Signs of the Times, Vol. 6, No. 20. (5/27/1880)

Signs of the Times

May 27, 1880

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · May 27, 1880

GOD'S ABHORRENCE AND TREATMENT OF SIN.

By Ellen G. White

BY MRS. E. G. WHITE.

MOSES now requested all who had been free from this great sin of idolatry, to come and stand by him, at his right hand, while those who had joined the rebellious in worshiping the idol, but who had repented of their sin, were to stand at his left hand. The people arranged themselves as had been directed. "And the sons of Levi gathered themselves together unto him." This tribe had taken no part in the idolatrous worship. But a large company, mostly of the mixed multitude, who instigated the making of the calf, were stubborn in their rebellion, and would not stand with Moses, either at his right hand or at his left.

Moses then commanded those at his right hand to take their swords, and go forth and slay the rebellious, who wished to go back into Egypt. None were to execute the judgment of God on the transgressors only those who had taken no part in the idolatry. They were to spare neither brother, companion, nor neighbor. Those who engaged in this work of slaying, however painful, were now to realize that they were executing upon their brethren a solemn punishment from God; and for executing this painful work, contrary to their own feelings, God would bestow upon them his blessing. By performing this act, they showed their true feelings relative to the high crime of idolatry, and consecrated themselves more fully to the sacred worship of the only true God. "And there fell of the people that day about three thousand men." Terror filled the hearts of the whole congregation. They feared that they would all be destroyed. As Moses saw their distress, he promised, according to their earnest request, to plead with God to pardon their transgression.

Those who plead that great charity must be exercised toward the transgressors of God's commandments, may see in this instance of God's retributive justice how he regards that charity that would cloak sin, or shield those in iniquity. The ringleaders in this wickedness, without respect to friendship or kindred, were to be punished with death. Only those were slain who stood forth in bold defiance to vindicate their conduct, while those who repented of their sins, and humbled themselves, were spared. Some would call the prompt and decided measures taken, a hard and severe spirit. But Moses here received from the mouth of God, the interpretation of, or what he calls, sanctification. In the prompt decisive act of showing their abhorrence of such disobedience and transgression, they sanctified themselves. This integrity, this undeviating faithfulness, brought a blessing upon the tribe who performed the act of terrible justice.

Aaron failing to stand up boldly for the right, his yielding to the strength of numbers, placed him with the majority. Aaron represents the cases of a large number composing our churches at the present day. They pass over sins existing in the church which grieve the spirit of God. They are lax where order and principle are involved, because it is not pleasant to reprove and correct wrongs. They are themselves carried along with the current, and become responsible for a fearful neglect of faithfulness.

Moses represents a class who will call sin by its right name; a class that will give no place to sin and wrong, but will purge it from among them. Our abhorrence of sin cannot be too strong, if we are controlled by no personal, selfish feelings, if we labor disinterestedly for the salvation of souls, pleading in behalf of the erring, and those blinded by their own transgressions.

On the morrow, Moses addressed them: "Ye have sinned a great sin; and now I will go up unto the Lord; peradventure I shall make an atonement for your sin." He went, and in his confession before God, he said, "Oh! this people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold. Yet now, if thou wilt, forgive their sin; and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written." The answer was, "Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book. Therefore, now go, lead the people unto the place of which I have spoken unto thee. Behold, mine angel shall go before thee; nevertheless, in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them." The Lord further showed his displeasure at their act by afflicting them with a plague.

Moses manifested his great love for Israel in his entreaty to the Lord to forgive their sin, or blot his name from the book which he had written. His intercessions here illustrate Christ's love and mediation for the sinful race. But the Lord refused to let Moses suffer for the sins of his backsliding people. He declared to him that those who had sinned against him he would blot out of his book which he had written; for the righteous should not suffer for the guilt of the sinner. The book here referred to is the book of records in Heaven, in which every name is inscribed, and the acts of all, their sins, and obedience, are faithfully written. When individuals commit sins which are too grievous for the Lord to pardon, their names are erased from the book, and they are devoted to destruction. Although Moses realized the dreadful fate of those whose names should be dropped from the records of Heaven, yet he plainly declared before God that if the names of his erring Israel should be no more remembered by him for good, he wished his name to be blotted out with theirs; for he could never endure to see the fullness of Jehovah's wrath come upon the people for whom he had wrought such wonders.

