The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1894-05-29
THE SUNDAY CLOSING MOVEMENT.
Editor Of The Tt IBUNE:

Editor Of THE TlIBUNE:
Dear Sir: There has been a good deal OF
talk Of late in the pulpits, in the courts
and on the streets, about the American
Sabbath, and the duties Of the citizen with
regard to it. Man is naturally an ire
ligious being and he hates to have ever
wholesome restraints put upon his actions,
although it may be for the general good.
The criminal never thinks the law a good
one that Furnishes him for his crime, and
hence the constant clamoring for personal
liberty. Webster defines the term liberty
to be liability to do as one pleases, free
dom from restraint" Are we to under
lie, swear, steal, cheat, murder or publish
through the mails? II so, why the re.
straints Of the government according to
the Bible, which was written byi the finger
of God rs a standard of morals, for all
nations and for all time. Who
ever, therefore, defines the Sabbath OF
the Pilgrim fathers to be blue laws,
might as well define the laws from Mount
Sinai to be green ones. The Sabbath is as
old as creation, the supposition is that it
was kept during the ZOO years Of anteii-
vivian history, having been written upon
the hearts of the people prior to any writ.
ten law on tables of stone. But when il
came laundering amidst fire and smoke
from the summit Of Mount Sinai on the
ears of the Jewish nation, it was at once
recognized as a divine institution, and,
from the Exodus to the incarnation Its
violation was visited with the severest
penalties for in Numbers, chapter 10, verse
SO, it Ia written, that the congregation
brought the transgressor without the camp
and stoned him with stones that he died"
and the day WAS so sacred that the Israe-
lites were not even to gather the mama
in the wilderness ON the Sabbath day; and
the scriptures are full OF penalties that
were Inflicted BY a just and righteous God
upon individuals and upon nations who
violated the fourth commandment.
Whatever might have happenedi during
the 400 years that the Jews were in Egypt,
for 1900 years after their deliverance from
bondage, they kept the day as most holy
unto the Lord and since the resurrection
Of our Lord, Jesus Christ, one day in seven
has been kept as a sacred day by all Chris
tendon. When the Pilgrim Fathers came
to America they brought the Christian
Sabbath with them aud although its strict
observance may be called by modern
society and by publishers Of newspapers
the "blue law problem" yet it has had al
excellent influence in working up our ma.
tional prosperity.
Lord Macauley in his history of England
says: IF the Sunday had not been OBJ
| served as a day Of rest, but the axe, the
spade, the anvil, the loom land he might
have added a thouscnd other things which
are carried on to day to crafty human
selfshness) had kept at work seven days
instead of six, she would not have occupied
the position she does today among the ma
tions Of the EARTH" A writer on physio,
logy says that cleanliness, pure air, good
food and exercise in the form of labor il
essential to mans physical, we'll being
and so Is rest and sleep. And as dod has
set apart a seventh portion of our time ss
a day Of rest, If we violate Heavens laws
we shall suffer for it in the end, physically,
morally. intellectually aud as a nation, for
o nation without a code Of morals to hold
it together will fall to pieces.
Such was the case with the great empire
of Babylon. During the Jewish captivity
it was made a capital offence for thom to
assert their rights ito keep the Sabbath
day holy as q divine institution handed
down from their f~orefathers and as given
by Moses in the fourth commandment
from Mount Sinai. But great Babylon is
no more.
Seneca, the philosopher, who educated
the monster Nero, st. Augustine tells us in
centuring the religion of the Jews, charges
its Sabbaths with causing the neglect and
obstructing the commercial ard Industrial
affairs Of the nation by booming to idle.
ness and waste the seventh part of life,
And is not America walking in the foot
steps of that once great empire that pro-
claimed herself the mistress of the world.
bnt now because Of Sabbath Dissertation
and other vice described in the first chap
ter Of the epistle to Romans, "lchabod is
written on her wallS."
And with IFS is not Sabbath dissertation,
with our great corporations, our drug
stores and whiskey shops almost If not
altogether a question not of absolute me-
cessity but Of dollars and cents. And what
in the name of common sense do that
class Of our citizens want who are to-day
running nine tenths of the gin shops and
whiskey bells OF the country, and who are
the authors OF nine-tenths of all the crime,
misery and wr~etchedness of the land, and
not content with filling our lock. ups, jalls,
prisons, penitentiaries, poor houses,
doubling our taxes every year, disgracipR
our homes, running our families, reducing
them to beggary and want, fitting our
boys for the gallows or a ~dlunkard's
grave, and then in addition to all the rest
are doing their best to destroy the institu-
ii ons of this God given country by rob.
bug us Of the sauctity of the Sabbath I'm.
der the name Of personal liberty. But
may God save us from such q liberty as
that liberty that defies all law, civil aud di-
vine, a liberty that leads to anarchy and
ruin.
Yours respectfully,