30. If it were even certain that by the Lord's day the writer of the book of Revelations meant to designate the first day of the week, would it thence follow that it is a day sacred by divine appointment, any more than that the "Sabbath day's journey" (Acts 1:12,) was a distance limited and prescribed by divine authority? If Luke could select the latter expression from the vocabulary of human tradition, without intending to sanction it as being of divine origin, could not John do the same with regard to the former expression?
31. Do the Fathers, or any one of them, inform us that the Lord's day was observed by abstinence from labor?—that it was observed as the Sabbath? Mark the question. It is not, was the day observed, simply; but, was it observed as the Sabbath?
32. Is there not an important distinction between the Sabbath and a religious festival? Does not the word Sabbath mean rest? Can any day, therefore, be called a Sabbath day, which is not a day of rest from ordinary labor?
33. Does a religious festival require any thing more than the commemoration of some important event, allowing the time not occupied in the public celebration of it to be spent in labor or amusement? Is not this precisely the manner in which the first day of the week was observed, according to the testimony of the ancient Fathers?
34. Though the observance of the first day of the week as a religious festival be in itself innocent, (Rom. 14:5,) so long as it is not made a pretext for dispensing with an express law of God, (Matt. 15:6,) yet do you find it any where in the word of God commanded as a duty?
35. Do you believe that a Sabbath, in the true and proper sense of the term; namely, a day of rest from all ordinary labor, is necessary and indispensable to the well-being of mankind? If so, do you honestly suppose that God would set it aside, and have its place supplied by nothing more than a religious festival?
36. Is it not wicked to uphold a course which makes the commandment of God of none effect? (Matt. 15:1-9; Mark 7:1-13.)
Reader! carefully ponder the foregoing questions, together with the Scripture references. Answer them as you would if you stood at the gates of death. Do not trifle with the Holy Spirit of God, by forcibly wresting his word from its obvious meaning. Let conscience be unfettered; and act, as fully realizing that "THOU, GOD, SEEST ME."
Published by the American Sabbath Tract Society,
No. 9 Spruce Street, N. Y.