ONE of the most significant signs of the times is the reception accorded in all
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American Sentinel
January 17, 1895
Pacific Press Publishing Company · New York · January 17, 1895
ONE of the most significant signs of the times is the reception accorded in all lands,—not excepting even our own,—to representatives of the Roman Catholic Church. The Catholic Universe of Dec. 7, 1894, has this editorial note illustrative of the foregoing remark:—
Detailed reports of Monsignor Satolli’s visit to Albany make it clear that the apostolic delegate was received by ecclesiastics and the highest officials of New York State, with every mark of distinguished consideration, rarely accorded even to eminent functionaries of Church or State. The fact may appear alarming to those narrow-minded fanatics who believe Monsignor Satolli to be a leader of the Jesuits, but level-headed folk, Catholic as well as Protestant, understand that the respect shown to the illustrious visitor, is nothing more than the due of the accredited representative of the acknowledged spiritual ruler of Christendom.
Such “distinguished consideration” is never shown to representatives of other churches; why, then, do the officials of New York show such consideration to Monsignor Satolli? It can be for no other reason than because Satolli represents not merely an ecclesiastical, but a political power. The papacy insinuates itself into the politics of every country; and it is for this reason that the officials of an American State deem it “wise statesmanship” to accord him such a rare reception.
An American Citizen Defends His Faith and His Rights.
A Victim of the Sunday-law Crusade Is Fined $50 and Costs For Keeping Open Store on the “Lord’s Day.”
W. T. GIBSON, a Seventh-day Adventist, of Everett, Mass., is arrested as the result of the work of a spy, who, sent by the mayor, purchases a half-pound of candy, and then informs. The defendant, when brought into court, pleaded his case substantially as follows:—
W. T. Gibson.—Your honor, I would like to say that I am not acquainted with the rules of the court-room, and therefore ask that you make allowance for any mistake I may make in pleading my case.
Judge Pettengill.—I think you will have no trouble.
G.—Your honor, the summons which brought me into this court accuses the defendant of keeping open shop on the Lord’s day, to which charge I plead not guilty (drawing a New Testament from his pocket); and I desire to define the Lord’s day by the declarations of Him who is the Lord of the Lord’s day as they are recorded in the Lord’s book.
Prosecuting Attorney.—Your honor, I object.
Judge.—Mr. Gibson, this is a civil, not an ecclesiastical court.
G.—Your honor, the summons which brought me before this court is by virtue of a law respecting an establishment of religion; and the very wording of the summons necessitates a religious controversy. The summons does not accuse defendant of doing work on the first day of the week, commonly called Sunday, but on the “Lord’s day;” and I desire to read from the Lord’s book a few scriptures, which will explain why I plead not guilty of doing business on the Lord’s day. The Lord’s book is the only authority which can decide which is the Lord’s day.
Judge.—Go on, Mr. Gibson.
G.—I wish to refer you to Mark 2: 27, 28, which reads: “And he said unto them, The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath: Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath.” Again, speaking of the Lord Jesus, the declaration is made in the second and third verses of the first chapter of the Gospel by John, that “the same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made.” The first declaration, your honor, asserts that18the Sabbath was made; and the second scripture declares that the Lord Jesus, who was in the beginning with the Father, made all things that were made in the beginning: hence, the Lord made the Sabbath day, and is therefore, rightfully Lord of the Sabbath day or Lord’s day. He it was who labored six days and rested the seventh day; “wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.” Now, having shown that the Son of man is Lord of the Sabbath day, I call your attention to Luke 23:56, to show which day of the seven is the Sabbath or Lord’s day.
Judge.—Please wait a moment, Mr. Gibson. Clerk, will you bring me the Bible? (After securing the court-room Bible, and blowing the dust from its covers) Mr. Gibson, what was your first reference?
Judge.—(After finding the text)—Go on, Mr. Gibson.
G.—I was about to read Luke 23:54–56. The text reads as follows: “And that day was the preparation, and the Sabbath drew on. And the women also, which came with him from Galilee, followed after, and beheld the sepulchre, and how his body was laid. And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment. Now (next verse, chap. 24, verse 1) upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others with them.” The text first quoted states that the Son of man is Lord of the Sabbath. This text states that “the Sabbath day according to the commandment” is the day which precedes the first day of the week. The Son of man is therefore Lord of the day which precedes the first day of the week, and that day is the Sabbath or seventh day of the week. Therefore the only day which the Son of man declares himself the Lord of, is the seventh day of the week and not the first day, hence the seventh day of the week, or the day preceding the first day of the week, is the Lord’s day.
