Earlier text: CHOOSING THE DISCIPLESIn reviewing the subject of “the Sabbath,” I design, not to follow any previous writer, but simply, plainly, and briefly, to convince sinners of sin, let their profession be what it may. And this I hope and pray may be done without giving offense to those who love the truth more than error. God has many servants who would gladly exchange error for the precious truths of his word. The books of the New Testament are said to have been written thus: Matthew’s gospel, six years after the resurrection of Christ; Mark’s gospel, ten years after the church commenced; Luke’s gospel, twenty-eight years after; John’s gospel, sixty-three years after; the Acts of the Apostles, thirty years after; the epistle to the Romans, and two to the Corinthians and Galatians, twenty-four years after; Ephesians, Colossians, and Hebrews, twenty-nine years; to Timothy, Titus, and the second epistle of Peter, thirty years; the Revelation of John, sixty-one years; his three epistles, about sixty-five years after the resurrection, and after the church had properly commenced. And it is easy for us to understand how these apostles understood and practiced with regard to the Sabbath; and they are the “foundation” next after Christ himself. Therefore, if there was any such institution known and frequently spoken of in the church as “Sabbath,” in those different ages of the church, we can easily know what was then meant by it. Some say if we keep the seventh day of the week, we shall keep a “Jewish Sabbath!” Well, we have no Saviour to trust in but Jesus Christ, who was according to the flesh, a Jew—no other apostles and prophets but Jewish—no other than Jewish Scriptures—and, indeed, Jesus said himself that “salvation is of the Jews.” John 4:22. And what did the writers of the New Testament mean by the words “Sabbath” and “Sabbath day?” What did Matthew mean in the sixth year of the Christian church? He certainly did not mean the first day of the week, but he meant the day before the first day of the week. See Matt. 28:1. He meant what all other Jewish writers ever meant; viz., “the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” But neither Matthew nor any of the apostles ever told us a word about the Sabbath being changed from the seventh to the first day of the week. Now, if the Scriptures cannot be broken, but everywhere mean one and the same thing, viz., “the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord,” then, if ministers contradict this, and say the seventh day is not the Sabbath of the Lord, but the first day of the week is the Sabbath, will they not in this bear witness clearly and positively against themselves, unless they bring forward the chapter and verse where God commanded the Sabbath to be changed? What did Mark mean by the word Sabbath? He meant, also, that the Sabbath was the day before the first day of the week. Chap. 16:1, 2. Surely, if the Sabbath had been changed at the resurrection of Christ, Mark would have known it within ten years afterward. What did Luke mean, who wrote twenty-eight years after the resurrection of Christ? He also meant that the Sabbath was the day before the first day of the week; for he says that the women who prepared the ointment rested the Sabbath day, according to the commandment. Chap. 13:56. Thus Luke understood the words “Sabbath day,” in the fifty-eighth year of the Christian era, to mean the day immediately preceding the first day of the week. How did John understand this subject in the sixty-third year after the Christian church? He not only speaks of the Sabbath day as the others did, but he shows plainly that the first day of the week was considered a business day by the disciples after the resurrection. John 20:1. See also Luke 24:13. But what did the writer of the Acts of the Apostles mean by the words Sabbath and Sabbath day, thirty years after the Christian church was fully commenced? In writing, he often mentions the Sabbath, and once mentions the first day of the week, as meaning quite another thing in plain distinction from the Sabbath. Acts 13:14, 42, 44; 20:7. The practice of the Jews was then, as it is now, to meet in the synagogue on the seventh day. And again: “The next Sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God.” He does not say this was the Jewish Sabbath, but the Sabbath day; this was the seventh day; and the first day of the week was not then known as a Sabbath by this writer; because he says the next Sabbath day the Jews and the Gentiles must all come together again. I say there would not have been any next Sabbath in the week till the next seventh day. Again, Acts 16:13. “And on the Sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was wont to be made.” He does not say on the Jewish, nor on one of the Sabbaths, as though there were two Sabbaths then, but on the Sabbath, i. e., the seventh day, as understood by all Jewish writers to this day. Again, chapter 17:2: Paul, as his manner was, went in among the Jews, and three Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures. Thus have I proved that the apostles of Christ understood that one day in the week should be called the Sabbath day; and further, I have proved that this day was the day before the first day of the week, which is the seventh day; and you cannot deny it, nor by the Scriptures disprove it; consequently, if the apostles of our Lord always call the seventh day the Sabbath day, six, ten, twenty-eight, thirty, and sixty-three years after the church was fully commenced, then