Individual Character Versus Legislation
In the New York Observer's notice of the death of John Bright sometime ago there occurred a statement which is worthy of preservation and of special note in this age, when the tendency is to try to elevate people in bulk. The statement is this:— “He cared supremely for the development of individual character; he preferred the material prosperity of the people, advancing slowly by their own efforts to quicker progress by State aid.”
There is probably not a National Reformer who would not agree with Mr. Bright in this. They would agree that the idea is absurd that men can be established on a higher pecuniary basis by legislation. They know well that it is individual character and energy that determine a man's standing. The State might pass a law that every individual should have a certain amount of property, and it might even distribute property so that each should have an equality, but in less time than it would take to make the distribution, some would have a great deal more, and some would have none at all. But if this is absurd in temporal matters, how much more so in matters pertaining to morals. National Reformers would have the State pass laws to make men moral and to elevate them spiritually, when it has not power to overcome individual characteristics sufficiently to make a rich man out of a man that is poor because of a lack of energy. There is at the present day, as we have before said, a tendency to do everything in bulk. Charity is carried on by associations; and temperance work, instead of being performed by and for individuals as formerly, is now relegated almost entirely to societies and political parties. And so it is with Christian work. People are getting tired of laboring for individuals, as the Master did. To labor personally for people seems too slow, so they want to have laws passed which will gather them in by the hundreds and thousands. The natural consequence of this is to put personal labor entirely at a discount. The only kind of labor which can accomplish any real results is despised because of its humility. Let the professed Christian people of this country become infatuated with the idea of National Reform, and real Christian effort would cease at once. Fortunately there are some still who believe that the conversion of one individual is of far more value than the forced compliance of a thousand to outward forms. Mr. Crafts and Seventh-Day Christians
Not long since a communication from Mr. Crafts in reply to a Mr. Cadman on “Cardinal Gibbons and the Sunday-Rest Bill,” appeared in a morning newspaper of Chicago. In that letter Mr. Crafts states that seventh-day Christians are guilty of “slanders,” “malicious misstatements and misquotations.” This letter of Mr. Crafts’ called out in the Chicago Morning Times, a letter from the Rev. J. W. Morton. Both of these letters are published in the Sabbath Recorder of August 15, from which we take this letter. The readers of the SENTINEL will be interested in the well put arguments of Mr. Morton:— In your paper of the 13th inst., the Rev. Wilbur F. Crafts, of the “American Sabbath Union,” charges seventh-day Christians with “malicious misstatements and misquotations” in reference to himself and the society he represents. As I am a Seventh-day Baptist I feel interested in this charge. I am not conscious, however, of having made any malicious statements about either him or his society, nor have I noticed anything of the kind in the Outlook, our denominational organ. But now that the question is up I want to call attention to a few misstatements and misquotations that Mr. Crafts and his co-workers have made. I do not say maliciously, but at least carelessly. 1. In the official notes of a hearing on the Sunday-Rest bill before Mr. Blair’s committee, December 13, 1888, Mr. Crafts says of Cardinal Gibbons’ letter, in the foot-note to page 18: “The letter is not equal in value to the individual signatures of the millions he represents, but no loyal Catholic priest or paper or person will oppose what has thus been indorsed.” In his letter to the Morning News he says that it was “distinctly said” that the letter “was not equivalent to the signatures of the whole Catholic Church, although it was hoped it would be equivalent to a negative indorsement by that church, in that the approval of the Cardinal, it was thought, would prevent opposition to the Sunday-Rest petition by any loyal Catholic.” Observe the difference. In the original the statement is absolute that no loyal Catholic will oppose the Cardinal’s letter. In the quotation “it was hoped” and “it was thought” that “the approval of the Cardinal” “would prevent opposition” “by any loyal Catholic.” Now what is this but gross misquotation and misrepresentation? 2. In the same document (page 124) Mr. Crafts says: “It would not be reasonable for legislatures to compel the ninety-nine one-hundredths of the population who do not regard Saturday as a sacred day to stop business for the less than one per cent. who do. If this were done, the Mohammedan immigrants of the future would soon be asking for laws halting industry on their sacred Friday also.” Now, here is an indirect, but none the less positive, assertion that observers of the Seventh day—Jews, seventh-day Adventists, and Seventh-day Baptists, desire the enactment of laws compelling others to keep Saturday holy. But Mr. Crafts ought to know that not one of either of these classes has ever petitioned for anything of the kind, while seventh-day Christians at least, have constantly and publicly declared their opposition to all civil Sabbath laws. Could there be a grosser misrepresentation than this? I do not say it is “malicious,” but it is unjust, injurious, and unworthy of a thoughtful Christian. 