Barnabas would fain have the world believe that God has made one law which
man could never keep without leading him into bondage. He says, “Sister
Stowe, nor any others of like faith pretends to keep the seventh-day
according to the commandment, that reads, ‘thou shalt not do any work.’
Exo. xx: 10. ‘Let no man go out of his place on the seventh day.’ There
stands the command with all its terrible sanctions of thunder and
lightnings. If this command is now in force sister S. and all the rest
must stand condemned at the dread tribunal of God, for they all break that
commandment as much as we who do not pretend to keep it.” The speciousness
of B.’s reasoning is a great deal more likely to lead saints into bondage,
than what he has said of sister Stowe. He begins in the very onset to
mislead the mind. He quotes “Let no man go out of his place on the seventh
day,” and says, there stands the command with all its terrible sanctions
of thunder and lightnings, and then says sister S. and Br. Bates and all
the rest must stand condemned at the dread tribunal of God, for they all
break that _commandment_. Now I say this is not a commandment, but a
command given to the children of Israel twenty days before they heard that
terrible thunder and lightning at mount Sinai, where the ten commandments
was made known to them by the Almighty God’s speaking them all out in an
audible voice, and then writing them with his own finger on tables of
stone. These are all the commandments that God ever gave to man, and they
were as equally binding on the stranger, (the Gentile) that was within
their gates, as on the Jew. Every one can see how difficult it would be
for a man well versed in scripture to remember every direction, or a “thus
sayeth the Lord,” for a commandment, especially the millions who cannot
read. They were of that character, of so few words, that God directed them
to “bind them for a sign upon their hands, and they shall be as a frontlet
between thine eyes,” (“that the Lord’s law may be in thy _mouth_.” Exo.
xiii: 9,) “and thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on
thy gates.” Num. xv: 38-40; Deut. vi: 8, 9. This, God’s code of Laws was
put into the Ark. Deut. x: 5. And he says that “one law shall be to him
that is home born and to the stranger that sojourneth with you.” Exo. xii:
49. Now Moses’ code of laws was written in a book and placed in the same
ark. Deut. xxxi: 24-26. This law from the xiv. ch. and onwards, and in
Lev. was to be read to the whole assembly once in seven years; see xxxi:
10-12, and Neh. viii: 1-6. Six hours, reading from morning to noon. But
the ten commandments as in Exo. xx: 1-17, can be read in three minutes. If
you want to understand God’s code of laws separately set forth and
enforced, see from iv. to xiv. of Deut. His reasons for giving them to the
Jews, vii: 6-8, and x: 22. He tells them they shall not add nor diminish
from them. Deut. iv: 2. (Mind this.) “The man for gathering sticks (either
to kindle a fire for his comfort, or cook some food, B. says,) was by the
command stoned to death.” This is all supposition; nobody knows what he
gathered sticks for, or what size they were; he was stoned to death for
it, and so we might be now if the law of Moses was in force. Let it be
distinctly understood, that God’s code of laws, which comprises the ten
commandments, does not forbid us to kindle fires on his Sabbath; nor
require us to stay in our houses, nor forbid us to assemble together to
worship; neither does it forbid us to administer to the sick on his
Sabbath, nor do any _work_ of absolute necessity. These I propose to treat
upon more at large, under the head _Scriptural Observance of the Sabbath_.
Barnabas says, “if the covenant is not altered, amended nor repealed, then
it means just what it says. ‘Thou shalt not do any work,’ stands out in
bold relief against those who talk so much about the command, but never
yet pretend to keep it. If they say they have a right to alter the
phrase,” &c. Now we answer, that we never have attempted to alter it. It
is perfectly right, and your bare assertion, in the absence of any kind of
proof, does not, nor ever will prove, that we do not refrain from work on
the Sabbath, according to the commandment, as set forth in the Scriptures.
