Observation
Quote
In my study of physiology I have recognized the fact that God is working in man at the present time, creating just as he has always been working in continuing and maintaining the work of creation week. I never undertook to differentiate between God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. I did not know it was necessary for me to do so. I am not very deep in theological things.
In his letter to G. I. Butler (August 5, 1905), Dr. John Harvey Kellogg acknowledged his belief in God’s active presence in creation but admitted that he never sought to differentiate between God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, indicating that while he leaned toward a Trinitarian understanding, he did not engage in deep theological distinctions on the matter.
Transcript
August 5, 1905
Eld. Geo. I. Butler,
1025 Jefferson St.,
Nashville, Tenn.
My dear old Friend:
Somehow the spirit moves upon me to send you a line tonight.
I wonder how things are going with you. Have you had a visit yet from the new master of medical ceremonies? to determine whether you shall have a sanitarium at Nashville or not? I understand he and Vice-President Irwin are coming down to look the ground over, and find out whether you are orthodox, and if you are, they will permit you to use the columns of the Review, and appeal to our people for help. I understand one of the conditions is that you must altogether denounce Battle Creek. Now what I want to say to you, my friend, is that I do not want you to miss any good chances for getting along in the world by standing up for us. We certainly need help, all the help we can get, but nevertheless we are not so weak on our legs that we must ask anybody else to run any chances of being thrown out and trampled under foot on our account.
We seem to be just now living in times when the old adage, “Every dog has his day”, is being particularly exemplified. It is not our day in Washington, but we are certainly having interesting times here. We have now about 800 patients, and good ones. We never had so many people, nor so influential people as now. The people who come do not say a word about paying our highest prices. Every room in the big building is occupied, and everybody pays full price, and pays for a lot of extras besides. Today I had a telephone message from Prof. Harper, President of Chicago University, saying that he will arrive tomorrow with his wife. He is coming here for examination and treatment. He is going from here to spend a few days with Rockefeller; then we expect him back. One of our nurses will go with him and carry out the treatment so far as he can. I believe we shall be able to help him, though perhaps not to cure him.
We have just had a patient come from Washington. She said she had been taking treatment at our branch there, and was very much surprised when I told her we had no branch there. “Why,” she said, “they told me it was a branch of this institution.” I, of course, expressed surprise at that. “Yes,” she said, “when I asked them if you were there, and how often you came, they said, ‘Dr. Kellogg was here just a short time ago.‘” She visited the place, it seems just after I was in Washington at the time of the conference. I am very glad our friends in Washington are not ashamed of us, at least when the question is one of professional standing; but I do not think it is quite fair for them to insist upon representing to the public that they are a branch of this institution when they endeavor to make it so clear to our people that they are on altogether a different foundation, that they have nothing to do with Battle Creek, but represent an institution founded by the founders of the Battle Creek institution. If they are to present themselves to the world as a product of W. C. W.’s genius, it seems to me they ought to conduct their institution just as the Battle Creek institution was conducted when W. C. W. or J. E. White and Co. left it. The institution at the the time I found it did not possess any great amount of prestige. They did some queer things back in those days when Dr. Ginley and “mother” Chamberlain were running things; but I have no disposition to boast of what has been accomplished. Whatever we have done that is good and worthy of commendation here at Battle Creek has been through the Lord’s help, and not by any special wisdom of our own. Our work has had to come up under such difficulties and tribulations that without the Lord’s help we certainly could have accomplished nothing; and he should have all the glory.
I just had a visit from one of the ministers of the Chesapeake Conference, who has just arrived from Washington. He lives in Washington, and has a pretty good idea of how things are going there, and he tells me that they are having awfully hard times financially. It seems good Brother Beard and Prof. Prescott have recently had an unpleasantness. He said he met Brother Beard on the street the other day, and he stopped to tell him they had just been having a board meeting, and he had told Prof. Prescott to his face that he lied, and that he knew he lied. His words were, “That is a lie and you know it.” Of course, I was not present; I do not know anything about the merits of the matter under controversy; but I understand things are considerably mixed up and anything but pleasant. The good minister also mentioned to me that he had a visit from Elder Underwood at the time of the Conference, and that Elder Underwood told him on his porch that Dr. Kellogg was the blackest-hearted rascal that had ever been connected with the Seventh-day Adventist cause. Prof. Prescott at Oakland told Dr. Waggoner that Dr. Kellogg was a rascal; but Underwood has, it seems, made new discoveries, and has found out that I am not only a rascal but that I have got a black heart. I think I shall have an x-ray picture taken of me to see what the color of my heart really is. It may turn out to be black after all. I know I am a poor sinner, and it may be I am a rascal; and it may be my heart is the color of soot. If it were not for the fact that you and Haskell seem to have some faith in me, and that my wife and children tolerate me, and that there are some 800 lawyers and doctors and senators and professors and presidents of colleges and other folks hanging around here begging me to give them attention, and a few other little evidences of a similar sort, I am not sure but what I might get flabbergasted and throw up the sponge, and let Underwood, Prescott, Daniells, Spicer, Evans, W. C. and the rest of the fellows that belong to the “ring” come up here and take my job and see what they can do with it. These fellows seem to be hankering for my scalp. I suppose I ought to give it to them. The trouble is I have but one, and so I could not fulfill the scriptural injunction which commands us to double the demands that are made upon us. If a man takes a coat, give him a cloak; also if he smites on one cheek, turn the other; if he requires us to go a mile, go two. As I have not a second scalp to give, I believe I will hang on to the one I have as long as I can.
