DICTATORS OF OUR OWN MORALITY.
By C. M. Snow
WE are prone to cling to many things that injure us; we are prone to fling aside many things that would do us good. The heathen will continue to chant a charm for a loved one's recovery when every charm has failed, and after the enlightened medical missionary has taken over the dangerous case; and the white man will keep his seat in the saddle of his hobby—his pet project—when the thing has been proved a failure again and again. This peculiar tendency has been strikingly illustrated in the attitude taken by some Sunday-law advocates toward the report of the Sunday-labor investigating committee of the Massachusetts Legislature. The report contains many statistics in regard to Sunday labor. It shows among other things that travel of the short-distance class (such as excursions to parks and beaches and points of interest and pleasure) has nearly doubled within the last ten years, and that the large proportion of this increase was in Sunday travel, both by land and water. Commenting upon this report the Congregationalist says:— "The public demand for labor on the Lord's day has thus been multiplied within a decade. Nor is this demand confined to any class or community. Church-goers are probably as exacting in these requirements as church-neglecters. "It must be evident that what the general public demands it will not consent to be deprived of by legislation. Attempts to forbid men by law to engage in Sunday recreation have been less and less effective, except so far as their amusements disturb the quiet to which others are entitled. Recent efforts have been chiefly directed to protecting workingmen from being compelled to work on Sunday. But the facts presented in this report show that workingmen would consider compulsory rest as great an injustice as compulsory labor on Sunday. Many of them have no religious scruples against working on that day, and they want the money they can thus earn. Social interdependence has grown so rapidly in recent years that it has become difficult, and in many cases impossible, for individuals to adjust their hours and days of labor to suit their convenience or their convictions. "Whatever legislation is to succeed in protecting the Lord's day must take into account existing conditions and public demands, and it must provide for a large degree of freedom both to work and to refrain from working. The people require that they shall be served with what they think they need on that day, and this includes being fed with wholesome food, having perishable goods cared for, and being transported to places where they can secure fresh air, out-of-door life, and social enjoyments." (Italics mine.) Now, here are several things that have been learned: The demand for labor on Sunday has been doubled in a decade; the demand is made by church-goers as well as by church-neglecters; attempts to forbid Sunday recreation have met with less and less success; the efforts put forth to "protect" laborers from Sunday work have been resented by the laborers, many of whom prefer to work on that day for the additional remuneration; notwithstanding the laws for the day's protection, it has become more secularized than ever. What should this have taught the workers for Sunday laws?—That their experience in this is attesting and emphasizing the fact that all religious legislation is wrong; that men can not be made religious, nor a day be made sacred, by legislation; that a longing for God can not be created in the human heart by any kind of human law; that a human prop can not strengthen the law of God; that an attempt to legislate sacredness into Sunday makes it more secular than it had previously been; that a human law to protect a divine thing (if Sunday were such) is a failure and a folly; that the Church and the State have each their proper functions, and that neither should interfere in the domain of the other—in short, that religion and the State should be kept "forever separate." But the lesson is not heeded. The quotation given above states that "whatever legislation is to succeed in protecting the Lord's day must take into account existing conditions and public demands." The facts and the conditions show unmistakably that Sunday legislation is a failure in creating a sentiment of sacredness for the day, or in decreasing the pleasure-seeking propensities of the people. Have they, then, discarded the hobby?—Not at all. They have expressed an intention of changing the style of its livery; but the same hobby,—the attempt to protect an institution which they consider divine with a shield which is only human,—is being ridden still. Ignoring the fact that all legislation of this character is wrong in principle and futile in practise, it is proposed simply to modify the legislation instead of discarding it wholly, in accordance with the lesson taught. When David found that Saul's armor, instead of "protecting" him would work against his success, he discarded it—he did not try to fashion it to fit his form. The Sunday law as a protector of Sunday sacredness has proved itself a failure, because it can not regenerate the heart. As a protector it has hampered the thing protected, for it has cultivated a trust in human law instead of a revival of religious feeling in the hearts of men. Energy has been spent in making, passing, and enforcing the law, when it should have been spent in teaching Christ in word and life, and the power and presence and sufficiency of His salvation. But to what will the change of livery in this war-worn hobby lead?—The quotation given above shows that, if carried out, it must lead to a man-made moral code. In other words, men are to become the dictators of their own morality; for "whatever legislation is to succeed in protecting the Lord's day must take into account existing conditions and public demands, and must provide for a large degree of freedom both to work and to refrain from working." Is man, then, to be both lawmaker and judge concerning the proper observance of the Lord's day? This is certainly the construction to be placed upon the quotation just given. The laws for the observance of that day must not run counter to existing conditions or the demands of the public. The public, as shown by the report of the Massachusetts investigating committee, are demanding that they be allowed to go where they please on Sunday, and that they be provided with traveling facilities for going there, a provision which necessitates labor on that day by others. There are many other things that the people are demanding for their Sundays, one of which is that they may do what they please on that day so long as they do not injure the persons or interfere with the rights of others in doing it. Still, they must have a law protecting the day, but it must permit the people to do whatever they demand to do. This simply makes the morality of Sabbath-keeping depend upon the wish or the whim of the populace; and when the people have decided the standard of their moral obligations in this instance, how long will it be before they will be attempting to establish for themselves in other things standards of morality which shall "take into account existing conditions and public demands"? What a flood of error such a sluice-gate as this would let in upon the world! It is wrong in theory; it is worse in practise. The law should change the existing conditions instead of the existing conditions changing the law. God does not hold men accountable to other men for their manner of worshiping Him; nor does He hold men accountable to Him for worshiping Him according to the commands of other men. But to what straits are men driven when they attempt to do that for which God has given them no authority?