Morning journal and courier., 1883-02-28

General Assembly has legalized the stealing Of sheep, allow me to recommend you to iegallze also the stealing of hens. Forasmuch as former General Assembly has authorized dlVers secular doings on part of Sunday, aovlse you to legalize divers entertainments on the same portion of Sunday. Believe me, my hearers, there is no light in such advice as His Excellency has given eur General As- sembly respecting the Sabbath What he says about 1t IS, spiritually, darkness itself It is advice that cannot be proitably contem- plated without amAzementl True Sabbath ngne emanates only from governors, legisla- tors and others Vho advise that the Sabbath be remembered, and be kept holy in honor of God whose dey it is, and who insists that governors, legislators and all the people, re- training from all work on his sacred day, de- light themselves in him, not finding their own pleasure, not doing their own ways.
 
 Wha1 God wants the Governor of this com monw edith to do is not to recommend that our load Sunday laws be made worse but he waAts our Governor in the use of his legal ac'omen to show as best he can how incon- Erueus are our and his Sunday laws. He wants our Governor to submit to the General As sembly this Is it right to permit the manu featuring establishment to beput in opera tion, the work shop opened, the goods of the merchant exposed for sale and even claim for debt to be secured by attachment, after sunset on Sunday, when God, who created the heavens and the earth, when God, in whom men live and move and have their being, commands the citizens of this com nonwealth not to do any work on the Sab bath Is it right to permit the traveller, the drover, the manager, the teamster to travel at will during the whole twentyfour hours of Sunday, in the face of the divine prohibition of all work on the day? And God, no doubt wants our Governor not to sack the repeal but the enforcement of the following law: F'No person shall be present at any concert of music, dancing or other public diversion on the Lords day or on the evening of said day." And in view of what the prophet Isaiah (58th chapter) says re- specting Sabbath pleasuring, we know that God can but frown on the three or more of our Legislators who are seeking to legalize Sunday evening concerts, and recreation" so-called during all Sunday What the Gov ernor ought to demand of our General As. sembly is the repeal of the Sunday law en- acted in 1882, and the re-enactment of the Sunday law of 1881 and previously, with the after sunset exceptions plotted out. Works of necessity and mercy or charity called are law unto themselves in the best sense of the term. A law precluding work of mercy or charity could but be hateful and unmerciful and law precluding works of necessity might, on occasion, be as unmerci- full as unreasonable. A work of necessity or mercy in the sight of heaven is not amenable to civil law. Such works keep holy the Sab bath and sanctify any hour of the week when they are in exercise. IA work of ne- cessity Sundaywise, it has been well said lis once to which providence calls us; one that was not foreseen and cannot be de- ferred." And the divine command, "Thou shalt not do any work on the Sabbath," never contemplated precluding the needful and mercifu1 work incidental to the pulling out of the pit the OK which may have fallen into it during the Sabbath-Luke 14:56.
 The want of the hour is 8 Governor to recommend, and General Assembly to en- act, with or without the exception of works of necessity or mercy. laws forbidding, with suitable sanctions, Sabbath work and Sab bath recreation" Gods law and testimony must determine in every instance how his Sabbath shall be kept. If his divine statute be: '"Thou shalt not do any work on the Sabbath" then our Governor will do well to recommend, and our Legislature will be wise to enact for the observance and highest good of the people of this State the same divine statute And if the divine word warn the people against finding their own pleasure on the Sabbath, then ought the General As- sembly of thls commonwealth to prohibit such conduct by civil statute.
 Such is the legislation that would seem to be demanded by the law and the testi- mony. And all persons who teach to the contrary would seem to do so because there is no true Bible light in them.