The Lord directed Moses to move his tent afar off from the encampment of Israel, thus giving expression to the people that he had separated himself from them. He would reveal himself to Moses, but not to such a people. Here he puts a difference between the faithful and the unfaithful; and this rebuke was keenly felt by the sinful Israelites.

In sadness they had buried their dead, the subjects of the wrath of an insulted God, and their sin had also separated Moses their leader from them. Moses pitched the tent where God indicated, but he called it the tabernacle of the congregation. Anxiously the people watched the movements of Moses as he repaired to the tabernacle. They feared that God had separated Moses from them that he might destroy them in his wrath. When Moses repaired to the tabernacle, every man stood in the door of his tent until he entered. The people had laid off all their ornaments, for the Lord had said to Moses: "Say unto the children of Israel, ye are a stiff necked people; I will come up unto the midst of thee in a moment, and consume thee; therefore now put off thy ornaments from thee that I may know what to do unto thee." They stripped themselves of their ornaments, and humbled their hearts in penitence before God. Moses had not informed the people with what success he had interceded with God in their behalf; but in response to his earnest importunities, God had promised to send an angel before them, but he had refused to go himself up in the midst of them, lest in their wayward course his wrath should consume them in the way.

As Moses entered into the tabernacle, the symbol of his glory in the cloudy pillar stood at the door of the tabernacle. Had Moses made an attempt to lessen the magnitude of the sins of rebellious Israel, he would not have been tolerated in the divine presence for a moment, for he would have shared the guilt of Israel. He plead before God that he should spare his people, notwithstanding their great sin, and in thus doing show himself a great and merciful God. Thus Moses cast himself and all Israel upon the large mercy of him whom Israel had dishonored. Moses then faithfully presented before the people the aggravating character of their sin. He knew that mere sacrifices and offerings would not remove the guilt unless their hearts repented sincerely of their transgression.

Some in this age of the world seem to think it a virtue to call sin righteousness. But Moses called sin by its right name, a transgression of God's holy law. Moses required all who were truly penitent and humble in view of their transgression, to manifest it by separating from the congregation, and in the sight of all Israel repair to the tabernacle, and he would plead with God to forgive their transgression, and receive them back again to his favor. Conviction and thorough repentance was required of ancient Israel in order to meet the standard of God. No less does God require of his people in our day. There must be genuine heart work in repentance and humiliation, in order to come under this covenant care, and protecting love of God. Unmistakable evidence is given that God is a jealous God, and that he will require of modern Israel as he did of ancient Israel, that they obey his law. For all who live upon the earth is this sacred history traced by the pen of inspiration.

NOT OUR OWN.

By Dean of Canterbury

Not in anything we do,— Thought that’s pure, or word that’s true, Saviour, would we put our trust; Frail as vapor, vile as dust, All that flatters, we disown; Righteousness is thine alone. Though we underwent for thee Perils of the land and sea; Though we cast our lives away, Dying for thee day by day, Boast we never of our own— Grace and strength are thine alone. Native cumberers of the ground, All our fruit from thee is found; Grafted in thine olive, Lord, New-begotten by thy Word, All we have is thine alone; Life and power are not our own. And when thy returning voice Calls thy faithful to rejoice; When the countless throng to thee Cast their crowns of victory, We will sing before the throne— "Thine the glory, not our own." —Dean of Canterbury.

The Sabbath and Its Objections

By Chris. Herald

OBJECTION is often made, that with God's children, who seek his glory, every day is a Sabbath, and every work is holy. This is one of a class of objections which faithfully discovers the shallowness of the conceptions of God's truth in so many. We are not little units, for whom the world was created, and for whom God exists. We were created for him, and not he for us, and the Sabbath, given before the law, is a sign between us and God which the unconverted can read and understand. Every infidel knows that a Christian believes so fully in the God that he denies, that he thinks it worth his while to spend a seventh part of his time in the service of that God, and this is a sign that he cannot forget during an endless eternity. Let us not also forget that there remaineth, when Jesus comes, a "keeping of a Sabbath for the people of God" (Heb. 4:9, margin).—Chris. Herald.

