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The Adventist Home
which they have discarded is like offering intoxicants to the inebriate.
Yielding to the temptation continually before them, they soon lose their
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relish for solid reading. They have no interest in Bible study. Their
moral power becomes enfeebled. Sin appears less and less repulsive.
There is manifest an increasing unfaithfulness, a growing distaste for
life’s practical duties. As the mind becomes perverted, it is ready to
grasp any reading of a stimulating character. Thus the way is open for
Satan to bring the soul fully under his domination
Hasty, Superficial Reading Weakens Power of Concentra-
tion—With the immense tide of printed matter constantly pouring
from the press, old and young form the habit of reading hastily and
superficially, and the mind loses its power of connected and vigorous
thought. Furthermore, a large share of the periodicals and books that,
like the frogs of Egypt, are overspreading the land are not merely
commonplace, idle, and enervating, but unclean and degrading. Their
effect is not merely to intoxicate and ruin the mind, but to corrupt and
destroy the soul
“I Cannot Afford Our Church Papers.”—There are those who
profess to be brethren who do not take the Review, Signs, Instructor, or
Good Health, but take one or more secular papers. Their children are
deeply interested in reading the fictitious tales and love stories which
are found in these papers, and which their father can afford to pay for,
although claiming that he cannot afford to pay for our periodicals and
publications on present truth....
Parents should guard their children and teach them to cultivate a
pure imagination and to shun, as they would a leper, the lovesick pen
pictures presented in newspapers. Let publications upon moral and
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religious subjects be found on your tables and in your libraries, that
your children may cultivate a taste for elevated reading
Messages to Youth on Objectives in Reading—As I see the dan-
ger that threatens the youth from improper reading, I cannot forbear to
present still further the warnings given me in regard to this great evil.
The harm that results to the workers from handling matter of
an objectionable character is too little realized. Their attention is
arrested and their interest aroused by the subject matter with which
15
Testimonies For The Church 7, 203
.
16
Education, 189, 190
.
17
The Review and Herald, December 11, 1879
.