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Review and Herald, Vol. 85, No. 5.

Publishers' Page

Review and Herald

Jan 30, 1908

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jan 30, 1908

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Conducted by the Department of Circulation of the Review and Herald Publishing Association

The Present Truth

In Facsimile
Do any of the REVIEW readers desire to secure a facsimile copy of the first two pages of the first paper—The Present Truth—ever published by Seventh-day Adventists, the paper that was the beginning of the REVIEW?
The Review and Herald Publishing Association is reproducing, in facsimile form, the first two pages of Vol. I, No. 1, of that paper, and have added to these two thrilling pages, of what is still present truth, a concise statement of the progress in the publishing of the third angel's message during the sixty years intervening between 1849 and 1908.
To possess these facsimile pages with their forcibly impressed truths of the early message, breathing the spirit of the 1844 movement, and revealing marked evidences of the humble means God accepted and used at the hands of men in the beginning of this great and last message to the world, together with a clear yet condensed statement of important facts with the figures and dates as results in the development of the publishing work since 1849, will doubtless be the desire of all of our present REVIEW readers. It will serve both as a relic of our humble beginning in the publishing work and also as a compendium of facts pertaining to the development of the entire work of the denomination. Price, sample copy, five cents, post-paid; 25 copies, one address, 75 cents.

The February Number of Life and Health

By Editor

The February number of Life and Health is now ready. It is essentially a “home number,” being filled with valuable instruction especially applicable in the home life. It will, therefore, be appreciated by the general public, and will yield the workers liberal returns for their services.
Its general articles include one from the well-known physician, S. A. Knopf, M. D., of New York, on “Sun, Air, and Water.” Dr. Kress treats the subject of “Pneumonia” in a very plain, practical way, and Dr. Leadsworth sets forth the “Contagion of Health.” Eminent scholars write upon “Consumption,” “Fake Meat Inspection,” “The Cause of Tuberculosis,” “Food Poisoning,” “Home Treatment of Tuberculosis,” “Prevention of Grip,” etc.
Dr. Prince gives an impressive contrast of the physiological methods of sanitariums and the drug practise, and shows why the drugs have a deteriorating effect.
In the Mothers’ Department are good things upon the manner of spending the “Winter Evenings at Home with the Children,” “The Punishing of Children,” “The Regulation of the Food of Infants,” etc., and Dr. Lauretta Kress prescribes a simple, yet effective, treatment for croup. Throughout the number, the children receive a good share of the attention of our writers.
Mrs. Fitch gives some new and surprising revelations in connection with her talks on “Dairy Products” and “Substitutes for Butter.” Mrs. E. G. White presents the power of prayer in behalf of the sick, and sets forth the principles that should guide those who pray for the sick. The entire number is filled with most practical and essential information in connection with the care of the health, and the prevention and cure of diseases most prevalent at this season of the year.
The outside cover of the February number is very attractive, being printed in colors. This number will be one of the best sellers we have ever issued. Forty thousand copies are provided for before the journal is printed. Doubtless it will have the largest circulation of any number thus far published. We invite all who are anxious to do some good, and who have the time to devote to this work, to correspond with us about the circulation of this popular health journal.
Price, single copy, 10 cents; 2 to 25 copies, to one address, 5 cents; 25 to 500 copies, 4 cents; annual subscription price, 75 cents.