it must be the Sabbath day now. And every one of the Lord’s ministers, who calls any other day the Sabbath besides the one so called by the writers of the New Testament, gives it a title which is nowhere to be found in the Scriptures; for when they say the Sabbath day, they mean something very different from what the New Testament means. It is already proved that the apostles called the seventh day of the week the Sabbath and the Sabbath day, for many years after the church was fully commenced. Now, we are to show what sin is; and we are not left to guess at it, or to suppose it; but we have a given rule to know with certainty what constitutes sin. “By the law,” then, “is the knowledge of sin.” By what law was the knowledge of sin twenty-four years after the resurrection of Christ? Ans. The very same law that was given when it was said, “Thou shalt not covet.” The law, then, by which sin is known, is the ten commandments, and you cannot deny it. This law says, “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.” Ex. 20:10, 11. Now, until this law is altered or abrogated (and Christ says he “came not to destroy the law”), by the same power that enacted it, a willful transgression of it is a willful sin, let your profession be what it may; for sin is the transgression of the law. He that offends in one point, or in one of these commandments, is guilty of all; i. e., is a transgressor of the law, a sinner in the sight of God. Now, a regenerated soul, a true-hearted Christian, says with Paul, “I delight in the law of God after the inward man.” “The law is holy, and the commandment holy, just, and good.” And any person who is not willing to keep the commandments of God, when plainly understood, has still a carnal mind, which “is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” Will you say this is judging too hard? or, This is a hard saying, who can hear it? I wish to judge no man; but the word that the Lord hath spoken, the same shall judge you in the last day. John 12:48. “As many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law; . . . in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel.” Rom. 2:12, 16. Then those who shall hold the truth in unrighteousness, those who pretend to keep the law differently from what God appointed it, those who, in fact, lay aside the commandments of God (the seventh day or any other command), and teach for doctrine the commandments of men (the first day instead of the seventh), such, the word says, are vain worshippers. Mark 7:7. But you say, it makes no difference which day is kept or called the Sabbath day, provided we keep one-seventh part of the time! This is not correct, because God never said so. God is not to be mocked in this way! He has been very good and kind to make the Sabbath for man, to appoint the day, and the particular time of the day when the Sabbath is to commence, and when it is to end; it is the seventh day in order from the creation—the seventh day in the creation; and he said, “From even unto even shall ye celebrate your Sabbaths;” as the evening and the morning were reckoned for the day. God did not leave this subject undecided, so that his people would appoint different days, and then for every one to call his own the Sabbath day. But God blessed and sanctified the seventh day, and proved that particular day to be designated by him, in the face and eyes of about six hundred thousand witnesses, by a miracle directly from Heaven, in withholding the manna on that day, and in giving the food for that day on the day before; and you cannot deny it, nor disprove it. Again, you say, How shall we know which is the seventh day? I answer, Do you wish to know? Then ask the Jews; for God has committed the lively oracles to them, and then scattered them among all nations. Do you know when the first day of the week comes? Well, the Sabbath is always the day before the first day of the week. Matt. 28:1. But you may say, Do not the majority of honest-hearted Christians keep the first day of the week? and have they not for centuries done common labor on the seventh day, and observed the first in obedience to the fourth command, and still been honest in their motives, and living Christians? I answer, What is that to us, so long as the true light of the Sabbath did not come to their minds? Now, we certainly know what sin is; not by what popular writers say—not by the popular traditions of our fathers—not altogether by our feelings—but by the law of God is this knowledge; for sin is the transgression of the law; and all who have the law of God have an infallible and everlasting rule to know what sin is. Art thou a willful transgressor of the law of God? Then by the law is the knowledge that thou art a willful sinner before God. But if thou art an ignorant transgressor of the law of God, then by the law is the knowledge that thou art an ignorant sinner before God. To say nothing of presumptuous sins, I say, If thou hast ignorantly sinned, then repent and reform, and God will heal you. Lev. 4:2, 13. By the law of God, then, is the clear knowledge of sin. I speak to you, Protestants, who keep the Sunday, a day formerly dedicated to the worship of the sun by the pagans, and afterward brought into the church by Constantine and Roman Catholics, and called the Christian Sabbath, a name never known for the first day of the week by any of the writers of the New Testament. I speak to you, Protestants, and ask you if you have any given rule to know what sin is? Have you any certain rule to know whether