I had a letter from Sutherland a day or two ago saying there was a man around there not long ago who wanted to give them ten thousand dollars for a sanitarium. It struck me it would be pretty nice if you could get hold of this man, or one like him, and get him to help you out with the enterprise you have already started at Nashville. I am glad you have had courage enough to make a start, and I want to assure you we will do all we can to help you along with this thing. We can give you most anything but money. We are compelled to put every dollar we can rake and scrape into a reduction of our debt; but I believe the Lord is going to help us to pay it off, and one of these days get the sanitarium endowed and make it a perpetual blessing to mankind.
I am feeling first rate, working harder than I ever did in my life before, and feeling better. My head is clear. The heavy load I have carried on it for a long time seems lifted. My heart seems lighter too. The Lord is certainly good to us, better than we deserve, and we re all of good courage, and are going to keep right on sawing wood and letting the hurricane roar, as Brother Haskell says.
When are you coming up to see us?
As ever your friend and brother,
J. H. Kellogg (signed)
P. S.----This preacher told me of a wonderful meeting they had in Washington just before the final breaking up, I think after you came away, after the Conference closed, in which Brother Willie prayed very hard that the Lord would help Brother Evans and Brother Daniells to make a good bargain with me with reference to the College Property and the Medical Missionary debt. I am afraid they went home feeling that their prayer was not answered. Funny things are happening these days, but everything is going all right. The Lord is managing the universe, and everything will come out straight in the end. I am beginning to see more and more clearly that all things work together for good. If there is anything that does not turn out well for us, it is our own fault and not the Lord’s.
A preacher came to me today to get me to explain to him about my pantheism. He said that he is going along with Daniells recently, and Daniells was ridiculing me by pointing to a dog and saying, “There goes a dog with god in him”; and then an ox, “There goes an ox with god in him.” He said Daniells gave him the impression that I taught that God the Father, God the Almighty was in that dog, and was in the ox. Of course I never taught any such thing. In my study of physiology I have recognized the fact that God is working in man at the present time, creating just as he has always been working in continuing and maintaining the work of creation week. I never undertook to differentiate between God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. I did not know it was necessary for me to do so. I am not very deep in theological things. The only thought with me was to make it clear that the wonderful things we see happening about us in the world are to be attributed to the divine Maker and Ruler of the universe, and not to mechanical causes which, once set in operation, go on of themselves without divine interference. This was my sole purpose in writing the “Living Temple”, and, do the best I can, I can not repent of what I did. After giving the matter careful and prayerful consideration for months, the best I can say is that the brethren have misunderstood my meaning and my motives, and have attributed to me motives and views which never entered into my mind; but I am done with the whole thing. It does not bother me any more, for I know the Lord’s hand is at the helm, and he will care for all of us in his own way, and correct false impressions so far as it is essential that they should be corrected in his own way and his own time. I have got more important business to attend to than squabbling with these men who have made it their business for the last three years to assail my work and my character. I might make things very unpleasant for them, for they have certainly laid themselves open to criminal prosecution for libel, but I shall simply let them go on their way while I go mine, and I will continue the work I have been trying to do for the last thirty years as the Lord gives me opportunity. Funny times these, aren’t they?
I wish you would ask me to do something for you. I should like to send you some good things to eat, but you don’t like my things, and I don’t know what service I can render you. If you get sick sometime, come up here and let us treat you. We will give you our best accommodations and the benefit of our best skill.
As ever your friend and brother,
signed J. H. Kellogg