Making Home Happy and Making Home Peaceful, by Mrs. L. D. Avery-Stuttle

By Mrs. L. D. Avery-Stuttle

WE call the attention of the readers of the REVIEW to those two important little books, which have done much in times past to make home happy and peaceful.
Many homes have been wrecked because of the fact that fathers and mothers were not really acquainted with their children. They seem to have forgotten that they were once young. They have unconsciously become harsh, unreasonable, and unsympathetic with their children, and thus fail to make their home attractive,—an abode of love and refinement. The parents forget that the Lord has implanted in the hearts of the children a great love for recreation and beauty. The sad result is seen in thousands of broken and unhappy homes, a multitude of young people lost to the church, and sent wandering in the dark highways of death.
Feeling this fact deeply, the author has tried to point out a better way in the little story, “Making Home Happy,” much of which is taken directly from life. The excellent sale of the book in the past testifies to the fact that it meets a long-felt want.
But there are two sides to every question, and the book “Making Home Peaceful,” a sequel to the other book “Making Home Happy,” was written to emphasize the other side. Having seen by experience that some easily influenced and overindulgent parents needed caution on the other side of the question, and that their children were often allowed to take liberties, and to be rude and disrespectful toward their elders, the author became deeply impressed to add to the first book the second, “Making Home Peaceful,” that both parents and children might see and understand their duty toward each other, and that the hearts of the parents might be turned toward the hearts of the children.
Both books are designed to make brighter and more peaceful homes, and to lead the reader toward that immortal home which shall be quietness and peace with forever. Either book will be found very helpful to both old and young, but it will be better if the two are read close together, reading “Making Home Happy” first.
Prices: “Making Home Happy,” paper cover, 25 cents; cloth bound, 50 cents. “Making Home Peaceful,” 75 cents, all post-paid.

Early Writings

“WHAT are ‘Early Writings’?” “Of what are they composed?” These are questions often asked by our young people, and those who have recently connected with the denomination. For the benefit of such we explain that the book we call “Early Writings” contains a compilation and reprint of the first published Testimonies of the author, Mrs. E. G. White, with foot-notes, giving dates and explanations. It is a reprint of the old book published in 1851 under the title of “Experiences and Views,” with no change of the original idea or sentiment.
Although many of the subjects treated in this book have been enlarged upon and brought out in other books by the author, they seem to be especially appreciated in condensed form as given in “Early Writings.” This book sparkles with the plain principles of the third angel’s message, and brings to the reader a store of information and instruction that will be especially helpful to any individual or denominational worker. It will do more to establish faith and confidence in the gift of the spirit of prophecy than any other book published.
A new edition of this work has been brought out, and is now being bound in pamphlet form at the cost of 35 cents a copy. It is also being bound in the plain cloth for 75 cents, and in flexible leather binding for $1.25.

Conference Laborers’ Report Book

The Review and Herald Publishing Association is completing a Conference Laborers’ Report Book, which is intended for the convenience of conference laborers who desire to keep in convenient form a permanent copy of their monthly and annual reports, together with other records for future reference.
It contains twelve blanks for monthly reports, a blank for annual reports, eight pages for cash account, eight pages ruled for recording appointments, eight pages for addresses, six pages for recording the personnel of various standing committees, and ten pages memoranda, making a very attractive and durable pocket book of eighty pages, six and one half by four inches, bound in limp leather. Price, 50 cents, post-paid.

Publication Ordering Information

Orders for any publication mentioned on this page may be sent to any conference tract society, or to Review and Herald Publishing Association, Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C., or Battle Creek, Mich.
Also Pacific Press Publishing Association, Mountain View, Cal.; Portland, Ore.; Kansas City, Mo.; Southern Publishing Association, Nashville, Tenn., and Fort Worth, Tex.

Selfishness or Sacrifice

By C. M. S.

