It Has Not by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Nov 15, 1905

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 31, No. 46.

It Has Not.

By Editor

In a recent issue of a temperance paper we find these words, used in discussing the Sunday-closing of saloons: Violators of our Sunday laws seem to forget that the Fourth Commandment of the Decalogue has never been repealed.

Yes, and Sunday-law promoters seem to forget it, too. What has Sunday-closing to do with the Fourth Commandment of the Decalogue? That commandment enjoins the seventh day, the day upon which the Creator rested, which He hallowed, upon which and within which He placed His blessing, and which He commanded forever. That precept pertains not merely to proportion of time,—that is incidental,—but to the particular time, the day. What right has man to set it aside, put himself in the place of God, and declare that God means what He does not say? How much of the spirit of Sabbath violation is fostered by these self-constituted interpreters of Jehovah's law the judgment alone will reveal. We are not referring to those who are observing Sunday ignorantly, supposing it to be of divine institution; God will lead every honest soul of them into the light. We refer to those who interpret, construe, God's law contrary to His express words, and then seek to enforce their construction contrary to the Spirit of the Gospel and His own direct instruction. And the worst thing we wish them is that they may see God and His law as it is. If temperance people would disconnect from all religious legislation whatsoever, they would do far stronger work. Those who seduce them to work for Sunday-closing, are working for Sunday and not for temperance.