Two kinds of work are specified or inferred in the law of Moses. “In the
sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread,” &c. The way this is done, “man
goeth forth to his work and to his labor until evening.” This of course
includes from the first day to the seventh. Then Sunday is the first
working day of the six. This is distinguished _servile_ work, because in
Lev. xxiii. chap. and xxviii. and xxix. ch. of Numbers, the Lord’s Sabbath
and the Jewish Sabbaths of holy convocations are all brought to view, so
that from the 14th day of the first month to the 22d, is the feast of
unleavened bread with offerings, and fifty days from the wafe sheaf or
resurrection is another. See Lev. xxiii: 16-18, and then from the first
day of the 7th month until the 23d of the same, viz. 1st, 10th, 15th and
23d. The eight last days is a continual feast. Now the Sabbath of the Lord
God must inevitably be included in this last eight day feast of
Tabernacles; once every year, and very frequently on the first and tenth
day Sabbaths, and so from the passover feast to the end of unleavened
bread, always must include the weekly Sabbath every year; sometimes on a
feast day, which John calls “an high day.” Now the order of these Jewish
Sabbaths and feasts. God says of them “_every thing upon his day, besides_
the Sabbaths of the Lord,” &c. All the work was to be performed in these
feasts, come on what day they did, besides the offerings on the Sabbath of
the Lord. Lev. xxiii: 37, 38. Well, what was the work for every weekly
Sabbath? See Num. xxviii: 9, and on Sabbath two lambs, besides the daily,
which was two more; see 3d v. So we see here were always four lambs, with
the meats, &c. offered every seventh day, and sometimes thirty bullocks,
rams and lambs; and in all of the Jewish Sabbaths except that on the tenth
of the seventh month, it is expressly said “ye shall do no _servile work_
therein.” Now all this was work and labor, but it was ceremonial worship
and obedience to God, hence it was not _servile_ work. It is explained in
Exo. xii: 16, “No manner of work shall be done save that which every
_soul_ must eat. That only may be done.” What will you do with all these
commands, Barnabas. Did they not have to go out of their places after God
gave them the law from mount Sinai? Did they not assemble for worship? Did
they not prepare them food to eat, think ye, after the manna ceased? and
did not the Saviour say of his disciples, when reproached for eating corn
on the Sabbath day by the Pharisees, that they were guiltless? Was it
wrong to take it without leave? See Deut. xxiii: 24, 22. Was not the work
of circumcision always going on every weekly Sabbath? Now Jesus being the
Lord of the Sabbath, shows us under the Gospel, where he transposes these
ten commandments from the tables of stone, and gives them in our minds and
writes them on our hearts; shows us that this work or labor on the
Sabbath, were henceforth acts of necessity and mercy, instead of _servile
work_ because our mode of worshipping God was entirely changed. Hence
Jesus said, “My Father worketh hitherto and I work.” John v: 17. See what
kind of work, xvii: 4. “Done the will of God, finished his work,” after
supper. See also iv: 34, and v: 36. See his good works, x: 25, 32. This
then was the work that Jesus and his Father were doing, and for these he
is called a notorious Sabbath breaker. Well he is now doing a marvellous
work. Hab. i: 5, yet ye will not believe. “It is time for the Lord to work
for men have made void thy law.” Psl. cxix.
It does not follow that men shall be put to death now for violating the
Sabbath, any more than for violating the first, fifth, seventh, or all the
commandments—for the penalty of death follows the violation of every one
of the commandments.
1st commandment: “Thou shalt have no other Gods.” See Deut. xiii: 6-10 and
Exo. xxii: 20.
2d. “Thou shalt not make any image.” Deut. xiii: 12, 16.
3d. “Thou shalt not profane my name.” Lev. xxiv: 16, 22, 23.
4th. “Remember the Sabbath day.” Num. xv: 32, 33, 36.
5th. “Honor thy father and thy mother.” Lev. xx: 9.
6th. “Thou shalt not kill.” Lev. xxiv: 21 and 17.
7th. “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” Lev. xx: 10.
8th. “Thou shalt not steal.” Joshua vii: 20, 21 and 25.
9th. “Thou shalt not witness falsely.” Deut. xix: 16, 17, 19, 21.
10th. “Thou shalt not covet.” Jos. vii: 20, 25.
All of the commandments together. Num. xv: 30, 31; see also Deut. xxviii:
15-67.
If these were all to be enforced now, there would be but a small remnant
of the ten hundred millions now living, left upon the earth. If it is
proper to enforce the fourth, it is the whole. How clear that all of these
death penalties were annulled with the Jewish dispensation.
