“I will not deny but that he was made prisoner upon my application.”[973]
The warmest friends of first-day sacredness will not deny that the least sinful part of this transaction was that it occurred on Sunday. Nevertheless the fact that Calvin caused the arrest of Servetus on that day shows that he had no conviction that the day possessed any inherent sacredness.
John Barclay,[974] a learned man of Scotch descent, and a moderate Roman Catholic, who was born soon after the death of Calvin, and whose early life was spent in eastern France, not very remote from Geneva, published the statement that Calvin and his friends at Geneva
“Debated whether the reformed, for the purpose of estranging themselves more completely from the Romish church, should not adopt Thursday as the Christian Sabbath.”
Another reason assigned by Calvin for this proposed change was,
“That it would be a proper instance of Christian liberty.”[975]
This statement has been credited by many learned Protestants,[976] some of whom must be acknowledged as men of candor and judgment. But Dr. Twisse[977] discredits Barclay because he did not name the individuals with whom Calvin consulted, and produce them as witnesses; and because that King James I. of England at one time suspected Barclay of treachery toward him. But no such crime was ever proved, nor does it appear that the king continued always to hold him in that light.[978] His veracity has never been impeached. The statement of Barclay may possibly be incorrect, but it is not inconsistent with Calvin’s doctrine that the church is not tied to a festival that should come once in seven days, even as Tyndale said that they could change the Sabbath into Monday or could “make every tenth day holy day, only if we see cause why,” and it is in perfect harmony with Calvin’s idea of Sunday sacredness as shown in his acts already noticed. Like the other reformers, Calvin is not always consistent with himself in his statements. Nevertheless, we have his judgment concerning the several texts which are used to prove the change of the Sabbath, and also respecting the theory that the commandment may be used to enforce, not the seventh day, but one day in seven, and it is fatal to the modern first-day doctrine.
John Knox, the great Scottish reformer, was the intimate friend of Calvin, with whom he lived at Geneva during a portion of his exile from Scotland. Though the foundation of the Presbyterian church of Scotland was laid by Knox, or rather by Calvin, for Knox carried out Calvin’s system, and though that church is now very strict in the observance of Sunday as the Sabbath, yet Knox himself was of Calvin’s mind as to the obligation of that day. The original Confession of Faith of that church was drawn up by Knox in A. D. 1560.[979] In that document Knox states the duties of the first table of the law as follows:—
“To have one God, to worship and honor him; to call upon him in all our troubles; to reverence his holy name; to hear his word; to believe the same; to communicate with his holy sacraments, are the works of the first table.”[980]
It is plain that Knox believed the Sabbath commandment to have been stricken out of the first table. Dr. Hessey, after speaking of certain references to Sunday in a subsequent work of his, makes this statement respecting the present doctrine of the Sabbath in the Presbyterian church:—