3. In the same document (page 22) Mrs. J. C. Bateham, a lady thoroughly indorsed by Mr. Crafts, in speaking of the great “half-mile” petition, says: “I do not know how many of these 7,000,000 have sent their individual signatures—it is said their are millions. I do know that nearly every State and Territory is represented, and that pasted on red cloth and arranged as drapery in the Foundry church of this city, for the American Sabbath Union now in session there, the petition is over half a mile in length, much of it in double columns; and yet this wonderful petition, doubtless by many millions the largest ever presented to this or any other government, is not yet full grown.” On page 24 these same 7,000,000 are said to have spoken “through their signatures.” These remarks refer to what Mr. Crafts calls “our half-mile double-columned petition,” which, he says, contains thousands upon thousands of individual signatures. Now Mr. Crafts must have known very well that Mrs. Bateham’s estimate of the number of these signatures was enormously exaggerated—that half-mile petition, though in double columns, could not have contained more than one hundred and sixty thousand2individual signatures, allowing sixty to each foot of double column, which is a very liberal allowance, indeed. Yet he allows the statement to go unchecked that it contained “several millions” and “was by many millions the largest ever presented to this or any other government.” As “field secretary” of the American Sabbath Union he ought to have corrected this egregious, published blunder long ago, but he has not. Seventh-day Christians are not “malicious” in their opposition to Sunday laws. They are as conscientious as Mr. Crafts himself, and he would do himself a great deal more credit by practicing a little more Christian charity than by sending sworn affidavits to religious bodies for the purpose of securing the “expulsion” of members who may have trodden on his theological or political corns. Crafts Charged With Perjury
THE AMERICAN SENTINEL, Oakland, Cal., for August 28, is largely devoted to refuting charges brought against it and its editors by W. F. Crafts, field secretary of the American Sabbath Union, who made an affidavit at Colorado Springs that the editors were guilty of willful and malicious falsehood and slander “by the square foot.” With the SENTINEL’s showing by means of fac-similes of letters written by Crafts to Prof. Jones, one of its editors, compared with the sworn statements of Crafts, the conclusion that the apostle of the National Sabbath law advocacy is guilty of perjury, is irresistible—Silver Gate (San Diego), Sept. 14. Sunday in California and New York.
By Ellet Joseph Waggoner
Mr. Crafts has been in California, the only State in the Union which has no Sunday law; and the people may now expect to have it held up in season and out of season as the terrible example of immorality and vice consequent upon having no Sunday law. In his speeches here he declared that the State had retrograded in religion and morals since the repeal of its Sunday laws six years ago. To be sure Mr. Crafts was not in California six years ago, or before, when they had a Sunday law, and has not been here since that time, with the exception of a few days this year; but that doesn't make any difference with him. But he does not find it all clear sailing in his endeavor to make capital for Sunday laws at the expense of California. At a meeting of the Congregational club in San Francisco, at which Mr. Crafts was present, the Rev. Dr. Barrows, of that city, said that what Dr. Crafts had said about the moral and religious declension in California was not true; that he had been here eight years, and that in all that time there had been a steady and constant advance in the moral and religious status, and that Dr. Crafts had been here but a few days and could not judge. He protested strongly against Dr. Crafts' carrying such a report back to the East, because it was not true. The report of the meeting continues as follows: “Dr. Williams of Tulare City indorsed Dr. Barrows' remarks. The Sabbath was as well observed in Tulare as in any city that he had ever lived in. He was certainly in favor of the workingmen having the privilege of Sunday rest, but for the churches to press Sunday observance on the State, upon religious grounds, and endeavor indirectly to compel men to go to church by strict Sunday laws, could do no good, and might do much harm to the cause of religion. Rev. Dr. Cruzan of the Third Congregational Church, San Francisco, agreed with Dr. Williams and Dr. Barrows. During his recent visit to the East he had spent a Sunday at Coney Island. There was nothing like it for immorality and dissipation on the Pacific Coast; yet this was right under the nose of Dr. Crafts when he was at home, in a State that had strict Sunday laws.” Let this be repeated everywhere Mr. Crafts goes. It comes from men who are earnest in their endeavor to get Sunday laws, but who are more interested in truth than in victory. It shows, what the Alta California claimed in a recent editorial, that Sunday laws are not necessary for the preservation of morality, and that California without any Sunday law is equal with, and even in advance morally, of some States that have a stringent Sunday law. But the point in the above quotation to which we wish to call especial attention is the charge by Dr. Williams, that Sunday laws, such as Mr. Crafts is laboring to secure, are an attempt to compel men to go to church. Mr. Crafts has complained bitterly because we have charged the same thing upon his movement. But here we have a statement to the same effect made by a minister who is engaged with him in an effort to secure a Sunday law, but who does not believe in going to the same length. This is another demonstration that the SENTINEL has not misrepresented the Sunday-law movement. E. J. W. “Look on this Picture, and on This.”
