gentleman should have attempted to carry them out in the forty years
during which God led the people in the wilderness; also, that his first
experiment was that of Sunday rest. In this he would have failed
utterly. Do you ask, How? I answer that God had decreed that no manna
should fall on the seventh day (Ex. 16:26), and that the manna which was
to be eaten on the Sabbath should be gathered on the day before (Ex.
16:5). It would therefore have been impossible for the individual in
question to provide food for his Sunday rest. But, disgusted with this
kind of Sabbath-keeping, suppose he should have tried, in order, Monday,
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, the result would not have
varied materially. On Sunday, there was an utter absence of all food; on
the other days, that which had been previously gathered, instead of
being fit for use, would have been found corrupted and changed into
loathsome worms, since God had told the people that only the manna which
was gathered on the sixth day should be kept until the day following;
and some of them, having made the experiment of disobeying in the
particular in question, found the result as cited above (Ex. 16:19, 20).
On the other hand, should the same individual have decided finally to
consecrate the seventh day of the week, he would have found no
difficulty whatever. Gathering his double portion of the manna on the
sixth day, by a miracle of God it would have been preserved pure and
wholesome through the last day of the week.
But how can this be accounted for on the hypothesis that no particular
day was chosen by the Lord? If, indeed, he had adopted the indefinite
plan, and had left the people to choose for themselves, it is certain
that he did this because it was the best method. But if it were the best
method, and if it were in accordance with his view of the statute, then,
assuredly, he would not have stultified himself and mocked the people by
first granting them a privilege and then, by his providence, preventing
them from carrying it out.
Should it be suggested that this law was confined to the land of
Palestine and to the Jews in its operation, I answer; first, that at the
time spoken of the people were in Arabia, not in Judea, and that even
should that be granted, which is not true, viz., that the fourth
commandment related simply to the Hebrews, this does not affect the
question at all, for no one will insist that Jews were only obliged by
it when in Judea. Wherever they might be, they were required to keep the
Sabbath, whether in bondage in Assyria, or traversing the known world in
quest of gain. From Spain to India, from Scythia to Africa, this law was
designed to apply and did apply for hundreds of years before it will be
even claimed that it was abolished. This being true, it is established
beyond question that God himself imposed upon men, traversing the whole
of the eastern continent, a uniform day of worship.
Do you inquire when they commenced it? I answer, At sunset, agreeably to
the direction in Lev. 23:32. Did they go eastward to the Pacific, or
westward to the Atlantic, they were required to commence their rest at
that hour. Was it impossible for them to do so? He that says so charges
God with folly. Were they capable of carrying out the requirement? Then,
at least on the eastern continent, the definite day was a practicable
thing. God knew how his people would be scattered; he gave them the
institution of the Sabbath, adapted to whatever circumstances they might
be placed in; he marked out that Sabbath from the rest of the week, and
in the outset settled beyond controversy the question that it was not
movable in its nature. Therefore, he who would accept the theory which
we have been considering and repudiate the one which we indorse, must do
it in the face of God’s explanatory providence, in the teeth of his
written law, and against the practice of his people, Israel, who for
centuries have had no difficulty in finding the Sabbath in every
latitude.
So much for the law and its history, making clear, as it does, that our
opponents do not understand the possibilities of the case as God looks
upon them. We will now proceed to the consideration of the difficulties
which they discover in the realization of our theory.
It is claimed that, in going around the world eastward, a day is gained;
and in going around westward, a day is lost, to the traveler. From these
premises it is argued that a definite day cannot be kept. Has it ever
occurred to the gentleman that his own theory would be somewhat
disturbed by the same trip? Mark it, it is exactly one-seventh part of
time which is to be kept. It will hardly be urged that all the old
watches in the land are reliable enough to be trusted in a journey of
this length, and, besides, suppose we had lived in a period when such
time-pieces were not known, then what? Oh! says the objector, we would
have gone by the sun. Then you agree with us, after all, that the sun
presents the most available method of marking the day; but remember,
now, that you are on your journey round the earth, westward; you travel
six days, each one considerably lengthened out by the fact that you are
going with the sun; you stop and rest on the seventh day, which you call
the Sabbath. Unfortunately, however, as you have been lying still, it is
considerably shorter than your six days of work; by this means you have
cheated the Lord out of one-seventh of the whole time which all of the
six days had in excess over the one on which you rested. Traveling
eastward, the opposite would be true, and your days of rest would be
longer than your days of labor, and would not, therefore, represent
one-seventh part of time.
Again, we might show by argument the complete anarchy into which the
community would be thrown by the realization of this doctrine, that each
man for himself is at liberty to fix upon his weekly Sabbath. Nothing
would be easier to prove than that it would seriously obstruct your
courts of justice; that it would render stated worship impossible; in
fine, that it would bring confusion into every walk in life.
