The Sentinel. [volume] (Trenton, N.J.) 1880-1882, 1882-10-07
The Economy of Rest.


1.-THE following very able and timely
lecture was given by DIR. Robert Pat
terson, at Pacific Grove Retreat, Mon
terey, in compliance with the request
of large number of visitors. In
further compliance with the unani-
nous and urgent desire OF all who
heard it, it is now submitted for publ
cation. 1t furnishes much food for
thought, and will be no doubt be read
with interest,
propose to prove that, as one of the
applications of the great law of peri
odicity "a law now recognized by all
scientists as world wide and eternaD,
the Sabbath rests on the same scien-
tific basis as the constitution OF the
atmosphere or the law of grav1tat1on,
or the succession of day and night, and
the duties thence arising.
Such a discussion may have its ef-
fects upon persons who do not profess
religion, but who own their obligation
to practice humanity. If it can be
demonstrated that Sabbath rest is as
necessary tor the preservation of hui
man life as ventilation, and that it is,
in fact, indispensable to the proper
italization of the blood, human1ta-
ians may be willing to unite with
theologians for Its preservation. If
men of science can satisfy themselves,
by experiment and demonstration,
that the great law of periodicity
regulates human life no less than the
life of cryst ais, or the life of plants
and that the formula for man, OF
Motion 6 plus Best l, is of the same
validity as the law of respiration, re-
quiring Nitrogen n plus Oxygen 81,
for the breath of life; they may be led
to accept that fact of science, rs an
expression of Gods will in nature that
all men should enjoy the Sabbath
rest.
This proof will appear upon an in
vestigation of the law Of periodicity.
Such an investig alton will demonstrate
the perpetual dependence of our earth
upon the revolutions of the heavens, of
which it forms part, and which have
held it, and all its tenants, in unswerv-
ing allegiance to the law of periodicity,
from the remOtest ages known to man.
This law of periodicity lies at the very
foundations of the earth, which were
not laid by slow and uninterrupted,
gradual deposits alone, but were
frequently upheaved, and tilted, and
contorted, and again deposited, by
geological revolutions and commissions,
in all manner of dips. inclinations,
cleavsges and upheavals. After these
rocks were deposited, they were not
compelled to mon, tonous, leisurely
drudgery of their life-work, but led a
life varied by the periods of work and
rest prescribed by the law of perio-
deity. As the geologist, sanding
amidst The palms OF India, or on the
fertile prsiries of Illinois, marks the
scratchipgs and burrows. which the
glacier ice-plow once ground on the
rocks, or the cargo of boulders de-
posted by an iceberg which once
hoated fathoms overhead in an arctic
sea, he becomes convinced that the
existing day of light and life here must
have been preceded by a night of freez-
ing death. He learns, also, that the
access of heat which melted out the
glaciers of the great ice age could not
have been generated by the cooling o
the globe (Which must have exerted
an influence precisely opposite), but
must have arisen from some change in
the relations of our cold, insensate
earth to the great celestial source of
heat and joy. Earth's great periods,
then, depend upon the heavens.
Sufficient attention has not yet been
bestowed upon the great fact, attested
by science, that the history of oar
world is not at all history of slow,
gradual, monotonous progress in one
unvarying course but is, on the con-
trary, the history of succession of
revolutions-a history of seasons of
work, succeeded by seasons of repose;
of days of light and life, followed, by
evenings darkening into nights of
silence and rest; OF continents up