Review and Herald, Vol. 42, No. 1. (6/17/1873)

Review and Herald

Jun 17, 1873

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 17, 1873

THE TRUE THEORY OF THE CHRISTIAN SABBATH.

By W. H. Littlejohn

ARTICLE ELEVEN.

The third theory of the Christian Sabbath, in the order in which we have been considering the different theories, affirms that the Sabbath was instituted at the creation of man, and that it has never been abolished or superseded. This theory further maintains that the essential idea of the law of the Sabbath is not the holiness of any particular portion of time, but the consecration of a specified proportion of time, viz., one day in seven; that, in accordance with this essential idea of the Sabbath, a change of day was admissible; that a change was actually made by divine warrant, on account of, and dating from, the resurrection of Christ; and that the first day of the week, the Lord's day, is the true Christian Sabbath, having its moral sanction in the fourth commandment.

Enough has already been written in these columns, in disproving the opposing theories, to show that this theory of the Sabbath is the true one. Two things being admitted, there appears to be no escape from this theory. Let it be admitted, first, that God instituted the Sabbath for all mankind, and that its law is of unchanging, as well as universal, application. This is readily conceded by those with whom we are now in discussion. Then, in the second place, let it be admitted that the inspired apostles, under the guidance of Christ and his Spirit, and with their manifest approbation, ceased to observe the seventh day, and actually observed the first day, of the week. This our opponents are very loth to admit. But the testimony given by us at considerable length is simply overwhelming and incontrovertible. The third theory, and it alone, harmonizes the immutable law of the Sabbath with the actual change of day.

In further confirmation of the correctness of this theory, it remains for us, in concluding this discussion, to show that this third theory accords with the fourth commandment, and meets every aspect of the design of the institution of the Sabbath.

The principal feature of the design of the Sabbath is the setting forth of God's sovereign control, as Creator, of man and the time of man, as God's creature. Called into being by the Creator, and made lord over the irrational and material creation, man was taught that his time was to be used for God's honor. It was a trust from the Creator; and that man might not forget this, one-seventh of the time in regular recurrence was marked out to be consecrated specially to the Lord of all. This is the very idea in the commemoration of the work of creation. It is to keep alive the knowledge of God as the Creator and Sovereign Ruler of man. To commemorate the creation is to keep before the mind, week by week, the duty of using our time for the honor of the Author and Upholder of our being.

Nor is the example of God's resting the seventh day made insignificant by this theory of the Christian Sabbath. “In six days God made the heavens and the earth, and rested the seventh day.” God's people, in different parts of the world, do and must begin their work at different times, and yet in each locality they labor six days and rest the seventh. It is the proportion of time which is the law of the commandment enforced by the divine example; and, hence, the Christian Sabbath, in the true import of the commandment, is as really the seventh day as the Jewish Sabbath. The Christian labors six days and not the seventh, according to the divine example and the divine command.

In this way, also, the true theory of the Christian Sabbath meets the design of the institution, as it was intended to arrest the current of the outward life and lead up the soul to unseen and eternal verities. And here there is a most important argument for the change of the day for Sabbath observance. It is most reasonable to believe that, if there be any work which more gloriously manifests the perfections of God, and serves better to turn the thoughts of men to things above, than the work of creation, the day which commemorates such a work would be the appropriate time for Sabbath observance.

So far as the essential idea of the Sabbath connects itself with a particular day, the argument is of great weight in favor of a change from the seventh to the first day of the week. The weekly division is the main thing, let the week begin when it may. It may begin on what we now call the third or fourth, or any other day. It will matter little. But as the first day, in our enumeration of the days, will always bring to mind the great work of redemption accomplished by the Saviour, who, on the first day of the week, rose from the dead, the observance of this day as the Sabbath best answers one of the principal designs of that institution.

And then, how fittingly does the observance of the first day, the day of the Lord's resurrection, correspond to the design of the Sabbath as a foretaste of the heavenly rest—the Sabbatismos, or Sabbath-keeping, that remains for the people of God. Rejoicing here on the Christian Sabbath in what our Redeemer has done for us, we look forward with joyful anticipations to the many mansions which he has gone before us to prepare, that we may be “forever with the Lord.”