When Jesus begins to promulgate his Gospel, the stoning system is all
broken up; see his admirable sermon on the mount. Matt v: 38-48. “Ye have
heard that it hath been said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,
but I say unto you that ye resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee
on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also,” &c. &c. Here we see that
all the followers of Jesus are to be peace men, or non-resistants, an
entire change in administering the law. Says Barnabas, this is just what I
have been trying to make you believe, that the law, _all_ of the _law_
that the Jews were subject to in their dispensation was abolished under
the Gospel, for we are here under the new testament law, (grace). Not
quite so fast: Jesus forseeing such kind of teaching as this, placed the
commandments of God, (on which hung all the law and the prophets,) on an
immovable and fixed foundation and carried the teaching and keeping of
them clear into the reign of heaven; and any honest man who is seeking for
the truth though he be ever so ignorant in other things, will admit, when
he reads the 17-19, 21, 27 and 33d verses in this chapter, the force of
this truth. What an idea that Jesus should promise such invaluable
blessings to his followers after they become immortal only to mislead and
tantalize them. This is the tendency of your no commandment no law system.
Why Jesus tells you that the teachings of the bible have no other
foundations to stand upon. Well the multitude would not believe him then
as you and others will not now. See what confusion and shame they suffered
and bore in withering silence from his simple direction about enforcing
the old law for the violation of the seventh commandment. Here _she_ is
master, “Now Moses in the law, (not God’s code of laws,) commanded that
such should be stoned. But what sayest thou?” “Let him that is without
sin, cast the first stone at her.” The consequence was that the woman was
left without an accuser. Thus for once the whole multitude were convinced
that the stoning system for violating the commandments was abolished. See
John vii: 3-11. Again, you ask, “What type or part of the law was
fulfilled by Christ keeping the seventh day, or in our keeping it?”
Answer—“Love is the fulfilling of the law.” “If ye keep my commandments ye
shall abide in my love, even as I keep my Father’s commandments and abide
in his love.” John xv: 10. “This is _my commandment_ that ye love one
another as I have loved you.” 12 verse. Again, Jesus says in Matt. xxii:
37-40, where he includes all of the commandments that love to God and love
to our neighbor, is the whole law and the prophets, i. e. that this is the
substance of the whole ten commandments. The great one on the first table,
the second on the second table of stone. Paul tells the Hebrews that the
_law_ having a shadow of good things to come cannot make the comers
thereunto perfect. This is the _law_ of Moses. The ten commandments, the
_law_ which God audibly gave from his own mouth, is the one that Jesus
here refers to, and the only one that he kept abiding in his Father’s
love. Isaiah says, “He will magnify the law and make it honorable.” You
know he dishonored the law of Moses by abolishing sacrifices and offerings
altogether, and nailing it to his cross. It appears to me that any child,
anxious for the truth, would see this distinction. But no, you seem
determined on abolishing the whole. You see that Jesus’ commandment, John
xiii: 34; xv: 12, is the very essence of his Father’s and is given
exclusively for the church; but his Father’s was, and is for the whole
human family, and the fourth contains the Sabbath. Now do you see what
Jesus means when he says he came not to destroy the law but to fulfill,
and don’t you understand him to, that this law will stand after the
heavens and the earth are passed away. Here then is how and where he
fulfilled the law, or as you ask to know, a part of the _law_, for in
keeping the commandments he certainly kept the Sabbath; see Mark vi: 2,
and Luke iv: 16, 31. This, then, is the way we fulfill the law, by keeping
the very same seventh-day Sabbath. There is but two codes of laws brought
to view here, viz. God’s and Moses’. Don’t you see here he has fulfilled
the first and abolished the last. You take this rule with you to your
favorite texts, viz. Col. ii: 14-17; 2d Cor. iii, and Gal. ii. and v.,
where you say the commandments, the law of God, and the Sabbath, are
abolished; and you will find the same distinction. God never gave Paul,
nor you, nor any one else, any more liberty to preach that _his law_ was
abolished in this, or any other way, than he did to preach that there was
no salvation for man. Don’t you preach that man should obey the law of
God, and when man obeys as Jesus did, don’t he fulfill the _law_? Can you
tell how man can fulfill it without obeying the _whole_ law? You say that
will bring us into circumcision. How can that be, when he has, as I have
just stated, abolished all the ceremonial part of the law of Abraham and