Your honor, I would like to ask you if the law by which I am prosecuted, relative to the Lord’s day, is not based upon the fourth precept of the Decalogue?
Judge.—I question your right to ask the court such a question.
G.—Your honor, I do not insist upon your answering it, but would regard the answer as a personal favor.
Judge.—Well, I presume that it is.
G.—Well, then, your honor, we will presume that the law is based on the fourth commandment, which says: “Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” Now, your honor, all civil law, not only in this country, but in all countries, recognizes Sunday as the first day of the week; therefore Saturday, the world over, is the seventh day of the week. And, according to the testimony of Christ, as read from the New Testament, Saturday, the seventh day of the civil law of the commonwealth of Massachusetts and of all the countries of the world, is the Lord’s day, a memorial of the creative power of Jesus Christ. The defendant is, therefore, according to the Lord’s book, not guilty of keeping open shop on the Lord’s day.
It is admitted that the scriptures which I have read were written thirty years after the resurrection of the Lord; therefore, the Holy Spirit which the Lord promised to send, and did send, to lead men into all truth, after he ascended to his Father, and which indicted the scriptures quoted, teaches, thirty years after the ascension of the Lord, and still teaches to-day, that the seventh day of the week—the day preceding the first day of the week—is the Lord’s day, according to the fourth precept of the Decalogue.
The command relative to the Sabbath regulates the Christian’s duty every day in every weekly cycle in every year; in fact, it regulates the duty of man every day of his life; and the command, “Six days shalt thou labor,” is just as explicit as the command to rest the seventh day.
Civil law cannot regulate the duties enjoined by the first four precepts of the law. These precepts enjoin duties, which can be rendered to God only, and defendant is accountable alone to God for the manner in which he observes the fourth commandment.
Your honor, I claim the divine right of dissent, and therefore deny the right of the pope of Rome, the czar of Russia, the president of the United States, or the mayor of the city of Everett, to prescribe for me my religious duty. All I ask, as a free-born American citizen, and as a man, is the free exercise of my civil and religious right to worship God according to the dictates of my own conscience. I deny the right of the magistrate to compel me to observe the first day of the week, and thereby deprive me of one-sixth of my time in which to earn my living.
I have observed the Sabbath since 1878, previous to which time I kept Sunday. I require no civil law to enable me to keep the seventh day, and every one around me exercises his right to keep Sunday and labor on Saturday; and no man disturbs me in keeping Saturday. I disturb no man on Sunday or on any other day, and no man thus accuses me. All I ask is the free exercise of my right to worship Him who said, “The Son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath,” and the right to labor six days, according to the dictates of my own conscience, so long as I do not actually disturb my neighbors.
Your honor, I have not interfered with any natural or constitutional right of my neighbors, and I am not guilty of keeping open shop on the Lord’s day. And I trust you will so decide.
The court fined Mr. Gibson fifty dollars and costs; but remarked that he would not attempt to defend his decision except to cite a precedent of a higher court. Mr. Gibson appealed his case, and it should have been tried ere this; but for political and other reasons, the case is still pending, although Mr. Gibson, who is a poor man, has repeatedly demanded a trial in the interests of himself and his business.
The Papacy in Europe.
THE prestige and power of the papacy is rapidly growing in other countries as well as in the United States, and in those very countries too that have always been supposed to be particularly Protestant. Germany and Switzerland are the two countries in which the Reformation worked with the greatest power and took the strongest hold, and yet in a single number of the Catholic Standard, Dec. 23, 1894, we find three items which show that practically both of these countries are under Roman Catholic control once more. We reprint all three of them, for the situation which they present is worthy the sober consideration of all. Here is the first one:—
Once more the Center or Catholic party holds the balance of power in the German parliament, and most properly announces that in the coming struggle over the anti-Socialist bill they will use that power to a two-fold purpose. Unless the Falk laws are wholly repealed so as to allow the Jesuits to come back in full standing, they will defeat the measure in any form; and even if this just concession be granted to them, they will not support the bill in its present drag-net form, but will insist on its being amended so as to make it bear at least the semblance of fair play and regard for constitutional rights. Thus once more do Catholics stand out prominently as the champions of true liberty and equal rights for all.