THE UNITED STATES IN PROPHECY.

By Uriah Smith

BY ELDER U. SMITH.

THE BEGINNING OF THE END—CONTINUED.

To show the strong convictions of many minds that the conflict here indicated is inevitable, we present some further extracts from the Index. In its issue of Feb. 12, 1874, it says:—

"Yet in this one point the Christianizers show an unerring instinct. The great battle between the ideas of the State and the ideas of the church will indeed be fought out in the organic law of the nation. The long and bitter conflict of chattel-slavery with free industry began in the world of ideas, passed to the arena of politics, burst into the hell of war, and expired in the peaceful suffrages by which Freedom was enthroned in the Constitution. The old story will be repeated; for it is the same old conflict in a new guise,—though we hope and would fain believe that the dreaded possibility of another civil war is in fact an impossibility. But that the agitation now begun can find no end until either Christianity or Freedom shall have molded the Constitution wholly into its own likeness, is one of the fatalities to be read in the very nature of the conflicting principles. The battle of the Amendments is at hand; a thousand minor issues hide it from sight; but none the less it approaches year by year, month by month, day by day. Cowardice to the rear—courage to the front!"

The sentiment here expressed, that "the agitation now begun can find no end until either Christianity or Freedom [by which the Index means infidelity,] shall have molded the Constitution wholly into its own likeness," is becoming the settled conviction of many minds. It is not difficult to foresee the result. Infidel, the Constitution can never become; hence, it will become wholly the instrument of that type of Christianity which the Amendmentists are now seeking. Again the Index says:—

"The central ideas of the Church and of the Republic are locked in deadly combat—none the less, because the battle ground to-day is the invisible field of thought. To-morrow the struggle will be in the arena of politics, and then no eye will be so blind as not to see it."

At the Pittsburg Convention, in 1874, "Dr. Kieffer said that this movement was more political than ecclesiastical, appealing to the patriotism of all classes alike, and should be accepted by all. Dr. Hodge said it was in no sense sectarian, and the ends it sought could be accepted by one denomination as well as by another—by the Catholic as well as by the Protestant. He said it was destined to unite all classes. And their work was all in this direction."

The following from the Index, we copy from the Christian Statesman, of Jan. 2, 1875. We do not endorse its statements as applied to real Christianity, but it probably expresses the view which will be taken of this matter by the churches generally, and so may be regarded as an indication of the course that will be pursued by them. While the political religionist can see in present movements the prelude of a mighty revolution, we believe it to be the same that students of prophecy have for years been led by the word of God to expect. The Index says:—

"Nothing could be more apparent, to one who intelligently followed the argument from its own premises, than that this movement expresses at once the moral and the political necessities of Christianity in this country. It is not a question of words, but rather a question of the vital interests of great institutions. Christianity must either relinquish its present hold on the government,—its Sunday laws, its blasphemy laws, its thanksgivings and fasts, its chaplaincies, its Bible in schools, etc.,—or else it must secure the necessary condition of retaining all these things by inserting some guarantee of their perpetuity in the National Constitution. Looking simply at the small present dimensions of the movement,—at the fewness of its devoted workers, the paucity of attendants at the late Convention, and the indifference of the public at large,—one is justified in dismissing it from consideration as of no immediate importance. But, whoever is qualified to detect great movements in their germs, and to perceive that instituted Christianity is in vast peril from the constant inroads of rapidly spreading disbelief of dogmatic Christianity,—whoever is able to discern the certainty that the claims of Christianity to mold political action in its own interest must sooner or later be submitted for adjudication to the supreme law of the land, by which they are not even verbally recognized;—will not fall into the superficiality of inferring the future fortunes of this movement, either from the mediæval character of its pretensions, or the present insignificance of its success. It may possibly be that the Christian churches do not really care for their own existence, and are prepared to surrender it without a struggle; but we do not so read history."