The great battle of the ages, the great controversy between light and darkness, good and evil, has been the battle, the controversy, to determine whether self-seeking or self-sacrifice should be the dominating characteristic throughout the universe. Jesus Christ on the one hand and Lucifer on the other stand forth as the willing representatives of those two principles. In Christ is love and self-sacrifice personified; in Lucifer is centered all that wars against Christ and his mission of love and reconciliation. Love set a race in Eden to fill a world with love and joy and peace. Selfishness planted there the seeds of doubt and distrust, discord and disbelief; and from those seeds have grown the thistles and thorns of sorrow, misery, hatred, and death. Before the advent of self-interest, man heard the counsels of God from the very lips of God; but now the glory of God is veiled from man, and the glory of man is no more.
When selfish interests are cherished in the heart of man, that soul has ranged itself on the side of him who brought us all our sorrow, on the side of him whose bitter business it has been through the centuries to fight against God, and multiply tombs for his children. When our own interests loom large in our eyes, and those of our neighbor grow dim and small, we may know that we are passing over to the enchanted ground at whose farther border waits the sleep of eternal death. God’s kingdom will not always endure part self-sacrifice and part self-love. The one tends to life everlasting, the other breeds naught but sorrow and death. The one is God’s undying purpose; the other is at war with him and his purpose. It is well that we take alarm at the first symptoms of selfishness in our hearts, for every such manifestation is putting a wider gulf between us and eternal life. Such attributes persisted in reduce us to the chaff and the dross which the fires of earth’s cleansing will consume.
The motive power of God’s universe must be love, for he is love. That actuated him in the gift of Christ; that actuated Christ in the gift of himself; and that will be the actuating motive of every soul that enters the gates of the city of God. Self-love has been a dominating characteristic in the history of the human race; but it will not be seen in the renovated universe. We have no time but the present in which, with the help of God, to weed it out of our lives; and the size of the task and the shortness of the time make it necessary that we give due diligence to the work. Nor are we to imagine that this cleansing of our lives can be accomplished by turning our attention on ourselves. The example of our Redeemer must be our guide. Forgetting self in the service of others—this brings us into harmony with the eternal purpose of God, and makes us coworkers with Christ in finishing his great undertaking and ushering in the kingdom of our God. C. M. S.