Another one, the complement of this, is as follows:—
It would certainly be noteworthy were Prince Hohenlohe to be the instrument in wiping out the last trace of the Bismarck-Falk anti-Catholic laws in Germany. When they were enacted, and thus called into existence the powerful Center Party, he, though a practical Catholic, held aloof and failed to identify himself with the Catholic movement that has won such glorious fame. But now that he is chancellor, in succession to the real author of those laws, he finds himself in need of the Catholic vote in order to be able to enact the anti-Socialist bill into a law. Without it the measure is doomed to defeat, and accordingly there would be good reason for supposing the report to be well founded that the new chancellor has offered valuable inducements to the Catholics in return for their support. Time brings its revenges.
With a Catholic party in the German parliament, that is able to dictate legislation and force the acceptance of its will; and with a Catholic Chancellor of the empire who is one with it in spirit and ready to play into its hands politically, it is evident enough that the papacy once more has control of Germany.
As to Switzerland, the pointer is as follows:—
The country that, over twenty years ago, most closely followed the example of, and even sometimes surpassed, Germany in waging the famous “Kulturkampf” war against the Catholic Church, was Switzerland; and the imitation seems to be kept up. Last month a Catholic, even though he be but a “Liberal” one, became chancellor of what Bismarck wanted to make the Protestant empire of the world; and last week a Catholic, and a staunch one, Dr. Zemp, of Lucerne, was elected president of the Swiss republic. This is truly a wondrous world. We may yet hear of Signor Crispi restoring the temporal power of the pope!
Yes, this is a wondrous world indeed. And in view of the situation as thus revealed, it is pertinent to ask whether the Reformation was indeed a mistake.
The papacy once had control of these countries. Was that control such a blessing that it is above all things to be desired again? If so, then assuredly her claim is justified—that the Reformation was so entirely an uncalled-for thing as not to deserve in any sense the title of “Reformation,” but, on the contrary, should be condemned as an unwarranted and mischievous innovation. But if, as is the fact, the control of these countries by the papacy before, was, as it always is in any country, a constant blight and a withering curse, it cannot possibly be anything else now; and therefore the Reformation was called for, and was in every sense a proper and righteous thing.
And the Reformation being a proper and a righteous thing when it delivered these countries from the domination of the papacy; and now these countries being once more dominated by the papacy; it follows that the people of these countries are more imbued with the principles of the19Reformation. And in that case it is only the logical consequence that the papacy should dominate these countries; for whenever a people become imbued with the principles of the papacy, whatever their profession may be, it is then a mere question of time as to that people and their country being dominated by the papacy in fact. And of this truth the United States is no less a striking illustration, than are Germany and Switzerland.
What National Reform Really Is.
WESTERN PENNSYLVANIA is the habitat of National Reform in the United States, hence it is there seen in its best, or rather, worst aspects.
It was in western Pennsylvania that Alexander Campbell battled against the “Moral Societies,” the National Reform Association of three-quarters of a century ago; and it is in western Pennsylvania that the most radical National Reform utterances are heard to-day.
In the recent National Reform convention in New Castle, Dr. R. J. George, a leading light in National Reform circles, spoke on the “Duties of the State to the Church.” He said:—
The State is subservient to the Church. The nations and kingdoms which do not serve God shall perish.
It is the highest dignity and honor of the State that it has been placed under the authority of the Church’s head.
The State should profess the true Christian religion. The Church is to teach the State God’s message. The Sabbath mail service is an assault upon the Church, because it is trampling upon the sacred day appointed by God for his service.
The State must have its moral system maintained in its legislation. It is the duty of the nations of the world to protect the Church in its work among missions. The State should bestow national gifts upon the Church and thus testify the sincerity of her attachment to the gospel.
The State erects jails and gallows, but gives nothing to the Church.
The very first proposition in the quoted paragraphs shows the true nature of National Reform, and is a confession of all that has ever been charged against the system. Webster defines subservient as, “Fitted or disposed to subserve; useful in an inferior capacity; serving to promote some end; subordinate.” It follows that, according to Dr. George, and according to National Reform, the State exists only to serve the Church; and as service means obedience, it follows that the real governing power is the Church, and that the State exists only to enforce the laws and decrees of the Church. And this is simply the papacy over again, a veritable image of the papacy.