Do you reply that you will obviate the difficulty by legislative
enactment, and that you will make this whole nation, from New York to
San Francisco, regard the Sunday for the sake of uniformity and good
order? I answer; first, have you then improved upon God’s great plan?
Did he not know that a definite day would be the best, and would he not
have been likely to give it to us? Secondly, then you admit that it is,
after all, possible to keep one and the same day across the whole of
this continent; for were this not true it would be idle for you to
attempt to produce uniformity by legislation. But putting this
concession of yours in regard to the western, alongside of God’s
enforcement of a definite day for centuries, on the whole of the
eastern, continent, the circuit of the globe is made, and the
possibility of keeping a definite Sabbath on both hemispheres is
established.
Before me lies the draft of an electrical clock, which is styled, “The
clock of all nations.” The design is an ingenious one, and serves to
show at a glance the difference in time between prominent cities in all
parts of the globe. For this purpose, a central dial is drafted,
representing the meridian of New York. The hands on this dial indicate
the precise hour of noon. Around this central figure are arranged twenty
additional dials, on each one of which is marked by the hands the time
of day as it will exist in the cities named, commencing on the east of
New York with Pekin, and terminating to the west of it with San
Francisco. By it, you perceive at a glance the precise variation of time
in the different longitudes to which these cities belong.
For example, while the clock of New York indicates twelve, noon, the one
in Pekin indicates twenty minutes before one in the morning; the one in
Rome, fifteen minutes to six P. M.; the one in London, five minutes of
five P. M.; and so on until you reach New York, where it is twelve M.
Then passing westward of that point, where the time is, of course,
slower, the dial for Chicago marks seven minutes past eleven A. M.; that
of St. Louis, five minutes of eleven A. M.; that in San Francisco,
fifteen minutes before nine A. M. By this means, the variation between
Pekin and San Francisco is shown to be about sixteen hours, or nearly
two-thirds of one whole day. By the same method, the reader will at once
discern that it is possible to locate the commencement of the day at any
one of these points in its passage around the world.
In order to do this, let it be supposed that the day begins when it did
in Bible times, with the setting of the sun. It is, if you please,
Sunday at Pekin, and those who keep that day commence to celebrate it at
sunset. Now, if we would ascertain just when the citizens of Rome would
enter upon a like service, it is only necessary to determine how long it
would take the sunset to travel the distance separating these two
cities. By consulting the draft in question, we find that the time at
Rome is six hours and fifty-five minutes slower than that at Pekin. This
being the case, the sunset would reach them, and they would enter upon
the first day of the week just six hours and fifty-five minutes after
those dwelling on the meridian of Pekin have done so.
So we might go through the whole list. As the world revolves upon its
axis, it would bring London to the same point where the people of Rome
saw the sun sink in the west and entered upon the Sunday, just fifty
minutes subsequent to that event. The citizens of New York would begin
their Sunday, also, with the sunset, four hours and fifty-five minutes
after those of London did so; and those of Chicago, fifty-five minutes
later than those of New York; and those of San Francisco, two hours and
twenty minutes subsequent to those of Chicago. All, however, would be
hallowing the same day, though not, for a portion of the time, the same
hours.[18] Each, in his own proper locality, would commence to keep the
day when it reached him, and continue to keep it until by a complete
revolution of the earth he is brought around to the commencement of
another day, as indicated by another decline of the sun. This is as God
would have it.
In the passage from Egypt to Palestine there was a variation of some
minutes; but there was no change in the time of commencing the Sabbath.
From even to even shall you keep your Sabbaths, was the divine edict,
and his people, in going eastward or westward, obeyed this injunction.
In doing so they needed no time-piece; nor would the traveler at the
present time. In every habitable region, according to God’s plan, the
great luminary of heaven visibly marks the boundaries of sacred time.
The day began in the east, and travels to the west. A complete
revolution of the earth brings it, with its complement of light and
darkness, to the home of every man, no matter as to the meridian of
longitude in which he lives. It is the same day, in the Bible sense, as
that kept by the Christian thousands of miles to the east of him, though
it may not begin at exactly the same moment.
Practically, this question has no real significance whatever. Though it
may puzzle the brain of one who has not before him the facts, it has
been settled forever in a most remarkable manner by the usage of
mankind. The fact is beyond cavil that, from the extreme eastern
boundary of the eastern continent to the extreme western verge of the
western continent, there is such a perfect agreement upon this point
that each day of the week, commencing on the western shore of the
Pacific, continues its course across Asia, Europe, and America, until it
arrives at the eastern shore of the same sea. So true is this that, were
there a line of churches surmounted with bells, in hearing distance of
each other, they could ring in the commencement of any day; say at
Yokohama in Japan, and its march could be made known along the whole
line from that place to San Francisco by a like practice in each of the
churches, without a solitary break until the last bell on the Pacific
coast had announced its arrival there. Whether it be admitted that it
can be done or not, it is a fact that the Christians from China to
California do observe the same Sabbath or Sunday all along the line
between the two points.