Roman Catholics sin or not, in bowing down to images? They say they do not sin! You say, you know they do sin! But how do you know it is sin to bow down to images, when they say it is not sin? . . . Ans. By the law, you say, you know this is sin, and you know it by no other rule; for you “had not known sin but by the law.” Well, by the same rule I know what sin is. You say it is not sin to work and do common labor on the seventh day. But we know, not by your assertion, but by the law, whether you sin or not. You say you know by the law that it is sin to bow down to images. I say, by your own rule, I know by the law that it is sin to do common labor on the seventh day; and you cannot deny it. And, if you know it is the duty of Roman Catholics to repent of their sins for transgressing the second command, then I know it is also your duty to repent of your sins for transgressing the fourth command. He who said, Thou shalt not kill—Thou shalt not steal—Thou shalt not bow down to images, neither serve them, &c., also said, “The seventh day is the Sabbath.” I would that you could see the weakness of your argument, viz., that one-seventh part of time was meant in the law, without regard to any particular day. In this, you make the commandments of God of no effect through your tradition. Yea, you make void the part of the command which says, “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” We read, not that the Lord blessed the seventh part of time, or the Sabbath institution, as you say, but the seventh day in particular. Why do you wish to take out and make void this part of the fourth command, when Christ hath said, “Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law?” It was just as necessary that the particular day should be designated as it was that there should be a Sabbath made for man. It would not have been according to Divine Wisdom to say, Thou shalt keep one-seventh part of time, or one day in seven, because this would have left mankind in as much confusion as your theory could make them! One might have kept one day, another, the next, till seven Sabbaths were kept in one family. Thus much for your seventh part of time. Suppose a parent should command his child to do a certain piece of labor on a certain day, and that the child should, without any just cause, neglect to perform the labor on the day specified, and should perform it on the next day. Would this show any respect for the authority of the parent? or would the parent approve such conduct in his child? You must say, No. Or, if a governor should command all the military to do duty two days in the year, and leave each one to select his own days, there would be as much wisdom in this as in your seventh part of time for the Sabbath of the Lord. God is not the author of confusion, but of order; yet your theory of one-seventh part of time makes him the direct author of confusion. Thus your theory, not the law of God, leads to anarchy and confusion, and the observance of no Sabbath; and you cannot deny it. What reasonable objection have you to the law of God? What fault can you find with it just as it stands? Have you wisdom enough to change it for the better? “The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul.” Ps. 19:7. Yea, it is so perfect that it has already converted the souls of many, even from the doctrines and commandments of men, to keep the Sabbath of the Lord, and I trust in God it will convert many more. Because the statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandments of the Lord are pure, enlightening the eyes—more to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold; sweeter than honey and the honey-comb. Verses 8, 10. “Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good.” For I [Paul] delight in the law of God, after the inward man. Individuality and Freedom of Conscience
No process is so fatal as that which would cast all men into one mold. Every human being is intended to have a character of his own, to be what no other is, to do what no other can do. Our common nature is to be unfolded in unbounded diversities. It is rich enough for infinite manifestations. It is to wear innumerable forms of beauty and glory. Every human being has a work to carry on within, duties to perform abroad, influences to exert, which are peculiarly his, and which no conscience but his own can teach. Let him not enslave his conscience to others, but act with the freedom, strength and dignity of one whose highest law is in his own breast.—Channing. The Way of Life.
By James White
THE Way of Life from Paradise Lost to Paradise Restored is the general caption we have chosen for those subjects which show the work of the law and the gospel in the execution of the plan of redemption, and the relation which the Father and the Son, and the law and the gospel sustain to each other. Our first paper upon this theme is on the second page of this issue. May the same consciousness of the presence of the Spirit of truth be enjoyed by the reader that has been with the writer as he has traced the lines which constitute the second page of this paper. We urge not only a careful reading of the thoughts which may appear under this caption, but that they may be carefully and critically studied. We shall take no part in a spirit of strife for the mastery, should it arise with those who differ; but we shall be very happy to receive and answer inquiries if put in the spirit of candor, provided they are strictly confined to propositions set forth by us. J. W. The Fullness of Time.
