James White, the Highly Visible Exception

As we noted earlier, pages 54-56, James White since 1844 had been doing the work of several men. By the time he was 44 he was worn out. He had carried the burden of financial accountability when others were slow to contribute; he had almost single-handedly led a “scattered flock” into becoming an organized church with doctrinal unity and a common goal; his pen had become a remarkable expositor of clear gospel teachings; and he was a constant source of encouragement and vision for others. But he did not know how to rest, nor was he temperate in his eating habits.MOL 301.1

On August 16, 1865, he suffered his first stroke after a week of unusual stress and little sleep. He was mentally and physically exhausted, virtually incapacitated. Realizing that emergency procedures were needed when he failed to respond to home rest, Ellen White remembered that her health reform principles included a special emphasis on hydrotherapy. But she did not know how this principle would work out in practice, especially for such a serious problem as her husband’s. So, in late September, 1865, she took James to “Our Home,” a health institution at Dansville, New York, that emphasized hydropathic treatments and other medical practices that involved natural methods rather than conventional drug therapy. ^{8One year earlier, in September, 1864, James and Ellen White had spent three weeks at Dansville, after she had completed Volumes III and IV of Spiritual Gifts. Volume IV contained the unfolding of her Otsego health vision of June 6, 1863. The principles contained in this Otsego vision were clear and the times were urgent; how to assimilate them and incorporate them into practical living would take time and experience. A timely article by Dr. James C. Jackson, “Our Home’s” administrator, on the treatment of diphtheria was reprinted in the church paper in February, 1863, and greatly impressed the Whites. At a time when terrified parents watched their children die without medical hope, the Whites employed the water treatment method advocated by Jackson, and three children, Moses Hull’s boy and the Whites’ Edson and Willie, survived diphtheria. Yet, later in November 1863, Henry’s cold became pneumonia and was treated with conventional drug therapy with no positive results. Although the Whites understood the principle of hydrotherapy when it applied to diphtheria, they had not yet seen its application to other diseases. The theory needed time and experience before it became a compelling principle in practice. The Whites sensed this need for a practical understanding of the full application of the Otsego health vision. Certain dietary changes were immediately made in regard to meat-eating, butter, healthier bread, less salt, and two meals a day, but other changes were yet to be made as the principles became clearer over time. Thus, off to Dansville in September 1864, not only for their health after so much stress of travel and publication, but “to see what we could see and hear, so as to be able to give to many inquiring friends a somewhat definite report.” James White, in How to Live, cited in Bio., vol. 2, p. 83.}MOL 301.2

In reflecting on this decision, especially when some church members thought they were not truly trusting James to God in prayer, Ellen White wrote: “While we did not feel like despising the means God had placed in our reach for the recovery of health, we felt that God was above all, and He who had provided water as His agent would have us use it to assist abused Nature to recover her exhausted energies. We believed that God would bless the efforts we were making in the direction of health.MOL 301.3

“We did not doubt that God could work a miracle, and in a moment restore to health and vigor. But should He do this, would we not be in danger of again transgressing—abusing our strength by prolonged, intemperate labor, and bringing upon ourselves even a worse condition of things?” ^{9The Review and Herald, February 20, 1866.}MOL 301.4