"So soon as they come to comprehend fully the fact that their legal 'Sabbath,' their Bible in schools, and all their present legal privileges, must one by one slip away inevitably from their grasp, unless they defend them in the only possible way by grounding them on Constitutional guarantees, it seems to us an irresistible conclusion from history and experience that they will arouse themselves to protect these possessions as infinitely important. If they do not, they have achieved a degree of moral rottenness, cowardice, and hypocrisy which we are very slow to attribute to them. These champions of a Christianized Constitution are to-day the POLITICAL BRAIN of the Christian church. Conceding their premises, which are simply those of the universal Evangelical communion, it is impossible to deny their conclusions. It is these premises that we dispute—not the logicalness of the conclusions themselves; and although we hold that the same premises, if further carried out, must lead to the Roman Catholic position expressed in the Vatican decrees; we none the less admit the necessity of traveling that road from the starting-point, if it is once fairly entered upon. Hence we are as strongly convinced as ever that the Christian Amendment movement contains the germ of a demand that must sooner or later be heard asserted with perilous emphasis, by the body of orthodox Christian churches."

The character of this movement is thus described by one who was an eye witness at the Pittsburg Convention:—

"They show determination to make the movement popular, and to reach the feelings of the people by every means. In their speeches, they alternate with the most impassioned earnestness and gravest argument the sharpest wit and even laughable puns and incidents. Staid 'Reverends' clap their hands in applause as heartily as I ever saw done in any kind of gathering, and Old School Presbyterian Doctors of Divinity, who have generally been noted for clerical dignity, take the greatest delight in raising the cheers of the crowd by their keen thrusts and witticisms. The Commercial was publicly recommended as giving the official report, and of the speech of the President of Washington and Jefferson College, it said, 'Dr. Hays' address was received with frequent marks of approbation, and his witty points drew forth shouts of laughter.' Judging from what I have seen, the standard of piety is not to be elevated by this work."—J. H. Waggoner, in Review, of Feb. 17, 1874.

Between the professions of this Association and the objects which they are openly laboring to obtain, there is an utter inconsistency as the following considerations will show. In the Review of March 24, 1874, the writer last quoted says:—

"We are sometimes perplexed to account for the singular operations of the human mind. When we see men of good natural ability, and of superior privileges of mental and moral culture, persistently clinging to the weaker side in argument, and seeming able to discover light only on the darkest side of a proposition, or endeavoring to sustain themselves by taking contradictory positions, our charity is taxed to the utmost to give them credit for the ability they seem to possess, and for the integrity of purpose they claim. Seldom have our reflections been more forcibly turned in this direction than in viewing the course pursued by the advocates of the Religious Amendment. A late number of the Christian Statesman, speaking of the Seventh-day Adventists, says:— "'From the beginning of the National Reform movement, they have regarded it as the first step toward the persecution which they as keepers of the seventh day will endure when our Sabbath laws are revived and enforced. One cannot but smile at their apprehensions of the success of the movement without harm a hair of their heads, but their fears are sincere enough for all that.'" Pursuing the line of argument into a consideration of the question whether there is anything in the professions of the Amendment party calculated to change our opinion in this respect, he continues:—

"If a profession of good motives and of a desire to steer clear of a union of Church and State on the part of the Amendment party could give us assurance on this point, then might we cease to notice this subject. On this point they are very explicit. A few quotations will suffice to present their claims. Said Hon. Mr. Patterson in the Pittsburg Convention:— 'Be not misled by the assertion that the movement agitated by this Convention tends to religious intolerance, to wedding Church and State. No such tendency exists. On the contrary, this movement claims nothing but to secure in the preamble of our National Constitution an acknowledgment of the supremacy of God and the Christian character of our nation, such as is now generally and authoritatively conceded to be the law of our land.'"

"This, surely, is lamb-like enough to throw us all off our guard. The following remarks by President Brunot (pronounced Bruno) on taking the chair are equally innocent to view:— 'The fourth Article of the Constitution declares that "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States," and the first amendment in the Constitution provides that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." We have not proposed to change these. We deem them essential, in connection with the amendment we ask, to the preservation of religious liberty, and, with it, an effective guard against a union of Church and State.'" "And again: 'The attempt to destroy the inalienable right of freedom of conscience in religion in this our favored land would meet with its very first organized resistance from this association.'"