Again, National Reform asserts that the State should profess the “true Christian religion;” but before the State can profess the true Christian religion, it must decide what the true Christian religion is; and this must be an authoritative decision, binding upon the several units which compose the State, for the State is simply the people in their aggregate capacity. But the action of the people in their aggregate capacity is only the action of the majority, or more frequently, of an organized minority having control of legislation; and under the National Reform scheme this majority or a united minority having control of legislation, must decide for the whole people what is the true Christian religion. But to decide for another what is the true Christian religion is to assume the prerogative of infallibility, and thus again National Reform leads us back to the papacy,—to the church of Rome; for this assumption of authority to decide what is the true Christian religion, is the very groundwork of the papacy.
This Government was at the first framed upon the principle of equal civil and religious rights to all. It was not opposed to religion, nor to its free exercise, but only to any profession of religion by the Government, because in the very nature of the case any profession of religion by the civil government must of necessity trench upon the freedom of the individual. It was very properly held by the framers of the Constitution that the “greatest service any government can render religion is to let it alone.” This is Protestantism, and it was after this principle that our Government was fashioned. But now comes National Reform and demands that the fashion of our institutions shall be changed; that instead of remaining as our fathers made it, this Government shall be imaged after the papacy; that it shall assume the prerogative of infallibility and define and profess “the true Christian religion.” Is not this a fulfillment of the prophecy of Revelation 13:14, “Saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast [the papacy], which had the wound by the sword and did live”?
And is not this virtually what has been done by the action of the various departments of the Government? First, in February, 1892, the Supreme Court decided that “this is a Christian nation;” then followed the World’s Fair legislation, in which Congress assumed to define at least one dogma of the “true Christian” faith, by declaring that Sunday, the first day of the week, is the Sabbath according to the fourth commandment; and this at the demand of the churches, thus giving “the church” the place claimed for her by National Reform, namely, that of lawgiver to the State.
The principle contended for by National Reformers has certainly been admitted by the Government. Over and over again it had been plainly stated by Dr. H. H. George, as it was in the New Castle convention, that the church can have anything she demands from Congress. “The Christian people have learned their power; they can mould legislation as they will.” Such is the boast of National Reform to-day; and this being true, the State being, by its own acknowledgment, subservient to the Church, have we not in this country a perfect image to the papacy, a church dominating the civil power and using it to further her own interests and to enforce her dogmas? We certainly have.
Certainly, if Dr. George’s theory were correct, if the State should have a religion, it should support it. And this is National Reform as one finds it in western Pennsylvania, and as it is fast obtaining in every part of our land once the home of liberty of conscience, but now the seat of the image to the papal beast, the home of that iniquitous system whereby the Government lends itself to the combined churches to enforce upon the consciences of all men the unscriptural dogma of Sunday sacredness.
Papal Policy.
IN an interview in this city recently, Dr. F. Z. Rooker said:—
I left Rome on December 9, having my last audience with the pope on the evening of December 6. . . . The pope has just received the first copies of the oriental encyclical which had been prepared during the last days of my stay at Rome, and copies of which I bear to Monsignor Satolli. The encyclical concerns the steps that have been taken in the East to bring into the Roman Catholic Church many of the inhabitants of Armenia and the countries thereabout, who, though practically Catholics, still refuse to acknowledge the supremacy of the bishop of Rome. By establishing schools and permitting the natives of these countries to retain many of their old customs in the celebration of the mass, the pope hopes to gradually bring them into the church.
This has ever been the policy of Rome. Of the era of Constantine, Gibbon says:—
The most respectable bishops had persuaded themselves that the ignorant rustics would more cheerfully renounce the superstition of paganism if they found some resemblance, some compensation, in the bosom of Christianity. The religion of Constantine achieved, in less than a century, the final conquest of the Roman empire, but the victors themselves were insensibly subdued by the arts of their vanquished rivals.
This is the policy by which the “man of sin” causes craft to prosper in his hand, and by which he destroys many.
Dr. Mullally Opposes the Endorsement of Dr. Parkhurst’s Methods.
