SUNDAY laws are wrong in principle. If playing baseball on Sunday is incivil or criminal it is equally so on Monday, Tuesday, or any other day of the week. What would you think of a law compelling people to desist from murder, theft, rape, or any other criminal or uncivil act on Sunday? Would you not insist if a law were to be enacted against crime it should prohibit it seven days in the week?
You argue that committing murder on Sunday, stealing on Sunday, committing riotous or unruly acts on Sunday, to the disturbance of public and well-being of society, was no more uncivil or criminal than committing the same acts on any other day of the week. Hence, if laws are to be framed against the committing of such deeds, they should be universal laws, covering the entire period of the week, and not merely Sunday. In other words, the day upon which the act is committed does not constitute it uncivil or criminal. The crime of incivility lies in the act itself, and not in the day upon which it is committed.
Any legislation making an act criminal or incivil by virtue of its being performed upon a certain day of the week, is the evidence that the law is the outgrowth of religious prejudice. This of itself should be sufficient argument against any law to defeat it.
The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution of the United States, and the Gospel of Christ agree that a man is endowed by the Creator with certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. No man has a right to transfer these rights, and no state has a right to assume that they have been transferred, and therefore to legislate accordingly.
Would the man who regards Sunday as the Sabbath, and goes to church on that day, and finds his happiness in worship on that day, consider that the state had a right to legislate him out of the privilege of using Sunday as a day of rest and worship? He would declare such legislation as an invasion of his inalienable rights. Has not the disbeliever an equal right to find his happiness in recreation on that day? Who gave the state any right to invade his realm of the "pursuit of happiness" in the using of the day as he chooses, so long as he conducts himself civilly?
The state has no more right to invade the disbeliever's right than it has to infringe upon the right of the churchman. But you say sometimes he does not conduct himself civilly in his Sunday recreation. Then let the law be against such incivility, and not against the right of recreation.
All agree that legislators are public servants, who represent the people. Would those who observe Sunday allow that a servant had a right to come into their household and dictate to them how they should spend Sunday? Such interference would not be tolerated. It would be regarded as out of place—an abuse of a servant's position and authority. Have not those who are not Christians equal rights to their pursuit of happiness, to refuse to be dictated to by servants in their household, as to how they shall spend the day, so long as they conduct themselves civilly.
Sunday laws are religious legislation, wrong in principle, and unwarranted assumption of authority by the state. Let me not be misunderstood. I am not merely opposing Sunday laws. I would oppose Sabbath laws by the state just as vigorously as Sunday laws. Why?—Because they would be wrong in principle. Man is accountable to God only, for his religion. Every man has a right to do as he pleases religiously, just so long as he does not infringe upon the inalienable rights of his neighbor.
This is why the founders of our government so carefully guarded these points in the fundamental law. This is why Thomas Jefferson, Lincoln, Grant, and others laid down the eternal principle of "hands off" religion so far as the state is concerned. Keep the church and state forever separate. It is but a reiteration of the principles enunciated by Christ Jesus Himself: "Render to Caesar [the state] the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." Therefore we oppose all religious laws by the state, and as Sunday laws are proven to be not civil, but religious laws, we oppose them because they are wrong.—From report of sermon, in Sedalia (Mo.) Sentinel.
THE SUNDAY LAW'S RESPONSIBILITY.
By G.
The Ram's Horn, in commending the action of a certain railroad president in abolishing Sunday excursion trains, makes this very erroneous statement:
The American Sabbath was one of the corner-stones upon which our temple of liberty was erected by the country's founders.
Nothing could be farther from the truth. In the first place, there is no such a thing as the American Sabbath. Sunday, which some people call the American Sabbath, is not in any sense an American institution. It is Roman, pure and simple, and was so long before America was discovered by Columbus. It came down from Rome through the Puritans and the Church of England, to the American colonies long before the "corner-stones" of our "temple of liberty" were laid. It was the cause of much intolerant persecution in New England for a long time, and through that persecution Roger Williams was banished from Massachusetts.