The Doctrine for All Nations

THERE is no other doctrine which so exalts the work of Christ the Saviour of the world as does the fundamental truth of conditional immortality and life in Christ. There is no doctrine which more effectually robs Christ of the glory due to him as Saviour of the world than the fundamental error of natural immortality and life inherent in man. In the one doctrine honor is given to Christ because he “hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.” In the other doctrine Christ is dishonored because his office as the life-giver is abolished, and life and immortality are made to be entirely independent of the gospel.
Furthermore, the preaching of the second advent of our Lord as an imminent event is the message to be proclaimed to all nations in this generation, and this teaching will prepare believers to stand in the judgment hour; but this great truth is either made secondary or ignored altogether by a very large majority of the ministers of the gospel to-day, whether they stand before a nominally Christian people in the home land, or meet gross heathenism face to face in the dark places of the earth. It is time for the message to be heard, in all lands, which proclaims Christ as our life, and which says, “Behold, he cometh with clouds.”
There is special need of teaching these two great doctrines as the demonstration of the superiority of the gospel of Christ over any heathen religion. This clear light of truth will dispel the darkness of error, and will guide in the heavenly way many who are now wandering in the devious paths of a satanic philosophy. This is well set forth by Edward White in his work “Life in Christ,” from which we take the following extract:—
Under present conditions the natural force of the gospel is abated. It does not take hold of the moral understanding of Asia. . . . Where is the force of truth and grace that smote the philosophies and idolatries of the Mediterranean in the apostolic age, and shook like an earthquake the whole of Roman Europe and Asia in a single generation? Let it not be said it was the stress of miracles that then availed. Miracles exerted an inconsiderable influence, in comparison with a truth which inspired an overpowering energy of faith, a grace that commended itself to all affections, and an announcement of approaching doom which struck like a blazing thunderbolt from the uplifted hand of the Almighty.
Is it not that we are propagating both abroad and at home a Christianity which is half paralyzed in its two chief forces of hope and fear through the perversions of an unbiblical theology? We fail in thoroughly presenting God’s love to the nations,—a love strong enough to melt even Chinese arrogance, and to develop the belief of a real and personal God among Chinese Buddhists, because we have encumbered Christianity with a doctrine of hell, so unjust, so indiscriminate, so hardening in its frightful propositions, that men’s consciences refuse to receive it. Our missionary theology can not commend itself “to every man’s conscience,” because every man’s conscience, whether in Europe or in Asia, in proportion as it is enlightened, rejects it with horror.
But the predominant system of teaching in heathendom fails also, I venture to think, in another department—through withholding the influence of a truth favorable to the production alike of hope and of fear. Not only does the retribution preached at home and abroad fail, by its unscriptural representations, to awaken terror in the educated classes, since whatever you exaggerate you weaken; but it is nearly everywhere the custom with missionary societies to send out teachers opposed to the belief of Christ’s advent to judge the nations, as the next great event in the history of the world.
The plain doctrine of St. Paul, in the second letter to the Thessalonians, that the personal advent of Christ will occur for the purpose of destroying “the man of sin;”—the doctrine of the prophet Daniel, that the Son of man will come in the clouds of heaven for the destruction of the fourth kingdom, and of that “horn that had eyes, and a mouth that spake great things;”—the doctrine that Christ himself will come to punish “with flaming fire” an antichristian clergy that has perverted revelation until men can no longer believe in it, and to judge nations that persist in idolatry after due summons to repentance;—this doctrine of Christ’s ever-impending advent, under the influence of which the gospel was spread in the first century, is denied by the missionary societies and the generality of their agents. Here is a present loss, and possible recovery of power, which may be readily appreciated.
Let the gospel be preached in India and China as the message of life to the dead, as the gift of immortality in body and soul, to a race sitting in the death shade of atheism; let it be preached as the message of a God who is intelligibly beneficent, but intelligibly and justly “terrible” to wicked men; let it be proclaimed that the times of pagan ignorance this righteous Judge “overlooked,” but now, on peril of the “greater damnation,” commands all men everywhere to repent; let the words of the apocalyptic angel become the topic of the missionary, “Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come!”—and one can not but believe that a new power might attend in the East, as in the West, the diffusion of Christianity.
There is something so heart-striking, so fitted to compel attention, in the apostolic warning of Christ’s imminent return to destroy obstinate and filthy worshipers of idols, to avenge the perversion of truth in Christendom, to raise in glory the sleeping saints, and to establish heaven’s kingdom on earth,—that even languid India must lift her head to listen, and haughty, philosophic China harken awestruck to the trumpet-blast. Christianity is a power which is designed to act on men from before as well as from behind, through the expectation of coming events, as well as through the study of facts accomplished. It is a prophecy and a mighty world-embracing drama, as well as a history. But under the prevailing system of teaching it is a gospel without the vivid hope of that advent of Christ to crown his followers, the prospect of which, at the beginning, filled and reddened like a dawn of glory all the eastern sky. The whole body of prophecy is now supposed to prove only, when interpreted with due caution, that the Lord “delayeth his coming,” that wisdom consists in proclaiming the doctrine of the “evil servant,” and in relegating the expectation of the Lord’s return to a generation that shall live at the end of the millennium. . . . Who, then, can wonder that a Christianity so diminished in its forces both to win and to appal, so pale and so colorless, naturally maintains a doubtful fight with the stiff-necked pagans of Asia? Is there not wanted a doctrine that commands itself more cogently to the reason and to the conscience of men, of the teachers as well as the taught, to their imagination not less than to their affections,—a love so real, so tender and intelligible,—a terror so soul-subduing, so near at hand, and so appreciably just, as to shake if it can not vanquish the stoutest resistance of the heathen;—a hope of speedy victory to the church, sufficient to restore the death-daring energies of the first century, and a courage founded on overpowering conviction which would engage in closer conflict with Eastern Buddhism and the stolid positivism of Confucius? That “throneless king,” as the Chinese call him, would soon, I trust in God, lose much of his opposing power, before a Saviour preached as if he were the very Jesus of the Gospels, coming quickly again to be the Lord of the world.
This sentiment is entirely in harmony with the instruction given through the spirit of prophecy concerning the preaching needed at this time: “The return of Christ to our world will not be long delayed. Let this be the key-note of every message.” We believe that the labors of those ministers will be most fruitful who keep in the forefront these two great doctrines of the Scriptures,—life in Christ and the imminent coming of Christ. These are the doctrines for all nations.

