The Publishing Interests

The publishing interests loomed large as the new year opened. The Signs of the Times was to be published every week instead of an issue every other week. This called for bold plans to fill its eight almost newspaper-size pages every seven days. In his editorial column in the January 6 issue James White promised, “Our friends may depend upon the Signs weekly,” and added:3BIO 13.4

We commence the series of articles setting forth the reasons of our faith and hope ...with the article ...upon the millennium. These articles will continue in proper order quite through the year. Sketches of the life of Mrs. White will also continue, and will be very important to those who should know the facts in her remarkable experience.3BIO 13.5

The first article of that issue followed immediately, under the title “Mrs. Ellen G. White, Her Life, Christian Experience, and Labors.” It was written with the general public in mind:3BIO 13.6

The name of Mrs. Ellen G. White is widely known in consequence of her writings and her public labors as a speaker in nineteen of the States and in the Canadas. Her books in print amount to about four thousand pages which have had an extensive circulation. And her labors as a speaker cover a period of more than thirty years.3BIO 14.1

But in the last ten years the providence of God, in harmony with the wishes of the people with whom she has been connected, has moved her out to speak to the crowds at our annual conferences and camp meetings in the several States where they have been held. Newspaper reporters have given sketches of her addresses, and have made statements of their effects upon audiences which have given her prominence in the minds of thousands who have neither read her books nor heard her speak....3BIO 14.2

In view of the situation, we have for several years felt that it was due the public that the life, Christian experience, and labors of Mrs. White be brought out in a humble volume for circulation as extensively as her name is known.3BIO 14.3

James White then introduced his plan of letting Ellen White speak for herself by drawing matter from her biographical volume, Spiritual Gifts,, volume 2, published in 1860. The material was edited and somewhat expanded, particularly as the series continued over a period of many months.3BIO 14.4