"As we read of his failure, we became somewhat mirthful over what seemed to us like a 'fool-hardy enterprise.' Had we known what we afterward learned as to why his scheme failed, we would have felt differently. We learned that hundreds had promised to join him that day at Harper's Ferry, not for plunder, but with the one object of liberating the slaves. The people did not come. Like Gideon's twenty-two thousand fearful and 'fainthearted' they stayed at home.

"Sister White at once checked our smiles over John Brown's case. She said, 'Brown's motives in that movement were all right. His sympathies were aroused for the cruel treatment of the slaves. That led him to make the move he did to secure for them what our Declaration of Independence says all men are entitled to – Liberty. John Brown's raid was not for plunder nor murder.'

"She then gave us to understand that there yet would be a move made in this country on a much greater scale than that of John Brown's for the liberating of the slaves. Now be it remembered that this prediction and counsel of Mrs. White was given in the latter part of the year 1859.

The war began in the year 1861. At that time the liberation of the slaves was not the issue. The war was undertaken to hold the States together. The South wanted to secede from the North, and the North wanted to hold the Union together." "The fighting went on for two years; but in January 1863, Abraham Lincoln issued his proclamation of emancipation. The country had asked the people to set apart a day of fasting and prayer that God would give the North success."

"In a speech by Ex-Governor John P. St. John, of Kansas, in Ottawa, Ill., to which I listened on the afternoon of June 29, 1891, he made the following statement:

The house was crowded with people, and it was indeed a solemn place. After coming out of the vision, she arose, and looking about the house, said:

"As a confirmation of the above fact, and as proof that the prediction was made on the day stated, and as an illustration of how the congregation understood it and circulated it, the following testimony is given:

"In connection with the prediction of that fearful war, Mrs. White further stated that Seventh-day Adventists 'would be brought into strait places in consequence of the war, and that it was the duty of all to earnestly pray that wisdom might be given to them to know what to do in the trying times before them.'

"At the time of the giving of the vision the Northern people generally had but little, if any, conception of the pending war. Even President Lincoln three months after,..... called for only 75,000 men, and these for the short term of three months.

"The total number of troops enrolled on the Union side during the war was 2,859,132. The Encyclopedia Britannica says that 'the Confederate army numbered, at the beginning of 1863, about 700,000 men,' but that it is difficult to ascertain just how many they had enrolled in all. It estimates their death roll at 'about 300,000 men.' Some of the late encyclopedias place the loss on the Union side,.....at 359,528.''

"As to the prediction concerning the men in the Parkville meeting-house losing sons in the war, I will simply state that in the autumn of 1883, I met the elder of the Parkville church, who was also elder in January 1861, when the vision was given, and asked him if he remembered the expression made by Mrs. White in relating the vision concerning the war. 'Yes,' said he, 'I do.' Will you tell me how many you know who were in the house that day who lost sons in the war? He at once recalled the names of five, and said, 'I know these were there, and that they lost sons in the war:and if I were at home, where I could talk with my people, I could give you more names. I think,' he continued, 'there were five more, besides these that I have mentioned.'

"Four years and more of persistent fighting on the part of the South until nearly half of all the mustered forces were lost by death in battle or from sickness, shows a striking fulfilment of the above prediction."– Pages 337- 340.