“Bright shadows of true rest; some shoots of bliss; Heaven once a week; The next world's gladness prepossessed in this, A day to seek. Eternity in time; the steps by which We climb above all ages; lamps that light Man through his heap of dark days; and the rich And full redemption of the whole week's flight. The milky way chalked out with suns; a clue That guides through evening hours; and in full story A taste of heaven on earth; the pledge and cue Of a full feast; and the out-courts of glory.” —The Christian Statesman.

“THE TRUE THEORY OF THE CHRISTIAN SABBATH.”

A REJOINDER.

It is a peculiarity of this discussion that we are prevented, in our rejoinders, from anticipating the positions which our opponent has in store for us. Were it possible to proceed upon principles of consistency, in debate, and conclude that he, having adopted such and such views, would continue to maintain them steadily for the future, there would be a sort of satisfaction found in preparing material to be employed hereafter. But we have learned, by actual experience, that in this debate such anticipatory action would be labor lost. For example: In the last reply which had to do with the seventh-part-of-time theory, we had intended to show that, were it true, and that, were the observance of one day in seven all that is now required, even then Sabbatarians stood upon a footing as safe as that of their opponents, since the observance of the seventh day answered to the keeping of one-seventh part of time, equally with that of the celebration of the first day of the week. Being prevented by want of space from indulging in these reflections, we laid them over for another week, supposing that they would come in play equally well at this time. Alas! what a mistake! We should have struck when the iron was hot. Unfortunately, we are not now confronting the no-day-in-particular doctrine, as we were then, but it is the “Lord's day” again, the first day of an indefinite week, “a particular, definite day, enforced by the command and the example of Christ and the apostles,” which once more stands before us. How it is that we have been borne so rapidly over the space which separates these antagonistic positions, the reader will have to decide for himself; for we confess to a perfect want of ability, on our own part, to render him any assistance. Without the slightest attempt at logical deduction, we are first informed that the essential idea in Sabbath observance is not that of the keeping of a particular day, but the consecration of one day in the week, allowing the week to begin wherever it may. This, we are told, would suitably commemorate God's rest at the creation of the world; and, also, that if, in addition, we make the day of our rest identical with the first day of the week, we can thereby celebrate both creation and redemption. For this very purpose, we are informed that the Sabbath commandment was changed, so as to admit of the introduction of a new day. But pause a moment. Has the gentleman told us just what change was made? Has he told us what words were stricken out? and how it now reads? The reader has not forgotten that this is the very thing the opposition were challenged to perform. He will perceive that this, also, is the very thing which the gentleman has failed to accomplish, and cannot hereafter do, since the reply under review is the last of his series. If it be said that he has cited us to the fourth commandment, as given in the twentieth of Exodus, as containing the law as it now reads, then he is self-condemned; for he admits that the phraseology of that commandment did enforce a definite day, and that, the last day of the week.

But once more: Passing over the absurdity of claiming a change in the law, where there is no ability to produce the statute as amended, let us go back from Sinai to Eden, along with the gentleman, and see if we cannot find, independent of the commandment, evidence that the creation Sabbath was not a portable institution, to be trundled about at the caprice of any and every individual. Mark it, now, it is granted that what is called the Jewish Sabbath law enforced the keeping of the seventh day, and admitted of no other as a substitute. But whence is this conclusion drawn? Undeniably, from the words, “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work.”

But where has the gentleman learned that the creation Sabbath was enjoined in the use of language less explicit and limited in its meaning than are the words of the decalogue? If he knows anything about the original decree of Jehovah, and the limitations with which he guarded the Sabbath in the outset, he, like ourselves, is compelled to go to the sacred record for information. If, in going there, he has been able to find anything which would prove that the Edenic Sabbath was less fixed in its character than that of Sinai, then he has made some progress. The only scripture which will throw any light upon the subject, will be found in Gen. 2:1–3. Unhappily for the gentleman, however, it is fatal to his conception that the original Sabbath varied in any way from that of the Jews—so-called. In the account of its institution, the language employed is almost precisely the same with that subsequently traced upon the tables of stone. It is there declared that God sanctified (i. e., set apart to a holy use), the seventh day. The reason for this action is the fact that he had rested upon it. Now, it will be observed that it was the “seventh day” that God blessed and sanctified, and no other. It is submitted, therefore, as the gentleman concedes, that the same expression (i. e., the seventh day), when employed in the commandment given to Moses, did locate the Sabbath institution immovably upon the last day of the week, until the law was changed; that the same language, when employed originally, must have produced the same result; in other words, if the command to keep the seventh day, as given on Mount Sinai, held the people strictly to the observance of the last day of the week, so, too, Jehovah, in the beginning, restricted the whole race to a Sabbath which was, equally with the other, the seventh, and, therefore, the last day of the week.

