THE SUNDAY QUESTION IN BALTIMORE.
The agitation existing in the city of Baltimore on the Sunday question, has already been referred to in these columns. A friend has sent us a package of Baltimore papers containing sermons on the Sunday question, and other allusions to the exciting theme. Most prominent just now, seemingly, are the sermons of J. B. Van Meter, pastor of the Mount Vernon Methodist Episcopal church. After laying down some general principles based on the declaration that “the Sabbath was made for man,” he is reported in the Baltimore American of Sept 29, 1879, as saying:— “These are the broad principles that are to guide us in the observance of the Lord’s day. We are left to apply them as best we can and as honorably as we will. We must work out our Sunday theories from these principles, for there is not a single specific precept in the Bible bearing on the subject, except Paul’s command to make charitable contributions on that day.” Then when we have made charitable contributions on that day, we have kept the only law there is for Sunday. But how much has this to do with the Sabbath? Judging from one more declaration, which we present below, we conclude that Mr. V.’s views of the Sabbath are much like those of the Christian Union; namely, that it is an institution wholly in the hands of men, to be manipulated by them according to their own pleasure. He says:— “I do not hesitate to affirm that the strict application of the fourth commandment to the modern world is an impossibility. As the Sabbath was made for man, it must bend and accommodate itself to the peculiarities of his ever-changing and ever-progressing history.” Then he goes on to say that certain branches of business must be carried on on Sunday, and that “when a man engages in an employment that necessitates Sunday work, he ought not to have laid on his conscience the sense of sin.” He apologizes for recreation on that day, and does not blame “the added hour of sleep” on Sunday morning. It would never do to let such views of Sunday, from a minister of the gospel, go unrebuked; hence another Methodist, H. E. Johnson, Independent, takes him to task for such loose views. Mr. J. plants himself squarely upon the fourth commandment, having yet to learn, what he must some day learn, that that commandment can never be made to enforce the Sunday Sabbath. This agitation is waking up the people everywhere to this great question; and the more people wake up to it the more the agitation increases. Let it go on. It is destined to shake this citadel of papal error as it has never been shaken before.