The foregoing displays a commendable zeal, and as it is “not incompatible with our interests,” we comply with the writer’s request to publish it. But do you know, Mr. Horton, what it is which the Fourth Commandment teaches? Presuming that your zeal is for God, rather than for yourself or your party, we will undertake to show you. The Fourth Commandment teaches, that the seventh, not the first, day of the week is the Sabbath. You and all your fellow-helpers, assume that the thing taught is, that the seventh part of time is holy to the Lord. But you misapprehend the meaning of the Commandment.
When it is said, ‘The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God,’ the meaning is—not, that the seventh day is the Sabbath which the Lord thy God appoints for thee to keep, but—that it is the Sabbath which the Lord thy God himself observed. On this point almost every body blunders, understanding the Commandment as if it read thus: ‘Remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work, beginning upon such day as may be designated; but the seventh day, after these six days of labor, is the Sabbath which the7Lord thy God appoints for thee to keep. In it thou shalt not do any work,’ &c.
Now a candid analysis of the Fourth Commandment will show, that the meaning is something very different from this. The first words of the commandment, ‘Remember the Sabbath-day,’ refer to a well-established historical fact. ‘The Sabbath-day’ is synonymous with ‘the Rest-day’ and refers to some particular Rest-day, known and rendered notable in history as such. The remainder of the Commandment clearly sets forth, and specifies, the particular Rest-day to which reference is had. It sets forth that the reference is to that notable Rest-day which the Creator himself observed, when he had finished his work. That Rest-day, in its weekly returns, is the one which we are commanded to remember and keep holy. Is it not so, Mr. Horton?
Now, we will submit it to yourself, whether the Rest-day which the Creator himself observed after he had finished his work, was not the last day of the first week of time. And we will submit it to yourself, whether that is not the day which the Creator ‘blessed and sanctified.’ You yourself shall say, whether he did not ‘bless and sanctify’ that day, because that in it he rested from all his work. And you yourself shall be the judge, whether this reason can possibly apply to any other day of the septenary cycle. All the other days were working days—were they not?
It comes then to this: That the seventh, or last, day of the first week of time is the one in which the Creator rested—the Sabbath, or Rest, of the Lord thy God; that upon this day the Creator put his blessing, so that in its weekly return it might be holy and a blessing to man; that this is the only day of the seven, which can with any propriety or truth be spoken of as a ‘sanctified’ day; that this, and this only, is the one which the Creator requires us to remember and keep holy in its weekly return.
The meaning of the Fourth Commandment is, therefore, as if it read thus: ‘Remember the Rest-day—the day designated in the History of Creation as such—to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work, but the seventh is the Rest, which Jehovah thy God observed—after he had finished his work. In it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor the stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested on the seventh day. Wherefore the Lord blessed the Rest-day, and sanctified it, so that in its weekly return it might be a blessing to man, for whom it was made.’ Mark II, 27.
Now the precise thing which the Fourth Commandment requires, is the commemoration of the Creator’s Rest. And why commemorate his Rest? Because, in so doing, we commemorate the work which that rest implies. In other words, by commemorating the Creator’s rest, we commemorate the whole work of creation, and celebrate it as the finished production of an almighty hand. To commemorate the work of creation, therefore, is the duty which the law of the Sabbath enjoins. And it enjoins it, in order that man may be saved from the atheistic folly of supposing that the worlds came into existence by chance, or by some power other than that of an all-wise intelligence; and from the heathenish folly of supposing that the matter of creation was eternal, or that the gods of the heathen, or any other being but the God of Israel, had anything to do in the formation of the universe. As a testimony against Atheism and Idolatry, the Sabbath was given to man.
And now, Mr. Horton, tell us whether you are not now, and have not all your life been in the transgression of the Fourth Commandment. Does not your own example tend to the perpetuity of that ignorance which has so long prevailed in regard to this subject? Do you not, every seventh day of the week, go about work, and say, (by your example at least,) that it is not the day which God has pronounced holy? Do you not thus give the lie to Him who has said, ‘The seventh day IS the Sabbath?’
We do not suppose that you mean to be an example of disobedience. We doubt not, that you are actuated by more honest intentions. The tone pervading your “Address,” is proof that you are much distressed on account of what you suppose to be highly dishonorary to God. But since “the man that abjures the Law of God, contained in the Decalogue, (or Ten Commandments,) or any single precept thereof, whether the Fourth, Sixth or Eighth, is a wicked man”—these are your own words—you are, if you know it, in rather an awkward predicament.—We would advise you to consider, therefore, whether it is not time to take the beam out of your own eye.
“Pardon us, if we should seem to fail in our respect toward so large, so learned, so talented a class,” as the one to which you belong, “when we say, our disgust—say, more, our indignation is excited, when you give us an eloquent essay in favor of a proper observance of the Sabbath,” and then, before you have done, begin to show the people “how they may very agreeably (if wicked enough) break God’s Commandment,” to keep holy the seventh day, by just substituting the practice of Sunday-keeping instead.
“And still more is our disgust and indignation excited, when ‘from early morn to high noon,’ on each Sacred day, our eyes and ears and hearts are pained with sights and sounds unholy, presented and made,” not so much by “the thousand ragged, ignorant boys,” as by the well-clad, intelligent men, whose carts and carriages, and open stores, and thronged markets, and military parades, and bands of music, and places of amusement, indicate a complete forgetfulness of the fact that God has said, “The seventh day is the Sabbath—in it thou shalt not do any work.” This frightful state of things, which ignores the existence of an institution designed as a constant testimony against Atheism, you yourself, Mr. Horton, have helped to perpetuate.
“Consistency is a jewel.” Vainly, indeed, in our estimation, will you advocate” obedience to the law of the Sabbath, while by that very law you stand condemned. “Thou that teachest another, teachest thou not thyself?” T. B. B.