Should it be replied that, although there is a uniform reckoning of the
days to those passing from San Francisco eastward to China, or from
China westward to San Francisco, that, nevertheless, should they cross
the Pacific Ocean from San Francisco westward to China, or from China
eastward to San Francisco, it would be necessary for them in the first
case to add a day, and in the last, to drop one, in order to make their
time harmonize with that of the people in these two countries, the reply
is, that this is very true. It does not, however, prove that there is no
definite day which can be kept alike by the inhabitants of the two
continents; for in order to the keeping of the same day on a round world
there must somewhere be a day-line, in other words, there must be a
point where the day begins. In crossing that line the same result would
ensue as that claimed in the passage from California to China _via_ the
Pacific, _i. e._, a day must be either dropped or added in the reckoning
of the individual making the transit.
We have already seen that God’s plan was to measure the days by the
setting of the sun. This being the case, the fourth day, on which the
sun was made, commenced at the precise point where at the time of its
creation it would have appeared to a person to the east of it as sinking
out of sight in the west. The day commencing at that point passed around
the earth until every portion of it had in succession witnessed the
setting of the sun on the fifth day. The only difficulty that remains in
the case, consequently, is that of deciding where the day-line should be
located. As already discovered, the practice of nations has fixed it in
the Pacific Ocean. It is not a little remarkable that sailors change
their reckoning while crossing that ocean backward or forward, and
circumnavigate the globe at will without the slightest confusion. The
only instance which has been cited in which any trouble has occurred, or
any confusion of date has arisen, is that of Pitcairn’s Island, in which
they failed to make the change under consideration.[19] Had they done
this, they would have found themselves in harmony with the great mass of
men living on the same meridian with their insignificant island.
The only matter of debate which remains is that concerning the proper
location of the day-line. Has there or has there not been a mistake made
in fixing upon the place where it belongs? Certain it is that the
providence of God seems to harmonize with the present arrangement. Man
commenced his existence in the east. The progress of empire has been
westward. Emigration has carried with it a harmonious system of counting
the days, by which they have been recognized as beginning on the
eastern, and traveling to the western, continent. Especially is this
true of the Christian world.
But, again, is there not, aside from this providential arrangement and
from the universal opinion that the day does begin in the east, as well
as the fact that scientific men have established the point of changing
the reckoning somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, some additional reason for
supposing that God would choose this locality for the beginning of the
day? We answer, There is. Should the day-line run through any continent
or large body of land, it will be readily perceived that it would
produce great confusion, since, on the one side of it, though imaginary
in its character, individuals would be keeping the seventh day of the
week, while on the other, their neighbors in close proximity to them
would not yet have made their exit from the sixth.
To avoid this difficulty, therefore, the only remedy which could be
found would consist in the employment of some great natural boundary,
such as a range of mountains or an expanse of water, by which those on
one side of the day-line would be so separated as to prevent the
disorder which must arise from constant and uninterrupted
intercommunication. That there is any range of mountains stretching
northward and southward from pole to pole which would answer the purpose
in question, no one will insist. The only resource left, consequently,
is that of those vast bodies of water called seas or oceans.
Turning now to the one which is known as the Atlantic Ocean, it is found
that the day-line could not be run through it without intercepting some
habitable portion of the globe. The only resource which remains is found
in the Pacific Ocean, which, as has been seen, has been selected by the
mass of mankind as a suitable place in which to make those changes that
would be necessary in case the day-line was actually located therein.
Happily, an examination of a large globe will prove that a line drawn
from Behring’s Straits southward across the latitudes which are
available for the homes of mankind will not touch any portions of land
whatever, or at least if it strikes any they would be so insignificant
in their character that they would not be worthy of mention.
With these remarks, the subject of the day-line is dismissed with the
conviction that the necessity of its existence, the fact that it must be
found in the Pacific Ocean if anywhere, and the uniform recognition in
practice, if not in theory, by all nations, of its location in that sea,
unite in furnishing a combination of facts which render assurance
justifiable in the mind of one who does not insist upon more testimony
than he ought to demand.
There remain now but two matters in the article of the gentleman which
need to be disposed of. These are found in the contemptuous sneer at the
insignificance of the numbers of Sabbatarians, and the witticisms, if
such they may be called, which are indulged in in the employment of the
suggestion concerning the use of the sponges saturated with stupefying
chemicals and the gratuitous trip around the world, which it is proposed
to give them.