A Work Foretold

By C. M. S.

On the eighth of January a mass-meeting was held in New York City, representing the various churches of Greater New York, in the interests of Sunday observance. The mass-meeting was held under the auspices of the "American Sabbath Union," which proposes to hold many such meetings in the near future in the larger cities of the country. Two resolutions covering the purpose of the union were adopted at this meeting, one of which we quote as published in the Episcopal Recorder of January 16:—
Resolved, That as public teachers and representatives of Christian sentiment, we can only view with alarm the tendency to use any portion of the legalized day of rest for secular recreations. This is not the purpose for which the fathers of our government enacted the Sabbath laws and set an example in Sabbath observance which was wholesome, and which challenges our conscientious imitation. Even the elimination of religious considerations on the part of the individual does not justify the devotion of the Sabbath day to secular amusements. He is under religious as well as civil law. If there be a divine commandment enjoining the observance of one day in seven as a time for worship, it has not been displaced by the passing from the old dispensation to the new, nor can it be abrogated by any enactment of Senate or Parliament. Rather does the commandment stand solitary and forever conspicuous, emphasized by the reverberating thunders and the flashing lightnings of Mount Sinai, as the spectacular setting in which the great Jehovah accompanied its bestowal on mankind. We dare not temporize with the decalogue. If the fourth commandment is binding at all upon the twentieth century, it is binding for all the twenty-four hours of the Sabbath day. All its hours are equally sacred; so that all entertainments in the late afternoon and in the evening of the Sabbath day, whether "educational" so-called or social, are in our judgment both desecrations of the day of rest and also defiant of that commandment which the great Maker has given unto men to observe.
The propositions set forth in the above resolution would, if carried out, subvert every principle of human liberty. For instance, the proposition is put forth in the third sentence that he who will not use the first day of the week in a religious manner shall not use it in a secular manner. Such a proposition would justify any set of men in taking from others the right to use any day which they might choose to set apart for special purposes. Who has granted to men the right to levy upon a portion of a man's assets in order to compel him to comply with their religious practises?
The resolution continues: "He is under religious as well as civil law." Very true; but "to his own master he standeth or falleth." The magistrate who attempts to administer religious law unites church and state, and puts himself in the place of God, as if God were not able to administer his own law, arrange his own system of rewards and punishments, and take care of his own kingdom. He who breaks the law of God must render account of himself to God, not to the state.
The resolution declares that the Sabbath law can not "be abrogated by any enactment of Senate or Parliament." That is true. It is also true that it can not be strengthened or improved "by any enactment of Senate or Parliament." Every civil law enacted for the purpose of enforcing a divine law is an insult flung in the face of the Almighty—as if his law needed the help of human law to save it from dissolution and obsolescence.
We confess to a feeling of wonderment when we read the words: "We dare not temporize with the decalogue," "emphasized by the reverberating thunders and the flashing lightnings of Mount Sinai," when we know that they who are saying this are not only temporizing with it, but literally tampering with it, to make it mean what God did not intend it should mean, and what in the very nature of the case it could not mean. Temporizing with the decalogue never could be, in the sight of heaven, so defiant an act as that actual tampering with the sacred instrument which is seen to day wherever Sunday laws are being urged by ministers of the gospel who try to use the fourth commandment as an authority for their acts.
The fourth commandment is binding to-day, as the above resolution intimates; but it is the fourth commandment as God gave it, not as it is being to-day misinterpreted to mean when men use it to give life to the Sunday institution, and thereby throw discredit upon the day which the commandment specifically enjoins.
Concerning the work which the American Sabbath Union is to do following this meeting, the editor of the Recorder says:—
That the matter is not to be allowed to rest with the passing of these resolutions, was evidenced by the passing of a third, which provides for an interdenominational committee, to consist of at least one representative of each Christian denomination. This committee "shall have in charge the calling of other mass-meetings, if this be necessary. It shall also wait upon the mayor, and otherwise express the sentiment of the mass-meeting representing the Christian citizenship of the community and the State."
In various parts of the country are springing up interdenominational committees, consisting of representatives of the various denominations, whose one purpose is to make the observance of Sunday compulsory upon all. Thus are they binding themselves together, all joined to the one great standard, the Sunday institution, pledging themselves to its enforcement. This work, so long ago foretold, we are seeing accomplished before our eyes; and seeing this, we know that the hour of the final conflict is nearing, and the glad day of our Saviour's return will not be long to wait.
C. M. S.