Moses. Again, you say, the only reason given in the bible why the Sabbath
was ever kept was, that the Israelites might remember that God brought
them out of Egypt. Deut. v: 15. Your objection to the answer that was
given by C. Stowe, and reiterating the question, as you have the above
answered one, and challenging all who desire to be under the law to prove
the contrary, in B. A. Dec. 2d, only goes for proof of your ignorance, or
wilfull misunderstanding of God’s commandment. If the fourth commandment
in Exo. xx: 11, as she quoted and you dissent from it, is not the reason
given why we should keep the Sabbath on the seventh day, as directed in
the ninth and tenth verses, then it would be impossible to understand the
simple word of the Lord. Because God has used the words “command _thee_”
to keep the Sabbath, in Deut. v: 15, every other word or form of speech
where God requires the keeping of the Sabbath, is made void by you. What
is the signification of commands? Is it not to appoint, enjoin, and
require by authority? Does it not mean the same as to say “Remember the
Sabbath day and keep it holy.”—“_Thou shalt not_ labor or do any work on
the Sabbath day.” Exo. xx: 8-10. Once more, God says, “Ye shall keep the
Sabbath.” Again, “Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the
Sabbath—for a perpetual covenant. _For_ in six days the Lord made heaven
and earth, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.” xxxi: 14,
16, 17. You see the word command is also used in the 16th verse, for the
fifth commandment, and because it is omitted in Exo. xx: 12, according to
your rule it is not valid. But it is not so—God speaks as positively and
understandingly when he says “_ye shall_,” as when he says “I command
you.” Again, you say—“If Christ did not virtually annul the fourth
commandment when he began his public ministry, _then the Jews were_ RIGHT
IN KILLING HIM AS A NOTORIOUS SABBATH BREAKER. He travelled about and did
much work on the Sabbath.”
In your second article you offer as proof Luke iv: 18-20. There certainly
is no proof of the law’s being annulled here. You then quote xvi: 16. “The
law and the prophets were until John,” &c. This in your whole argument for
annulling the fourth commandment. Read the next verse, “And it is easier
for heaven and earth to pass, than for one tittle of the law to fail.” Now
don’t a law fail when it passes away? Yes. How then can this law fail till
heaven and earth passes? This was virtually showing how impossible it
would be for one tittle of the law of God to fail. Here Jesus reverts to
the seventh commandment, 18th verse, and shows that the law of the
decalogue was what he meant. But he does not say that any law was annulled
here. If you say that any part of the law of Moses was abolished here, you
upset all the foundation that infidelity raises to overthrow the whole law
of God. I wonder that all the second advent editors are not out against
you, for if this be true they have no more foundation for their no-law and
no-commandments of God system to stand upon than many who are hung on the
gallows for venturing to practice after such teaching, by violating the
eighth and sixth commandment. I am aware that their Judge Advocate, Joseph
Marsh of Rochester, N. Y. has filed in his plea, (see Advent Harbinger,
Nov. 9th,) that _we_ are under the law of grace, the new testament, and
not the law of Moses, which he asserts embraced the ten commandments. Why
does not the law of grace save thieves and murderers and liars from the
gallows here, and eternal death hereafter. (Rev. xxi: 8.) Answer—because
there is no _precept_ by which it can be done out of the law of
commandments, which was made for _all men_, Jew and Gentile. How would
murderers and robbers understand their sentence, viz. You are to be hung
until you are dead for violating the law of the new testament, and may the
Lord have mercy on you for violating his law of grace. Stop, says the
American, you are bound to show me the precept. I ask where it is to be
found if the commandments are abolished? Oh, sir, but you have violated
the spirit of them. Well, but do tell me, sir, how I have violated the
spirit of a law that you say was abolished and forever done away more than
eighteen hundred years ago. I am ignorant, I never professed religion, I
do not understand the meaning of grace in the new testament—I pray you,
sir, don’t hang an innocent man.
I have already shown what they tell us that their foundation is for the
abolition of God’s law; it is in Gal. ii.; Cor. iii, and Col. ii: 14-17.
The very day that our Lord was nailed to the cross—(every writer that I
remember to have read before on this subject begins at the cross, where
Paul directs us to look for the abolition of offerings and oblation,
Moses’ ceremonial mode of worship)—but you have attempted, without proof,
to show that this was done three years before, and that without a shadow
of proof that the fourth commandment, or any of them, was done away.
In this second article, you cite us for the same proof to Col. ii: 8-17.
