Morality of the Sabbath
By D. M. Canright
VI. Man's nature, physically and mentally, requires just such a day of rest as the Sabbath precept provides, and hence, like all moral precepts, it provides for a natural and universal want of the race.
Moral precepts are those which grow out of the nature of things, those which are founded upon the attributes of God and the nature of man. The Sabbath precept looks both ways—to God and to man, and may be said to be doubly moral from that fact. That man's physical nature requires just such a rest day as the Sabbath, is susceptible of the clearest proof. This man's experience for six thousand years has abundantly proved. A volume might be written upon this one point without exhausting the subject. We have room for only a few brief statements.
Experiments have been tried in various ways, and careful observations have been taken, all going to show that both men and animals will accomplish more labor in a given time, do it in a better manner, and preserve better health by resting every seventh day, than they will by working continuously. Where men or animals work day after day continuously, without a regular, weekly day of rest, they soon become worn down, jaded out, depressed in spirit, slack in their habits and every way unfitted for earnest, careful, cheerful, labor. Experiments with horses on street cars and canal boats have been tried; with men on railroads, in mills, mines, and other places; and every where the same results have followed.
Two mills with the same machinery, capital, hands, and everything have run side by side for a year, one working six days and the other seven days in the week. The one running six days accomplished more work, and did it in a better manner than the one running seven days. Travelers over the Plains have observed similar results.
The other day a judge in Santa Clara, Cal., told me his experience in crossing the Plains with teams in an early day. A large caravan started together. About half the party were in favor of resting upon Sunday. The other half were in so great a hurry that they opposed it and decided to travel every day. So the train divided, one-half resting upon Sunday, and the other traveling every day. The first week or two the Sunday travelers gained a little. After that the second party came up with them and passed them, and kept ahead all the way through. The party which rested every seventh day came through in better health, and with their teams in a much better condition than those who did not.
"In the year 1839, a committee was appointed in the legislature of Pennsylvania, who made a report with regard to the employment of laborers on their canals. In that report they say, in reference to those who had petitioned against the employment of workmen on the Sabbath, 'They assert, as the result of their experience, that both man and beast can do more work by resting one day in seven, than by working on the whole seven.' They then add, 'Your committee feel free to confess, that their own experience as business men, farmers, or legislators, correspond with the assertion.'"
"The experiment was tried in a large flouring establishment. For a number of years they worked the mills seven days in a week. The superintendent was then changed. He ordered the men to stop the works at eleven o'clock on Saturday night, and not to start them till one o'clock on Monday morning, thus allowing a full Sabbath every week. And the same men, during the year, actually ground fifty thousand bushels more than had ever been ground, in a single year, in that establishment before."
"A manufacturing company, which had been accustomed to carry their goods to market with their own teams, kept them employed seven days in a week, as that was the time in which they could go to market and return. But by permitting the teams to rest on the Sabbath, they found that they could drive the same distance in six days, that they formerly did in seven, and with the same keeping preserve them in better order."
"Two neighbors in the State of New York, each with a drove of sheep started on the same day for a distant market. One started several hours before the other, and traveled uniformly every day. The other rested every Sabbath. Yet he arrived at the market first, with his flock in a better condition than that of the other. In giving an account of it he said, that he drove his sheep on Monday about seventeen miles, on Tuesday not over sixteen, and so lessening each day, till on Saturday he drove them only about eleven miles. But on Monday after resting on the Sabbath, they would travel again seventeen miles, and so on each week. But his neighbor's sheep, which were not allowed to rest on the Sabbath, before they arrived at the Market could not travel without injury more than six or eight miles a day."
"A number of men started from Ohio, with droves of cattle for Philadelphia. They had often been before, and had been accustomed to drive on the Sabbath as on other days. One had now changed his views as to the propriety of traveling on that day. On Saturday he inquired for pasture. His associates wondered that so shrewd a man should think of consuming so great a portion of his profits by stopping with such a drove a whole day. He stopped, however, and kept the Sabbath. They thinking that they could not afford to do so, went on. On Monday he started again. In the course of the week he passed them, arrived first in the market, and sold his cattle to great advantage. So impressed were the others with the benefits of thus keeping the Sabbath, that ever afterwards they followed his example."
The Sabbath Manual, by Justin Edwards, D. D., pp. 50–52, 56–59.
The above statements show the necessity for a weekly rest day. They prove nothing in favor of Sunday which these writers call the Sabbath. The same benefits physically and mentally would follow from resting upon any stated day of the week. Other considerations determine which day is the Sabbath. But these facts do show that a weekly rest day is absolutely necessary for physical health and vigor.
Simply resting nights is not sufficient. An occasional holiday now and then is not sufficient. Nothing but a regular rest day, one day out of every seven, will do. We appeal to the experience of every laboring man who has ever tried both plans, to say if our position is not correct. After a good Sabbathday's rest, with how much more vigor, animation, and even delight the laboring man can commence another week's work. But alas! how forlorn and hopeless, how pitiable is the case of the man or beast that is compelled to labor on and on without any Sabbath day. It is a violation of a fundamental law which the Creator has stamped upon our nature. These are facts which are equally true in every age of the world, from Adam down, and among all nations, whether Jews or Gentiles, which shows that the Sabbath law meets a natural and universal want of mankind.
