Individuality in Religion by A.T. Jones

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Senator Blair.--The law was wrong, you say?

Mr. Jones.--Certainly the law was wrong. The Roman law was that no man should have particular gods of his own,--gods not recognized by the Roman law.

Senator Blair.--That law was not for the good of society?

Mr. Jones.--No, sir.

Senator Blair.--Certainly it was not. Then you have to repeal the law or obey it.

Mr. Jones.--It ought to be repealed.

Senator Blair.--During these eighteen hundred years we have contrived to repeal that law; but here comes an intelligent people who have evolved among themselves, as the result of a thousand or fifteen hundred years of history, among other things, the institution of the Christian Sabbath, by writing it in the laws of every State in this country, so that the whole American people made up of communities or States, have enacted the principle of this law.

Mr. Jones.--The same principle is under the bill before the Committee. There is the same principle under it all. If you can legislate in regard to the Sabbath, you can legislate in regard to blasphemy; you can legislate in regard to idolatry, and every other offense against God, as did both the Puritan and the papal theocracy.

Senator Blair.--You deny the right of the majority, in other words, to make a law in conformity with which the whole shall practice in society?

Mr. Jones.--I deny the right of any civil government to make any law respecting anything that pertains to man's relationship to his God, under the first four of the ten

commandments. I wish right here to show further that this is not only the principle of the word of Jesus Christ, but also of the American Constitution.

Before Christianity was preached in the world, the Roman empire had among its laws these statutes:

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"1. No man shall have for himself particular gods of his own; no man shall worship by himself any new or foreign gods, unless they are recognized by the public laws.

2. Worship the gods in all respects according to the laws of your country, and compel all others to do the same. But hate and punish those who would introduce anything whatever alien to our customs in this particular.

3. Whoever introduces new religions, the tendency and character of which are unknown, whereby the minds of men may be disturbed, shall, if belonging to the higher rank, be banished; if to the lower, punished with death."

The Christians did have a particular God of their own, not recognized by the Roman law. They did introduce a new religion. The Roman empire enforced the law, and that is why the Christians were put to death. If things pertaining to God be a proper subject of legislation by civil government, then no Christian was ever persecuted, and there has never been persecution in this world.

All the Roman empire did in killing Christians was to enforce the law. Then the question was with the Christians, at that time, and the question is with us, Is not the law wrong? and did not the Christians have the right to attack the law? That is what they did. When a Christian was brought before the

magistrate, a dialogue followed something like this:--

Magistrate.-- "Have you a particular God of your own,--a god not recognized by the Roman law?"

Christian.--"Yes."

M.--"Did you not know that the law is against it?"

C.--"Yes."

M.--"Have you not introduced a new religion?"

C.--"Yes."

M.--"Did you not know that the law is against it?"

C.--"Yes."

M.--"Did you not know that the penalty is death, for those of the lower ranks?"

C.--"Yes."

M.--"You are of the lower ranks?"

C.--"Yes."

M.--"You have introduced a new religion?"

C.--"Yes."

M.--"You have a God of your own?"

7 C.-- "Yes."

M.--"What is the penalty?"

C.--"Death."

That was all. The Romans enforced the law upon the Christians in the first days of Christianity; and there was no persecution in it, if the principle be recognized that civil government has a right to legislate in religious things. The empire had this apparent advantage, too, that the law existed before Christianity was known in the world.

Christianity appeared to Rome as nothing else than an uprising against the imperial power. Laws are made to be enforced; and to enforce the law is all that the Roman empire ever did, whether up to the time of Constantine, or at any other time.

In fact, all the papacy did in the Middle Ages was to have the emperors enforce the law. We stand today just where the Christians did at that time; we come to the root of the whole matter, and deny the right of the civil government to legislate on anything that pertains to our duties to God under the first four commandments, and assert the Christian and American principle that every man has the right to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience.

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Mr. Jones.--The principle that the Christians asserted was to render to Caesar that which is Caesar's, and to deny the right of Caesar to demand anything that pertains to God. They gave their lives in support of that principle, against the law of the Roman empire, and against the very existence of the Roman empire. This principle was asserted and maintained until it forced the Roman empire, with all its power, to recognize the right of every man to have a particular god of his own, and to worship that god as he chose.

The Roman empire did come in the days of Constantine and Licinius to that point. At the death of Galerius, it was decreed in the Roman law, by the emperors Constantine and Licinius in the Edict of Milan, that every man should be at liberty to have any god he pleased, and worship him as he pleased. But it was the Christian principle that forced the Roman empire to that point in the face of all its laws and institutions of ages.

Our national Constitution embodies the very principle announced by Jesus Christ, that the civil government shall have nothing to do with religion, or with what pertains to God; but shall leave that to every man's conscience and his God. As long as he is a good citizen, the nation will protect him and leave him perfectly free to worship whom he pleases, when he pleases, as he pleases, or not to worship at all, if he pleases.

In Article VI. of the Constitution of the United States, this nation says that "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

By an amendment making more certain the adoption of the principle, it declares in the first amendment to the Constitution, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."

This first amendment was adopted in 1789, by the first Congress that ever met under the Constitution. In 1796 a treaty was made with Tripoli, in which it was declared (Article II.) that "the Government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion."

This treaty was framed by an ex-Congregationalist clergyman, and was signed by President Washington. It was not out of disrespect to religion or Christianity that these clauses were placed in the Constitution, and that this one was inserted in that treaty. On the contrary, it was entirely on account of their respect for religion, and the Christian religion in particular, as being beyond the province of civil government, pertaining solely to the conscience, and resting entirely between the individual and God. This fact is so well stated by Mr. Bancroft in his "History of the Constitution of the United States," that I will here insert it:--

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"In the earliest States known to history, government and religion were one and indivisible. Each State had its special deity, and often these protectors, one after another, might be overthrown in battle, never to rise again. The Peloponnesian War grew out of a strife about an oracle. Rome, as it sometimes adopted into citizenship those whom it vanquished, introduced in like manner, and with good logic for that day, the worship of their gods. No one thought of vindicating religion for the conscience of the individual, till a voice in Judea, breaking day for the greatest epoch in the life of humanity, by establishing a pure, spiritual, and universal religion for all mankind, enjoined to render to

Caesar only that which is Caesar's. The rule was upheld during the infancy of the gospel for all men. No sooner was this religion adopted by the chief of the Roman empire, than it was shorn of its character of universality, and enthralled by an unholy connection with the unholy State; and so it continued till the new nation,--the least defiled with the barren scoffings of the eighteenth century, the most general believer in Christianity of any people of that age, the chief heir of the Reformation in its purest forms,--when it came to establish a government for the United States, refused to treat faith as a matter to be regulated by a corporate body, or having a headship in a monarch or a State.

