In the Sabbath Recorder of Nov. 13, 1879, appeared an article from Eld. A. E. Main, a portion of which the readers of the REVIEW had the opportunity of reading last week. Said article contains some other expressions which perhaps demand a passing notice. Eld. M. says: “I am heartily glad that thousands of heathen have, during the past year, embraced Christianity, though at the cost of their embracing one error, the First day Sabbath. I am exceedingly sorry that our Advent friends have been so successful in leading members of our churches from truth to error, and in winning others over to one truth at the cost of their embracing a whole system of errors.” We do not care so much for the spirit of hostility manifested in this article against S. D. Adventists; but it seems to us that great indignity is heaped upon the Sabbath of Jehovah. In 1 Cor. 7:19, Paul says that “circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God”—“is something,” says Whiting’s translation. In harmony with this sentiment, we likewise feel that the keeping of the commandments of God is something. Whether or not a man is keeping the law of the great Jehovah, which is the rule of life here, and is to be the rule of judgment hereafter, is a matter of exceeding great moment; but whether or not a man is correct in all those points of theory which are mere matters of belief and do not directly affect the life, while it may be a matter of some importance, is not of such infinite consequence as the former. We would much rather a person would be brought to obey God, though cherishing some merely theoretical errors, than to be theoretically correct in all those points of faith which do not practically affect the life, and live in open, though it may be ignorant, violation of God’s moral law. But this great practical matter of keeping the commandments of God, Eld. M. lowers to an ignominious depth, placing it below mere points of doctrine. He is very glad that thousands of heathen have been converted to a Sunday-keeping Christianity—still violating the law of God; he is very sorry that any have been turned to the true Sabbath, and to keep all the commandments of God, through Adventists, because, as he thinks, they are thereby led to cherish some doctrinal errors. This is the more surprising, coming, as it does, from a professed friend of the Sabbath. And if his brethren do not openly rebuke the utterance of such a sentiment, we trust they love the Sabbath too well to extend to it any great manifestation of sympathy. Again he says: “A man had better be an Adventist than an unbeliever; but he had better be a truly evangelical Christian than either.” Just the status assigned to S. D. Adventists in this paragraph it may perhaps be difficult to determine. They are not unbelievers. We are glad of that. And this expression, we suppose, may be taken as an acknowledgment that they are believers in Christ. They will undoubtedly also be acknowledged as commandment-keepers. Then they keep the commandments of God, and follow the Lord Jesus Christ. But, alas! they are not “truly evangelical Christians.” We suppose those converted heathen Sunday-keepers are. If so, we see again the low position to which the Sabbath is relegated by this writer; and we can assure him that such preaching, that men can be true evangelical Christians and keep Sunday, will not turn them to the Sabbath any more rapidly in the future than it has done in the past. Eld. M. closes his article as follows: “We need not and do not fear to meet their errors in equal and open conflict; but if we shut our eyes to our danger, the conflict will, through our own fault, become an unequal one, and the battle may go against us.” We know not how else this language can be taken only as an open challenge for public contests over our differences of opinion, and a recommendation to his brethren to enter upon an immediate and vigorous crusade against S. D. Adventists. If this is a correct deduction from the language, and we would not give any other, then let it go upon record, whatever may be the attitude and the action of these two bodies toward each other in the future, that a proposition of this kind first came from them, not from us. Though in the past, a few irresponsible persons have manifested their hostility, as individuals, toward S. D. Baptists, no representative man among us, and none of our organs of publication, have ever made such a proposition. But we really think that Eld. M. is manufacturing about all the battle there is. Despite his protestations to the contrary as quoted last week, we can assure the people that we would not overthrow one of their churches, much less all, if we had the best opportunity imaginable. We do not desire to disturb them in the least. And as to the investigation of our own views, this is the very work to which we have been inviting the world, for the past twenty-nine years. Another S. D. Baptist minister says that our views “will be rejected more and still more as they are investigated.” That is not just the way it has seemed to work so far; but perhaps a new experience is in store for us; yet we see no other way but to continue “on this line.” We have circulated quite a number of pages of our views for investigation the past year, and we hope to double the number in the year to come. We have nothing to keep in the shade. We seek the light of the noonday sun. We do not desire to harbor a single doctrine, which, with the Bible as a standard, will not endure the test of the severest scrutiny and criticism. We believe we speak the minds of all our people when we say that any and all our churches are open to Eld. M., or any of his brethren in the ministry. We fondly conceive that with the rule of literal interpretation, a rule followed by every reformer from Luther down, so far as they did reform, our views find in the Bible a perfect Gibraltar of defense. If this is not so, the sooner we are ousted from this fancied citadel the better. And the one who first does this, will first receive the warm thanks we are treasuring up for this hypothetical benefactor.