By George Ide Butler
I was struck with an idea expressed by D'Aubigne while reading the history of the Reformation the other day, which I will give to the readers of the SIGNS. He says, “A reformation is not arbitrarily made as charters and revolutions are in some countries. A real reformation prepared during many ages is the work of the Spirit of God. Before the appointed hour the greatest geniuses and even the most faithful of God's servants cannot produce it. But when the reforming time is come, when it is God's pleasure to intervene in the affairs of the world, the divine life must clear a passage, and it is able to create of itself the humble instruments by which this life is communicated to the human race. Then if men are silent, the very stones will cry out.” It seems to me the author has here expressed a very great truth. Any one conversant with the history of the Reformation will give an assent to it. It seemed wonderful that so many ages could pass away and the masses of the people be so long held under papal corruptions and such gross error. The priesthood were known, many of them, to lead the most abandoned lives, and the popes themselves, who were looked up to with such reverence, were many of them guilty of the grossest immorality and most brutal cruelty. All the forms of religion seemed corrupted. And yet this condition of things continued right on, even when there was a general feeling among very many of the people that these things were not as they should be. And the priests were held many times in contempt and even ridicule by the common people. There were many eminent men in the two or three centuries preceding the Reformation who did much toward enlightening the people in the arts and sciences. The light seemed to be dawning in all directions except in religion. And more than this, individuals arose and made an attempt at reform in religion; men apparently as pious and devoted as Luther; men of ability and learning. Wicliffe arose in England more than one hundred and fifty years before Luther. He was a man of great ability, preached against the Catholics, caused the Bible to be translated, and labored faithfully and ardently in the cause of true religion. But all his efforts accomplished very little in comparison with those of Luther. The time had not come. Huss arose in Bohemia a century before Luther. He was a man of God. He preached the truth faithfully. He held up the corrupt lives of the priests and spoke boldly against them. Multitudes followed him even while wandering in the fields suffering persecution. Yet it seems he could not seriously affect the permanence of the Roman power. He died a martyr, and his work was nearly all crushed. The time had not come. God has the control of the events of the world. When his time comes all agencies will be ready. So it was in the Reformation. We are apt to give too much credit to the simple agents that God uses and forget that after all, the glory belongs entirely to him. Had Martin Luther, and Zwingle, and the other Reformers, arisen a century before, we have no reason to expect they could have fared better than Huss. Had it not been that God wrought, and as it were steered the bark of the Reformation through the perils that environed it, the result would have been far different. He seemed to raise up special agencies at the right time to upset the skillfully-laid plans of the devil for the destruction of his work. Yes, in all past ages the same principle has been seen. The seed of Israel were not permitted to inherit the land of promise at first, and what a curious plan it would seem to us that God laid, and how contrary to what we should naturally adopt. They must be sent down to the land of Egypt, and there become slaves, be grievously oppressed, come into a condition where it would seem almost impossible that God's promises ever could be verified to them, and there they had to wait till the fullness of time came, till the “iniquity of the Amorites” was full; then God by his mighty power brought them out. Moses, it would seem, thought it could be done before, but when he made the attempt it turned out a failure. Jesus Christ came in the “fullness of time.” Many may have wondered why he was not manifested before. Why the Lord waited four thousand years before sending his Son into the world. But those who have given this much reflection tell us the condition of things was such at that time as would render the proclamation of the gospel much easier than at any time before. The Roman empire was at its height, and generally in a state of peace. The human mind was active. The old religions of polytheism were losing their hold upon the people. The gods of the different nations of antiquity were nearly all brought face to face in the pantheon at Rome, that there in each other's presence they might show their mutual insignificance. The Grecian gods could not save Greece. The Carthaginian gods could not save Carthage, and so on ad infinitum. What a glorious time for the religion of Jesus to come in and show its superiority. It came, and in a few years spread all over the empire. The fullness of time had come. It has often seemed strange to me that a truth so plain as the Sabbath should have lain dormant so many years, to be revived down here at the close of time. Why did not the Reformers preach it generally? We believe they were honest men, engaged in the work of God. And yet one of the plainest truths in the canon of inspiration was overlooked or ignored by them. To be sure, this was preached by our Seventh-day Baptist friends. But it never has seemed to make that stir in the religious world that its great importance demands. Somehow there has seemed to be a hindering cause. It seems lamentable that such men as John Bunyan should have written against the claims of the Sabbath when the arguments are so clear. It would seem that God had purposely determined to reserve a truth of great clearness by which to especially test the last generation of men. The fullness of time had not come. The true Reformers of that age had all upon their hands they could do to bring out those truths God had intrusted to them. They did that work well and nobly, and fell at their posts. Now the time for the great Sabbath reform has come. The third angel's message must be preached. The commandments of God are to be restored and take their rightful place in the plan of God, and in the affections of his people. And we see the needed agencies springing into existence, the work moving forward according to God's order, bearing marks of permanency, of sound sense, of true religion. We easily discern the hand of God in it. God's Spirit bears witness to it. His seal is plainly set to the work. All these things should give us faith in God, that if we do our part he will do his. And although the “mills of God grind slow,” yet his plans are certain of their accomplishment in his own good time. — GEO. I. BUTLER. An Improper Use of Terms.