As is well known, there was quite a thorough political revolution in this city at the election last November. As is also well known, Dr. Parkhurst, by political and immoral methods, had a considerable share in bringing this about. Tributes of honor have been paid to Dr. Parkhurst by different secular organizations. Dr. Parkhurst is a Presbyterian in religious connection, and a member of the “Presbytery of New York.” Some, at least, of this Presbytery think that Dr. Parkhurst’s political work is so much of a Presbyterian affair that the Presbytery, as such, should honor him for it.20
To this end a resolution was introduced at the regular monthly meeting of the Presbytery in December,—the first after the election. But Dr. Mullally (all honor to him), braved the opprobrium that he could not help but know must come upon him for such a thing, and openly challenged the proposition. The report says:—
Dr. Mullally (he was careful to tell the reporters to spell his name with four l’s) does not believe that a minister is called to preach civic righteousness; he would draw a sharp line between duties to the State and duties to God, and he would exclude from “the court of Jesus Christ” all civil and social methods. If the members of the Presbytery want to give recognition to Dr. Parkhurst’s work they ought, he concedes, to adjourn as a Presbytery and meet as citizens. Of course they did not want to do this, and so put the resolution over for a month.
This is perfectly sound and Christian doctrine. And yet the Independent cannot pour contempt enough upon Dr. Mullally for having done this. And the Independent makes great pretensions to being in favor of separation of Church and State! Now if Dr. Parkhurst’s political and immoral work was done as a Presbyterian; and if this work was in the regular line of the work of the Presbytery of New York, then of course it is proper enough that the Presbytery as such, in the regular course of its Presbyterial business, should pass a resolution in commendation of him and his work; and then, too, it follows that the Presbytery of New York counts its interests and work as identical with the interests and work of the city of New York, and that, therefore, there is a union of the Presbytery of New York with the city of New York; in other words, a union of Church and State.
Dr. Mullally consistently advocates the separation of Church and State in the Presbytery of New York. The Independent professedly believes in the separation of Church and State, and at the same time scathingly condemns Dr. Mullally. Therefore from this, one of two things as certainly follows as that two and two make four; namely, either the Independent does not really believe in the separation of Church and State, or else it does not know what the separation of Church and State is. And in the United States there are entirely too many people who are just like the Independent.
Rome Condemns Free Inquiry.
THAT Rome is opposed to the right of private judgment, is evident from this editorial note from the Catholic Times of Dec. 15:—
Not Protestantism, but indifferentism, is the chief obstacle to the conversion of Americans to the Catholic Church. The whole spirit of the country is in favor of looking upon religion as a personal opinion. You are at perfect liberty to change your religious opinions as you do your coat and hat. . . . The only church with a shadow of a claim to unity and universality is the Roman Catholic. We should impress upon our countrymen the logical position which the church holds, and show them that it is not based on bigotry or intolerance, but upon the essential nature of truth, which must be exclusive. If there is only one true religion, any creed or opinion contradictory of that must be false; and if we can find out the one true religion, we need not prolong our investigations into anything that calls itself a church.
Yet all signs point to a wider diffusion of the false idea of religion as a private and personal opinion, which it is every man's birthright to choose, hold and reject at pleasure. This is the outcome of the spirit of free inquiry and private interpretation which was created and fostered by the Reformation. It is the glory of Protestantism, of which it has also been the bane.
There is no mistaking the spirit of this utterance. It is opposed to the right of private judgment. But if the right of private judgment is not to be exercised, it must be repressed, and that by force; there is no other way. And yet Rome poses as the champion of civil and religious liberty! But let it never be forgotten that in the terminology of the papacy, religious liberty is the right to “worship God according to the dictates of a right conscience;” and a “right conscience” is a conscience controlled by the Catholic Church.
Wrangling.
“PHYSICIAN, heal thyself,” is most applicable to the Sunday-enforcement champions. While posing as reformers and attempting to cure the Sunday-breaking malady, it is ever and anon apparent that they themselves are in dire need of a cure for selfishness, private ambition, and carnality in their chronic stages.
The last meeting of the Pennsylvania Sabbath (Sunday) Association, held at Williamsport, Nov. 29, 1894, was marked with a disgraceful contention between leaders over the distribution of territory, the term “wrangling” being applied by each party to the other’s conduct.
However, the latest wrangle among these self-appointed custodians of other people’s morals is between “Rev.” Edward Thompson, “general manager of the Sunday League of America,” and “Rev.” J. H. Knowles, secretary of the American Sabbath (Sunday) Union. Mr. Thompson, who has been operating in the West, recently came East, as it would appear to look for a job, and in order to aid in securing one, commenced distributing Sunday League literature and availing himself of every opportunity to speak and “lift a collection.”