William Lloyd Garrison’s Protest Against Sunday Laws

By W. A. S.

[The time was 1848. The occasion, a convention in Boston, in response to a call issued by Garrison and a score of associates “To the Friends of Civil and Religious Liberty.” In that year an organization called the “American and Foreign Sabbath Union” had been particularly active in urging the enforcement of Sunday observance, and in the midst of the historic anti-slavery agitation of which Garrison was the leader, it was felt by friends of liberty that the occasion called for the sounding of a note in behalf of religious liberty. Truly a clarion note is sounded in the following resolutions introduced by Garrison. In order to give both the resolutions and the larger portion of his speech upon them, further facts concerning the convention and the circumstances must be deferred to another time. Though somewhat long, this trumpet call in behalf of true principles will, we are sure, be read with deep interest. It was of Garrison and his championship of civil and religious liberty, that John Bright, the English statesman, wrote to James Russell Lowell, “I know no nobler man than William Lloyd Garrison.”—W. A. S.]

The Resolutions

1. Resolved, That they who are for subjecting to fine or imprisonment such as do not receive their interpretation of the Scriptures in regard to the observance of the first day of the week as the Sabbath, are actuated by a mistaken or malevolent spirit, which is utterly at variance with the spirit of Christ,—which, in various ages, has resorted to the dungeon, the rack, the gallows, and the stake, for the accomplishment of its purpose,—and which ought to be boldly confronted and rebuked.
2. Resolved, That the penal enactments of the State legislature compelling the observance of the first day of the week as the Sabbath are despotic, unconstitutional, and ought to be immediately abrogated; and that the interference of the State, in matters of religious faith and ceremonies, is a usurpation which can not be justified.
3. Resolved, That as conflicting views prevail in the community, which are cherished with equal sincerity, respecting the holiness of days, and as it is the right of every class of citizens to be protected in the enjoyment of their religious sentiments on this and every other subject pertaining to the worship of God, all classes should be united in demanding a repeal of the enactments alluded to, on the ground of impartial justice and Christian charity.
4. Resolved, That this convention recommends to all the friends of religious liberty throughout the country the presentation of petitions to the next legislature, in every State in which such laws exist, and protesting against their enactment as an unhallowed union of church and state.
5. Resolved, That if the legislature may rightfully determine the day on which people shall abstain from labor for religious purposes, it may also determine the place in which they shall assemble, the rites and ordinances which they shall observe, the doctrines which they shall hear, the teachers which they shall have over them, and the peculiar faith which they shall embrace; and thus entirely subvert civil and religious freedom, and enable bigotry and superstition, as of old, to— “Go to their bloody rites again,—bring back The hall of horrors and the assessor’s pen,— Recording answers shrieked upon the rack,— Smile o’er the gaspings of spine-broken men, And perpetrate damnation in their den!”
6. Resolved, That as it has been found safe, politic, and beneficial to allow people to decide for themselves in all other religious observances, there is no reason to doubt that the same good results would attend their liberation from the bondage of a Sabbatical law; for “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.”

