CAUSE OF SUNDAY-CYCLING DESECRATION.
In the following from The Christian Advocate, Dr. Buckley well suggests that the real cause of backsliding does not lie in the special form of sin or temptation most prominent, or which lead people away, but in the real condition of heart which the temptation finds when it presents itself:— “Does not the power of the bicycle to demoralize the sabbath, as it has done, show that the church had, to a great extent, lost its influence before the fascinating wheel had come upon the scene? If its discipline had been what it should have been; if its means of grace had been fervent, its Sabbath-school instruction truly practical, serious, and spiritual; if its ministry had had the grasp upon the community which they should have had, and which at a not remote period they did have; and if Christian parents had exerted in their families the influence which they might have done, would not the church have stood as a solid rampart against this wave of sabbath desecration? and would not departures from the true sanctity of the Lord’s day, in spirit and letter, have been comparatively few?” While the above terms refer to Sunday, not the Sabbath, the principle holds good. The only way for the church to withstand evil or to overcome evil is to fortify herself from within, in God’s way. If the great popular church had done this, she long since would have been brought to see the true Sabbath of the Lord, and have found joy and strength in observing it in Christ Jesus.