In order to avoid this conclusion, it will be required that, by some means, he should be able to show that the same terms which were employed by God, at one time, have a different meaning from that attached to them, as employed by him at another time. Not only so, the Sabbath in Genesis, like that in Exodus, is further limited and defined by two additional facts. First, it was the day on which God rested; secondly, it was the day which he blessed because he had rested upon it. Therefore, before any other day could be substituted for it, these two things must be true of it, as matter of history. This, however, can never be the case, as it regards any day of the week, save the last; consequently, he who celebrates any other is not celebrating the one which God imposed in the beginning. So much for the definiteness of the Sabbath which was given to Adam.

Should it be replied that what has been remarked is correct, and that it is not argued that any one was at liberty to keep any other day than the seventh of the week, until Christ changed the law, and thereby authorized them so to do, we reply, Very good; that brings us back again to the original proposition, which is, Did he make such a change? If he did, then it is just as important that we should have clear and conclusive evidence that such an alteration was made by him, as it is that we should have the abundant testimony which we now possess that a definite Sabbath was originally given to mankind. All this speculation in regard to what might have been done with perfect consistency under a given state of facts, is worse than idle. What we demand, is this—What has been done? Instead of concluding that Christ did a certain thing because it would have been right so to do, first show us, by actual Scripture quotation, that he really performed the work in question, and the consistency of his action will take care of itself. A theology which has no broader, firmer basis than individual conception of the propriety of certain occurrences which may never have taken place at all, is not worth the paper on which it is drawn out. This, nevertheless

is the very material with which we are dealing. Eleven articles, ostensibly written to afford divine authority for the change of days, are concluded; and, from beginning to end, there is not found in them a “Thus saith the Lord,” for the transfer. Again and again it is inferred that such and such transactions meant so-and-so. Again and again it is concluded that such and such things are admissible, not because of any scriptural warrant, but because they seem good in the eyes of those with whose practice they best conform. The reason why this is so, the reader will readily perceive. It is found, not in the fact that the learned gentleman who represents the opposition is insensible to the superiority of positive Bible statements over individual surmise, but in the necessity under which he is placed, to employ the only material which he has at hand. Meeting him, therefore, where he is, let us prove the unreliability of such deductions as he is indulging in by actual test. The points which he is attempting to establish, are these: 1. The original idea of the Sabbath can be met by the observance of the first day of the week, as well as by that of the last. 2. That the commemoration of Christ's resurrection can only be suitably carried out by hallowing the first day of every week.

Now, as to the first of these propositions, it will only be safe to decide that it is correct, after giving it mature reflection. We have already seen that God's original plan for preserving the memory of creation week, was that of setting apart the last day of each subsequent week for the imitation, on our part, of his rest thereon. To say, therefore, that it would have answered just as well to allow the individual to take any other day—say the first day of the week—for this purpose, is to argue that God acted without cause in making the selection which he did, and enforcing it for four thousand years. If the question were one of indifference, why did he not leave the day unfixed? Why not allow them, then, to commemorate his rest on the first day, as the gentleman would have done now, arguing that the ends of the original Sabbath would, in this way, be fully met? Certain it is, that no good reason can be assigned why it would now be more proper to commemorate the rest of Jehovah by a variable Sabbath, than it has been heretofore. This being true, the gentleman's logic is wholly unsound, or else the action of the Deity was inconsiderate.

Turning, now, to the second proposition, the reader will be instantly struck with its unqualified antagonism to the first point which is sought to be made out.