By M. C. WILCOX.
THOSE who are advocating a Sunday-Rest law are continually classing together all who oppose it. They say that here are seventh-day Christians in company with liquor-dealers, saloon-keepers, etc., and that one is known by the company he keeps. Granted that liquor-sellers are opposed to such a law. It does not make the law right because the liquor-dealer is pursuing a disreputable business. Many of these men who favor a Sunday law are Republicans, so are many liquor-dealers; but this does not prove that the principles of Republicanism are wrong. Many Sunday-law men are Democrats; many liquor-dealers are also; but that does not prove that democracy is wrong. Many prohibitionists are Sunday-law men, but, admitting Sunday laws to be wrong, this does not prove that the principles of prohibition are wrong. So, many liquor-dealers, and saloon-keepers, are in a certain way conjoined with Christians in opposing the principles involved in one certain law; but that does not prove that the Christians are wrong unless they indorse liquor-selling. And those Christians who oppose, especially, Sunday laws, most emphatically do not indorse the liquor trade or intemperance in any form. Their association with saloon-keepers is not association of persons or motives. It is purely accidental. Various parties are opposed to the law for various reasons. Infidels oppose it because they do not believe in the religion of those who advocate it; liquor-dealers, because it interferes with their ill-gotten gains; and Christians, because they have paramount faith in the Christian religion and in the liberty vouchsafed by that and which ought to be vouchsafed by civil government; because they believe such a law to be intrinsically wrong. Liquor-dealers, among others, have signed the protest against Sunday laws. They did it with their own consent, of their own free will. They did so, not because they loved the class of Christians which opposed the law better than those who favored it, but because they did not like the law. Some we presume have signed it at the invitation of Christians, but they were not compelled so to do. Others of the various denominations have done the same. The AMERICAN SENTINEL has labored to bring this question before all classes, in order that it might not pass Congress till all had had the opportunity, at least, to know the wrongfulness and downright wickedness of such legislation. In contrast with the above work of the SENTINEL, note the method of the American Sabbath Union. The majority of saloon-keepers, it is safe to say, belong to the Roman Catholic Church; yet the whole membership of that church was counted as favoring such a law on the individual indorsement alone of one member of that church. Therefore many saloon-keepers were counted, and that without even their consent. The association of liquor men with the supporters of the AMERICAN SENTINEL is purely incidental, while that of the American Sabbath Union, on its part, was premeditated and intentional. Not only that, but while the Sunday-law petition called for adults, twenty-one years of age or more, the children of all the great denominations, belonging to the churches, were counted with the adults. The constituency of the opposing petition will compare favorably with the constituency of the Sunday-law petition. And as far as methods in obtaining petitions are concerned, there is no comparison, but only contrast. The method of the SENTINEL has been open, ingenuous, and honest. The method of the American Sabbath Union has been secretive, ingenious, and dishonest. Reader, “Look on this picture, and on this,” and decide between. Truth and righteousness need not stoop to unjustifiable means. Some News.