By W. H. L.
MEN in all ages have attached more or less importance to names. Some have even seemed to think that the appellation given to a place, an individual or a class, has much to do in determining its history. Without falling in with this view altogether, we believe that there is a propriety in these things, the regarding of which can produce no evil, and naturally result in good. So far as our own denomination is concerned, the designation which it shall bear through its coming history is one of those things which has been decided in the past. Nor have we any fault to find with the selection which has been made. Some may object that the title is not a scriptural one. This fact, however, to our mind, does not present a serious difficulty. To cling to the term Christian, disciple, saint, &c., &c., with the tenacity which leads some who bear them to be continually resting an argument for their orthodoxy upon the fact that they are thus designated, at times presents an appearance of exclusiveness which lays them liable to the charge of claiming as their own not only the name, but also a monopoly, of the saintly virtues. It would be an undertaking of no small magnitude to find for the more than six hundred and sixty-six different sects in Christendom Bible appellations; and yet it is not unfrequently necessary to be able to discriminate between them. In order that this may be done in the clearest and shortest manner possible, they have generally fixed upon some designation peculiar to themselves. The more perfectly descriptive, therefore, of the various points of faith held by these different denominations, the more proper and significant are the titles by which they are known. Judging from this standpoint, we, as a people, should be well pleased with the name, Seventh-day Adventists, since it presents the prominent parts of our faith in a manner too clear to allow of our being confounded by an individual of intelligence with any other body of Christians. 1. It sets forth the fact that we are Adventists; or believe in the near coming of the Lord. 2. As a consequence, we are Christians. 3. That we are commandment-keeping Christians; since we observe the seventh day. 4. That in this last particular we differ from the mass of First-day Adventists, who in common with the Christian world, observe Sunday. Having said thus much respecting the name which we find ourselves providentially wearing, and about which there are clustering in the past too many pleasant reminiscences to admit for a moment of the thought of change, I wish to call attention here to an improper use of terms which seems to have become nearly universal with those in the world who speak of us, and which is encouraged, to a very large extent, by the practice of our own people. It is this: Very many of our brethren and sisters are in the habit of styling themselves Seventh-day “Advents,” from which fact this custom has become general with those who do not belong to us. A moment’s reflection will satisfy any one acquainted with the laws of language, that this form of expression is not correct. We are not Seventh-day “Advents,” but Seventh-day “Adventists.” If you would feel the force of this criticism, turn to Webster’s dictionary, and under the word “Advent,” you will find the following definitions, viz., 1. “A coming; approach; visitation. Specifically, the first or second coming of Christ.” Now we can in no sense represent the coming of Christ; but we are firm believers in its near approach, and are therefore properly styled “Adventists,” which signifies not the event itself, as does the word “Advent,” but those who believe the personal coming of Christ to be near at hand. Let us, therefore, who have been guilty of encouraging the error in question, manifest that teachable spirit which is always ready to improve in everything that relates to the cause of God, and thereby afford good evidence of that humility of heart which must ever attend the name, in order to constitute us genuine Adventists. W. H. L. The Law of God.