"Vindicating the right of individuality even in religion, and in religion above all, the new nation dared to set the example of accepting in its relations to God the principle first divinely ordained of God in Judea. It left the management of temporal things to the temporal power; but the American Constitution, in harmony with the people of the several States, withheld from the Federal Government the power to invade the home of reason, the citadel of conscience, the sanctuary of the soul; and not from indifference, but that the infinite Spirit of eternal truth might move in its freedom and purity and power." Last chapter.

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At this point I am brought to the assertion of the second of the principles upon which we stand in our opposition to Sunday laws, or any other form of religious legislation: that is, the principle of the Constitution of the United States; and upon this principle I maintain that this proposed Sunday law is unconstitutional.

The object of this Sunday bill is wholly religious. The last section shows the object of the entire bill; and that is, "to secure to the whole people rest,... and the religious observance of the Sabbath day."

No one, therefore, need attempt to evade the force of objections against this bill by saying that it is not the religious, but the civil, observance of the day that is required; because it is plainly declared in the bill itself, that it is not only to secure rest to all the people, but that it is also to secure the religious observance of the Sabbath day. There is not a single reference in the bill to any such thing as the civil observance of the day. The word civil is not used in the bill. It is a religious bill wholly. The title of the bill declares that its object is to secure to the people the enjoyment of the Lord's day as a day of rest, "and to promote its observance as a day of religious worship."

The first section defines the Lord's day; the second section refers to the day as one of worship and rest; the third section refers to it as a day of religious worship; the fourth section refers to its observance as that of religious worship; and the sixth section plainly declares, what is apparent throughout, that the object of the bill is "to secure to the whole people rest,... and the religious observance of the Sabbath day," on the first day of the week.

It is the religious observance of the day that its promoters, from one end of the land to the other, have in view. In the convention, now in session in this city, working in behalf of this bill, only yesterday Dr. Crafts said:--

"Taking religion out of the day, takes the rest out."

In the "Boston Monday Lectures," 1887, Joseph Cook, lecturing on the subject of Sunday laws, said:--

"The experience of centuries shows, however, that you will in vain endeavor to preserve Sunday as a day of rest, unless you preserve it as a day of worship. Unless Sabbath observance be founded upon religious reasons, you will not long maintain it at a high standard on the basis of economic and physiological and political considerations only."

And in the Illinois State Sunday convention held in Elgin, Nov. 8. 1887, Dr. W. Everts declared Sunday to be "the test of all religion."

Sunday is a religious institution wholly; Sunday legislation, wherever found, is religious legislation solely; and this bill does not in its terms pretend to be anything else than religious. Being therefore as it is, religious legislation, it is clearly unconstitutional.

In proof of this, I submit the following considerations:--

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All the powers of Congress are delegated powers. It has no other power; it cannot exercise any other. Article X. of Amendments of the Constitution expressly declares that--

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, or prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

In all the powers thus delegated to Congress, there is no hint of any power to legislate upon any religious question, or in regard to the observance of any religious institution or rite. Therefore, this Sunday bill, being a religious bill, is unconstitutional; and any legislation with regard to it will be unconstitutional. Sunday being a religious institution, any legislation by Congress in regard to its observance, will be unconstitutional as long as the United States Constitution shall remain as it now is.

Nor is this all. The nation has not been left in doubt as to whether the failure to delegate this power was or was not intentional. The first amendment to the Constitution, in declaring that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," shows that the failure to delegate such power was intentional, and makes the intention emphatic by absolutely prohibiting Congress from exercising any power with regard to religion.

It is impossible to frame a law on the subject of religion that will not prohibit the free exercise of religion. Therefore the first amendment to the Constitution absolutely prohibits Congress from ever making any law with regard to any religious subject, or the observance of any religious rite or institution.

More than this, the National Reform Association knows, and has been contending for twenty-five years, that for Congress to make any Sunday laws would be unconstitutional. Yet the National Reform Association is one of the most prominent agencies in urging forward this bill; and the Secretary of that Association stood at this table to-day to plead for its passage. And this only shows that they are willing knowingly to resort to unconstitutional means to secure their coveted power, and to accomplish their purposes.

As for Dr. Crafts and his fellow-workers, whether or not they know it to be unconstitutional, we do not know. In the announcements of the national Sunday-law convention now (Dec. 11-13, 1888) being held in this city, it was stated that the church in which the convention was to meet would be festooned with the names of six millions of petitioners; but at the beginning of the first meeting it was stated that there were fourteen millions of them.

A question was sent up asking how the number could have grown so much larger so suddenly. Mrs. Bateham was recalled to the platform to answer the question, and when she answered it, the cause of such a sudden and enormous growth was explained by the fact that Cardinal Gibbons had written a letter indorsing the bill, and solely upon the strength of his name, seven million two hundred thousand Catholics were counted as petitioners.

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This was not a complete answer to the question, because the Cardinal's letter does not authorize any such use of it as they have made, at least so much of it as was made public does not. The whole of the letter was not made public there, because, Dr. Crafts said, it was for the Senate Committee. It was laid on the table here to-day. But so much of it as was read merely referred to the action of the Baltimore Council in commanding a stricter observance of Sunday, and said:--

"I am most happy to add my name to those of the millions of others who are laudably contending against the violation of the Christian Sabbath by unnecessary labor, and who are endeavoring to promote its decent and proper observance by judicious legislation."

This was all. He said, "I am happy to add my name," etc. He did not say that he added, or that he wished to add, seven million two hundred thousand others with his name, or in his name; yet this was done. But it was not so much to be wondered at, because the same principle had been acted upon before throughout the country, and when five hundred petitioners could be made out of one hundred, and two hundred and forty thousand out of two hundred and forty, it was perfectly easy and entirely consistent to make seven million two hundred thousand and one out of one.

This thing was perfectly consistent also with the principle in another point. The petition reads:

"We, the undersigned, adult residents of the United States, twenty-one years of age or more, hereby petition," etc. In counting these seven million two hundred thousand petitioners in behalf of the Sunday law, they thereby certified that all these were Catholics "twenty-one years of age or more."