The government of this republic was placed upon a secular basis altogether. Every one was supposed to be absolutely free in matters of religion, under no obligation to any religion whatever. "No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States," says the Constitution, Article VI., Section 3. And this is emphasized by Article I. of Amendments, which says, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."
Now the compulsory observance of any religious institution is not a free exercise of religion. Therefore the framers of the Constitution did not contemplate any compulsory sabbath law, nor was there any law to hinder the free observance of any day. And the administration of President Washington, one of the recognized founders of our "temple of liberty," so far disclaimed any religious element in the structure of the government as to disclaim even the Christian religion. In a treaty with Tripoli, signed by Washington in 1797, it was expressly stated that "the government of the United States is not in any sense founded upon the Christian Religion."
Again, the Ram's Horn says:
When men bring themselves to ignore the laws of God they can and do readily ignore the laws of man.
This is in every word true, but it recoils very heavily on Sunday observance. The Sunday institution is in direct contradiction of the law of God, which says, "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." And so the Ram's Horn's statement recoils very heavily on the United States Government, if we assume that Sunday is "one of the corner-stones of our temple of liberty." It leaves us the logical conclusion that in this ignoring of the law of God we have the solution of the excessive criminality now extant. It leaves us also the further logical conclusion that the increasing effort to enforce the Sunday laws of the states—in defiance of the law of God—is the direct cause of the increasing disregard of the laws of the land.
This is probably more than the Ram's Horn editor contemplated in his statement of fact, but it is a straight conclusion from his premise. G.
GOD AND MAMMON.
By G.
A CORRESPONDENT residing at Ocean Park, Los Angeles County, Cal., notes preparations for a great revival effort at that place, where there are many pleasure-seekers and consequently much worldliness during the summer season. The peculiar feature of this religious revival movement is that a conspicuous figure in the services is a minister who is carrying on a rather questionable business for a "revivalist." He is conducting a stereopticon advertising business, and one of the advertisements thrown upon his screen nightly is an invitation to visit a certain German beer garden. The special inducement is that "every lady receives a printed photograph." In the advertisement the place is called "The Roof Garden," and thereby the people—the strangers, especially—are expected to be beguiled.
But this "revivalist," we are told, also advertises the theatrical performances which are of the variety character common at pleasure resorts. He also advertises various brands of cigars, and almost anything that will pay the price. Sundays this minister finds employment in the city, substituting for stated pastors. He is also an enthusiastic advocate of temperance.
A revival under the ministration of such servants of mammon may succeed in drawing a crowd and more money, but the result as to souls saved in the kingdom of God is very questionable. It is a sign of the times, however. With such a tendency increasing on every hand, even the professed ministry yoking the sacred calling with questionable schemes for making money, it is a pertinent question, "When the Son of Man cometh, shall He find faith on the earth?" Luke 18:8.
Appearances certainly indicate that it will be a "little flock" of whom it will be said, "Here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus." "Many are called, but few chosen." It would be well for those who would mingle the works of darkness with the proclamation of the Gospel to be admonished by the Lord's words, "Ye can not serve God and mammon." G.
A CONDITION TRUE IN THE WEST.
The Cost of Homes.
AN inestimable advantage in the moral and physical life of the United States as compared with England ten years ago was the cheapness with which our people could get modest homes. That advantage does not now exist.
In spite of higher labor cost, an American frame cottage could in 1893 be erected for less money than the brick or stone cottage to which the building rules of many English parishes practically limited their people. More elastic regulations are now being adopted in England. The importance of healthful separate homes is preached, and a permanent exhibition has just been opened near London to show how in iron and wood, in cement, concrete, artificial stone, steel and plaster, or in expanded metal, cottages can be and have been built at a cost of $750 each, and are rented with a tiny garden for $6.25 a month.
Not much of a cottage could be built in the suburbs of New York for $750. The cost of frame construction has here almost doubled in fifteen years, partly because of higher wages, but mainly from the operations of trusts within the tariff to advance prices. The Brick Trust, the Wire-Nail Trust, the Glass Trust, the Lumber Trusts, the combinations of makers of builders' hardware and plumbers' supplies, have raised the old rough-and-ready estimate of $4.00 or $5.00 dollars a square foot for building frame cottages to $8.00 or $10.00.
