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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Apr 5, 1877

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 49, No. 14.

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HOME TO THE RESCUE.

By C. W. S.

The Presbyterian has an article headed, as quoted by the Statesman, “A Sabbath-keeping Revival in France,” in which it is stated that one M. de Cissey, a layman and a Romanist, is “preaching to crowded houses in various parts of the Republic, urging a reform in Sabbath-keeping, arguing for the Scriptural sanctity of the day [meaning Sunday] and its observance.” The writer says, “France has no Sabbath in the true sense of the word. The ‘Sunday’ is the hebdomadal holiday, the stated or extraordinary election day, the public fete day, the day for military reviews, inaugurations, imposing parades, and all other grand demonstrations on the part of the government, and on the part of private people a day of work or amusement, as humor or advantage may prompt.”
This manner of treating Sunday, if not marked with all the pious reverence for that day that the papacy has claimed for it, is at least but the natural result of her teachings upon its origin and claims to sanctity. Let us see. The Catholic Church claims that the first-day Sabbath is a Catholic institution. In a work entitled, Catholic Christian Instructed, pp. 209–211, we read as follows:—
“Ques. What warrant have you for keeping the Sunday, preferable to the ancient Sabbath, which was the Saturday?”
“Ans. We have for it the authority of the Catholic Church, and apostolic tradition.”
“Q. Does the Scripture anywhere command the Sunday to be kept for the Sabbath?”
“A. The Scripture commands us to hear the church (Matt. 18:17; Luke 10:16), and to hold fast the traditions of the apostles. 2 Thess. 2:15. But the Scriptures do not in particular mention this change of the Sabbath. John speaks of the Lord’s day (Rev. 1:10); but he does not tell us what day of the week this was, much less does he tell us that this day was to take the place of the Sabbath ordained in the commandments. Luke also speaks of the disciples’ meeting together to break bread on the first day of the week. Acts 20:7. And Paul (1 Cor. 16:2) orders that on the first day of the week the Corinthians should lay by in store what they designed to bestow in charity on the faithful in Judea; but neither the one nor the other tells us that the first day of the week was to be henceforth the day of worship and the Christian Sabbath; so that truly the best authority we have for this is the testimony and ordinance of the church. And, therefore, those who pretend to be so religious of the Sunday, whilst they take no notice of other festivals ordained by the same church authority, show that they act by humor, and not by reason and religion; since Sundays and holy days all stand upon the same foundation, viz., the ordinance of the church.”
It will be seen by the above that Sunday is classed with the “festivals” ordained by the Catholic Church. The same is found in all their standard works upon the subject. In Abridgment of Christian Doctrine, we find the following testimony:—
“Ques. How prove you that the church hath power to command feasts and holy days?”
“Ans. By the very act of changing the Sabbath into Sunday, which Protestants allow of; and therefore they fondly contradict themselves by keeping Sunday strictly, and breaking most other feasts commanded by the same church.”
“Q. How prove you that?”
“A. Because by keeping Sunday they acknowledge the church’s power to ordain feasts, and to command them under sin; and by not keeping the rest by her commanded, they again deny, in fact, the same power.”
It being clear that Sunday is regarded by the Catholic Church as simply a festival or holy day of that church, it is proper next to inquire, “What are the days which that church commands to be kept holy?” The answer to this question, we quote from the Catholic Christian Instructed:—
“Ans. 1. The Sunday, or our Lord’s day, which we observe by apostolic tradition, instead of the Sabbath. 2. The feasts of our Lord’s Nativity, or Christmas day; his circumcision, or New Year’s day; the Epiphany, or twelfth day; Easter-day, or the day of our Lord’s resurrection, with the Monday following; the day of our Lord’s ascension; Whit-Sunday, or the day of the coming of the Holy Ghost, with the Monday following; Trinity Sunday; Corpus Christi, or the feasts of the blessed sacrament. 3. We keep the days of the Annunciation, and Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. 4. We observe the feasts of All-saints; of St. John Baptist; of the holy apostles, St. Peter and St. Paul. 5. In this kingdom we keep the feasts of St. Patrick, our principal patron.”
Having now an idea of the holidays of the Catholic Church, Sunday heading the list, it is easy to see why Catholics in general treat the day as they do, not regarding it as a day to be kept in any sense as the holy, sanctified Sabbath of the fourth commandment was ordered to be observed, but simply keeping it as a holiday. But the writer in the Presbyterian says that Romanists are beginning to see that this lax observance of Sunday has an irreligious tendency. He says,
“This open profanity, this desecration of the holy day of God, and even destruction of the faintest form of its sanctity, have proved an offense even to those who have a devout horror of Puritanism. Conscientious Romanists have seen that a dishonored Sabbath means the decay of religion, the demoralization of the people, the disturbance of the foundations of social order, purity, and peace. Monsieur de Cissey is at once the evidence and the advocate of this healthful reaction. Even though very slight, and though it come from the bosom of Rome, necessarily wearing a Roman coloring, we hail the movement with pleasure, and wish it God speed. . . .”
“M. de Cissey appears before his hearers in dress coat and white cravat, and with easy address, good-humored manner, and pleasant tones, lively anecdotes, and withal with deep earnestness and sincere conviction, pleads for the revival of a Sabbath in France. . . . The new cathedral at Digne has been opened to him, and the impression made upon the audience that filled the house was profound. . . . We trust that our hearty Presbyterian benison will in no wise neutralize the benediction which the Roman Pontiff is said to have given the new crusade. Moreover, we venture to commend the case of this lay preacher to the consideration of such of our Roman Catholic friends as have been exercised over the apostolic authority and ecclesiastical propriety of Mr. Moody’s work.”
