WE do not question the sincerity of the author of the following lines. It is an honest effort to reconcile two conflicting views and bring together Seventh-day people and First-day people in the observance of two days. But it can not be done. This is what he says:
By common consent and usage, the first day of the week, called the Lord's day, is set apart by the church and recognized by the state as a day for religious worship. The Lord's day, however, is not a day of rest but a day of strenuous Christian endeavor and service. With many persons Sunday is the most laborious day of the week. Moreover, a large number of persons, especially among the working people, if they want any time for themselves, usually take Sunday because all their other time is required by their secular duties.
Why not have one day in the week for physical rest? And, as a preparation for the activities of the Lord's day, there is no day more fitting than the seventh day of the week. The fact that such an arrangement may seem to favor the seventh-day Sabbath is no argument against it, but may really be considered an argument for it by many persons who are not clear in their own minds concerning the Sabbath question.
They hold that the Ten Commandments, as the moral law, are entirely distinct from the ceremonial law of the Jews, and that we have no more right to change one of them than we have to change another; they also hold that the seventh-day rest antedates all Jewish law and was intended for all men as a commemoration of creation.
By associating the cessation of the usual routine of daily toil with the seventh day of the week, there would not necessarily be any detraction from the Lord's day but it would rather emphasize the true significance of that day,—the joyful commemoration of resurrection and re-creation, which is the central fact of Christianity, the keystone of the Gospel arch, the hope of humanity.
A general observance of such a rest day would not revolutionize social conditions. Its practicability can be seen in the fact that at the present time, all the teachers employed and the pupils enrolled in the schools of our country, comprising about twenty-three per cent. of the entire population, observe Saturday as a day of rest; and if it is beneficial for the mental toiler, why not for the physical toiler? —The Ideal Church.
He who recognizes the holiness of God's law can never compromise. The Sabbath is not given as a day of mere cessation from labor, but a memorial-day of God, a holy worship-day, the only Lord's day of the Bible according to the Bible. "To obey is better than sacrifice." "Why call ye Me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?" Putting the two days on a level is putting no difference between the holy and the profane. Why not settle the question, not with a divided, halting, indeterminate, and expediency-loving public, but with God? The Bible never points to a day as the memorial of the resurrection. God's witness before men of that great event is the manifestation of His power and life and righteousness in men.