"And Dr. Kerr said:— 'We want no union of Church and State. Let that question be raised in this country and there is no element of the opposition that would rise against it that would be more decided and determined than that represented in this Convention. We wish no restraint of the rightful liberties of any man.'"

"These utterances are pleasant to read, and doubtless they and others like them have had much to do in enlisting so strong an interest in favor of the Amendment. And were these sayings, or those of like nature, all that they had put forth, we should feel constrained to regard the men and their work in a light somewhat different from that in which we now view them."

"RICH."

The term "rich" is comparative. Some men feel themselves rich on a sum that other men would think poverty. A man's own opinion of the meaning of the word "rich" is constantly changing. The amount that would make him rich to-day, will be altogether too small for that purpose ten years hence. There are many, no doubt, in this city whose idea of how much it takes to make a man rich constantly keeps ahead of the amount of wealth they manage to accumulate. They, very likely, say to themselves that as soon as they feel that they have enough they will do something handsome for the city, that will carry their names down to posterity. But, as thousands after thousands are added to their wealth, their idea of the word "rich" expands and they die really rich men, and in a few years are forgotten. This was well exemplified in the case of Miss Louisiana St. John, of New York. She lived most penuriously on Elizabeth street, in that city, and accumulated a vast amount of wealth. She started by renting a large tenement house and subletting it to tenants at a profit. Then she bought houses and lots that were sold for taxes and got them cheaply. These she resold and soon became rich. Her hobby was that she would make a magnificent gift to some charitable object and she constantly talked about how it was to be done. But she never felt quite rich enough. She was always going to do it. The consequence was that she died a short time since worth a million dollars, all of which will go to strangers, and her name will go to the oblivion that she hoped all her life to avoid by a munificent donation.—Detroit Press.

WORSHIPING THE GOLDEN CALF.

By Spurgeon

I WISH to show the suitability of my subject to this present time. I am sure it is not out of season. "Who is on the Lord's side?" let him come to Christ and consecrate himself this day to him. For first, the worship of the golden calf is pretty general now. Men are esteemed according to the amount of money which they possess; indeed, we say a man is "worth so much."

Though the man may not be worth a pair of old shoes, yet if he has a big house, a fair estate, and a huge capital, he is said to be worth so much. Poor little creature! In many cases his worth might be written on your thumb nail. It is not the man that has worth: his house, his lands, and his gold have the worth, but not the man. There is far too much bowing down and cringing before the golden calf in all classes of society. No end of dodges are tried to get a scraping of one of the creature's hoofs. Brother, you must sooner endure poverty than do a wrong thing for the sake of riches; and you must learn to value men for what they are, not for what they have. It needs not Christianity to tell you that some of the worthiest, noblest, and most kingly of men earn their bread by the sweat of their brow; when you meet them, love and honor them. On the other hand, you must know that some of the vilest of men have at times climbed to high places of wealth and power. Do not cringe to any man, but least of all bow to a mere money bag. Value men by their characters, and not by their positions. God grant that none of us may ever be found worshiping the golden calf.

Yet to get into society the meanest things are done. I do not know what sort of thing society may be, but I have heard that it is a very wonderful achievement to get into society; to have the privilege of enjoying the empty ceremonies and hollow shams of stupid splendor! To have the privilege of talking to those persons who spend more on their dress than on their religion. From what little I do know of this wonderful thing called "society," I have felt no ambition to partake in its felicities; and yet to get into society I have seen men fling away their principles, forsake their friends, stifle their consciences, abandon their church fellowship, and become traitors to their God. Forsooth, they are successful in business, and hope to rank among the county families, and so they leave those who love them to entertain at lavish cost those who sneer at them. The Lord save those of you who are prosperous from being thus degraded.—Spurgeon.

TWO WAYS OF READING THE BIBLE.

“WOULD you like another chapter, Lilian, dear?” asked Kate Everard of the invalid cousin, to nurse whom she had lately come from Hampshire.

“Not now, thanks; my head is tired,” was the feeble reply.