Garrison’s Speech upon the Resolutions

Of all the assumptions on the part of legislative bodies, that of interfering between a man’s conscience and his God is the most unsupportable and the most inexcusable. For what purpose do we elect men to go to the General Court? Is it to be our lawgivers on religious matters? . . . This passing a law forbidding me or you to do on a particular day what is in itself right, on the ground that that day, in the judgment of those who make the enactment, is more holy than another,—this exercise of power, I affirm, is nothing better than usurpation. It is the spirit which in all ages has persecuted those who have been loyal to God and their consciences. It is a war upon conscience, and no religious conclave or political assembly ever yet carried on that war successfully to the end. You can not by enactment bind the consciences of men, nor force men into obedience to what God requires.
Who wants to be persecuted on account of his own conscientious views? I will ask the first-day Sabbatarian: Do you claim a right to entertain your views, without molestation, in regard to the holiness of time?—Most assuredly. How do you make it out that the first day of the week is the Sabbath?—“I believe it to be so; if it is not, to my own Master I stand or fall. Under a government which avowedly tolerates all beliefs, I claim the right, as a first-day Sabbatarian, to keep that day as the Sabbath.” Well, I do not assail that right. I claim the right also to have my own views of the day; the right to sanctify the first, second, or third, or all days, as I think proper. Now I turn to that first-day Sabbatarian, and ask him how he dares to dictate to me to keep the day which he regards as holy, and to say, “If you do not obey me, I will put my hands into your pocket, and take out as much as I please in the shape of a fine; or if I find nothing there, I will put you in prison; or if you resist enough to require it, I will shoot you dead.” How dare he do this? If he is not a ruffian, is he a Christian? Talk of the spirit of justice animating the bosom of the man who comes like a highwayman with, “Do or die!” Who made him a ruler over other men’s consciences? In a government which is based on equality, we must have equal rights. No men, however sincere, are to wield forceful authority over others who dissent from them, in regard to faith and observance. The case is so plain that it does not need an argument; and I am confident that, in the course of a few years, there will not be a Sabbatical enactment left unrepealed in the United States, if in any part of Christendom. It belongs to the tyrannical legislation which formerly sent men to the stake, in the name of God and for his glory, because they did not agree in the theological views of those who burned them.
In this country one pharisaical restriction after another, imposed by legislation, has been erased from the statute-book, in the progress of religious freedom. We now come to this Sabbatical observance as the last, perhaps,—a powerful one at any rate. If the Sabbath day be of God, it does not need legislation to uphold it. There is no power which can prevail against it. . . .
Why should we attempt to legislate upon a question of this kind? Observe how many differences of opinion prevail, honestly and sincerely, in the world, respecting it. Does any one doubt that the Seventh-day Baptists are sincere? Are they not honest, courageous, self-sacrificing men, those who stand out against the law and public sentiment, for conscience’ sake? The men, even though they err, who are true to their consciences, cost what it may, are, after all, those who are ever nearest to the kingdom of God. They desire only to know what is right, and they have the spirit in them to do what is right. The great mass of the first-day Sabbatarians—do they not claim to be conscientious and sincere? And the Quakers, who regard no day as in itself, or by divine appointment, more holy than another,—who will question their honesty or sincerity in this matter?
Here, then, are widely conflicting sentiments; but which of these parties shall resort to the arm of violence to enforce uniformity of opinion? The case is easily settled by making it our own, my friends. It is, as truly stated in the call [for the convention], based upon the declaration of Jesus, ‘Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.’ Now there is no Seventh-day Baptist who would wish to be proscribed for his views, of course. There is no first-day Sabbatarian who wishes a majority to get into the legislature to pass laws against the observance of the first day of the week as the Sabbath, or who would not vehemently protest against it. ‘Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them,’ and the religionist who is not prepared for this, is to be associated with the scribes and Pharisees of a persecuting age. He is one who joins in the crucifixion of Jesus as a blasphemer. . . .
