History oF THE SABBATH. 199
to respect the science of astronomy. To this, it is suf:
ficient to reply that Dr. Akers has not established his
reckoning upon any such basis of astronomical calculation
as to command the respect of the scientific world. IIis
book was published in 1855, but we have no evidence
that the scientific men of this age accept it as estah-
lished by any substantial facts in astronomy. Indeed,
the president of the University of Michigan, like Dr.
Akers, a Methodist clergyman, writing in 1866, pro-
nounces the whole effort a complete failure! See page
168 of this work. And yet every one of these scientific
men are in sympathy with the first-day Sabbath so far
as they have any religious interests.
But even astronomy must have data from which to
reckon, or upon which to base its calculations, or it is
utterly powerless to establish chronological points. The
testimony of all history shows Sunday to be the first day
and Saturday the scventh. How, then, can astronomy
prove that the first day of Genesis was Monday and the
seventh day Sunday? Can that science determine the
exact age of the world, and so enable us to count the
days from the creation to the resurrection of Christ?
No astronomer claims to do this. How, then, does Dr.
A. prove that the seventh day of the week observed at
the exodus is nof the seventh day of Gen. 2:2, 37
How he establishes this will certainly interest the curi-
ous reader. His “fixed point in chronology” is the
Sunday of Christ's resurrection. From this he reckons
back to the day of God's rest ir Gen. 2:2, 3, and finds
it to be just 290,767 weeks, to a day! Thus proving,
to his mind, that the seventh day of Gen. 2:2, 3, is the
first day of Matt. 28:1.
But this is not all. Having reckoned back from
Christ’s resurrection to God's rest-day in Eden, and by
that reckoning made it clear to his own mind that God’s
rest was upon Sunday, he sets out from his new basis,
the rest-day of God upon Sunday, and reckons forward
to the exodus, and by that second count of days he de-
termines that (ods rest-day came that year upon Abib 16.