Passing over the fact that the writer of the above has ignorantly or otherwise called this Romish festive day “the holy day of God,” we cannot help noticing his anxiety to have Catholics and Protestants join hands in this effort to put a false Sabbath in a respectable attitude before the world. This move on the part of the Catholics may prove a powerful auxiliary to the “Amendment” party of this country, whose chief end is to put this same institution of the Catholic Church “on an undeniable, legal basis in the fundamental law of the land.”
These moves are no surprise to us. For more than twenty years, Seventh-day Adventists have been showing from the prophetic word that Sunday-keeping would yet be established in this country by law; and we look upon the agencies that are at work in this direction as simply fulfilling the prophecy of Rev. 13:14,—“saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.”
But a very remarkable circumstance of this move in France remains to be considered, and that is this: It arises after our people have succeeded in awakening a great and increasing interest in that country upon the subject of the true Sabbath of the Lord.
It is a self-evident fact that a counterfeit is never made until after the genuine appears. Now, whenever it has appeared to the adversary that he could more successfully hinder the work of God, and destroy souls, by introducing a counterfeit religion, than by direct warfare against the truth, the counterfeit has been devised and presented; and a large number have always been ready to take it at par. Moses was sent to work miracles before Pharaoh, through the power of the Holy Spirit, and immediately the sorcerers, ancient spiritualists, imitated those miracles. But their power was limited; they could go so far and no farther.
The first advent of the Messiah took place as was foretold. Satan blinded the eyes of the majority of the professed people of God so that they did not know him; and since that time, he has presented a long list of false Christs, counterfeits, who have led millions to destruction.
When the appointed time came, the messages of Rev. 14 began to be sounded; and the people that John foresaw would at that time be keeping the commandments of God, and would have the testimony of Jesus, began to appear upon the stage of action. See Rev. 14:12; 12:17; 19:10. The spirit of prophecy was first manifested among S. D. Adventists in 1844. Not long, however, was the genuine allowed to be exercised alone. The counterfeit made its appearance four years after in the Fox family, near Rochester, N. Y., in the form of modern spiritualism; and so thoroughly had the theological track—the doctrine of the natural immortality of the soul—been laid for this engine of the devil to run upon that it made rapid progress, and now numbers its votaries by millions.
The great reform upon the observance of the true Sabbath, foretold in Isa. 8:16; 56:1, 2, 3; 58:12, 13, was commenced by the S. D. Adventists in 1844. At first, the work was carried on under difficulties, and moved very slowly; but it has been firmly advancing with increasing rapidity until the present. For several years, the enemy confined his plans to direct attacks; but this not promising to be a method so successful as was desired, he soon brought into requisition his skill in counterfeiting. He saw that if men could be made to conceive a greater fondness for the false Sabbath, already in vogue, if they could be made to take a patriotic view of the national benefits to be derived from giving Sunday an honorable name and legal protection, under the impression that by this the name of God would be honored and his authority acknowledged in the great Constitution of our government, a basis would be laid for a building of large proportions.
Alas! that the people might know what god they honor when they lift up the institution of Sunday-keeping. The God that made heaven and earth never authorized it, never sanctified it, never blessed it. He sanctified another day, the seventh day of the week, his own holy rest-day; and when he commanded man to do his own work upon the other six days, he forbade forever that man should set apart any one of those working days to be regarded regularly as a sacred day of rest. The god that is honored by religiously observing any one of these days is the individual or power that authorizes such observance; and when the time shall come when the law of the land shall demand that people reverence the first-day Sabbath, then it will appear whether we will worship God or another.
This national revival of the Sunday Sabbath first took form in a convention at Xenia, O., in Feb., 1863, composed of eleven different religious denominations. The association here formed was at first called a “Religious Council.” It was soon after known as the “National Association to Secure the Religious Amendment of the Constitution of the United States.” Its meetings have been frequent, and its popularity is increasing. It is supported by senators, members of the high courts, doctors of divinity, presidents of colleges and universities, editors, and men of high standing and great influence.
And now that the long-obscured light of the fourth commandment is piercing the moral darkness of France, where the papacy has long been a power, and the down-trodden Sabbath of the Lord is being made known to the people of that country, a Catholic layman, with the benediction of the Roman Pontiff, flies to the rescue of the Catholic Sabbath, and “conscientious Romanists” begin to see “that a dishonored Sabbath [Sunday] means the decay of religion.” Thus the raising of the ensign of truth is again followed by the unfurling of the banner of error.
As the third angel’s message is borne from land to land, and yet is one united voice, so may we not expect a union of churches that arise to oppose it—a union, the chief object of which is to contend for the only disputed doctrine upon which they can seem to agree,—that of the observance of the first-day Sabbath? We think there are indications of this, when Rome takes the sword, and Protestantism, to cheer her on, sends her “benison” across the Atlantic. C. W. S.