By Alonzo T. Jones
The DENVER News says the AMERICAN SENTINEL “is doing great injury to the cause of the masses of America by discouraging the right to a day each week for worship, rest, or innocent recreation.” This will be news indeed to the readers of the SENTINEL, as every intelligent reader of the SENTINEL well knows that its work is and always has been to assert the right of every man to those very things. What the SENTINEL denies is the right of the State or any other earthly power to compel any man to rest who does not want to rest, or to compel him to rest when he does not want to, or to compel him to rest or worship or recreate to suit the majority. The SENTINEL has never denied nor discouraged the right of any man to rest or worship or take innocent recreation when he pleases, as he pleases, and as much as he pleases; but it forever denies the right of the State to compel those who do not want to do any of these things to do them in order to please those who do want to do them. The SENTINEL denies the right of the State to rob any man of his right to follow his honest occupation at all times. It denies the wisdom of Acts which make crimes of honest occupations, and it denies the justice of any system of law that punishes the honest, industrious citizen equally with the thief and the vagabond. Another statement of the News that will be equally newsy to the readers of the SENTINEL is that this paper “is doing efficient work for the enemies of all religion.” Why! the SENTINEL itself is a religious paper. We know it is doing efficient work; but as for doing efficient work for the enemies of all religion, this is a mistake. For the true religion, the religion of Jesus Christ, the SENTINEL’s sole endeavor is to do the most efficient work that it possibly can. And against every effort to support religion by the State or to enforce its sanctions or observances by civil law, the SENTINEL endeavors to do as efficient work as it possibly can. Any government which sets itself to aid, support or enforce the sanctions or observances of religion, is itself an enemy of all true religion; and he is the best friend to true religion who is most opposed to any such system. Any religious rite or institution whose observance cannot be secured without resort to the civil291power, ought not to be observed at all. Any religion that cannot sustain itself or its observances in the world without the aid of civil government is unworthy of the consideration of mankind. As those who are working most strenuously for Sunday legislation, are doing it professedly in the Christian name; and as the movement can only do the more harm to the Christian name as it becomes the more popular and powerful; so those who most love Christ will oppose the movement most. That is what the SENTINEL opposes and this is why we oppose it. And those who know the most about true Christianity will easily understand our opposition the best. Opposition to false religion is not opposition to all religion. Opposition to false forms of the true religion is not opposition to all religion. Opposition to false methods of securing conformity to false forms of the true religion is not opposition to all religion. Opposition to false methods of securing conformity to even the true forms of the true religion, is not at all opposition to all religion. Will the News please note; for this is the opposition which the SENTINEL conducts. A. T. J. Religion and the Public Schools.
“If the State is to furnish education in religion, in what, I ask, shall it consist? Who shall judge and determine what is true and what false in all that claims to be religion, or even Christianity—who shall pronounce with authority of law what is to be taught as embraced within what have been styled the fundamental or elementary truths of religion—who shall declare the amount, and kind, and degree of the knowledge to be imparted? “These are important questions, seriously propounded and deserving of respectful answer. The gentlemen on the other side, say they limit the religious instruction demanded to what they call a ‘broad Christianity.’ I have already once or twice adverted to the term. I do not know that I understand it. If I do, it is a ‘broad’ humbug. The Christian religion is not a vain and unmeaning generality. It is a definite and positive thing. It means something or it means nothing. In my view it is a supernatural scheme of redemption—a revelation from God of his gracious purpose and plan of salvation, to a race, ‘dead in trespasses and sins,’ through the mediation and atonement of Jesus Christ, who, being God from eternity, became incarnate and by his death upon the cross became a sacrifice for sin, made expiation for it, and having risen from the grave ascended into heaven and there sitteth on the right hand of the Father to make intercession for his people. The whole character and value of it as a religion, consists altogether in being, as it claims to be, a supernatural plan of salvation from sin, otherwise irremediable. Strike out from the Bible the parts which disclose, reveal, and teach that scheme, and the rest is insignificant. And any instruction or education in religion which does not specifically teach the facts which constitute that scheme, and which cannot be stated even, except as conveying dogma, is no instruction in the Christian religion whatever—it is simply instruction in philosophy and ethics, or practical morals. “Now, I deny the authority and the ability of civil government to decide upon questions of religious truth. “Now, if your honors please, the truth of religion is a matter of spiritual discernment. As the apostle Paul has said: ‘But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.’ It is a matter of spiritual discernment, and I ask the question in all sobriety where, in the constitution and organization of any civil commonwealth on the earth, from the beginning to the present day, there has ever been found a body of civil legislators capable of deciding for anybody but itself what is the truth in religion. “There is an old lesson on this subject. I find that in the trial of Jesus, as recorded in the Gospel of John, that the chief priests accused him before Pilate of blasphemy, saying: ‘We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.’ When Pilate had arraigned him; he said to him, ‘Art thou the king of the Jews?’ Jesus answered him, Sayest thou this thing of thyself, or did others tell it thee of me? Pilate answered, Am I a Jew? Thine own nation and the chief priests have delivered thee unto me. What hast thou done? Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now is my kingdom not from hence.’ Then when the Jews found that Pilate would not take jurisdiction of the case on the charge of blasphemy, on the ground that he had made himself the Son of God, and so had violated the law of the Jewish theocracy, they charged him with treason, on the ground that he was claiming to set himself up against Cæsar as king, and when they found out that Pilate sought to release him, the Jews cried out: ‘If thou let this man go, thou art not Cæsar’s friend. Whosoever maketh himself a king speaketh against Cæsar.’ “In this colloquy between Pilate and our Lord on this point, as to his kingship, and the nature of his kingdom, Pilate said unto him: ‘Art thou a king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Everyone that is of the truth heareth my voice. Pilate said unto him, What is truth? Then was the head of the civil State unable to comprehend, because unable, spiritually, to see the truth, as it is in Jesus—the truth of religion. “Let the civil authorities now as well as then, beware, when called upon by popular clamor, whether of Pharisees or priests, to pronounce upon religious truth, lest, in their necessary ignorance to discern it, they do not crucify the Lord of glory afresh! And let his disciples beware, lest, in tossing the Bible and its precious truths into the arena of political controversy, they violate that injunction and warning—‘Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.’ “It is said there are hundreds and thousands of children in this goodly, this Christian city, that have no chance or opportunity for being educated in what my friends on the other side call ‘the elementary truths of Christianity,’ not even a knowledge of that ‘broad Christianity,’ unless it can be given to them by a perusal every morning, by the teacher, of a few verses out of the Bible in the common school. I say, if it be so, it is a lamentable confession of great lack and neglect of duty, not on the part of the State, but on the part of the church, meaning by that the invisible body of true believers who are, as they believe, to create the kingdom of heaven upon earth. “It is said they are in the by-ways, lanes, and alleys. And can they not be reached there? Cannot the church send out its ministers, or are they too busy, day after day, in their studies, preparing to dole out dogmatic theology Sunday after Sunday, to the tired ears of their wearied congregations? Cannot they send out their Sunday-school teachers? Cannot they send out their missionaries? Why the command of the Saviour was to go out into the streets and lanes of the city, and into the highways and hedges, and bring all in, bring them in to the feast which he had prepared—this feast of fat things, of goodly things. Must we say that the church has grown idle and lazy, and can only hobble on its crutches, and therefore that our school directors must set themselves up as teachers of religious truth? No! Let the church cease to depend upon any adventitious or external aids. Let it rely solely upon the omnipotent strength of the Spirit of the Lord that is in it. Let it say to the State, ‘Hands off; it is our business, it is our duty, it is our privilege to educate the children in religion and the true knowledge of godliness. Don’t let them starve on the husks of a broad Christianity. Let us give them that which is definite, and distinct, and pointed—the everlasting and saving truths of God’s immortal gospel. “Don’t teach them, ‘Be virtuous and you shall be happy,’ but ‘believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.’ Now, I say, and I say it with all due humility, as one not called upon to instruct, but nevertheless, to say what is in me—let the church say: Here is our field; it is white to the harvest; here is our duty; here is our mission; here is our work, to evangelize, to save the lost and perishing crowd. “Let her rise up in the full measure and majesty of her innate spiritual strength—let her gird her loins for the mighty task—let her address herself with all earnestness and heroic zeal to the great but self-rewarding labors of Christian love—let her prove herself by her works of self-denying charity, to be the true church as Jesus proved himself to the disciples of John to be the true Messiah, when he told them ‘Go and show John again those things which ye do hear and see; the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up and the poor have the gospel preached to them.’ Let her organize all her forces for a more determined and closer, hand-to-hand, struggle with sin and evil, of every form, and the misery and wretchedness, of which they are the cause. Let her ministers and missionaries not only proclaim from their pulpits ‘the unsearchable riches of Christ,’ but descending among the hungry multitudes, distribute to them the precious bread of life. Let them declare to the rich, and the educated, their duties, their responsibilities, and their privileges, and lead them in person to the places where their work is to be done, and stimulate them by their example to do it. Let them inspire by their enthusiasm, and fire with their zeal, the indifferent and the slothful. Let them, by setting forth the beauty of holiness and the purity of ‘the truth as it is in Jesus,’ which is able to make us wise unto salvation, send the healthful and invigorating influences of292our holy religion through every social relation, and glorify the business and the pleasures of our daily and secular life, by consecrating them to the glory of our Father who is in heaven. Let them turn these streams of the pure water of life, welling up in the hearts of their followers, into the dark and pestilential receptacles, where ignorance, poverty, misery, and sin are gathered, and breed disorder and death. Then the great and the good, the noble and the wise, in the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth unto those things which are before, pressing toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus, in one grand array will meet and wrestle against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places, and shall wrestle not in vain, for they shall be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might; clad in the whole armor of God, their loins girt about with truth, and having on the breast-plate of righteousness, their feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace, and above all, taking the shield of faith wherewith they shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked, the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit. Then shall be hastened the promised time of the coming of our King, when there shall be a new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness—the Holy City, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband, the tabernacle of God with men, where he will dwell with them and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them and be their God. “But let them remember that to advance this glorious consummation the church must throw away the sword of civil authority which some of her too eager and impetuous sons would put into her hands; that the kingdom of her Lord is not of this world; that she must render unto Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s; that she must not permit any unholy dalliance with the solicitations of worldly power or advantage, but keep herself unspotted from the world; that her dominion is over the minds and hearts of men, and her victory achieved with spiritual weapons alone, by appeals to their reason, to their conscience, to the highest and best in their ruined nature, to be restored by the power, not of human laws, but of the Spirit of God, and that in proportion as she becomes conscious of her origin and destiny, of the divine life she bears in her bosom, hid with Christ in God, and grows into the recognition of her mission and place in the work and history of the world and of eternity, she will dissolve all ties that bind her to secular influences and the natural sphere of human interests and actions, and establish herself firmly upon the seat of her spiritual throne, whence shall silently but most potently issue streams of truth and goodness, wisdom and love, faith and charity, into all the channels of human thought and activity, to restore upon earth the paradise of God.” The American Sabbath Union did not have plain sailing in Los Angeles any more than in some other places in California, as is well shown by the following letter by the Rev. Thomas W. Haskins of the Episcopal Church in the Los Angeles daily Tribune of September 3:— The Tribune yesterday morning says that all the churches of the city except the Baptist were closed last night in order to take part in the mass meeting at the Pavilion in behalf of Sunday observance. Christ Episcopal Church was not closed, and I am told that St. Paul's was not. I do not think that Epiphany or Ascension were closed. I have no authority to speak for my brethren of the Episcopal Church, but speaking only for myself I did not unite in the meeting because I could not have done so without opposing the methods to be advocated, both as wrong in themselves and ineffectual if adopted, and so stayed away. Judging from what I have heard of the history of the movement elsewhere, opposition would not have been tolerated an instant even had I ventured to suggest it; the decree of infallibility has gone forth and now only seeks the sanction of Cæsar to force it upon the people. Straws show which way the wind blows, and the fact (if the Tribune report be correct) that the police were sent for to suppress the circulation of some printed matter in opposition to this movement shows its latest tyranny, under the specious plea of liberty and rest, to be developed when it shall have secured the power. The history of such efforts when they did come in the days of weal and power ought to make every humble Christian hesitate when he looks to the civil power to protect his liberty. We are now living under the blessings of civil and religious liberty. There is nothing whatever to hinder any Christian man or woman from honoring either the Jewish Sabbath or the first day of the week, and the law will protect him in this liberty. What more do we want? It will be time enough to file our complaint when this liberty is taken away. It is a question whether or not Christian people are not most to blame for the present observance, or non-observance, of the first day of the week, and all this fuss is nothing but a cloak of righteousness to cover nakedness in the sight of the Lord Christ. I have spoken plainly, but I asperse no man's motives. I only question his judgment in establishing the righteousness of Christ among men and bearing witness to his lordship over our hearts and lives.
THOMAS W. HASKINS.