Constant thought and mental application in the same direction for seven days in the week is as ruinous to the mind as continued labor is to the body. This has been proved in the cases of students in colleges, lawyers in the prosecution of their business, and other like occupations. It is found that a continued disregard of the Sabbath produces a dispirited, listless, and careless habit; and that the same persons can accomplish more mental labor, and make greater progress in their studies by strictly observing a weekly day of rest, than they can by working seven days in the week. By unbending the mind, or entirely changing the course of one's thoughts and studies, the brain seems to recuperate, so that we can take up our studies at the beginning of another week with renewed vigor and power of application which those lack who have not had this mental rest. This I know from experience and from careful observation. A proper amount of nightly rest is not enough. Occasional recreation is not sufficient. God's own provision of a weekly day of rest is the only thing that will completely answer the requirements of the case. To whatever a man's mind is steadily applied during six days of the week, that he should entirely drop and lay aside on the seventh day, and turn his thoughts to something else. How admirable then, is God's provision for a weekly Sabbath day upon which all ordinary pursuits, whether physical or mental, must be laid aside, and that day be spent in devotion toward God. If this precept of the decalogue is not founded in the nature of man then there is not one of the ten that is. Of Sabbath-breaking Justin Edwards says:
"It is in opposition to another law; not merely to that which was written on the tables of stone, but to a law written by the finger of God, on the nature of both man and beast. They were not made for seven days' labor in a week, and they cannot endure it without diminishing their strength and shortening their lives.
"The Sabbath institution is not a positive or moral institution merely. It is based upon a natural law. And if it is the duty of laboring men not to commit suicide, it is their duty to keep the Sabbath.
"In the year 1832, the British House of Commons appointed a committee to investigate the effects of laboring seven days in a week compared with those of laboring only six, and resting one. The committee consisted of about thirty of the most prominent men of Parliament.
"They examined a great number of witnesses, of various professions and employments. Among them was John Richard Farre, M. D., of London, of whom they speak as 'an acute and experienced physician.' The following is his testimony: "I have practiced as a physician between thirty and forty years . . . I have had occasion to observe the effect of the observance and non-observance of the seventh day of rest during this time. I have been in the habit during a great many years, of considering the uses of the Sabbath, and of observing its abuses. The abuses are chiefly manifested in labor and dissipation. Its use medicinally speaking, is that of a day of rest. As a day of rest, I view it as a day of compensation for the inadequate restorative power of the body under continued labor and excitement. "I consider, therefore, that, in the bountiful provision of Providence for the preservation of human life, the Sabbath appointment is not, as it has been sometimes theologically viewed, simply a precept partaking of the nature of a political institution, but that it is to be numbered among the natural duties, if the preservation of life be admitted to be a duty, and the premature destruction of it a suicidal act.' This is said simply as a physician, and without reference at all to the theological question. . . . Researches in physiology, by the analogy of the working of Providence in nature, will show that the divine commandment is not to be considered as an arbitrary enactment, but as an appointment necessary to man."
"I have found it essential to my own well-being, as a physician, to abridge my labor on the Sabbath, to what is actually necessary. I have frequently observed the premature death of medical men from continued exertion. In warm climates and in active service this is painfully apparent. I have advised the clergymen also, in lieu of his Sabbath, to rest one day in the week. It forms a continual prescription of mine."
"The working of the mind in one continued train of thought is destructive of life in the most distinguished class of society; and that senators themselves stand in need of reform in that particular. I have observed many of them destroyed by neglecting this economy of life. Therefore, to all men, of whatever class, who must necessarily be occupied six days in the week, I would recommend to abstain on the seventh; and in the course of life, by giving to their bodies the repose, and to their minds the change of ideas suited to the day, they would assuredly gain by it. In fact, by the increased vigor imparted, more mental work would be accomplished in their lives. A human being is so constituted that he needs a day of rest both from mental and bodily work."—Sabbath Manual, pp. 34–39. Thomas Sewell, M. D., professor of pathology and the practice of medicine in the Columbian College, Washington, D. C., says:
"While I consider it the more important design of the institution of the Sabbath to assist in religious devotion and advance man's spiritual welfare, I have long held the opinion that one of its chief benefits has reference to his physical and intellectual constitution; affording him, as it does, one day in seven for the renovation of his exhausted energies of body and mind—a proportion of time small enough, according to the results of my observation, for the accomplishment of this object. . . . I have no hesitation in declaring it as my opinion, that if the Sabbath were universally observed as a day of devotion and of rest from secular occupations, far more work of body and mind would be accomplished, and be better done; more health would be enjoyed, with more of wealth and independence, and we should have far less of crime and poverty and suffering." Ebenezer Aldin, M. D., of Massachusetts, remarks: "After much reflection, I am satisfied that the Sabbath was made for man, as a physical as well as an intellectual and moral being. . . . Unnecessary labor on the Sabbath is a physical sin, a transgression of a physical law, a law to which a penalty is attached—a penalty which can not be evaded." Justin Edwards, D. D., bears this testimony: "It is now settled by facts, that the observance of the Sabbath is required by a natural law, and that, were man nothing more than an animal, and were his existence to be confined to this world, it would be for his interest to observe the Sabbath."—Sabbath Manual, p. 60.
A few years since six hundred and forty-one medical men sent a petition to Parliament upon this subject in which they say: "Your petitioners, from their acquaintance with the laboring classes, and with the laws which regulate the human economy, are convinced that a seventh day of rest, instituted by God, and co-eval with the existence of man, is essential to the bodily health and mental vigor of men in every station of life."—Associated Medical Journal, June, 1853, p. 554, quoted in The Sabbath, by Gilfillan, p. 180.
Such testimonies as these from the most celebrated business men, eminent lawyers, and skillful physicians could be multiplied to any extent, all testifying to just what we claim, viz., that the Sabbath precept rests upon one of the plainest laws of nature. It is therefore, moral in its broadest sense.
D. M. CANRIGHT.
San Francisco, Dec. 10, 1874.