Dear materials and the righteous demand for cheap houses compel flimsy building. The disappearance of the honest chimney is one of the worst results in its effects upon health. No better ventilating device is known than the open grate, yet even pretentious houses are now built with a single chimney as small as possible. What professes to be a fireplace has often no flue; the gas-log it contains simply discharges used-up air into the stuffy room.
The recent plea of Mr. Leubuscher before the convention of Co-operative Building-Loan Associations for the lightening of the tariff tax on homes strikes at more than a political issue. The cost of homes is a grave national concern.—N. Y. World.
Durango’s Strict Sunday Ordinance
DURANGO, Colo., has a pretty strong Sunday law of its own,—Ordinance No. 229. The municipal officials have ordered it to be carried out and enforced to the letter. The Durango Telegraph, which went to press with its Sunday edition before midnight Saturday, among other things tells us that “It will now be a criminal offense to mow the lawn or milk the cow, unless the latter work can be proven to be a work of charity or mercy. A strict enforcement will tie up the street-cars, shut down the light-plant, unless they come under the provisions of mercy or charity. Engineers and trainmen on incoming or outgoing freight or passenger trains will also be subject to arrest and fine. We know it will be pleaded that work on newspapers, lines of transportation, telephone and telegraphic communication, and the furnishing of electric lights, is work of necessity. But the store-keeper might maintain that the sale of groceries to a hungry man was also a necessity. . . . The ordinance does not provide for the stopping of watches and clocks, but such flagrant violations will no doubt be covered with a codicil. Hens that lay eggs on Sunday will not be punished for the first offense, but if the offense is repeated it will call for a straight-jacket until they consent to hold off until Monday. But now for Sunday—Sunday under the Blue Laws: ‘Do all work before twelve o’clock Saturday, for Sunday we will rest—or be arrested.’”
TWO KINDS OF BUSINESS.
DR. WASHINGTON GLADDEN, chairman of the Congregational Board of Missions, moderator of the National Congregational Council, intimates that there is a great deal more money tainted than Mr. Rockefeller's. He thus speaks of the two kinds of commercial business: "There is honorable, clean, and legitimate business in this and other lands. This sort of business lives up to the motto of 'Live and let live,' but there is a gigantic business that means robbery, commercial piracy, as it were, and which in disregard of all laws of fair competition, pushes ahead, leaving misery, poverty, and revolution in its wake. The latter kind of business has no regard for human rights nor constitutional law. The church ought to put its seal of approval on all good business, and its stamp of condemnation on the other kind."
But how can this be the case, when most of the men who are doing the kind of business condemned by Dr. Gladden are members of some of the great ecclesiastical bodies, and are exalted and honored by their own churches? Dr. Gladden alludes to a large percentage of church-goers of the present day as "dead tissue," those who in a lackadaisical manner attend church, but never take an active part in its work. He also states that the Sunday-school attendance is sadly decreasing.
And this is not the testimony of Dr. Gladden alone, but it is manifest everywhere.
REFORM WORK AS A GRAFT.
The forthcoming session of Congress promises to be memorable in its investigation of graft. So much corruption has been unearthed—especially in the Agricultural and Interior departments—that Congressional investigations are almost certain to follow.
While Congress is in the mood, it is to be hoped that it will take steps to eliminate some of the graft that has grown up under its very nose. One of the most offensive grafts we know of is the printing and dissemination by the government of documents having nothing to do with the government business and intended primarily for the glorification or financial benefit of individuals. It is an easy thing to have almost any kind of stuff printed as a “public document” on the request of a Senator, and it is then sent broadcast through the mails at public expense. Senators of the highest standing, who would scorn the slightest suggestion of participating in a grafting enterprise, permit themselves to be made parties to this abuse.
