Dale, D. C. (Congregationalist), pp. 106, 107. London:
Hodder and Stoughton.
+Also Canon Eyton declares: ‘‘There is no word,
no hint, in the New Testament about abstaining
from work on Sunday. ... The observance of
Ash Wednesday or Lent stands on exactly the same
footing as the observance of Sunday... . Into
the rest of Sunday no divine law enters.”—*“ The
Ten Commandments,” Canon Eyton (Church of
England). London: Thubner and Co.
The Rev. Isaac Williams states: ‘“ And where are
we told in the Scriptures that we are to keep the
first day at all? We are commanded to keep the
seventh; but we are nowhere commanded to keep
the first day. . . . The reason why we keep the
first day of the week holy instead of the seventh is
for the same reason that we observe many other
things, not because the Bible, but the church, has
enjoined it.”"—' Plain Sermons on the Catechism,”
Rev. Isaac Williams, B. D. (Church of England),
Vol. 1, p. 334. London: Longmans and Co.
The ‘Methodist Episcopal Theological Compend,”
page 180, says: ‘It is true there is no positive com-
mand for infant baptism, nor is there any for keeping
holy the first day of the week.”
Albert Barnes, the great Presbyterian commenta-
tor, makes the statement: “No precept for it is
found in the New Testament.”
The first recorded instance of Sunday observance
that has any claim to be considered genuine is
“mentioned by Justin Martyr, A. D. 140, when some
Christians met and read the writings of the apostles.
He does not even intimate, however, that this day
has any divine authority, either from Christ or
from His apostles. It was about this time that the
great apostasy set in that is foretold in Acts 20: 29,
30; 2 Timothy 4:3, 4; and 2 Thessalonians 2: 3, 4.
REMODELING APoSTOLIC CHRISTIANITY
HE pagan Romans who nominally accepted
Christianity, generally remained unchanged
at heart. The ‘‘mystery of iniquity’ was working
and they began to remodel the religion of the
apostles. A Baptist historian says: “Toward the
latter end of the second century, most of the churches
assumed a new form; the first simplicity disap-
peared; insensibly, as the old disciples retired to
their graves, their children came forward and new-
molded the cause.”’—' Ecclesiastical Researches,”
chapter 6, page 5I.
Since the converted pagan had heretofore held
Sunday as a feast day in honor of the sun god, they
now brought it into the church. Morer, a leading
church historian, says that ‘‘the Christians thought
fit to keep the same day, and the same name of it,
that they might not appear causelessly peevish,
and by that means hinder the conversion of the
gentiles.”—*“ Dialogues on the Lord’s Day,” pp. 22,
23
The old Chamber’s Encyclopedia, in its article,
“Sabbath,” says:
APRIL, 1929
“By none of the Fathers before
the fourth century is it [the first day of ‘the week]
identified with the Sabbath; nor is the duty of
observing it grounded by them either on the fourth
commandment or on the precept or example of
Christ or His apostles.
“Unquestionably the first law, either ecclesiastical
or civil, by which the Sabbatical observance of
that day is known to have been ordained, is the
edict of Constantine, 321 A. D., of which the-follow-
ing is a translation:
Tue Famous Epicr
“YET all judges, inhabitants of the cities,” and
artificers, rest on the venerable day of the
sun. But in the country, husbandmen may freely
and lawfully apply to the business of agriculture;
since it oftens happens that the sowing of corn and
the planting of vines cannot be so advantageously
performed on any other day.’
“But it was not until the year 538 that abstinence
from agricultural labor was recommended, rather
than enjoined, by an ecclesiastical authority [the
third Council of Orleans], and this expressly that
the people might have more leisure to go to church
and say their prayers.”
In its article “Sunday,” the ‘Encyclopedia
Britannica,” says: ‘“‘It was Constantine who first
made a law for the proper observance of Sunday;
and who, according to Eusebius, appointed that it
should be regularly celebrated throughout the
Roman Empire.”
The ‘Encyclopedia Britannica’ further declares:
‘“’The earliest recognition of the observance of
Sunday as a legal duty is a constitution of Constan-
tine in 321 A. D., enacting that all courts of justice,
inhabitants of towns, and workshops were to be
at rest on Sunday (venerabils die solis), with an
exception in favor of those engaged in agricultural
labor.” —* Encyclopedia Britannica,” Volume XXV1I,
11th edition, article ** Sunday,” p. 95.
Robert Cox says: ‘‘He [Grotius] refers to Eusebius
for procf that Constantine, besides issuing his well-
known edict that labor should be suspended on
Sunday, enacted that the people should be brought
before the law courts on the seventh day of the week,
which also, he adds, was long observed by the
primitive Christians as a day for religious meetings.
. . . And this, says he, ‘refutes those who think
that the Lord's day [Sunday] was substituted for
the Sabbath — a thing nowhere mentioned either
by Christ or His apostles.””’— Hugo Grotius (d.
1645), “Opera Omnia Theologica.” London: 1679;
cited tn ‘‘ The Literature of the Sabbath Question,”
Robert Cox, Vol. 1, p. 223. Edinburgh: Maclachlan
and Stewart, 1865.
Professor Webster states: ‘This legislation by
Constantine probably bore no relation to Chris-
tianity; it appears, on the contrary, that the emperor,
in his capacity of Pontifex Maximus, was only adding
the day of the sun, the worship of which was then
firmly established in the (Continued on page 34)
PAGE TWENTY-FIVE
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