Remember, now, that the gentleman is arguing stoutly for first-day sanctity. He is not so particular when the week begins, but it must have just seven days, and the first of them must be devoted to the commemoration of the Lord's resurrection. Should you ask him why he is thus particular in the selection of the first day of the week, he would reply, “Why, that is the day on which the Lord arose! and it is his resurrection, as the crowning act in the work of redemption, which we seek to honor.” But, reader, would it not occur to you, immediately, that this is a repudiation of all which he has said concerning the Edenic Sabbath? Now, mark it; what God demands, is, that we should honor the seventh day of the week, as the one which he rested upon, blessed, and sanctified. If, therefore, the rest, the blessing, and the sanctification, of that day can be suitably remembered by the observance of another day differing from it, then the assumption that an event is most impressively handed down by the dedication, for this purpose, of the very day on which it transpired, is unsound. But if this assumption be unsound, then all of the gentleman's talk in regard to the necessity for a change of days, in order to the suitable commemoration of the resurrection of Christ and the completion of the work of redemption, is without force. For, assuredly, if he is right in supposing that God's rest in Eden, on the seventh day, can be commemorated as well on the first day as on the seventh, then the same principle will hold good in regard to the events which transpired on the first day of the week, i. e., they can be kept in remembrance by the hallowing of the seventh day as well as by that of the first. But this being true, his argument for the necessity of the change of Sabbaths is gone, and his philosophy of the change proved to be unsound. The only purpose which it has served in this controversy, has been the revelation of that which is really the conviction of its author, as it

is that of men generally, that there is no time in which great transactions can be so suitably commemorated as that of the time on which they took place. When the nation wishes to celebrate the anniversary of its independence, it sets apart for this purpose the fourth of July, which answers exactly to the day of the month on which the Declaration of Independence was made. Substitute for this another day, and you have marred the impressiveness of the occasion.

So, too, with God's rest on creation week; it must be so celebrated that all the associations connected with it will be calculated to lead the mind back to its origin and object. Turn it around, as the gentleman proposes to do, i. e., substitute the first day of the week in the place of the last, and you have precisely reversed God's order. You have put the rest-day first, and caused the six laboring days to follow; whereas, God, knowing that rest was only needed after labor, worked six days and then rested the seventh, not because he was weary, but because he desired to put on the record for us an example to be strictly followed. The gentleman, however, without the slightest warrant, has, with a rash hand, laid hold of the divine procedure, and now says that the order pursued was not necessary to the inculcation of the great lessons which God designed to impart. To this, I reply, 1. That God's actions are never superfluous. 2. That if we err at all, it is safer to err on the side of the divine example. 3. That if the idea of God's working six days is in any way connected with a proper Sabbath rest, then it is indispensable that the Sabbath should follow, and not precede, the working portion of the week. 4. That if the rest of God, merely, is the object which we should keep before our minds by a proper regard for the Sabbatic institution, the gentleman has himself shown, by the logic which he has employed, that the only suitable period for the keeping of that rest is found in that portion of the week on which God ceased from his labors.

The remark of the gentleman that the work of redemption furnishes a subject worthy of being remembered by observance with Sabbatic honor of the day on which it was completed, is worthy of passing notice. The idea which he advances is one which is quite prevalent, and employed with great satisfaction by clergymen generally, when controverting the claims of God's ancient rest-day. The strength of his position lies in the fact that it distinguishes between redemption and creation, assuming, perhaps correctly, that the latter is more exalted than the former. Having won the assent of the mind to this proposition, the reader is quietly carried over to conclusions much less obvious than the first. Almost unconsciously he is led to decide, with his instructor, that, since redemption is a greater work than creation, it ought, therefore, to be honored by a day of rest. Now we shall not enter into this matter largely, but we simply suggest that either this decision is the result of human, or else it is the product of divine, wisdom. If it is human wisdom, then its teachings should be followed with extreme caution. If it is divine wisdom, then they can be obeyed with the most implicit confidence. Just at this point, therefore, it is all-important that the test be applied. Has Jehovah ever said that the commemoration of creation week had become less desirable on account of the possible redemption of a fallen race, by the death of his Son? The most careful reader of the Bible has failed to find any such language; in fine, the intimation that such is really the fact, is rather a reflection upon the Deity himself, since, from it, it might be inferred that the glory of his work had been dimmed by the fall of the race.