By R. F. Cottrell
There are those who are determined to have the ten commandments abolished, all to excuse their violation of the Sabbath of the fourth commandment. They have seen that the attempt to prove a change of the day of the Sabbath, so as to enforce the keeping of the first day of the week by the commandment, is an utter failure. The Sabbath with the Israelites was a definite day, distinguished by God’s providence in the giving of manna on “the six working days,” and the withholding of it on the seventh; and it was enforced by a penalty on them as a nation. They can also see no way to abolish the Sabbath commandment alone, striking it out of the midst of those moral laws where it was placed by the finger of God; therefore the only thing left is the abolition of the whole code. To succeed in this they affirm that the ten commandments were the old covenant, which was to vanish away, and that in the Scriptures “the law never means the ten commandments.” Why assert this? Because Christ teaches the perpetuity of every jot and tittle of the law, “till heaven and earth pass;” therefore they wish to make it appear that the term, the law, does not refer to the ten commandments. In the next verse, however, the Saviour changes the term to commandments, a term generally applied in the New Testament to the ten. See Matt. 15: 1–6; 19: 17, 18; Eph. 6: 1–3. Now let us see whether the Scriptures teach that the ten commandments are the law of God. Exodus 24: 12: “And the Lord said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there; and I will give thee tables of stone, and a law, and commandments which I have written; that thou mayest teach them.” Now what law or commandments had God himself written? The ten commandments, nothing more or less—the commandments which he spoke to all the people from Sinai, as recorded in the twentieth of Exodus. Here is the proof. “These words the Lord spake unto all your assembly in the mount out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud,5 and of the thick darkness, with a great voice; and he added no more. And he wrote them in two tables of stone, and delivered them unto me.” Deut. 5: 22. If the law and the commandments which God had written were one and the same, why does he say, “a law and commandments?” To make it emphatic, it is a figure of speech called pleonasm, which is the introduction of superfluous words to impress an idea more strongly, as: “All ye inhabitants of the world, and dwellers upon the earth.” See Brown’s Grammar, p. 256. This figure is often used in the Bible: as when we read, “Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws,” we need not search for a separate thing to answer to each one of these terms. It signifies that he obeyed God in all his established laws, and did all that he bid him on every occasion. Our “old covenant” friends tell us that the law spoken of by Jesus in Matt. 5: 17, 18, was “the law which related to him in types;” but that the commandments referred to in the next verse were those which “he was then giving to his disciples.” But it is evident that “these commandments” are identical with the law of which he has just affirmed the perpetuity till the end of time; for it is a conclusion drawn from what he had said of the law. Said he, “Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments,” &c. Our Saviour’s discourse is connected and logical. He does not, with the appearance of drawing a conclusion from what he has just said of the law, leap off to some commandments he was about to give; for what our friends claim as the commandments of Jesus are in the subsequent part of the discourse. Is it not evident that the law, and the commandments here affirmed, are those which David, by the Spirit, says are the truth. “Thy righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and thy law is the truth.” Ps. 119: 142. “Thou art near, O Lord; and all thy commandments are truth.” Vs. 151. To abolish these would be to abolish truth. Let us inquire what they are, and when, where, how, and by whom they were proclaimed. Here is the testimony: “Thou camest down also upon Mount Sinai, and spakest with them from Heaven, and gavest them right judgments, and true laws [mar., Heb., laws of truth], good statutes and commandments; and madest known unto them thy holy Sabbath, and commandedst them precepts, statutes, and laws, by the hand of Moses thy servant.” Neh. 9: 13, 14. This answers our inquiry. The laws of truth were given by Jehovah, with his own voice, at Mount Sinai, when he spoke to the assembled hosts of Israel. The ten commandments including the “holy Sabbath,” were spoken by God, and are clearly distinguished from the precepts, statutes, and laws, given “by the hand of Moses.” Of those given by the hand of Moses some were moral, like the ten commandments, and some were ceremonial and typical; but every principle of righteousness and truth is embodied in the ten commandments; and this law of truth shall endure as long as heaven and earth, as our Saviour teaches. Have we proved that the ten commandments are laws of God? A recent writer quotes this text, Neh. 9: 13, 14, only he corrupts it by making it read, “the,” instead of “thy holy Sabbath,” and then says, “Here is a time specified when the Lord made known unto the Jews their Sabbath, implying very clearly that it was a new day, not observed by their fathers.” The Italics are his; and the superficial reader might think that it was their Sabbath and a new day made known