But there was not a man in that convention, and there is not a woman in the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, who does not know that there are not that many Catholics in the United States "twenty-one years of age or more." They virtually certified that all the Catholics in the United States are "twenty-one years of age or more," for they distinctly announced that "all the Roman Catholics" were petitioning for the Sunday law. But as they had virtually certified the same thing of the Protestant churches throughout the country, why should they not go on and swing in "all the Roman Catholics" in the same way? They could do the one just as honestly as they could do the other. When men and women professing themselves to be protestant Christians will do such things as that to carry the Catholic Church with them, it is not to be wondered at if they should be willing to resort to unconstitutional means to make their

religious zeal effective in national law.

Senator Blair.--Then you assume that this bill and all Sunday laws concern only the relation of man to God, and not the relation of men to each other?

Mr. Jones.--Yes, sir, that is the principle upon which we stand.

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Senator Blair.--Right there I find fault with your original proposition. You have got to establish, before you can defeat the ground of Sunday laws, that Sunday laws are not for the good of Caesar; that is, not for the good of society.

Mr. Jones.--I have not had time to prove that yet. I will prove fully that Sunday laws are not for the good of anybody.

Senator Blair.--Come to the point as soon as you can. That is the point in this case, as between you and the law proposed to be enacted.

Mr. Jones.--Very good. For the State to compel men to do no work is to enforce idleness. Idleness is the root of unlimited evil. It is a true proverb that we learned in our boyhood, "Satan always finds something for idle hands to do."

In this world, to compel men to be idle is to force them into a line of influences and temptations which in the very nature of things can end only in evil. It is well known, and it is one of the principal grounds of the complaints of those who are working for Sunday laws, that Sunday is, of all the week, the day of the most wickedness; that the record of crime and violence on Sunday exceeds that of any other day of the week, especially in large cities.

Dr. Crafts refers constantly to London as an exemplary city in the matter of enforced Sunday laws, but the fact was brought out last spring by a member of this Committee--Senator Payne--that the statement had lately been "made on authority, that London on Sunday is the most immoral and dissipated city in the world."

Now why is this? They argue that it is because the saloons are open on Sunday. But the saloons are open every other day of the week. Then the saloons being open no more on Sunday than on any other day, why is it that there is so much more violence done on Sunday than on other days of the week?--It is because more men are idle on Sunday than on any other day of the week. Upon this point I quote an extract from the Cincinnati Commercial Gazette of March 10, 1888.

"They declare Sunday the moral ruin of the people. They prove it by alleged statistics of criminal prosecutions to show that more crimes of violence are committed on Sunday than on all other days of the week. Why is this? Because the saloons are open?--They are open on other days. This reduces them to the sole reason that it is because it is a day of idleness.

"Their argument is absolutely destructive to the beneficence of the custom of a rest day. They continually affirm that a Sabbath day is the very foundation of religion, morals, and society, and they as incessantly declare that the custom of Sunday cessation from work in the cities had made it a day of moral ruin. What is their recourse from the destruction which they charge upon the day of idleness?--To make statutes more stringent to enforce idleness. Arguing that idleness on that day leads mankind to moral ruin, they call for a more rigid enforcement of idleness, to lead mankind to the ways of salvation.

"Surely there is need to revise their basis in season before they can proceed rationally in legislation. Selling beer is no more a sin on Sunday than on other days. The reason why more crimes of violence are done on Sunday than on other days--if that is a fact--is not that the saloons are open, but that the men are idle. The good of a day of rest for the toilers has to be taken with the drawback of this unavoidable evil from idleness and indulgences of appetites. The cause is the cessation of vocations."

This argument is entirely sound. We submit to the consideration of any candid mind that it would be far better to allow men to follow their honest occupations on Sunday as they do on other days of the week, than to compel them to be idle, and thus forcibly throw them into the way of all the temptations and evil that beset men in this world. No State, therefore, can ever afford for its own good to enact laws making idleness compulsory, as Sunday laws do.

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More than this, to prohibit men from following their honest occupations at any time, under penalties of fine or imprisonment, or perhaps both, is for the State to relegate honest occupations to the realm of crime and put a premium upon idleness and recklessness.

It is well known that in many localities if a man will only be idle on Sunday, he can run into all sorts of dissipation and wickedness to any extent, except that of down-right violence, without any fear of prosecution or penalty of any kind. But if any quiet, industrious citizen chooses to engage in his honest occupation,--going quietly about his own business on his own premises on Sunday,--he is subjected to prosecution, to a penalty of a heavy fine, and perhaps imprisonment.

This is nothing else than to put a premium upon wickedness. No State can afford to make crimes of honest occupations.

No State can afford to put such a premium upon idleness and all its attendant wickedness.

All these complaints of evil and violence and wickedness on Sunday, so enlarged upon by the people who are working for Sunday laws, is an open confession that wickedness is the effect of enforced idleness, and this in itself is the strongest argument that can be offered against the very things for which they plead.

The States of the Union have all these years been sowing the wind in this very thing, and now they are reaping the whirlwind. And, worse than all, they propose to cure the evils of all this enforced idleness by more stringently enforcing more idleness throughout the whole nation, and by the national power.

It may be answered that this reflects upon the wisdom of God in appointing a day of rest; but it does not. God appointed the Sabbath for a purpose; and that purpose is that men should remember him in his works of creation, and worship him as Creator.

The intention of the commandment enjoining the observance of the Sabbath day, is the honor of God, and his worship as Creator. This worship and the religious sanctions which God has associated with the Sabbath, are considerations which will ever prevent the day from becoming a day of idleness of those who keep the Sabbath in obedience to him; and the worship of God and the religious sanctions which he has put upon the Sabbath, are the only things that ever can prevent the Sabbath from becoming a day of idleness.

Those who advocate this Sunday bill well know this. This whole principle is embodied in that statement Dr. Crafts made to the Knights of Labor, that "if you take religion out of the day, you take the rest out." The same principle is also apparent in the words of Joseph Cook, before referred to, that you will in vain endeavor to secure the enforcement of a day of rest unless you enforce it as a day of worship; and unless it be founded on religious reasons, it cannot be long maintained.

Thus these men themselves confess the point which I here make: that it is only the religious sanctions and worship that can ever keep a day of rest from being a day of idleness, and of consequent wickedness.

But it is only God who can furnish those sanctions; the State never can. Therefore, next step in the proceeding on the part of those who are calling for this law is to have the State attempt to supply the religious sanctions which belong with the day of rest, and which only can keep it from being a day of idleness and a day of evil.