To answer these sallies to the satisfaction of some would be impossible,
while with others, possessing the power of logical discrimination and
knowing that the office of mere wit is most frequently that of diverting
the attention from a course of reasoning which it is felt cannot be met,
such an effort would be uncalled for. The paucity in numbers is the same
old, threadbare objection which every great reform has been compelled to
meet since the world began. While the administration of narcotics and
the trip round the world would be just as fatal to the exact observer of
the seventh part of time as it would to one celebrating a definite day,
even though it were admitted that the consequences of such a journey
would be as claimed by the writer.
But besides all this, it will be discovered that the basis of the whole
transaction, both in the case of the sponge and the vessel, is fraud,
deceit, and force. Stupefy a man with narcotics for twenty-four hours;
or nail him down under the hatches of a circumnavigating vessel; break
the compass; send him round the world; let the whole community conspire
to falsify the facts in the case; do not let him know where he has been;
falsify the truth regarding the day observed by first-day keepers; and
then, forsooth, you have changed the practice, if not convinced the
judgment, of a little handful of conscientious, definite Sabbath-day
keepers. Wonderful, gentlemen! Wonderful in the extreme! What results
for such prodigious efforts! Alas, for truth, when it must pass such an
ordeal as this! We blush, but not for ourselves. We would almost be
willing to inhale the anæsthetic or run the hazard of the voyage at sea,
taking our chances respecting the proper preservation of the
Heaven-appointed day of rest, if, by so doing, we might prevent our
brethren of the Amendment school, for whose welfare we have the most
earnest desire, from making so sorry a show of the low estimate which
they place upon the importance of employing in a controversy like this,
arguments which appeal only to the Christian’s head and heart, instead
of those which appeal to the baser faculties of the mind.
A summary of the ground traveled in this rejoinder would run somewhat as
follows:—
1. That in adopting the seventh-part-of-time theory, the gentleman has
abandoned the definite first day which he sought to establish in the
first nine of his articles.
2. That the seventh-part-of-time theory is just as fatal to the Sunday
as it is to the Sabbath.
3. That it overturns the practicability of the proposed Amendment, since
it seeks to enforce a definite day, and since, according to it,
Sabbatarians have a Bible right to observe the seventh day in the
exercise of a divinely given choice of days.
4. That it is possible to establish the identity of the last day of the
week at the present time with that upon which God rested at the
completion of the emotion; from the providential manner in which God
pointed it out in the exodus from Egypt; the fact that Christ and his
disciples kept the Sabbath according to the commandment; the general
agreement among Jews, Christians, and heathen concerning its place in
the week from that time to this.
5. That the objection concerning the conflict between a definite Sabbath
and the laws of nature at the poles does not array the God of nature
against himself, or our version of his commandment, since the trouble
does not imply any want of foresight on the part of the Deity, but
rather a disregard of the plainest teachings of both providence and
nature on the part of those who have placed themselves where it was
never designed that men should locate.
6. That if a definite day is impossible, then the wisdom of God is
impeached, since, both by the letter of the commandment and by his
providential interpretation of it for forty years, that is the very
thing which it inculcates.
7. That a definite day can be kept on the eastern continent, since this
had been done for hundreds of years before the change of the law will be
even claimed.
8. That a definite day can be observed on the western continent, since
this is the very object which the Amendment is designed to secure.
9. That the trip around the world would render it as impossible to keep
an exact seventh part of time as it would a definite seventh day.
10. That the seventh-part-of-time theory would introduce into society
the direst confusion, defeating even the administration of justice.
11. That, practically, the whole world from the extreme east to the
extreme west does keep a definite day.
12. That the loss and gain of time creates no disturbance except in the
crossing of the Pacific Ocean.
13. That with a definite day, there must be a day-line.
14. That that day-line is, by the uniform practice of nations, and the
providence of God, which renders it impossible that it should exist
anywhere else, drawn through the Pacific Ocean.
15. That it only remains for us to do just what we are doing and have
been doing for centuries in order to prove by actual demonstration that
all the difficulties in the way of a definite Sabbath can be readily
disposed of by those who are desirous of keeping the law of God as it
reads.
Footnote 18:
By consulting the figures given above, the reader will be able to
demonstrate, not only the fact that the inhabitants along the line
from Pekin to San Francisco, can hallow the same day, but also that
the day which they hallow will be identical in some of its hours. For
example: It was shown that the people of Rome commence their day six
hours and fifty-five minutes later than do those of Pekin. Deducting
these six hours and fifty-five minutes from twenty-four hours we have
left seventeen hours and five minutes as the period of time during
which the citizens of these two cities would be celebrating the
Sabbath in common. Applying the same principle to other cities, we
find that London and Pekin would worship together for sixteen hours
and fifteen minutes; New York and Pekin, eleven hours and twenty
minutes; Chicago and Pekin, ten hours and twenty-five minutes; S.
Francisco and Pekin, eight hours and five minutes.
Footnote 19: