embraced them in their order, and followed Jesus by
faith into the heavenly Sanctuary. These messages were represented
to me as an anchor to hold the body. And as individuals receive and
understand them, they are shielded against the many delusions of
Satan.
After the great disappointment in 1844, Satan and his angels were
busily engaged in laying snares to unsettle the faith of the body. He
was affecting the minds of individuals who had a personal experience
in these things. They had an appearance of humility. They changed the
first and second messages, and pointed to the future for their fulfillment,
while others pointed far back in the past, declaring that they had
been there fulfilled. These individuals were drawing the minds of the
inexperienced away, and unsettling their faith. Some were searching
the Bible to try to build up a faith of their own, independent of the
body. Satan exulted in all this; for he knew that those who broke loose
from the anchor, he could affect by different errors and drive about
with winds of doctrine. Many who had led in the first and second
messages, denied them, and division and scattering was throughout the
body. I then saw Wm. Miller. He looked perplexed, and was bowed
with sorrow and distress for his people. He saw the company who
were united and loving in 1844, losing their love for each other, and
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opposing one another. He saw them fall back into a cold, backslidden
state. Grief wasted his strength. I saw leading men watching Wm.
Miller, and fearing lest he should embrace the third angel’s message
and the commandments of God. And as he would lean towards the
light from heaven, these men would lay some plan to draw his mind
away. I saw a human influence exerted to keep his mind in darkness,
and to retain his influence among them. At length Wm. Miller raised
his voice against the light from heaven. He failed in not receiving
the message which would have fully explained his disappointment,
and cast a light and glory on the past, which would have revived his
exhausted energies, brightened up his hope, and led him to glorify
God. But he leaned to human wisdom instead of divine, and being
broken with arduous labor in his Master’s cause, and by age, he was
not as accountable as those who kept him from the truth. They are