A Response to the Video:
Seventh-day Adventism, the Spirit Behind the Church

by Bob Pickle

Answers to Questions Raised by:
Mark Martin, Sydney Cleveland
Dale Ratzlaff, The White Lie
. . . and Others

Discern Fact from Fiction

Health Counsel, Wigs, and the Reform Dress

[The following does not appear in all copies of the video. See the note preceding #117-#118.]

#124: "The book A Solemn Appeal also warned readers of the dangers of sleeping on feather beds '...sleeping on feather beds and feather pillows, in close, unventilated rooms... aids in inducing this vile practice of solitary vice...' A Solemn Appeal p. 96."—Narrator.

#124: She said not to sleep on feather beds. As with the quote under #119, this one comes from Dr. E. P. Miller, physician of the Hygienic Institute of New York City, not Mrs. White. His section in James White's Solemn Appeal was 21 pages long.

The seven words omitted at the middle ellipsis state clearly what Professor Fowler had in mind: ". . . is another cause of weakness and therefore . . . ." Since sleeping on feather beds in unventilated rooms causes weakness and poor health, wrong habits are less easily resisted.

Notice he said "sleeping on feather beds . . . in close, unventilated rooms." So sleeping on them in large, airy rooms isn't a problem.

It may sound strange today, but the idea that sleeping on feather beds in small, unventilated rooms was unhelathful was not an unheard of opinion back then. In 1856 a periodical listed seventeen "Ways of Committing Suicide" very slowly. Fourth on the list was "Sleeping on feather beds in seven by nine bedrooms" (Review and Herald, July 10, 1856, p. 83). Perhaps it had something to do with the bed accumulating moisture or mold.

At any rate, physicians who were not Adventists were still warning against feather beds decades after Solemn Appeal came off the press (The People's Common Sense Medical Adviser, pp. 279, 377, 378). James White apparently agreed in 1870 (Solemn Appeal, p. 270). In contrast, Mrs. White's writings never warned against using feather beds or pillows. She may never have agreed with the idea.

The video really ought to be criticizing the doctors of that age instead of Mrs. White, if they think there is a case to be made. But the criticizing of doctors who were never Adventists is not the purpose of the video.

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