But, again, if the Lord has not said that he would not have the memory of creation cherished still, has he ever said that he would have the work of redemption signalized by a weekly rest? Once more the student of the Scriptures unhesitatingly answers in the negative; but if God has failed to make this declaration, who shall presume to put words in his mouth, and read the thoughts of his mind, as those having authority so to do? The man who will undertake to do it is venturing upon ground which lies hard by that of blasphemy. God never neglects to say that which ought to be said; he never calls upon any man to go beyond his commandments, for in them, says Solomon (Eccl. 12:13), is found the whole duty of man. Furthermore, were we to reason upon this matter at all, every consideration would lead us to

the conclusion that the inference of our opponents is not correct. In the first place, redemption is not yet fully completed in the case of any individual. In the second place, the scripture says we have (are to have) redemption through his blood (Col. 1:14). But his blood, it is generally supposed, was shed upon Friday, and, therefore, it is not impossible that the hallowing of that day would more suitably commemorate redemption than that of any other day. In the third place, it was proved at length in a former article, that if creation was suitably commemorated by a day of rest, redemption, which is an event entirely opposite in its character, would naturally be celebrated by some institution of an entirely different nature. In other words, the Sabbath inculcates cessation from labor by the indulgence of inaction, while all the events connected with the resurrection of Christ rendered inactivity impossible.

But finally, we are not left, in a matter of this significance, to the unreliable decisions of the human mind. Not only is it true that God has never appointed a day of septenary inactivity, as the Heaven-chosen memorial of the resurrection of the divine Son of God; but it is also true that God himself, in the exercise of a wisdom which will hardly be impugned by finite beings, has selected an institution entirely different from that under consideration for the illustration of that phase of the work of redemption which was seen in the resurrection of Christ. Says the great apostle to the Gentiles: “Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection.” Rom. 6:4, 5. “Buried with him in baptism, wherein also we are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.” Col. 2:12. Baptism, that is, Bible baptism, or the immersion of the individual beneath the water, most forcibly commemorates the death of our Lord. As the administrator lowers the body of the passive subject beneath the yielding wave, by the very necessity of the case, breathing is, for the time, suspended, and the person, as nearly as may be while in life, as he lies motionless in the hands of the individual to whom he has committed himself in the exercise of an act of faith, shadows forth the death and burial of his Lord in a most impressive manner. As he rises, also, from that position, and, proceeding to the shore, unites once more with the throng of living beings who surround him, he most forcibly illustrates the coming back again of our Lord from death and the grave to a life of infinite activity and glory. All, therefore, which is necessary in order to the remembering, by outward expression, of that most glorious event, which gave back to the disciples, from the nations of the dead, the body of the beloved Master, is that we go forward in the fulfillment of an ordinance which has been provided for that purpose, and which sets forth the events which are thought worthy of a memento in a manner as superior to that in which it could be done by mere inaction, as God's conception of what would be suitable under such circumstances, is higher than that of man. The wonder is that any one should have lost sight of the original design of an institution which is remarkably expressive of the purpose for which it was created. In fact, had not the same power which has changed the Sabbath, also tampered with the ordinance of baptism, by changing the original form into one less expressive of its historic associations, we believe that the view which is now passing under consideration never could have suggested itself to any mind.

But, reader, it is now time that our labor should be drawn to a close. In the providence of God, we have walked together over the territory devoted to the great and important Sabbath question. With pleasure, we are about to lay down our pen for the last time, and submit the whole matter to you for the pronouncing of the final verdict of your individual judgment. As we do so, it is with feelings of most profound gratitude to God for a truth which, while there is underlying it a cross so heavy that it cannot be lifted by human strength unaided, is, nevertheless, so plain that its mere statement is its most complete demonstration. Were it not true that society is at present so organized that the keeping of the seventh day involves social, political, and

pecuniary sacrifice, much greater than he is aware of who has not considered the matter, we would not hesitate to say that a complete and speedy revolution could be wrought upon this subject in a brief space of time. Never, in the history of any reformation which has heretofore occurred, were men covered with a more complete panoply of defense, and armed with more destructive weapons of offense, than are God's commandment-keeping people at the present period. The only mystery connected with the subject is, that, being as plain as it is, the fact of the change should not have attracted universal attention before. Traversing again the ground over which we have come with the gentleman who has managed the opposition in this debate, the poverty of his resources is most striking. In all that he has said, he has proved nothing which has in any way relieved his case, nor can his failure be attributed to any lack of capacity on his part. In the handling of the material with which he has had to do, he has displayed not a little ingenuity. The arguments which he has employed and the positions which he has taken are those of the orthodox ministry generally at the present time. His failure is entirely attributable to the natural weakness of the position which he has sought to defend. His was indeed a hard task. He felt the moral necessity of a Sabbath, as a Christian man; and, finding the religious world keeping the first day of the week, he sought to defend this practice from the Bible standpoint. But, alas for his cause! The more he has appealed to this source, the more certain has it become that the Bible, and the usages of Christendom in this matter, can never be harmonized. Turning over its pages, we do indeed find the most ample authority for a day of rest, which is generally honored as such. As we have seen, the record in brief stands as follows:—