But they know that the State has none of those religious sanctions; and they know that these will have to be supplied to the State by the church, and then the church will call upon the State, by its power, to force them upon the citizen.

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This is precisely what is proposed. Rev. Sam Small, in a sermon in Kansas City last winter, expressed the views of many more than himself, when he said:

"I want to see the day come when the church shall be the arbiter of all legislation, State, national, and municipal; when the great churches of the country can come together harmoniously, and issue their edict, and the legislative powers will respect it, and enact it into laws."

But any attempt to enforce religious observances only enforces hypocrisy and multiplies sin, because love for God is essential to every act of religious duty. For a man to tender obedience or homage to God when he has no love for God in his heart, only dishonors God, and does violence to his own nature. For anybody to obey God, or perform religious observances from interested motives, is sin; and for the State to exert its power in compelling men to act religiously, and pretend to honor God when they have in the heart no love for God, is only to force them into hypocrisy, and to compel them to commit sin, which, increased and multiplied by the exertion of national power, can end only in ruin, and that speedily.

For as Mr. Buckle has most forcibly expressed it:--

"In this way, men being constrained to mask their thoughts, there arises a habit of securing safety by falsehood, and of purchasing impunity with deceit. In this way, fraud becomes a necessity of life; insincerity is made a daily custom; the whole tone of public feeling is vitiated; and the gross amount of vice and of error fearfully increased."

Consequently, it is only at its own peril that the State can ever enforce the observance of a day of rest.

More than this, for the State to allow itself to be dictated to by the church as is here proposed by Mr. Small, is to render the church superior to the civil power, which can end in nothing but a religious despotism, which is the worst of all despotisms. Thus by every line of reasoning that can spring from the subject, it is demonstrated that for the State to fix a day of compulsory rest can only end in evil. Therefore, my proposition is proved, that Sunday laws are not for the good of anybody.

Further: as it is only the religious sanctions which surround a day of rest, that can prevent it from being a day of idleness, and consequently of evil; and as God only can supply these sanctions, it follows that to God only, can Sabbath observance be rendered.

He only can command it; he only can secure it; and being a duty which can be rendered only to God, we are brought again directly to the command of Jesus Christ, to render unto God, not to Caesar, that which is God's, which clearly forbids the State to have anything to do with Sabbath observance.

This whole line of argument is fully sustained by the Sabbath commandment itself. That commandment says:

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work: but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it."

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First, He rested on the seventh day; second, He blessed it and made it holy. That you may become tired is not given as a reason for doing no work on the seventh day. God does not say that on the seventh day you shall do no work, because if you should, you would overdo or break down your physical system. Nothing of the kind. Man's physical wants are not referred to in the commandment.

It says, Work six days, because the Lord worked six days; rest on the seventh day, because the Lord rested on the seventh day; keep that day holy, because the Lord blessed it and made it holy. It is the Lord who is to be held in view. It is the Lord who is to be exalted. Therefore the fourth commandment and its obligations have solely to do with man's relationship to God.

It is not man's physical, but his spiritual, needs that are held in view in the Sabbath commandment. It is intended to be a day in which to worship God,--a day of holy remembrance of Him, and of meditation upon His works. The day is to be kept holy. If it is not kept holy, it is not kept at all.

When the State undertakes to demand the observance of the Sabbath, or Lord's day, it demands of men that which does not belong to it, but which belongs only to God. When the State undertakes to secure the observance of the Sabbath, it undertakes that which, to it, is an impossible task, because holiness is not an attribute of civil government, nor has it either the power or the credentials to promote holiness; and as has been already demonstrated, all that it ever can do in any such effort is to enforce idleness and put a premium upon recklessness, which, for its own welfare, the State can never afford to do.

If the State undertakes to supply, from whatever source, the religious sanctions which alone can keep the day from being one of idleness, generating evil, it only enforces hypocrisy, and increases sin.

Therefore I repeat, that by every logical consideration of the subject, I have sustained my proposition that Sunday laws are not for the good of anybody or anything in this world.

Senator Blair.--Do you understand that this bill undertakes to make anybody worship God?

Mr. Jones.--Yes, sir, I affirm that it does; and I will prove it by statements made by those who stood here to-day. But I have some other points to make first; and here I propose to introduce my historical argument. I want you all to see that in this way the papacy was made in the fourth century.

I shall read all that I do read, perhaps, on this point, from Neander's Church History, vol. 2, Prof. Torrey's edition, Boston, 1852. I can only refer to it by the page.

As I have related, the Roman empire was forced by the principles of Christ, to recognize the right of every man to worship as he chose. This right was recognized in the Edict of Milan, A. D. 312. But liberty of conscience trembled in the balance but a moment, and then the bishopric, with that ambitious spirit that developed the papacy, took up the strain, and carried forward that line of work which ended in the imperious despotism of the Middle Ages. I want you to see just how that was done, and you will then have no difficulty in seeing the tendency of the present movement.

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Neander says:--"There had in fact arisen in the church a false theocratical theory, originating not in the essence of the gospel, but in the confusion of the religious constitutions of the Old and New Testaments, which ... brought along with it an unchristian opposition of the spiritual to the secular power, and which might easily result in the formation of a sacerdotal State, subordinating the secular to itself in a false and outward way." --p.132.

A theocratical theory of government tending to subordinate the secular to itself, was the scheme. In other words, the church aimed to make the ecclesiastical power superior to the civil power. These theocratical bishops made themselves and their power a necessity to Constantine, who, in order to make sure of their support, became a political convert to the form of Christianity, and made it the recognized religion of the empire; for says Neander further:--

"This theocratical theory was already the revailing one in the time of Constantine; and ... the bishops voluntarily made themselves dependent on him by their disputes, and by their determination to make use of the power of the State for the furtherance of their aims." -- Idem.

Out if that theocratical theory of government came the papacy, which did subordinate the civil to the ecclesiastical power, and that same spirit is to be guarded against to-day in the United States as much as in any other country.

I want you to see that there is a theocratical theory underlying this whole scheme. Mr. Bateham has said that the Woman's Christian Temperance Union started this movement a short time ago, and that they had worked it up. What is their aim in civil government? I quote from the monthly reading of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of September, 1886,--a monthly reading for all the local Unions throughout the country--the following:--

"A true theocracy is yet to come, and the enthronement of Christ in law and lawmakers; hence I pray devoutly, as a Christian patriot, for the ballot in the hands of women, and rejoice that the National Woman's Christian Temperance Union has so long championed this cause."