Soon after, Mr. Knowles met Mr. Thompson on the streets of New York and challenged his right to invade his territory. Mr. Thompson replied as follows,—if Mr. Knowles’ public statement before the New York Methodist Ministers’ Monday morning meeting (Jan. 7), in the presence of Mr. Thompson, can be believed:—
Oh, this is only a temporary affair. You see I am seeking a pastorate East, and this is one of the ways I have of getting known.
Mr. Thompson was very angry at his brother for thus publicly betraying his confidence, and said:—
I did not know that what I said to him in confidence he would blabber all over the city and injure me in preventing me from getting a hearing before the more important churches.
After much bitter contention Dr. J. M. King, president of the Law and Order League of America,—the inquisitorial annex of the Sabbath Association,—raised applause by declaring, with much warmth, “Dr. Knowles needs no certificate of character from this conference, and any son of a bishop or of Gabriel who comes here to offer attacks on Dr. Knowles has come to the wrong market with his wares.”
All this is very fitting; these builders of the American image of the papacy act their part well. How all this reads like the rows of the Roman Catholic bishops when in the councils of the early centuries they legislated on what men should believe and thereby built the papacy.
Dr. Parkhurst and the Sabbath.
By E. E. FRANKE
While the name of Dr. Chas. H. Parkhurst is on the lips of so many people, not only in this country, but all over the world; and while he is being eulogized by religio-political law and order leagues, Sunday unions, National Reform associations, periodicals, and political preachers generally, as one of the greatest moral reformers of the day, it might be well to understand the doctor's position on the Sunday question, which is at present agitating these same leagues, unions, associations, periodicals, and political preachers, and which they are trying to enforce on the people by civil laws. In a sermon on the “Lord's day,” delivered in the Madison Square Presbyterian Church, New York, in May, 1886, and afterward published in the Christian Union, the doctor made the following statements:—
The case is a difficult one to state justly. That is one reason why the pulpit has so little to say concerning it, and one reason why so much that is written upon it misses its mark. It is a hard mark to hit.
No one who wants an itemized scheme of Sunday-keeping can obtain any such thing either from Paul or the Lord. Why not, then, revert to the Old Testament, and be contented simply to found a sermon on Sunday-keeping upon the basis of the fourth commandment?—Because that would get us into more difficulties than it would get us out of. The fourth commandment does not cover the Christian Sabbath.
We do not keep the fourth commandment by hallowing one day in seven, unless it is the seventh day we hallow. There is not sufficient promise in the fourth commandment to yield the Christian Sabbath as its conclusion.
The doctor says “the case is a difficult one to state justly.” We ask, Why?—Because when the case is stated justly, Sunday as God's rest-day, is relegated to the obscurity it deserves, along with the other relics of Catholicism repudiated by all true Protestants, while the seventh day (Saturday), which God says is the Sabbath, shines out in heavenly lustre with a plain “Thus saith the Lord” back of it. “It is a hard mark to hit,” says the doctor. True. The Bible is entirely silent about the Sunday, while every allusion to the day of rest, in both the Old and New Testaments, points clearly to God's sanctified Sabbath, the seventh day. This the doctor admits, and then adds, “The fourth commandment does not cover the Christian Sabbath” (Sunday). No, it certainly does not. While it is a fact that God's commandments “are exceedingly broad,” they are too narrow to cover this child of apostasy. See Isa. 28:20. They may call it “Christian Sabbath,” “Continental Sabbath,” “American Sabbath,” “Pearl of Days,” “Lord's Day,” or what not; but still its hideous countenance cannot be hidden, but stands forth in all of its deformity as a caricature of baptized paganism, having beneath its stolen titles its old solar name, Sun-day, or day of the sun.
Again, the doctor says, “We do not keep the fourth commandment.” This is a frank but sad admission. God says: “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. James 2:10, 11. In other words, the individual who breaks one commandment, is a law-breaker. The religio-political leagues, Sunday unions, National Reformers, and political preachers, etc., who are lauding the doctor as a reformer, may not digest what he says concerning their Sunday, but one thing is certain, that when our blessed Saviour, who alone is “Lord of the Sabbath” (the seventh day), shall appear the second time, the people who have accepted him as their Lord and Master, will be keeping all the commandments (Rev. 12:17, and Rev. 14:12), including the fourth which says, “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God,” and with him will “enter in through the gates into the city.” Rev. 22:14.