at Sinai for the first time. But what are the facts? Nehemiah, addressing God, says “thy holy Sabbath.” What is the Lord’s Sabbath? The day on which he rested. Sabbath means rest. “The seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD THY GOD.” Why? Because he “rested the seventh day.” For this reason “the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.” Was this Sabbath made known to Israel for the first time, when God spoke to them from Sinai? No; for they were keeping it before they reached that place. See Ex. 16. So the argument on making known their Sabbath, a new day is mere sophistry of the baldest kind. What to him is so clearly implied, to others must be as clear as mud. To show his fairness in quoting Scripture, I give the text as he gives it on another page. “The Jewish rest-day was peculiar to them, hence we read the Lord made ‘known unto them’ the ‘holy Sabbath . . . by the hand of Moses.’” It may be well enough to abridge a text, if the true meaning is preserved; but this quotation makes the text say what it does not say, but contrary to it. And this is a sample of all that can be said against the ten commandments, as the universal and perpetual law of God. Paul quotes from the ten commandments as the law. “I had not known sin but by the law; for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.” Rom. 7: 7. And of the same law he says in another place, “Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.” Rom. 3: 31. Is it come to this, that “God’s ten words, which not only in the Old Testament, but in all revelation, are the most emphatically regarded as the synopsis of all religion and morality,” are claimed to have been abolished, by professed ministers of the gospel? As well might they throw away the whole Bible as to reject that law which is the only code, distinguished and honored by being given to man in the hand-writing of the Almighty. What evil may we not expect, when sin has come to be so bold as this? R. F. COTTRELL. The New Volume.
By James White
With the new year we commence the new volume of the Signs of the Times. “Happy New Year,” dear reader, and may you find much joy in perusing the several numbers of this paper for 1877. Our first object shall be during the current year to give the reasons of our faith and hope. We have commenced this work at several times during the last five years and have been broken off from it by adverse circumstances which we could not control. Paul would have made a pastoral visit to the church at Thessalonica at a certain time, but “Satan hindered him.” But under most favorable circumstances we enter again upon the work of our choice, and resolve, by the grace of God, that nothing shall hinder us this time. Redemption is a grand and glorious theme. And we are very happy in contemplating it, and in bringing out those great fundamental facts upon which the faith and hope of the gospel are built. Mrs. White designs to furnish matter for each number of the Signs which will deeply interest all our readers. Her expositions of scripture truths, practical appeals, and her life sketches, will add great importance to this volume of our paper. The “Home Circle” will be a department of great importance to every family. Here will be found lessons of self-control, mutual forbearance and love, respect for parents, the power of kindness toward children, and the great moral and religious lessons of life, which should bless every household. These articles for the family circle, embracing parents as well as children, are not hastily snatched from our exchanges for this year. They have been selected by the watchful, critical eye of a mother, during the twenty years she has been leading her own children to manhood, and by her hand pasted in huge scrap-books from which they are now taken. “Good Health” is also a department of practical importance to every family. This column will be filled each week with the choicest selections, containing the most authentic facts upon the great subject of how to live so as to secure to ourselves and to our children the greatest amount of physical, mental, and moral power. Here will be found a thousand hints, and cautions, and bits of timely advice for all. And the departments of “Religious News and Notes,” and “Secular News,” will be selected and edited with great care, and with the object ever in view to meet the wants of the reading public. The Signs of the Times will be devoted, agreeably to our first design, to expositions of prophecy, to stating the reasons of our faith and hope, to recording the signs of our times in current events in fulfillment of prophecy, to practical godliness, and to religious and secular news. And neither time, nor labor, nor means will be spared to make it such a paper as the friends of the cause will take pleasure in circulating among their friends and neighbors, and in sending abroad in our own and in other countries wherever the English language is read. We are happy to know that hundreds of personal friends, from the Pacific to the Atlantic, take a lively interest in the circulation of the Signs. The Tract and Missionary Societies in the several States have taken hold of the work in earnest, and in a manner to insure success. With the blessing of God upon the conductors of the paper, and upon the efforts of those who labor to circulate it, the volume of the Signs of the Times for 1877 will be a power in the land to shake the foundation of error, and build up the cause of Bible truth. J. W.