A theocratical theory, you see, is behind this movement, and is again coming in to interfere in civil things, to establish a theocracy, and to subordinate the civil power at last, to the ecclesiastical.

Senator Blair.--Do you think the question of giving the ballot to women is a religious question?

Mr. Jones.--No. I only read this for the purpose of giving the proof that there is a theocratical theory underlying this, as there was that in the fourth century, so as to show the parallel.

Senator Blair.--But the parallel seems to imply that the extension of the suffrage to woman is by divine appointment, and is the introduction of a theocratic form of government?

Mr. Jones.--Yes, they want the ballot so as to make a theocracy successful.

Senator Blair.--Therefore you would be against woman's suffrage?

Mr. Jones.--I would be against woman's suffrage, or any other kind of suffrage, to establish a theocracy.

Senator Blair.--But that is not the question. It is possible these women have misstated their own idea there.

Mr. Jones.--No, because I have other proofs. Let me read them.

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Senator Palmer.--Do you suppose they intended there a practical theocracy?

Mr. Jones.--I do, sir; but let me read further, and you will get their own words.

Senator Blair.--If these women are trying to overthrow the institutions of the country, and are about to establish a sacerdotal State, we ought to know it.

Mr. Jones.--That is true, and that is why I am speaking here; we want the nation to know it.

Senator Blair.--These women need looking after, I admit.

Mr. Jones.--They do in that respect, and there are many men concerned in the same business.

Senator Blair.--Otherwise it would not be dangerous.

Mr. Jones.--It would be dangerous anyway. A theocratical theory of government is dangerous anywhere. It is antichristian, as well as contrary to right and the principles of justice.

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Senator Blair.--Do you suppose that the government of heaven is a theocracy?

Mr. Jones.--Yes, sir; but a civil government--a government of earth--is not.

Senator Blair.--Then why is it dangerous?

Mr. Jones.--Governments of earth are not dangerous when properly controlled.

Senator Blair.--They only say that a true theocracy is yet to come. A millennium is supposed to be coming; perhaps they have reference to a millennium that we have not yet got, so that they will wait some years before they get it.

Mr. Jones.--But I am going to read what kind of laws they propose to make to bring in the millennium.

Senator Blair.--So far as you have read, you have not touched the question; for they say a true theocracy is yet to come, and it may be they are looking to the coming down of the New Jerusalem, for the time of the new theocracy.

Mr. Jones.--No, because no true theocracy can ever come through civil laws, or through politics, or through the ballot.

Senator Blair.--That is not sure at all.

Mr. Jones.--It is by the Scriptures.

Senator Blair.--I do not know; I have read the Bible several times. But go on.

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Mr. Jones.--The government of Israel was a true theocracy. That was really a government of God. At the burning bush, God commissioned Moses to lead his people out of Egypt. By signs and wonders and mighty miracles multiplied, God delivered Israel from Egypt, and led them through the wilderness, and finally into the promised land.

There he ruled them by judges "until Samuel the prophet," to whom, when he was a child, God spoke, and by whom he made known his will. In the days of Samuel, the people asked that they might have a king. This was allowed, and God chose Saul, and Samuel anointed him king of Israel. Saul failed to do the will of God, and as he rejected the word of the Lord, the Lord rejected him from being king, and sent Samuel to anoint David king of Israel; and David's throne God established forevermore.

When Solomon succeeded to the kingdom in the place of David his father, the record is: "Then Solomon sat on the throne of the Lord as king instead of David his father." 1 Chron. 29 : 23.

David's throne was the throne of the Lord, and Solomon sat on the throne of the Lord as king over the earthly kingdom of God. The succession to the throne descended in David's line to Zedekiah, who was made subject to the king of Babylon, and who entered into a solemn covenant before God that he would loyally render allegiance to the king of Babylon. But Zedekiah broke his covenant; and then God said to him:--

"Thou profane, wicked prince of Israel, whose day is come, when iniquity shall have an end, thus saith the Lord God; Remove the diadem, and take off the crown: this shall not be the same: exalt him that is low, and abase him that is high. I will overturn, overturn, overturn it, and it shall be no more, until He come whose right it is; and I will

give it Him ." Ezekiel 21:25-27; 17:1-21.

The kingdom was then subject to Babylon. When Babylon fell, and Medo-Persia succeeded, it was overturned the first time. When Medo-Persia fell, and was succeeded by Grecia, it was overturned the second time. When the Greek empire gave way to Rome, it was overturned the third time. And then says the word, "It shall be no more, until He come whose right it is; and I will give it Him."

Who is he whose right it is?--"Thou shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David; and he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end." Luke 1:31-33.

And while he was here as "that prophet," a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, the night in which he was betrayed he himself declared, "My kingdom is not of this world."

Thus the throne of the Lord has been removed from this world, and will "be no more, until He come whose right it is," and then it will be given him. And that time is the end of this world, and the beginning of "the world to come."

Therefore while this world stands, a true theocracy can never be in it again. Consequently, from the death of the Christ till the end of this world, every theory of an earthly theocracy is a false theory; every pretension to it is a false pretension; and wherever any such theory is proposed or advocated, whether in Rome in the fourth century, or here in the nineteenth century, it bears in it all that the papacy is or that it ever pretended to be,--it puts a man in the place of God.

Now I will read another statement as to the purpose of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. It is from the annual address of the President of the National Union, at the Nashville convention, 1887. It is as follows;--

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"The Woman's Christian Temperance Union, local, State, national, and worldwide, has one vital, organic thought, one all-absorbing purpose, one undying enthusiasm, and that is that Christ shall be this world's king."

Senator Blair.--"Shall be."

Mr. Jones.--"Shall be this world's king."

Senator Blair.--But you are a clergyman, and you read the Bible to us.

Mr. Jones.--I am going to read a passage presently right on this point.

Senator Blair.--Is it not in the same Bible that the time when Christ is to be the king, is the present?

Mr. Jones.--I am going to read a passage from the Bible in connection with this subject. Allow me to finish this extract:--

"The Woman's Christian Temperance Union, local, State, national, and worldwide, has one vital, organic thought, one all-absorbing purpose, one undying enthusiasm, and that is that Christ shall be this world's king;--yea, verily, THIS WORLD'S KING in its realm of cause and effect,--king of its courts, its camps, its commerce,--king of its colleges and cloisters,--king of its customs and constitutions... The kingdom of Christ must enter the realm of law through the gateway of politics."