Los Angeles, September 2. I will not allow that any Christian brother or minister of the gospel in this city or any city goes before me in sincere and unceasing endeavor to proclaim the gospel of Christ, nor minister the same when accepted, nor that any soul is straitened more than mine at the growing disregard of the Christian observance of the first day of the week, and it is very painful for me to have to differ from so many of my brethren in this latest effort to honor God's holy name. But as much as I love my brethren, I love truth more. A distinguished living divine has said that “men are so apt to settle into ruts, and think that certain things are to be taken as matters of course, that somebody needs to thrust an eternal interrogation point before them, if they are ever to stop and think at all whether the way in which things are going is the right way.” Let this letter of mine be the interrogation point as to the method of Sunday laws. That we desire all men to be Christians and acknowledge Jesus as Lord there can be no doubt; but that a single Christian will be made by the passage of a Sunday law, and its observance enforced by penalties upon an unwilling people, there is grave doubt. There is no warrant for such a method anywhere in the New Testament. No authority, or suspicion of such authority, was given by our Lord to his church. There is not a scintilla of evidence in the New Testament or the early Fathers that the Jewish Sabbath was transferred to the first day of the week, or that the observance of the first day was based upon the fourth commandment. In the earlier and purer days of the church, when under the shadow of heathenism and the curse of persecution, there is not a thread of evidence that the Christians sought to enforce their faith or customs upon the surrounding world. The history of such efforts when they did come in the days of weal and power ought to make every humble Christian hesitate when he looks to the civil power to protect his liberty. Sunday Laws and Workingmen.
By C. P. BOLLMAN
A STANDARD argument for more rigid Sunday laws in this country is that the “working people” may have a day of rest. The case is thus stated by Senator Blair, the father of the now famous Sunday-Rest bill:- “The mass of the working people would never get Sunday rest if there had not been a law of the land that gave it to us. There is that practical fact, and we are fighting for the tired, hungry man, woman, and child all over the country who wants a chance to lie down and rest for twenty-four hours out of the whole seven days.”
Just so; and “to lie down and rest for twenty-four hours,” or else go to church, is about the only chance that poor people would have under the regime proposed by the American Sabbath Union, the W. C. T. U., and National Reformers generally. In fact, the measures which they propose and to which Senator Blair has been lending himself would of necessity discriminate against the very class which it is proposed to benefit. Only those who live in cities can appreciate the privilege of an occasional outing in the country, or at least in some suburban park. But these pseudo philanthropists propose to place all such luxuries beyond the reach of the poor by stopping all public conveyances on Sunday. Now the tired son of toil, in almost any city, whenever the weather is suitable, can take his family on Sunday and by means of street cars, ferry boats, excursion steamers, or excursion trains, can in a very short time reach some park or other pleasant resort, more or less frequented, according to his tastes; and in some such place the workingman and his wife and children can spend the day more healthfully, more restfully, and more pleasantly than would be possible in the average tenement house. But under the new order of things, to be ushered in by a national Sunday law and by more stringent State laws, such privileges can be enjoyed only by the rich. Not being dependent upon public conveyances, the wealthy can, if they choose, leave their pleasant homes and drive to the parks or into the country, and enjoy upon Sunday that which they, but not the “working people,” can have the privilege of enjoying almost any day. But meanwhile the poor man and his family can literally “lie down and rest for twenty-four hours.” But how many care to do293that? and how much real rest is there in it if they did, especially for the tired mother who has scarcely been out of the house for a week, and for the children who desire nothing so much as a breath of fresh air and a sight of the trees and fields? But it is said, “Let the whole family go to church.” A good suggestion certainly; but suppose they do not wish to go to church? Who has the right to so hedge them about with restrictive laws that they will be compelled either to go to church or spend the entire day at home, or on the street, or at least within easy walking distance of home? Would not the effect of such laws be to shut the tired wife and mother up at home week after week, to put the children on the streets at least one day in the week, and send the husband and father to spend the day in some secret drinking resort? But why pursue the subject further? The real purpose of Sunday laws is not to benefit the working people but to exalt and honor the day as a religious institution, and to compel people to attend church by closing as far as possible every avenue of pleasure. In fact this purpose has been boldly avowed more than once by the friends of Sunday laws. Sabbath-keeping is good, and religion is good, but enforced idleness is not Sabbath-keeping neither is it religion, nor is it conducive to true religion.