How unfortunate for your argument; first that Christ annulled the _law_,
and of course the Sabbath, when he began to preach, according to Luke iv:
18-20, and xvi: 16. And then in another place quote Col. ii: 8-17, for the
same point of time. How could Christ annul any law twice. First, at his
preaching and second at his death, three and a half years apart. Your
argument is groundless and futile; therefore the uncalled for blasphemous
language of yours, that the Jews were right in killing him (the Son of
God) as a notorious Sabbath breaker, will fall on your guilty head. Hear
the proof: “They that forsake the law praise the wicked.—He that turneth
away his ear from hearing the law, even his _prayer_ shall be
_abomination_.” See also James ii: 10. Once more, the law that Jesus says
shall not pass away, &c. Luke xvi: 17, is proved to be the same as in ch.
x: 25-28. Jesus says, how readest thou? what is written in the law? He
answers by quoting the two great commandments in the law, in Matt. xxii:
36-40—the same as given in ch. v: 17-19, the keeping of which _then_ and
_thenceforward_ would make them of great esteem in the reign of heaven.
Compare also xix: 16-19 with Luke xviii: 18-20. If Jesus’ promise of
eternal life by our keeping the law of—or, and commandments fails us here,
then all his new testament teaching, the “law of grace,” so termed, will
fail with it.
In conclusion, you call us foolish adventists, and wish to know who has
bewitched us? Answer—not the strictly keeping the holy Sabbath and other
commandments, but by listening to, or following such unrighteous and
deceptive teachings as you set forth. No marvel that you would like to
preach it in all the sectarian synagogues in the land, if they would hear
you. Fallen Babylon is a more suitable place for such teaching than you
will ever find any where else. John describes their condition, Rev. xviii:
2. But I pass. There is but one more remark of yours that I deem worthy of
a reply, and I should not most probably have reviewed your articles, only
for the defence of God’s law and the suffering little flock, my brethren,
who are endeavoring to stand where John, in his vision, saw them at this
present hour, viz. In their patient waiting time, “keeping the
commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.”
You say, “If a tree may be known by its fruits, we have a woeful tree
here. First, _shut door_; next, _seventh-day Sabbath_, or the bondage of
the law; next, Oh, it would be a shame to speak of those things which are
done of them in secret. God grant them repentance which is unto life.”
That we believe in the shut door, and seventh-day Sabbath, is true; that
we wash one another’s feet, as Jesus taught, and greet one another as Paul
has taught, is true of a great portion of those who keep the Sabbath and
believe in the past and present truth. If you mean these, that it be a
shame to speak of, we answer that we do it openly and avowedly, and teach
and practice the same wherever we go, and prove it clearly by the
scriptures. If there is any thing secretly practiced by us, it is as much
unknown to the church as it is to you. The days of J. Turner and some
other leaders of fanaticism in Maine, I trust, have about all subsided,
since they have crawled into the Laodocean state of the church. If you
know of any thing that we secretly practice in our worship or service of
God, that which is a shame to us, we are not unwilling for you to make it
as public as you please. We have no faith nor fellowship for any such
thing, neither have we any claim on them.
As the editor of the Bible Advocate and yourself are aiming at the one
object, viz. the abolition of God’s holy Sabbath, and the treading down
God’s truth seeking children; he is approbating and upholding you in your
disguise; we are therefore left to conjecture. From some marks which I
have seen under your two coverings, I am very strongly inclined to believe
that your real name is Jacob Weston of New Ipswich, N. H. If I am wrong,
then what I am about to state will not apply to Barnabas. If I am right in
the real character, then I shall discharge _another_ duty by exposing an
enemy to both God and man, under the cloak of the apostle Barnabas, and
beneath that a sheepskin laced round the body of a WOLF, “speaking great
words against the most high, thinking to change times and laws.” Your
unrighteous thrusts, to put down and destroy God’s honest children, who
are endeavoring to live by every word of God, seems to be in perfect
keeping with your wayward, backslidden course. It is you, sir, that have
been practising things in secret, which are a shame, and a disgrace, and a
stigma upon the cause which you profess. Now lay off that apostolic cloak
which you have taken to cover your deformed and deceptive arts. The reason
why you have assumed this garb to oppose your opponent, C. Stowe, is to
_some_ very obvious. You knew that she was acquainted with some of your
ungodly proceedings. You had not forgotten the false promises and
pretences which you had resorted to, first, to obtain her money, and then
to keep her out of it. After repeated calls for it, you at length sent it
to her, stating that the reason why you did not answer her letters, was,
because you had not the money, and you did not write her, _because it
would subject her to pay the postage_, as _you could not_! and then in an
insulting manner to dictate a letter, teaching her how she should write to
you.