One of the most flagrant cases of grafting in public printing and free mail distribution is that engineered by the Rev. Wilbur F. Crafts, of Washington, whose superhuman energy in behalf of his fellow-man has sometimes received the attention of the Post. He is the head of the “International Reform Bureau,” and is busily engaged in sending out a document called “Patriotic Studies” under the frank of Senator Gallinger, of New Hampshire. The Philadelphia Record tells how this graft was foisted upon the public. . . . Much of the extravagance in the Government Printing-office is the fault of Congress itself in permitting parasites to fasten themselves upon the “public document” and franking privileges. The spectacle of the “International Reform Bureau” doing its purifying work by means of an insolent and offensive graft is peculiarly edifying! In the thorough reform to be undertaken by Congress we hope the “International Reform Bureau” will not be overlooked.—Washington Post, July 27.
Sunday Closing and Individual Choice
The Business Men's Association of Oak Park, a suburb of Chicago, has declined to accede to the request of the ministerial union to give its endorsement to a movement for the closing of all business houses in Oak Park on Sunday. Very properly, tho it is unfortunately an unusual thing in such bodies nowadays, the opinion prevailed among the business men that the question of Sunday closing should be settled by each individual member of the association.
War, Russian Reform, and Consumption Cure
The matter of peace or the continuance of war between Russia and Japan, still hangs in the balances, with the chances largely in favor of war. As we go to press, Japan refuses to withdraw her demand for indemnity, and Russia refuses to pay indemnity in any amount whatever or under any guise whatever. President Roosevelt has made personal appeals to both monarchs in the interests of peace, and altho the appeals have been received with favor, it is understood that the envoys will meet for the last time on August 28, without hope of reaching an agreement. In this case, we may expect to hear of a renewal of the war without delay, as both parties have long been preparing, and are now closely facing each other.
The czar's ukase calling a popular assembly is looked upon from vastly different view-points by different classes of the Russian people. In some cases public meetings, largely attended, have protested strongly against its provisions, principally because there is not enough of power given to the assembly, and because it is not coupled with the promise of much-desired freedom. They demand for the Russian people immediately full civil rights, freedom of the press and of speech and meeting, and universal suffrage.
A report from New York states that the New York Post Graduate Hospital announces the discovery of a vegetable fluid which has been accepted as a positive cure for consumption. It is stated that every tuberculosis patient treated by the vegetable compound has recovered. If this be authentic, there is no doubt but that it will become a matter of general knowledge before many weeks, unless the secret of the ingredients become the property of some rapacious trust.
The whole province of Warsaw, Russia, has been placed under martial law, and hundreds of arrests have been made. The Socialists have declared a general strike. In Odessa district there are reported fresh agrarian riots. Peasants are destroying the property of the land owners, and some estates have been entirely demolished.
In the city of New York during the past year there were 59,196 births, of which only 11,903 were of pure American parentage. Italians stood next to Americans, with 11,298. The third highest, in point of numbers, was the Polish and Russian Hebrew, with 9,688.
Two successful trials of air-ships have been made during the week past, one in New York and the other in Portland, Oregon. In both instances the air-ships remained in the air for some time, and both were said to be under perfect control.
Reports from New Orleans indicate a general decrease in the number of yellow-fever patients. The total number of deaths to date has been 226. New cases continue to develop, but the spread of the disease seems to be under control.
The Swedish Government is now taking measures to settle amicably the matter of Norway's separation from Sweden. It is said that King Oscar is now willing that one of the members of his family should be the first king of Norway.
A mob of about a thousand Buddhists recently attacked a French Catholic Church in China, and killed eighteen priests. The French Government is demanding the punishment of the guilty.
Owing to a collision between a Japanese transport and a British ship 127 Japanese invalided soldiers were drowned on August 2, in the Inland Sea.
France is threatening to seize a town on the border of Morocco because of the unprovoked arrest of a French subject by Moroccan officers.
WALKING WITH GOD.