1. There is a Sabbath. 2. That Sabbath is the seventh, and not the first, day of the week, for the following reasons: (1.) In the beginning God rested on the seventh day, thereby laying the foundation for its Sabbatic honor (Gen. 2:3); whereas, he never rested upon the first day. (2.) He blessed the seventh day; whereas, he never blessed the first day. (3.) He sanctified the seventh day, or devoted it to a religious use; whereas, he never sanctified the first day. (4.) The day of his rest, his blessing, and his sanctification, he commanded to be kept holy, in a law of perpetual obligation; whereas, he never commanded the observance of the first day. (5.) The Lord Jesus Christ recognized the obligation of the seventh day by a life-long custom of observing it (Luke 4:16); whereas, the Lord Jesus Christ never rested upon the first day of the week; but always treated it as a secular day. (6.) He also recognized its perpetuity forty years after his death, when speaking of events connected with the destruction of Jerusalem, by instructing his disciples to pray that their flight might not occur thereon (Matt. 24:20); whereas, he never spoke of the first day as one to be honored in the future, nor, indeed, so far as we know, did he ever take it upon his lips at all. (7.) It is the day which the holy women kept, according to the commandment, after the crucifixion of our Lord (Luke 23:56); whereas, there is no account that any good man has ever rested upon the first day out of regard for its sanctity. (8.) It is the day on which Paul, as his manner was, taught in the synagogue (Acts 17:2); whereas, Paul never made the first day of the week, habitually, one of public teaching, a thing which he would have been sure to do had he looked upon it as sacred to the Lord. (9.) Being mentioned fifty-six times in the New Testament, it is in all these instances called the Sabbath; whereas, the first day is mentioned eight times in the New Testament, and in every case it is called, simply, the first day of the week. (10.) In the year of our Lord 95, it is spoken of by John as the Lord's day (Rev. 1:10); whereas, the first is in no case mentioned in the use of a sacred title. (11.) It is mentioned not only as the Sabbath; but it is also spoken of as the next Sabbath, and every Sabbath, thus proving that it had no rival (Acts 13:4; 15:21); whereas, the day before the first, and the sixth day after it, being spoken of as the Sabbath, it is classed with the other days of the week. (12.) In the Acts of the Apostles, and, in fine, in the whole canon of the New Testament, there is not a single transaction which is related as having occurred upon the seventh day in the least incompatible

with the notion that it continued to be regarded as holy time, while the law which enforces its observance is inculcated in the clearest and most emphatic terms (Matt. 5:17–19; Rom. 3:31; Jas. 2:8–12); whereas, the first day was one on which Christ indulged in travel on the highway in company with others, after his resurrection, without informing them of its character, or rebuking them for sin. It is also a day on which two of the disciples walked the distance of fifteen miles on one occasion, while on another, Paul performed the journey of nineteen and one-half miles on foot, while Luke and seven companions worked the vessel around the headland for a much greater distance (Luke 24:13, 29; Acts 20:1–13).