Kate closed her Bible with a slight feeling of disappointment. She knew that Lilian was slowly sinking under incurable disease, and what could be more suitable to the dying than to be constantly hearing the Bible read? Lilian might surely listen, if she were too weak to read to herself. Kate was never easy in mind unless she perused at least two or three chapters daily, besides a portion of the Psalms, and she had several times gone through the whole Bible from beginning to end. And here was Lilian, whose days on earth might be few, tired with one short chapter!

“There must be something wrong here,” thought Kate, who had never during her life kept her bed for one day through sickness. “It is a sad thing when the dying do not prize the word of God.” Such was the hard thought which passed through the mind of Kate, and she felt it her duty to speak on the subject to Lilian, though she scarcely knew how to begin. “Lilian,” said Kate, trying to soften her naturally quick, sharp tones to gentleness, “I should have thought that now, when you are so ill, you would have found special comfort in the Scriptures.”

Lilian’s languid eyes had closed, but she opened them, and with a soft, earnest gaze on her cousin, replied, “I do—they are my support; I have been feeding on one verse all the morning.”

“And what is that verse?” asked Kate.

“Whom I shall see for myself,” began Lilian, slowly; but Kate cut her short.

“I know that verse perfectly—it is in Job; it comes just after ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth,’ the verse is ‘Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another.’”

“What do you understand by the expression ‘not another’?” asked Lilian.

“Why, of course it means—well, it just means, I suppose, that we shall see the Lord ourselves,” replied Kate, a little puzzled by the question; for though she had read the text a hundred times she had never once dwelt on its meaning.

“Do you think,” said Lilian, rousing herself a little, “that the last three words are merely a repetition ‘whom I shall see for myself’?”

“Really, I have never so particularly considered those words,” answered Kate. “Have you found out any remarkable meaning in that, ‘not another’?”

“They were a difficulty to me,” replied the invalid, “till I happened to read that in the German Bible they are rendered a little different; and then searched in my own Bible, and found that the word in the margin of it is like that in the German translation.”

“I never look at the marginal references,” said Kate, “though mine is a large Bible and has them.”

“I find them such a help in comparing scripture with scripture,” observed Lilian.

Kate was silent for several seconds. She had been careful daily to read a large portion from the Bible; but “to mark, learn, and inwardly digest it,” she had never thought of trying to do. In a more humble tone she now asked her cousin, “What is the word which is put in the margin of the Bible instead of ‘another,’ in that difficult text?”

“‘A stranger,’” replied Lilian; and then clasping her thin, wasted hands, she repeated the whole passage on which her soul had been feeding with silent delight. “‘Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not a stranger.’ Oh Kate,” continued the dying girl, while unbidden tears rose to her eyes, “if you only knew what sweetness I have found in that verse all this morning while I have been in great bodily pain! I am in the Valley of Shadow—I shall soon cross the dark river; I know it; but he will be with me, and not a stranger. He is the Good shepherd, and I know his voice; a stranger would I not follow. and when I open my eyes in another world, it is the Lord Jesus whom I shall behold—my own Saviour, my own tried friend, and ‘not a stranger,’ I shall at last see him whom, not having seen, I have loved.”

Lilian closed her eyes again, and the large drops, overflowing, fell down her pallid cheeks. She had spoken too long for her strength; but the feeble sufferer’s words had not been spoken in vain.

“Lilian has drawn more comfort and profit from one verse—nay, from three words—in the Bible, than I have drawn from the whole book,” reflected Kate. “I have but read the Scriptures—she has searched them. I have been like one floating carelessly over the surface of waters under which lie pearls; Lilian has dived deep, and made the treasure her own.”

Let me earnestly recommend the habit of choosing from our morning portion of the Bible some few words to meditate over during the day. At a mother’s meeting which I attend each of the women in her turn gives a text to be remembered daily by all during the week, and in every family such a custom might be found helpful. It is by praying over, resting on, feeding on God’s word, that we find that it is indeed spirit and life, and to the humble, contrite heart, “sweeter than honey and the honeycomb.”—A. L. O. E. in Baptist.

THE SABBATH IN A. D. 54.

