SABBATARIANISM.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 4845, 2 October 1876, Page 2

SABBATARIANISM.

Some time since a lecture was delivered in the Melbourne Athenaeum on the Sabbatarian question. The Arffus report was reprinted by a local contemporary ; and yesterday at Man-ners-street church in the morning, and Thorndon church in the evening, the Rev. A. Reid, President of the Wesleyan Conference, delivered a sermon in answer to what was contained in Mr. Smith’s lecture. After the usual devotional exercises had been gone through,

The Rev. Mr. Reid selected as his text Mark ii. 27, 28. He commenced by explaining that it was owing to the special circumstances—his intention of criticising publicly what had appeared in a public print—that the sermon had been' advertised. As a rule, he was averse to advertising religious services, for too much advertising spoke well neither for preacher nor people. A good many hard things had lately been said about the Sabbatarians, as they were called by the Press, and this hard hitting had culminated in the publication of part of a lecture delivered in Melbourne by a Mr. James Smith against the Sabbatarians. The privileges of a free Press were enjoyed in the colonies and fully appreciated, but colonists should also be thankful for a free pulpit. The province of one undoubtedly was to criticise the pulpit, and the pulpit claimed to exercise the same right when it thought it necessary to do so. A kind of mutual supervision was exercised. If the preserves of the pulpit were encroached upon it claimed the right to protest, and by virtue of this right he protested against the misrepresentation they had lately been subjected to by the Press. The lecture by Mr. Smith had been exceedingly severe upon Sabbatarians; and before going further, in order to better understand the matter, it was desirable to define Sabbatarianism. They were Sabbatarians because they considered the Sabbath a holy day—a day in which they could meet twice in this sanctuary, a day in which they were not to indulge in railway excursions, nor to open the museums and athenaeums and libraries to the public. So much for the|term. This lecture by Mr. Smith contained three charges. First, that the Sabbatarians made the Sunday a day of sadness. He denied it utterly and entirely, and claimed that they made the Sunday a day of brightness and of joy. Second, that there was no scriptural authority for the religious observance of the Sabbath. This he denied, and affirmed that they had ample authority for the religious observance of theLord’sDay. Third, that the Sabbatarians were actuated by that spirit of intolerance and persecution which had in times past sent martyrs to the rack, the dungeon, and the scaffold, for the conscientious worship of God. This he denied in toto, and protested against such a charge being brought against them. In reference to the first of these; they were told they made the Sunday a day of gloom and sadness ! Mr. Smith had commenced his address by supposing the moon to be habitable and inhabited, and that one of the Lunarians, availing himself of Jules Verne’s celebrated projectile, had visited the shores of Hobson's Bay. It might be asked what have we to do with the moon, but it was said the influence of the moon affected men’s reason, and it was only upon such a supposition that the wild sayings of Mr. Smith could be accounted for. If the Sabbath of the Sabbatarians were a day of gloom and sadness, what were its constituents? At the basis of the Sabbath day rest. Man during six days must work in’order to live, but on the Sabbath he rested. That day was amply supplied with all that was necessary to existence. On that day the toiler for one day became absolutely free and independent of labor—on that day he lived as a lord instead of as a serf—from the status of a dependent he rose to be master of the position for one-seventh of his time. Did this sense of being master of the position and this sense of freed >m —freedom for limb and freedom for faculty beget gloom and sadness. Whoso said this was guilty of a gross perversion of truth. The Sabbath secured family reunion. Not merely was man on the Sabbath freed from toil ; not simply master of the position and amply supplied with all the necessaries of life; —but on this day he enjoyed family life in all its completeness, in all its perfection. Then the family was one, and the summit of true human happiness attained to. The public worship of the Sabbatarians was criticised, or rather misrepresented. It was said someone “rang a bell, and then people rushed to an enclosure;” and the service was jeered at. Mr. Reid went on to defend the service. There might be bad singing, dreary prayers, and prosy sermons ; but there was also heartstirring singing, prayer which breathed outthesoultoGod, andsermons bymen who studied the will and wishes of our Father as revealed to man by the gospel of his Son;:and the best men and women of the world were those who enjoyed such singing, prayer, and sermons. The lecturer had attempted a witticism by saying ; “ It was considered sinful to open a picture gallery for the instruction and delight of those who cannot afford to procure works of art for themselves, but it was not sinful for the opulent classes to amuse themselves in their libraries with their private collections of pictures throughout the whole of Sunday; It was considered improper for a band of music to perform compositions of an allegro character, but not for an organ to do so, if they were written in adagio time." What was the tact. There was proper music for weddings,, proper music for social gatherings—proper music for all occasions in life’s history —and there was proper music for the worship of God, Music proper under one set of circumstances would be very improper: under another, and to have wedding music at the worship of God would destroy all solemn feelings. The reference to the difference between private and public picture galleries was simply false. Sabbatarians did not make any, distinction. The opulent merchant who s.mused himself in his picture gallery simply for tbe gratification of his aesthetic taste was just as sinful as the mechanic in fustian who with a similar object