We tolerate everything, except the opinions of men with regard to the first day of the week! Having very successfully gone thus far, I think we may take the next step, and finish the whole category of religious edicts enforced by penal law. Some of you doubtless remember what a hue and cry was raised by the religious press and the clergy, at the proposition to amend that portion of the constitution of Massachusetts, which required persons to be taxed for the support of public worship somewhere. But the spirit of religious liberty came up, and said, ‘That is tyranny, and the law ought to be,—ay, must be—repealed.’ What was the response of the evangelical press?—‘This is an infidel movement! This is an attempt to overthrow Christianity!’ And it prophesied that just as surely as the proposed amendment should be adopted, public worship would be sadly neglected. Well, the constitution was altered, in this respect, notwithstanding this selfish outcry. Is there less of public worship than formerly? The clergy have never been so well sustained as they now are, and no one laments the change.
Now, the outcry raised against the repeal of all Sabbatical laws, as an infidel movement, is as absurd, as preposterous, as libelous, as the other, and will be found so when those laws cease to be in force. . . .
What a tremendous outcry was raised in England when Daniel O’Connell, in behalf of Ireland, demanded the passage of the Catholic Emancipation act by the British Parliament! The Protestant clergy and the Protestant press cried out against it. It will never do, they said; the cause of religion will suffer. Where now is the Catholic test?—Gone; its ashes are not to be found; but has any injury followed from its repeal? So with regard to the unrighteous restrictions imposed upon the Jews; they were justified on the ground of Christian vigilance and security. But, during the present Parliament, the Jew in England can now take his position anywhere in the government, as well as the Christian. Does any one suppose Christianity will suffer by this?
Christianity, as taught by its Founder, does not need any governmental safeguards; its reliance for safety and prosperity is not on the rack or the stake, the dungeon or the gibbet, unjust proscription or brutal supremacy. No—it is the only thing under heaven that is not afraid; it is the only thing that repudiates all such instruments as unholy and sinful. . . .
Let us be careful how we trample on human liberty or human conscience. Said the apostle, ‘Every one of us shall give account of himself’—not to the Legislature of Massachusetts, not to the Congress of the United States, but—‘to God.’ . . .
It is not profane men, immoral men, who are especially interested in this movement. Far otherwise. They are glad, indeed, of any holiday on which to indulge their animal propensities; but they who go forward in a cause like this must be reformers in principle, and they will assuredly find the evil in the world not with them, but against them. They will find priestcraft on the one hand, and the rabble on the other, joining in a common persecution. Jesus was crucified, not by the chief priests and scribes and Pharisees alone, but it needed the populace to join with them; and then they could nail him to the cross, as they did, between two thieves, for this among other reasons, that he was not of God, because he did not keep the Sabbath day.

A Judge Decides the Question

ADVOCATES of Sunday laws, when seeking to show that the legislation they seek would not mean a union of church and state, have frequently declared that such laws were merely “police regulations,” enacted in order that the people might rest. But Judge Sheldon, of the district court of Johnson County, Kansas, has given a judicial decision of that question. The matter under consideration was the legality or illegality of playing baseball on Sunday. He decides that, according to the Sunday law of Kansas, Sunday baseball playing is illegal. Concerning this decision the Union Signal of January 16, giving its own version of the judge’s reason for rendering that decision, says editorially:—
The judge holds that the Sunday laws are designed to guard the religious privileges of the people, and decisions should be rendered in harmony with the spirit of the law.
They must decide so; for the purpose of a Sunday-law promoter is never met when the people merely rest on Sunday, and take the kind of rest that suits them best. The promotion of religion is the underlying motive in every Sunday law ever enacted. Will our National Reform friends admit it, now that the Kansas judge, in declaring Sunday baseball a violation of the law, has settled the other question also? If they do, we shall expect to hear no more about Sunday laws being mere “police regulations,” not religious legislation, but civil only.
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