Such a work as this, then, the papacy must accomplish according to the prophecy; and the prophecy cannot fail. And when this is done, what do the people of the world have? They have two laws demanding from them obedience: one, the law of God as originally enacted by him, an embodiment of his will, and expressing his claims upon his creatures; the other, a revised edition of that law, emanating from the pope of Rome, and expressing his will. And how is it to be determined which of these powers the people honor and worship? It is determined by the law which they keep. If they keep the law of God as given by him, they worship and obey God. If they keep the law as changed by the papacy, they worship that power. But further, the prophecy does not say that the little horn should set aside the law of God and give one entirely different. This would not be to change the law, but simply to give a new one. He was only to attempt a change, so that the law as it comes from God, and the law as it comes from the hands of the papacy, are precisely alike, excepting the change which the papacy has made therein. They have many points in common. But none of the precepts which they contain in common can distinguish a person as the worshiper of either power in preference to the other. If God's law says, "Thou shalt not kill," and the law as given by the papacy says the same, no one can tell by a person's observance of that precept whether he designed to obey God rather than the pope, or the pope rather than God. But when a precept that has been changed is the subject of action, then whoever observes that precept as originally given by God is thereby distinguished as a worshiper of God; and he who keeps it as changed, is thereby marked as a follower of the power that made the change. In no other way can the two classes of worshipers be distinguished. From this conclusion, no candid mind can dissent; but in this conclusion we have a general answer to the question before us, "What constitutes the mark of the beast?" THE MARK OF THE BEAST is THE CHANGE HE HAS MADE IN THE LAW OF GOD.
We now inquire what that change is. By the law of God, we mean the moral law, the only law in the universe of immutable and perpetual obligation, the law of which Webster says, defining the terms according to the sense in which they are almost universally used in Christendom, "The moral law is summarily contained in the decalogue, written by the finger of God on two tables of stone, and delivered to Moses on Mount Sinai."
If, now, the reader will compare the ten commandments as found in Roman Catholic catechisms with those commandments as found in the Bible, he will see in the catechisms that the second commandment is left out, that the tenth is divided into two commandments to make up the lack of leaving out the second, and keep good the number ten, and that the fourth commandment (called the third in their enumeration) is made to enjoin the observance of Sunday as the Sabbath, and prescribe that the day shall be spent in hearing mass devoutly, attending vespers, and reading moral and pious books. Here are several variations from the decalogue as found in the Bible. Which of them constitutes the change of the law intended in the prophecy? or, are they all included in that change? Let it be borne in mind that, according to the prophecy, he was to think to change times and laws. This plainly conveys the idea of intention and design, and makes these qualities essential to the change in question. But respecting the omission of the second commandment, Catholics argue that it is included in the first, and, hence, should not be numbered as a separate commandment. And, on the tenth, they claim that there is so plain a distinction of ideas as to require two commandments. So they make the coveting of a neighbor's wife the ninth commandment, and the coveting of his goods the tenth.
In all this they claim that they are giving the commandments exactly as God intended to have them understood. So, while we may regard them as errors in their interpretation of the commandments, we cannot set them down as intentional changes. Not so, however, with the fourth commandment. Respecting this commandment, they do not claim that their version is like that given by God. They expressly claim a change here, and also that the change has been made by the church. A few quotations from standard Catholic works will make this matter plain. In a work entitled, Treatise of Thirty Controversies, we find these words:—
"The word of God commandeth the seventh day to be the Sabbath of our Lord, and to be kept holy; you [Protestants], without any precept of Scripture, change it to the first day of the week, only authorized by our traditions. Divers English Puritans oppose, against this point, that the observation of the first day is proved out of Scripture, where it is said, the first day of the week. Acts 20:7; I Cor. 16:2; Rev. 1:10. Have they not spun a fair thread in quoting these places? If we should produce no better for purgatory, and prayers for the dead, invocation of the saints, and the like, they might have good cause, indeed, to laugh us to scorn; for where is it written that these were Sabbath days in which those meetings were kept? Or where is it ordained they should be always observed? Or, which is the sum of all, where is it decreed that the observation of the first day should abrogate or abolish the sanctifying of the seventh day, which God commanded everlastingly to be kept holy? Not one of those is expressed in the written word of God."
In the "Catholic Catechism of Christian Religion," on the subject of the third (fourth) commandment, we find these questions and answers:—
"Ques. What does God ordain by this commandment?
"Ans. He ordains that we sanctify, in a special manner, this day on which he rested from the labor of creation.
"Q. What is this day of rest?
"A. The seventh day of the week, or Saturday; for he employed six days in creation, and rested on the seventh. Gen. 2:2; Heb. 4:1, &c.
"Q. Is it then Saturday we should sanctify in order to obey the ordinance of God?
"A. During the old law, Saturday was the day sanctified; but the church, instructed by Jesus Christ, and directed by the Spirit of God, has substituted Sunday for Saturday; so now we sanctify the first, not the seventh, day. Sunday means, and now is, the day of the Lord."
In "Abridgment of Christian Doctrine," we find this testimony:—
"Ques. How prove you that the church hath power to command feasts and holy days?
"Ans. By the very act of changing the Sabbath into Sunday, which Protestants allow of; and therefore they fondly contradict themselves by keeping Sunday strictly, and breaking most other feasts commanded by the same church.
"Q. How prove you that?
"A. Because by keeping Sunday they acknowledge the church's power to ordain feasts, and to command them under sin."
In the "Catholic Christian Instructed," again we read:—