By R. F. Cottrell

THIS is the date of Paul's labors at Corinth, as given in the Bible. The apostle worked at his trade on week days while in this place, but preached on the Sabbath. It is said, "And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks." Acts 18:4.

The fact that one day in the week was used for religious purposes at this time, while the disciples were laboring upon the other days of the week, and that the Spirit by which they spoke and wrote call it the Sabbath, without note or comment, is a sufficient refutation of the claim that the Sabbath was abolished at the cross, and consequently that there is no Sabbath for this dispensation. There was then in A. D. 54, a day properly called the Sabbath. No explanation is given, as that it was the Sabbath of the Jews, because none was needed; therefore there was a Sabbath at this date.

Again, if there was at that time any day distinguished as the Christian Sabbath, that was doubtless the day observed by Paul and his companions in travel, his partners in the tent-making business, "the Jews and the Greeks." All these parties and classes were agreed in the day. None complained of having to keep two Sabbaths, or of losing one day's labor in a week. Jews and Christians then kept the same day; and if any day should be designated the Christian Sabbath, that is the day.

But that was the seventh day of the week, or Saturday, and not the first day, or Sunday. It was the day on which the Jews worshiped in the synagogues then, and the day on which they still do the same. All are agreed that it was Saturday, so-called, and not Sunday, on which Paul preached to the Jews and Greeks at Corinth. No scholar could be found that would risk his reputation on its denial. Then the seventh day was the Christian Sabbath when Paul was at Corinth.

But it is claimed that the first day of the week has been the Christian Sabbath ever since the resurrection of Christ; that although it is not mentioned in the account of Paul's labors at Corinth, yet it existed at that time. Let us see if this is possible. "He reasoned in the Synagogue every Sabbath." Then there was no Sabbath during this time that was not so occupied. But all these meetings being held on the seventh day, the phrase, "every Sabbath," includes every seventh day, or Saturday, and excludes every other day, the first day, or Sunday not excepted. Therefore the first day of the week was not the Sabbath in any sense while Paul was laboring at Corinth in A. D. 54. The terms, "every Sabbath," did not include one first-day, therefore they excluded them all.

Now if the first day, or Sunday, was not the Sabbath, in any sense, when Paul was preaching at Corinth, when did it become the "Christian Sabbath," and by what authority?

R. F. COTTRELL.

Looking Unto Jesus

THE only rule of life to the Christian, and the only safety to the sinner, is in looking unto Jesus.

The Persistence of Bad Habits

A YOUNG man who thinks he can lead a reckless and profligate life until he becomes a middle aged man, and then repent and make a good, steady citizen, is deluded. He thinks that people are fools, destitute of memory. He concludes that if he repent everybody will forget that he was a dissipated fellow. This is not the case; people remember your bad deeds and forget your good ones. Besides, it is no easy thing to break off in middle life bad habits that have been formed in youth. When a horse contracts the habit of balking, he generally retains it through life. He will often perform well enough till the wheels get into a deep hole, and then he stops and holds back. Just so it is with the boys who contract bad habits. They will sometimes leave off their bad tricks and do well enough till they get into a tight place, and then return to the old habit.

He Knows

THROUGH all my little daily cares there is One thought that comfort brings whene'er it comes; 'Tis this—"God knows." He knows Each struggle that my hard heart makes to bring My will to his. Often, when night-time comes, My heart is full of fears, because the good That seemed, at morn, so easy to be done Has proved so hard; but then, remembering That a kind Father is my judge, I say. "He knows." And so I lay me down with trust That his good hand will give me needed strength To better do his work in coming days. –Sel.

A CHILD'S REBUKE.

A baker who was a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, was one day hurrying along with a tray in his arms, when just as he passed through a side door he accidentally ran against his little girl, a child about three years of age. Annoyed and irritated at the moment because he had, as he supposed, hurt the little one, he shouted in a loud angry voice, "Get out of the way!" and passed on. More frightened at the father's stentorian shout than by the trifling accident, the child went whimpering down the yard, and meeting her aunt, was asked if she was hurt. "Ess," replied the little creature, "but Jesus didn't 'peak in dat way to 'ittle child'en—he took 'em up in his arms, he did." What a rebuke from the mouth of a child!

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