visited the public picture gallery. It was said Sabbatarians derived their origin from the Puritans, who were spoken of in language he should be sorry to repeat. They were called “gross' feeders,” as men “who believed their mission to be to make their fellow men miserable, and they certainly succeeded in their malevolent effort.” He cited John Bunyan as a Puritan, and inquired was he a grass feeder, did he deem his mission to be to make men miserable ? Also Richard Baxter, Cromwell, Hampden, and the-Pilgrim Fathers, to whom the present generation werer indebted for freedom to worship God, and who had assured the liberties of Britons and laid the foundations of the greatest republic the world had ever seen. Let the anti-Sabba-tarians think over the result of the work of the Puritans, and reflect that they were the ancestors of the two nations who were now doing most for the promotion of the good of the world-nations which had civilised and Christianised China, the Indies, the Fijis, Tonga, and other places. The lecturer had described the Sunday in Scotland twenty years ago as “a periodical season of sufferance and dejection.” Mr. Reid traversed the assertion, and spoke in very feeling terms of the happiness of the Sundays of his boyhood. He then took up the next point —the alleged absence of scriptural warrant for the religious observance of the Sabbath. He said there was no necessity to go so far back as the Levitical code, to Nehemiah, Isaiah, or the other prophets. There was plenty of evidence, direct and indirect, in the New Testament. They were there told—“ As was His custom He went into the Synagogue and taught them on the Sabbath day.” He also cited various passages from the epistles, to show that the Sabbath had been hallowed, and pointed out the reason of the change of the Sabbath from the seventh to the first day of the week. The seventh day had been regarded in commemoration of creation completed. But the completed creation had been marred by sin, and so far as man was concerned creation had come to nought. Christ then resuscitated and revived creation by redemption, and the accident not the essence of the law was altered to commemorate thedeliverance. He then dealt with the third charge, that Sabbatarians were actuated by a spirit of intolerance and persecution. He denied it. They claimed the right to endeavor to mould public feeling: to their manner of thinking, but not to coerce, and they also claimed the right of exercising their suffrage as citizens Given a right to determine whether a picture gallery or an athenasum should be brought into existence, or given a right to say how it should be managed and at what hours opened, they challenged the right of any man to say they should not have an equal voice in determining whether such institutions should be closed on. the Sabbath. Given a right to decide whether a railway should be constructed, they challenged anyone to deny they had an an equal right to regulate its traffic. They acted according to their conscience,, but abided by the result of their efforts. If they were in the minority they might regret it, but they would accept the fact, as they had done on the athenaeum question in Christchurch and Dunedin. Why should not the anti-Sabbatarians act similarly? The minority should yield to the majority, and if beaten on the question of opening athenmums, why should they complain of persecution? The Sabbatarians wished every man to have the same liberty they themselves enjoyed; but give the anti-Sabbatarians their way, and the liberty of the working men was at an end. The day was given to man by God himself, and in the interests of the working population and of true liberty, the Sabbatarians objected to public property being so used as to rob them of their rights. These self-created philanthropists might say what they liked, but it was not the act of a true patriot to rob them of this God-gift. If they would exercise themselves in trying to lessen the hours of labor he could understand them, but to lay sacrilegious hands on what they esteemed most precious was not fair, and he was perfectly astonished that any man of intelligence'could have made such statements as had appeared. Their own idea of the Sabbath was that of an invitation to spend the day with God, and abandon the frivolties of the world. It was to them an education for life eternal, and the opportunity for engrafting a knowledge in their children which should make the world better. They were not afraid of the world's arguments if so inconclusive as those advanced in this lecture. They should, by their kindness and consideration for others’ welfare, prove to the world the benefits they received from the Sabbath. This question would not be compassed by preaching, but by the force of example. The blessing of the Sabbath was, like that of mercy, twofold, blessing him that gives and him that takes.