After this squall had blown over and things had become more settled, a
mysterious letter is presented to sister Stowe, signed Lydia B. Weston,
setting forth your helpless condition—not actually asking for money,
because it would not comport with her severe remark about “_dying
first_,”—but to draw still more on her sympathy, it states that her
husband had fell and lamed, or sprained his ancle, &c. &c. Sister S.,
although about forty miles from this scene of suffering and distress,
requested a friend and neighbor of yours to ascertain what was needed, and
she was ready to assist, notwithstanding all the past. Your house was
visited and inquiry made for the lame man, but he was away. “Well, you
have heard from Washington?” Your wife. L. B. Weston, replied, “she did
not know how?” [Another statement is, “have you heard from Washington?”
“No.” “Have you not written to Washington?” (or sister Stowe.) “No.”] The
messenger was much surprised! “Well, are you in need of any thing?.” “No,
we have all that we need at present!” and she then proceeded to enumerate
all the comfortable things she had.
From this it is evident that your wife was an entire stranger to this
letter and its contents. Who wrote this forged letter? The capitals, it
was said by those who examined it, were J. Weston’s, but the hand-writing
was rather finer than his. When you have been told of this your reply has
been that sister Stowe _lies_ if she says that I wrote that letter! It is
all in vain for you to reiterate such assertions. The question is, where
is the person in New Ipswich, whose hand-writing will compare with this
letter, and who is so interested in your behalf that they will even
contradict your wife, who manages your household affairs; and state
falsehoods, and then commit the high crime of FORGERY, by affixing her
name to their assertions, to obtain for you what you did not need; and
among other things, what could they mean by lying so about your lame leg?
If you can find this _daring_, loving, and insultingly magnanimous person
in your neighborhood, do, for the sake of the community at large, expose
him, and let this sister and others whom you have maligned, have their
real name. And then if you go to Nelson again, to preach the doctrine of
the second advent by a notice in the Bible Advocate of July 30th, or Aug.
5th, “Squire Hale will not refuse you the use of the meeting house,
because of said _forgery_.” And possibly they may then sympathise with you
more in respect to your poverty in having but one feather bed in your
house, &c. &c., when it is well known that you have three, and other
things in proportion.
That must have been rather a stirring exhortation that you gave the man
who called to see you, a short time since; that the Lord was coming in
about three weeks. Did you cite him to the Bible Advocate of Dec. 9, and
tell him to read the caption that your old friend Timothy Cole had
published for you; that the _time for the Lord’s coming was revealed_, and
that you felt so impressed with the truth of the above that you could not
hold your peace any longer, &c. Well, possibly he did feel the force of
the truth, that the Lord would soon come, but it soon vanished from him
when you read the note for twenty dollars, in his favor, which he now
presented, and which you told him was not negotiable, and that there was
no law by which he could collect it. Did you not feel rather singular, for
a professed ambassador of Christ, to be told by this man “how strange it
appeared to him that _you_ should go and put such a note on to an old
woman.” [This is an old lady, partially deranged, who having a little
money, finally consented to loan it to him on a note for interest.] It
seems you had consulted a lawyer, to know whether it could be collected in
her life time for her.
Are you aware of the heinousness of these things? Did you ever read the
life of the pious Dr. Dod of England, who was hung for _forgery_; people
no doubt liked his preaching. I know a professed minister, who, not many
years since, was elected pastor of a church, with but two or three
dissenting votes, in a place situated in North latitude 41° 33’, and
longitude 70° 53’ W., who was told by one of his members, in a church
meeting, that he had committed the high crime of _forgery_, which he did
not attempt to deny. The member for daring to utter this and connected
things, was suspended from their communion until he should make ample
satisfaction. The minister was retained, and a great revival, by his
exertions, immediately followed, and numbers were added to _their_ church.
So, you see, ministers are not to be known by their great preaching and
revivals. “Ye shall know them by their fruits.” So, I trust, the second
advent believers will know you hereafter. They will also know that God
never employed a righteous man to stigmatize and attempt to make void his
Sabbath and commandments. That is, and ever has been, the work of “the
Devil and his angels.” “Surely the Lord God will do nothing but he reveals
his secrets unto his servants, the prophets.” Amos. But “he that turneth
away his ear from hearing the _law_, even his prayer shall be
abomination.” All men are liable to err and make mistakes, but when
persevered in, under disguise, they are to be rebuked.