In view of the above, the whole question of obligation may be summed up in the following words: Shall we keep a day which God has commanded, which Christ inculcated, and which holy men regarded from the opening until the close of the canon of Scripture? or shall we disregard that, putting in its place one which neither God, nor Christ, nor a holy angel, nor an inspired man, ever, anywhere, under any circumstances, enjoined, and which, in addition, God and Christ, and holy men and women, are everywhere in the sacred word brought to view as treating in a manner such as they would only treat a day of secular character? In fine, it is simply the same old test applied once more to human action, which has in all ages been the measure of moral character, i. e., Shall we obey God? or shall we not? Shall we gratify our own inclination and have our own way by pertinaciously persisting in a course of action for which we have no Scripture warrant? or shall we take the Bible in one hand and, accepting its doctrines as the words of life, follow them to their legitimate consequences in our daily walk? Says John, “This is the love of God, that ye keep his commandments.” Says James, “Show me your faith without works, and I will show you my faith by my works.” Sublime sentiments, indeed! In them is expressed the moving, controlling principle of every Christian heart. Oh! that all men in the ages of the past had held to the noble purpose of taking God at his word, believing that he meant just what he said, and walking out with a noble courage upon their confidence in his wisdom to legislate, and his right to command. Had they done so; had they been willing to be taught instead of going uninstructed; had they submitted to be led instead of insisting upon independent action, how much misery would have been spared our kind! Take, for example, the case of Eve—God exempted one tree in the garden from the rest, saying, “Thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” Unhappily, the mother of all living ventured to deviate from the command of God in what appeared to her an unimportant particular, and, as the result, a race was plunged into the terrible consequences of rebellion. It would seem as if this should have been enough to teach all, that it is only safe to do just what God requires in small, as well as great, things. Alas! however, this has not been the case. Nadab and Abihu, with the example of Eve before them, contrary to the directions of the Lord, ventured to substitute natural fire for the hallowed fire of the altar. To them, there was no apparent difference; but in a moment the curse of God fell upon them and they were borne lifeless, and without the honors of an ordinary funeral service, away from the camp of Israel. Uzziah, despising the commandment of the Lord, by which the Levites alone were to touch the ark, in an unguarded moment reached out his hand to steady it, and God made a breach upon him in the presence of the people. Uzziah fell lifeless before the ark which contained the same law which is under consideration. It was not the ark that sanctified the law; but, rather, the law that sanctified the ark. If, therefore, God was so jealous of that which was merely the vehicle of the ten words spoken by his voice and written by his finger, how must he feel in regard to those words themselves? In them is found the embodiment of the whole duty of man. With them, God now tests, as he has always tested, the characters of men. “Know ye not,” says Paul, “the servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?” True, it may be, that we can transgress that law at the present time without suffering the visible displeasure of God, as did those whom, in the past, he set forth as examples

of his wrath. But let us not deceive ourselves on this account; God is no respecter of persons. Moral character is what he admires, exact obedience is what he demands. In his providence, at the present time, it is our fortune to live in an epoch when great light is shining upon the long dishonored and mutilated Sabbath commandment. A worldly church, having departed from the simplicity of gospel teaching and gospel method for the propagation of truth, has called to her aid the elements of force and the appliances of law. Closing their eyes to light, ample in itself for all the purposes of duty and doctrine, they have entered upon a crusade, determining to venture the experiment, so oft repeated, of enforcing, as doctrines, the commandments of men. The end of this matter God knows, and has pointed out in his word. With outward success they may meet; but it will be at the terrible cost of that vital godliness which is alone found where the arm of God is made the arm of our strength. For those who, in the past, have ignorantly broken the law of Jehovah, God has ample forgiveness; but for those who, in the face of God's providential dealings, and in diametrical opposition to the plain teachings of his word, to which their attention is being called, shall still persist, not only in disobedience, but, also, in acts of oppression against those who prefer the narrow and rugged path of Bible fidelity, there can be nothing in reserve but the terrible displeasure of him whose right it is to command.

Reader, whoever you may be, and whatever may have been your past convictions and life, we turn to you in final appeal. As you revere God, as you love Christ and his precious word, we exhort you in this matter to seek wisdom from the only true source. Be not discouraged by the disparity in numbers, neither tremble before the hosts which may frown upon you in the coming contest. “The Lord he is God.” Under the shadow of his wing we can safely abide. No nobler destiny was ever vouchsafed to the obedient among the children of men, than is prepared for those who shall prove their fealty to the God of Heaven by a noble testimony to their love for him, by the keeping of his holy Sabbath, under circumstances, in the near future, which shall indeed try the souls of men.

May God grant that both reader and writer, nay, more, also our opponent in this discussion—toward whom we entertain none but the kindliest feelings—also, all, everywhere, who are indeed the children of the living God and the brethren of our blessed Lord, may come to see eye to eye in this matter, so that, finally, we shall be brought safely through the perils of this last great conflict, which the true church is to endure, and stand victorious over all our enemies upon the Mount Zion of our God, there to sing the song of a deliverance complete and eternal, in a world where, from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, all flesh shall come to worship before the Lord. (Isa. 66:23.)

W. H. LITTLEJOHN. Allegan, Mich.

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