By Henry Suso
MARK those men whose life is hidden in God, so that of themselves they make no account. Thus can they delight themselves fully and freely in all that which God is doing, apart from the thought of themselves; and to them, therefore, it is true that heaven and earth are theirs, and all things are theirs, and fulfil their will, because the will of God is their will. And their cup overfloweth with joy even here below, because in all things they have a joy and delight that is steadfast and full. Whilst they walk with God, all is peace. For in Him sorrow is not sorrow, and pain is not pain, but all is peace and rest; all that God willeth, to9them is sweet and pleasant. Nor is it only that to them the will of God is sweet. It is more than this. For to them He gives the fair sunshine of His comfort, and the blessed joy of heaven, even here below, so that they live already as it were in heaven.—Henry Suso.
FORETOKENS OF OUR LORD'S RETURN
By George W. Rine
CRIME; OR, THE REIGN OF LAWLESSNESS.
(Concluded.)
DURING the last twenty years there have been more than 3,000 lynchings in the United States; and the most of them were executed in a spirit of brutality and savagery seldom paralleled even among barbarous tribes. In each of these atrocities law and government were thrown to the winds, while thousands connived with the murderous mobs and either openly or tacitly approved these anarchistic killings. In truth, entire communities have sympathetically acquiesced in these hellish tragedies; and not infrequently men of the highest intelligence and of presumable integrity have not only excused, but even defended, the bloodthirsty rabbles who committed these wholesale outrages against law, justice, and decency. Does this fact not prove that the spirit of lawlessness practically dominates the human heart to-day, that contempt for law is in the very air, in these turbulent, crucial days?
Mr. Ray Stannard Baker has said, with great aptness:
> Lynching is not so much a disease in itself as it is the symptom of a disease. It is a symptom of lawlessness, of the failure of justice, of political corruption. It is an attempt of nature to throw off disease—as she sometimes throws off the humors of the blood in the human body—by violent eruptions.
And this disease—the failure of law—is not essentially a Southern disease, tho it is complicated and emphasized there by an ignorant, inferior, defenseless, often criminal, negro population. No Southern manifestation of mob-law has equaled in downright anarchy the conditions in Colorado last year. In the North, as our negro population increases—and it is increasing rapidly—we shall lynch negroes with the same utter brutality that we find in the South; we have done it already, and repeatedly, in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kansas, Delaware, and in other Northern states. No Southern lynching was ever more barbarous than that of Wilmington, Delaware.
Mr. Baker has called attention to the fact that a town in which a lynching has been perpetrated nearly always has a previous bad record of homicide. Between January 1, 1902, and March 7, 1904, the city of Springfield, Ohio, where a negro was murdered by a mob on the latter date, had the unenviable record of ten murders committed within its limits. The Daily Sun of Springfield, in referring to this orgy of man-killing, asks editorially, "What are you going to do about it?" Its own answer is, "Nothing." The morning following the lynching, the same paper printed in its headlines,—
Awful Rebuke to the Courts. They Have Temporized with the Criminal Classes until Patience Was Exhausted.
How clearly these facts show that the courts themselves are essentially lawless. By their failure to apply and enforce the laws, the courts become substantially law-breakers, and therefore criminally culpable. Prof. E. S. Todd recently alleged that in Springfield, the chief fault of the municipal government has been, and is, the laxity and discrimination in the enforcement of the law. Many of the municipal ordinances have been shelved for years. "A sort of dry rot, a moral paralysis," says Mr. Baker, "seems to strike the administration of law in a town like Springfield. What can be expected of officers who are not accustomed to enforce the law, or of people not accustomed to obey it—or who make reservations and exceptions when they do enforce it or obey it?" When the sheriff appealed to the Springfield mob, urging them to let the law take its course, they vociferously jeered him.
The man who joins a lynching mob forgets that by his very act he puts himself on the same plane of criminal guilt as is the intended victim, for both have abandoned themselves wholly to brute passion—the one to that of lust, the other to that of blind rage.
Through the great magazines the public have been informed again and again, by those who make a specialty of sociological subjects, that there are places in all our large cities where boys are trained to become professional thieves, where girls in their teens are taught to beg and steal, and where men and women are voluntarily maimed and crippled in order to appeal to the sympathies of the people and thus make begging more profitable. Everywhere law-makers and other law officers sell themselves to become law-breakers. It is admitted that in all cities and large towns, the police levy blackmail on dives and other illegal hot-beds of reeking, festering vice and corruption. In fact, the New York Sun says epigrammatically: "There are as many crooks on the police force as there are off it."