That emphasizes "this world's king." Jesus Christ himself said, "My kingdom is not of this world." Then assuredly the Woman's Christian Temperance Union stands against the words of Jesus Christ, in saying that he shall be this world's king; and that that kingdom is to enter the realm of the law through the gate-way of politics. Jesus Christ has his entrance through the gate-way of the gospel, and not through politics.

Nor did this purpose end with the Nashville National Woman's Christian Temperance Union convention. The proposition was repeated by the New York national convention last summer, in the following resolution:--

"Resolved, That Christ and His gospel, as universal king and code, should be sovereign in our government and political affairs."

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Mr. Jones.--Well, let us apply the resolution. Suppose the gospel were adopted as the code of this Government. It is the duty of every court to act in accordance with the code. There is a statute in that code which says,--"If thy brother trespass against thee, rebuke him; and if he repent, forgive him. And if the trespass against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day turn again to thee, saying, I repent; thou shalt forgive him."

Suppose, then, a man steals a horse. He is arrested, tried, and found guilty. He says, "I repent." "Thou shalt forgive him," says the code, and the Government must conform to the code. He is released, and repeats the act; is again arrested and found guilty. He says, "I repent." "Thou shalt forgive him," says the code.

And if he repeats the offense seven times in a day, and seven times in a day turns to the court, saying,: "I repent," the Government must forgive him, for so says that which the Woman's Christian Temperance Union has resolved should be the governmental code.

Any such system as that would destroy civil government in twenty-four hours. This is not saying anything against the Bible, nor against its principles. It is only illustrating the absurd perversion of its principles by these people who want to establish a system of religious legislation here.

God's government is moral, and he has made provision for maintaining his government with the forgiveness of transgression. But he has made no such provision for civil government. No such provision can be made, and civil government be maintained. The Bible reveals God's method of saving those who sin against his moral government; civil government is man's method of preserving order, and has nothing to do with sin, nor the salvation of sinners. If civil government arrests a thief or a murderer and finds him guilty, the penalty must be executed, though the Lord does

forgive him.

The theocratical theory referred to seems to pervade the whole body, for the eighth district of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, at Augusta, Wis., Oct. 2-4, 1888, representing fifteen counties, passed this resolution:--

"Whereas, God would have all men honor the Son, even as they honor the Father; and,--

"Whereas, The civil law which Christ gave from Sinai is the only perfect law, and the only law that will secure the rights of all classes; therefore,--

"Resolved, That civil government should recognize Christ as the moral Governor, and His law as the standard of legislation."

The law which Christ gave from Sinai is not a civil law; it is the moral law. But if that be a civil law, and this a civil government, what in the world does a civil government want with a moral Governor? These excellent women should be informed that civil government is based upon civil law, and has civil governors only.

Moral government is founded in moral law, and has a moral Governor only. Any governmental theory that confounds these is a theocratical theory, which is precisely the governmental theory of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, as is demonstrated by these proofs. And any theocratical theory of government since Christ died, is the theory of the papacy.

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Mr. Jones.--These extracts prove that the purpose of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union is the establishment of "a practical theocracy."

Please do not misunderstand me here. There are none who have more respect or more good wishes for the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, in the line of its legitimate work, than have we. We are heartily in favor of union, of temperance union, of Christian temperance union, and of woman's Christian temperance union; but we are not in favor of any kind of political Christian temperance union, nor of theocratical temperance union. We sincerely wish that the Woman's Christian Temperance Union would stick to its text, and work for Christian temperance by Christian means; and not for Christian temperance by political means, nor for political temperance by theocratical means.

I believe in Christian temperance. Not only do I believe in it, but I practice it. I practice Christian Temperance more strictly than the Woman's Christian Temperance Union even preaches it. But believing in it as thoroughly as I do, and endeavoring to practice it as strictly as I believe in it, I would never lift my hand nor open my lips in any effort to compel men to practice the Christian temperance in which I believe and which I practice. Christianity persuades men, instead of trying to compel them. By the purity and love of Christ, Christianity draws men instead of trying to drive them. It is not by the power of civil government, but by the power of the Holy Spirit, that Christianity secures the obedience of men and the practice of Christian temperance.

The establishment of a theocracy is the aim of the prime movers in this Sunday Law movement, as it was also the aim of the church leaders of the fourth century. And what came of that movement at that time? I read again:--

"This theocratical theory was already the prevailing one in the time of Constantine; and... the bishops voluntarily made themselves dependent on him by their disputes, and by their determination to make use of the power of the State for the furtherance of their aims."--Neander, p. 132.

This being their theory, which resulted in the determination "to make use of the power of the State for the furtherance of their aims," the question arises, What means did they employ to secure control of this power? The answer is, They did it by means of Sunday laws.

The first and greatest aim of the political church managers of that time was the exaltation of themselves; and second only to that was the exaltation of Sunday. These two things had been the principal aim of the bishops of Rome for more than a hundred years, when Constantine gave them a chance to make their schemes effectual by the power of the State. The arrogant pretensions of the bishop of Rome to secure power over the whole church, was first asserted in behalf of Sunday by Victor, who was bishop of Rome from A D 193 to 202.

"He wrote an imperious letter to the Asiatic prelates commanding them to imitate the example of the Western Christians with respect to the time of celebrating the festival of Easter [that is, commanding them to celebrate it on Sunday]. The Asiatics answered this lordly requisition with great spirit and resolution, that they would by no means depart in this manner from the custom handed down to them by their ancestors. Upon this the thunder of excommunication began to roar. Victor, exasperated by this resolute answer of the Asiatic bishops, broke communion with them, pronounced them unworthy of the name of his brethren, and excluded them from all fellowship with the church of Rome." --Mosheim, chap. 4, par. 11.

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The one means by which these church managers secured from Constantine the use of the power of the State, was the famous edict prohibiting certain kinds of work on "the venerable day of the sun."

That edict runs thus:--

"Let all the judges and towns-people and the occupation of all trades rest on the venerable day of the sun; but let those who are situated in the country, freely and at full liberty attend to the business of agriculture, because it often happens that no other day is so fit for sowing corn and planting vines, lest the critical moment being let slip, men should lose the commodities granted by Heaven."

This edict was issued March 7, A. D. 321. Only judges and towns-people and mechanics were to rest on Sunday; people in the country were at full liberty to work. But this did not satisfy the political managers of the churches for any great length of time.

"The object of the first Sunday law," says Sozomen, "was that the day might be devoted with less interruption to the purposes of devotion."

And as the government was now a theocracy, it was only consistent that all should be required to be religious. Consequently, an additional Sunday law was secured, which commanded all people to do no work on Sunday.