E. E. FRANKE.
Religious Liberty.
By GEO. E. FIFIELD
CHRIST came to set men free. He said, “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me; because the Lord hath anointed me . . . to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound.” Isa. 61:1. Perfect liberty is found only in Christ. God’s law is called the law of liberty. The inspired Word calls that law a hedge. It marks out those unchangeable boundary lines of right, between man and God, and between man and man, which must be recognized, else liberty is impossible to intelligent beings. All slavery, physical, moral, and intellectual, came from breaking that law. Liberty is found only in obedience to it. Still there is a sort of slavery in the futile attempt to keep it in our own strength. But Christ, through the new covenant, writes that law in the heart, so we not only have power to keep it, but his will becomes ours; so we, with Christ, delight to do his will, because his law is in our hearts. Here is perfect liberty. The perfectly saved will be perfectly free. Throughout eternity they will do just what they please, because they please to do just what makes liberty and joy possible.
Now, as to the relation of the State to the conscience of man. Christ found men enslaved to kings and to priests. He set them free from both. He taught that all men are brothers, sons of one father, and therefore equal before the law,—equal in civil rights. Rulers were therefore, only21their servants, chosen under God to protect them in the enjoyment of their rights. He freed us from the chains of priestcraft, by teaching the absolute independence of the individual soul in matters religious, and by promising the Spirit of Truth to guide each one into all truth.
It is true, all liberty comes through keeping God’s law; but God himself who wrote that law in the hearts of men in the beginning, who spake it amid the thunders of Sinai that all might hear and obey, writing it, not on perishable parchment to pass away, but on the fleshly adamant, to last forever, who waits through the new covenant to re-write it in every trusting soul,—God himself who did all this, still made man as free to disobey these precepts as to obey them. That men might be made thus free, God ran the risk of sin, and because God ran such risk, sin exists to-day. Why did God run the risk of all this fearful iniquity that man might be made free? To this there can be but one answer. It was because he knew the worthlessness of all forced obedience, and that, therefore, the freedom to sin was absolutely necessary to the possibility of righteousness.
After having at such infinite risk made men free to sin, that the internal principle of love might work itself out in outward acts of righteousness unhindered by force,—after having made men thus, has God given to any human authority the right to take away that freedom, and so thwart his plans? He has commanded all men to worship him and obey his precepts, and this command applies to each individual personally; but has he ever commanded any man or set of men to compel others to worship him, or to act even outwardly as if they worshiped him? To ask these questions is to answer them emphatically in the negative.
The civil power is the power of arbitrary force to compel men who will not be righteous, to at least be civil, that men may live together in peace and quietness. The true power of the Church, is the power of divine love manifest in human flesh, to win men to lead righteous lives. The two powers are entirely separate, and Jesus so taught when he said, “Render to Cæsar [the civil power] the things that are Cæsar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” When Peter, as a member of the Christian Church, sought to defend the truth by the sword, Jesus, pointing to his Father as the Church’s only source of power, said, “Put up again thy sword into his place: for all they that take the sword [i. e., in religious matters] shall perish with the sword.” The tares were to be allowed to grow with the wheat until the harvest. Then God would send forth his angels and gather out the tares and burn them. No human effort of arbitrary force was to be used in rooting them out, lest in the act the wheat should be uprooted instead. Again, Jesus said: “My kingdom is not of this world; if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight.” Every civil law has the power of the sword back of it. If it is right to make a law, then it is right to enforce it. In denying to the Church the power of the sword, Jesus therefore forbade the Church to ask the State for laws enforcing religious beliefs and observances. Paul understood this when he said, “The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds.” The early Church, strong only in the power of God, triumphed grandly, even over the opposing force of a false religion, upheld by a false State. Only when she allied herself with that State, seeking its aid, did she deny her God, lose her power, and darken the world down into a night of a thousand years. The present effort of the Church to get the State to enforce the observance of Sunday, and to introduce the teaching of Christianity into the State schools, is but a revival of the pagan and papal doctrine of force in religious things, and as such, it is anti-Christian.