But I dare not specify any further. It is demonstrated that throughout the whole body social—in high places as well as in low places—crime, which means lawlessness, percolates. Yes, society is honeycombed, positively perforated, with law-breaking. The truth of this serious charge is verified by unimpeachable testimony from thousands of the most trustworthy sources.
Some of the Causes.
It has become notoriously patent that a very large proportion of public officials connive at wrong-doing, for illicit gain, thus making themselves doubly criminal. Can a body of policemen and other public officials engaged in criminal practises prevent others from committing crime? "Can a board of aldermen," asks Mr. S. S. McClure, "who for private gain combine to loot a city, govern a city well?" "Political pull" is responsible for a vast catalog of crimes. It protects the dive-keeper, hampers the administration of justice, secures ridiculously light sentences and unwarranted pardons, puts into public offices persons notoriously inefficient, and makes public office a private privilege.
Again, the people are apathetically indifferent. They do not insist that the laws be enforced. They are not on the alert to preserve order and maintain justice. In other words, the great body of the people are not scrupulously law-respecting and law-abiding. They are willing to elect rascals to office if only the rascals are "good fellows." They are in love with "good politicians" rather than "good officers."
The Ultimate Meaning.
The Bible student will recall the significant fact that in the time immediately preceding the Deluge, Jehovah Himself testified that the earth was "FILLED WITH VIOLENCE," Gen. 6:13. That fact was one of the several reasons for which God declared that He would destroy the earth with a flood. Because of their love of lawlessness and consequent unbelief, the people "knew not until the Flood came, and took them all away; SO SHALL ALSO THE COMING OF THE SON OF MAN BE." Matt. 24:39. This is the express, unqualified declaration of our Lord. Do not the quotations given above from various publicists as to the present reign of crime, again and again refer to present-day crimes as "crimes of violence"? No word seems to come to the tongue of public reformers to-day more frequently than that of "violence." Violence, violence, the earth is again "filled with violence." "And as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of Man." Luke 17:26.
It is well known that the greater part of the matter covered by Matthew 24, comprises our Lord's own prophecy respecting His second advent. Now note His prediction concerning the prevalence of lawlessness at the time when the Gospel "shall be preached in all the world" as a preparation for His second coming. "And because INIQUITY SHALL ABOUND, the love of many shall wax cold." Matt. 24:12, compare with verse 14. The word "iniquity" literally means "lawlessness." Hence Jesus' statement may be paraphrased thus: "And because lawlessness shall abound," etc. Now, take this statement with the one in Genesis 6, and observe how conclusively they point to the solemn fact that we are living in the very days referred to by the Saviour as being similar to the days of Noah. Has it not been shown repeatedly in previous articles that, like the Antediluvians, society is to-day absorbed in "eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage"? "So shall also the coming of the Son of Man be." Lawlessness shall abound, shall be multiplied (A. R. V.), declared Jesus. Does not lawlessness abound to-day, dear reader? Are crimes not multiplied now as they were in Noah's age?
At this very time, when lawlessness is multiplied, our Master commands us to "Watch therefore; for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come." Matt. 24:42. "Therefore be ye also ready; for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of Man cometh." Verse 44. "Blessed is that servant." Verse 46.
HE SHALL NOT FAIL NOR BE DISCOURAGED.
By Ellen G. White
BY MRS. E. G. WHITE.
IN His mission of mercy to our world, Christ was constantly confronted with apparent failure. He seemed to do little of the work He longed to do in uplifting and saving. Satanic influences were constantly working to obstruct His way. But He would not be discouraged. Through the prophecy of Isaiah He declared:
"I have labored in vain,
I have spent My strength for naught, and in vain;
Yet surely My judgment is with the Lord,
And My work with My God. . . .
Tho Israel be not gathered,
Yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord,
And My God shall be My strength."
It was to Christ that the promise was given:
"It is a light thing that thou shouldst be My Servant
To raise up the tribes of Jacob,
And to restore the preserved of Israel.