"By a law of the year 386, those older changes effected by the Emperor Constantine were more rigorously enforced, and, in general, civil transactions of every kind on Sunday were strictly forbidden. Whoever transgressed was to be considered in fact as guilty of sacrilege."-- Neander, p. 300.

Then as the people were not allowed to do any manner of work, they would play, and as the natural consequence, the circuses and the theaters throughout the empire were crowded every Sunday. But the object of the law, from the first one that was issued, was that the day might be used for the purposes of devotion, and that the people might go to church. Consequently, that this object might be met, there was another step to take, and it was taken. At a church convention held at Carthage in 401, the bishops passed a resolution to send up a petition to the emperor, praying--

"That the public shows might be transferred from the Christian Sunday, and from feast-days, to some other days of the week."--Idem.

History does not say whether or not this petition represented the names of fourteen million petitioners, the greater part of whom never signed it at all. History is also silent as to whether the petition was indorsed by any one man who could be counted for seven million two hundred thousand men. But history is not silent as to the reason why it was necessary to send up the petition. The petitioners themselves gave the reason, and it was this;--

"The people congregate more to the circus than to the church." -- Idem, note 5.

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Mr. Jones.--In the circuses and the theaters large numbers of men were employed, among whom many were church-members. But rather than to give up their jobs, they would work on Sunday. The bishops complained that these were compelled to work: they pronounced it persecution, and asked for a law to protect those persons from such "persecution."

The church had become filled with a mass of people, unconverted, who cared vastly more for worldly interests and pleasures than they did for religion. And as the government was now a government of God, it was considered proper that the civil power should be used to cause all to show respect for God, whether or not they belonged to a church, or whether they had any respect for God.

The people, not being allowed to work, crowded the circus and the theater. They had no wish to be devoted; and as they were forced to be idle, a flood of dissipation was the inevitable consequence. Neander says of it:--

"Owing to the prevailing passion at that time, especially in the large cities, to run after the various public shows, it so happened that when these spectacles fell on the same days which had been consecrated by the church to some religious festival, they proved a great hinderance to the devotion of Christians, though chiefly, it must be allowed, to those whose Christianity was the least an affair of the life and of the heart."--Idem.

And further:--"Church teachers were in truth often forced to complain that in such competitions the theater was vastly more frequented than the church."--Idem.

And the church could not then stand competition; she wanted a monopoly. She got it, at last.

This petition of the Carthage Convention could not be granted at once, but in the year 425, the desired law was secured; and to this also there was attached the reason that was given for the first Sunday law that ever was made; namely,--"In order that the devotion of the faithful might be free from all disturbance."-- Idem, p. 301.

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Mr. Jones.--It must constantly be borne in mind, however, that the only way in which "the devotion of the faithful" was "disturbed" by these things, was that when the circus or the theater was open at the same time that the church was open, the "faithful" would go to the circus or the theater instead of to church, and therefore their "devotion" was "disturbed."

And of course the only way in which the "devotion" of such "faithful" ones could be freed from all disturbance, was to close the circuses and the theaters at church time. Thus, and by this means, every reason for not being devoted was taken away from all the people. Then in the very next sentence Neander says:--

"In this way the church received help from the State for the furtherance of her ends."

This statement is correct. Constantine did many things to favor the bishops. He gave them money and political preference. He made their decisions in disputed cases as final as the decision of Jesus Christ. But in nothing that he did for them did he give them power over those who did not belong to the church, to compel them to act as though they did, except in that one thing of the Sunday law.

Their decisions, which he decreed to be final, were binding only on those who voluntarily chose that tribunal, and affected none others. Before this time, if any who had repaired to the tribunal of the bishops were dissatisfied with the decision, they could appeal to the civil magistrate. This edict cut off that source of appeal, yet affected none but those who voluntarily chose the arbitration of the bishops.

But in the Sunday law, power was given to the church to compel those who did not belong to the church, and who were not subject to the jurisdiction of the church, to obey the commands of the church.

In the Sunday law there was given to the church control of the civil power, that by it she could compel those who did not belong to the church to act as if they did. The history of Constantine's time may be searched through and through, and it will be found that in nothing did he give to the church any such power, except in this one thing--the Sunday law.

Neander's statement is literally correct, that it was "in this way the church received help from the State for the furtherance of her ends."

tbc

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Mr. Jones.--The work, however, was not done yet. True, the bishops had secured the power of the State to take away from the people all excuse for not being religious; but from the beginning of the whole scheme, the people had no real wish to be religious. They had none of the spirit of devotion in their hearts; and although the State had forbidden them to work, and had shut the Sunday circuses and theaters, still the people would not be religious. The next step to be taken, therefore, in the logic of the situation, was to compel

them; and the theocratical bishops were equal to the occasion. They were ready with a theory that exactly met the demands of the case; and the great Catholic Church Father and Catholic saint, Augustine, was the father of this Catholic saintly theory. He wrote:--

"It is indeed better that men should be brought to serve God by instruction than by fear of punishment, or by pain. But because the former means are better, the latter must not therefore be neglected. Many must often be brought back to their Lord, like wicked servants, by the rod of temporal suffering, before they attain to the highest grade of religious development." --Schaff's Church History, vol. 2, sec. 27

Of this theory Neander remarks:--"It was by Augustine, then, that a theory was proposed and founded, which contained the germ of that whole system of spiritual despotism, of intolerance and persecution, which ended in the tribunals of the Inquisition." --Church History, p. 217.

The history of the Inquisition is only the history of the carrying out of this infamous theory of Augustine's. But this theory is only the logical sequence of the theory upon which the whole series of Sunday laws was founded. The church induced the State to compel all to be idle for their own good. Then it was found that they all were more inclined to wickedness. Then to save them from all going to the Devil, they tried to compel all to go to heaven. The work of the Inquisition was always for love of men's souls, and to save them from hell!.

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Mr. Jones.--Allow me to summarize these statements from Neander:

He says of the carrying into effect of the theocratical theory of those bishops, that they made themselves dependent upon Constantine by their disputes, and "by their determination to use the power of the State for the furtherance of their aims." Then he mentions the first and second Sunday laws of Constantine; the Sunday law of 386; the Carthage Convention, resolution, and petition of 401; and the law of 425 in response to this petition; and then, without a break, and with direct reference to these Sunday laws, he says:

"In this way the church received help from the State for the furtherance of her ends."

She started out with the determination to do it; she did it; and "in this way" she did it. And when she had secured the control of the power of the State, she used it for the furtherance of her own aims, and in her own despotic way, as announced in Augustine's Inquisitorial theory. The first step logically and inevitably led to the last; and the theocratical leaders in the movement had the cruel courage to follow the first step unto the last, as framed in the words of Augustine, and illustrated in the history of the Inquisition.

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Mr. Jones.--That is the system with which Sunday laws belong. That is the theory upon which they are based. They have no other foundation. Mr. Elliott, who has spoken here in behalf of this bill, knows that there is no law in the Bible for keeping the first day of the week. I could read a passage from his own book, "The Abiding Sabbath," page 184, in which he confesses "the complete silence of the New Testament, so far as any explicit command for the Sabbath, or definite rules for its observance, are concerned." And everybody knows that the Old Testament does not say anything about the observance of the first day of the week as Sabbath.

Everybody likewise knows that the Old Testament does not say anything about keeping the first day of the week as the day of the resurrection of the Saviour, or for any other reason. Dr. Johnson and others here this morning have said that the first day of the week was chosen because it was a memorial of the resurrection of the Saviour. It is the New Testament that tells about the resurrection of the Saviour. That is granted. Dr. Elliott confesses, and the American Tract Society publishes it, that there is "complete silence of the New Testament" in regard to it. Then what right have they to put it into law, and try to compel by civil law all people to keep as the Lord's day that for which there is no scriptural authority? Let me read another passage from another book, printed by the American Sunday-school Union. On page 186 of "The Lord's Day," written by Mr. A. E. Waffle, are these words:--

"Up to the time of Christ's death, no change had been made in the day. The authority must be sought in the words or in the example of the inspired apostles."

Then on the very next page he says:--

"So far as the record shows, they [the apostles] did not, however, give any explicit command enjoining the abandonment of the seventh-day Sabbath, and its observance on the first day of the week."

Dr. Schaff, in the Schaff Herzog Cyclopedia, says:

"No regulations for its observance are laid down in the New Testament, nor, indeed, is its observance even enjoined." --Article Sunday.

If, then, they confess that Christ gave no law for its observance, why do they want to compel people to observe it? What right have they to compel anybody to observe it? I deny their right to compel me or anybody else to do what Christ never commanded any man to do.

Senator Blair.--You admit there was a Sabbath before Christ came?

Mr. Jones.--Certainly.

Senator Blair.--And he said came not to destroy, but to fulfill?

Mr. Jones.--Certainly.

Senator Blair.--Is there anything in the New Testament which destroyed the Sabbath already existing?

Mr. Jones.--No, sir.

Senator Blair--Then why does it not continue to exist?

Mr. Jones.--It does exist, and we keep the commandment which provides for the Sabbath.

Senator Blair.--Then you say there is a Sabbath recognized, and that is equivalent to its re-affirmation by Christ?

Mr. Jones.--Certainly.

Senator Blair.--I do not see from what you are stating, but that Christ recognized an existing law, and that it is continuing at the present time. You say that it is one day, and they say that it is another.

Mr. Jones.--But they are after a law to enforce the observance of the first day of the week as the Lord's day, when they confess that the Lord never gave any command in regard to it. The commandment which God gave says that the "seventh day is the Sabbath."

Senator Blair.--Is it still the Sabbath?

Mr. Jones.--Certainly, and we keep it; but we deny the right of any civil government to compel any man either to keep it or not to keep it.

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Mr. Jones.--That is the system with which Sunday laws belong. That is the theory upon which they are based. They have no other foundation. Mr. Elliott, who has spoken here in behalf of this bill, knows that there is no law in the Bible for keeping the first day of the week. I could read a passage from his own book, "The Abiding Sabbath," page 184, in which he confesses " the complete silence of the New Testament, so far as any explicit command for the Sabbath, or definite rules for its observance, are concerned." And everybody knows that the Old Testament does not say anything about the observance of the first day of the week as Sabbath.

Everybody likewise knows that the Old Testament does not say anything about keeping the first day of the week as the day of the resurrection of the Saviour, or for any other reason. Dr. Johnson and others here this morning have said that the first day of the week was chosen because it was a memorial of the resurrection of the Saviour. It is the New Testament that tells about the resurrection of the Saviour. That is granted. Dr. Elliott confesses, and the American Tract Society publishes it, that there is "complete silence of the New Testament" in regard to it. Then what right have they to put it into law, and try to compel by civil law all people to keep as the Lord’s day that for which there is no scriptural authority? Let me read another passage from another book, printed by the American Sunday-school Union. On page 186 of "The Lord’s Day," written by Mr. A. E. Waffle, are these words:–

"Up to the time of Christ’s death, no change had been made in the day. The authority must be sought in the words or in the example of the inspired apostles."

Then on the very next page he says:–

"So far as the record shows, they [the apostles] did not, however, give any explicit command enjoining the abandonment of the seventh-day Sabbath, and its observance on the first day of the week."

Dr. Schaff, in the Schaff Herzog Cyclopedia, says:

"No regulations for its observance are laid down in the New Testament, nor, indeed, is its observance even enjoined."–-Article Sunday.

If, then, they confess that Christ gave no law for its observance, why do they want to compel people to observe it? What right have they to compel anybody to observe it? I deny their right to compel me or anybody else to do what Christ never commanded any man to do.

Senator Blair.–You admit there was a Sabbath before Christ came?

Mr. Jones.– Certainly.

Senator Blair.–And he said came not to destroy, but to fulfill?

Mr. Jones.–Certainly.

Senator Blair.–Is there anything in the New Testament which destroyed the Sabbath already existing?

Mr. Jones.–No, sir.

Senator Blair–Then why does it not continue to exist?

Mr. Jones.–It does exist, and we keep the commandment which provides for the Sabbath.

Senator Blair.–Then you say there is a Sabbath recognized, and that is equivalent to its re-affirmation by Christ?

Mr. Jones.–Certainly.

Senator Blair.–I do not see from what you are stating, but that Christ recognized an existing law, and that it is continuing at the present time. You say that it is one day, and they say that it is another.

Mr. Jones.–But they are after a law to enforce the observance of the first day of the week as the Lord’s day, when they confess that the Lord never gave any command in regard to it. The commandment which God gave says that the "seventh day is the Sabbath."

Senator Blair.–Is it still the Sabbath?

Mr. Jones.–Certainly, and we keep it; but we deny the right of any civil government to compel any man either to keep it or not to keep it.