I will also give Thee for a light to the Gentiles,
That Thou mayest be My salvation unto the end of the earth."
Thus saith the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel, and His Holy One,
To Him whom man despiseth, to Him whom the nation abhorreth, . . .
Thus saith the Lord:
"In an acceptable time have I heard Thee,
And in a day of salvation have I helped Thee;
And I will preserve Thee, and give Thee for a covenant of the people,
To establish the earth, to cause to inherit the desolate heritages;
That Thou mayest say to the prisoners, Go forth;
To them that are in darkness, Show yourselves.
They shall not hunger nor thirst;
Neither shall the heat nor sun smite them;
For He that hath mercy on them shall lead them,
Even by the springs of water shall He guide them."
Upon this word Jesus rested, and He gave Satan no advantage. When the last steps of Christ's humiliation were to be taken, when the deepest sorrow was closing about His soul, He said to His disciples, "The prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in Me." "The prince of this world is judged." "Now shall the prince of this world be cast out." With prophetic eye Christ traced the scenes to take place in His last great conflict. He knew that when He should exclaim, "It is finished!" all heaven would triumph. His ear caught the distant music and the shouts of victory in the heavenly courts. He knew that the knell of Satan's empire would then be sounded, and the name of Christ would be heralded from world to world throughout the universe.
Christ rejoiced that He could do more for His followers than they would ask or think. He spoke with assurance, knowing that an almighty decree had been given before the world was made. He knew that truth, armed with the omnipotence of the Holy Spirit, would conquer in the contest with evil; and that the blood-stained banner would wave triumphantly over His followers. He knew that the life of His trusting disciples would be like His, a series of uninterrupted victories, not seen to be such here, but recognized as such in the great hereafter.
"These things have I spoken unto you," He said, "that in Me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation; but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." Christ did not fail, neither was He discouraged, and His followers are to manifest a faith of the same enduring nature. Tho apparent impossibilities obstruct their way, by His grace they are to go forward. Instead of deploring difficulties, they are called upon to overcome them. They are to despair of nothing and to hope for everything. With the golden chain of His matchless love, Christ has bound them to the throne of God. It is His purpose that the highest influence in the universe, emanating from the source of all power, shall be theirs. They are to have power to resist evil, power that neither earth nor death nor hell can master.
HOW JESUS KEPT SUNDAY.
By Thoro Harris
BY THORO HARRIS.
IT is a matter of history—and historical facts are not subject to alteration—that God in the beginning did sanctify the seventh day; and this sanctification would necessarily endure so long as the earth, whose creation it commemorates, should exist. How shallow, then, how weak, how delusive, are the sophistries employed to bolster up the Sunday-sabbath!
To offset this inevitable conclusion that the Sabbath of Jehovah is a perpetually-binding institution, it is asserted that Jesus Christ "nailed" the seventh-day Sabbath "to the cross;" and that His resurrection on the first day of the week inaugurated a new sabbath.
If this were the case, would we not expect Him to make this fact manifest? would we not expect to find Him taking the first opportunity to show this change by Himself doing, or giving direct permission to others to do, servile work upon that original Sabbath day?
But what are the facts? After His death upon the cross, our Redeemer was laid in the grave on Friday before sunset. All the next day He spent in absolute rest; while the holy women, we are also assured, "rested the Sabbath day according to the commandment." Just as truly as God did rest in the beginning on the seventh day, just so truly did Christ keep Sabbath in the grave at the close of His earth-work.
The following day, the first day of the week, so far from being a Sabbath of rest, was one of the busiest our Saviour ever spent. He went from place to place, appearing first to Mary Magdalene, then to Peter and John, to the two who journeyed to Emmaus, and at night to the eleven, and there is reason to believe that He even visited His Father in heaven to confirm His work on earth. (Compare John 20:17, Matt. 28:9). It would seem as tho every moment of the day was occupied; what time remained for rest and refreshment, the essence of Sabbath observance?
Christ is our example. To imitate Him is to rest on the seventh day and labor most industriously on the first.
