The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1899-09-26
OBSERVING THE SABBATH.

The Massachusetts Bureau of Labor
Statistics has made an inquiry into
the number of people, who do labor for
gain on Sunday, and it reports that
100000 persons out of 1,015,O0O, labor
for gain on that day While the manu-
facturers do not employ Iaborers on
Sunday the newspapers employ on
that day 81 out of 1929 employed alto
gether. The street cars employ on
Sunday 82S2 persons out OF 1896 en-
ployed during the week while the
steam cars employ on that day 671S
out of total number Of 81 ,4SO employ
ed altogether. These figures are evil
dence of the fact that the people of
Massachusetts, as a community, have
abandoned the practice of keeping the
Sabbath day holy, if it is inconvenient
to do So The practice of observing
il is still carefully observed by many
when it is not inconvenient or does not
interfere with certain business pur-
suits. But every man in the state
is his own Pope, and issues dispensa-
III
pleasure. Of course he does not expect
to be consistent, for he will issue dis
pensation to himself to employ an
operator on Sunday to send a telegram,
or to a car driver to work himself and
his mules on Sunday, but will protest
against his neighbor's blowing a grain
field on that day.
But Massachusetts is not upon the
down grade to perdition, for if she
were, it would be said but conclusive
evidence that Puritan example, the
Puritan schools and colleges and
churches which were established in
Massachusetts, were seriously defective
and furnished only crumbing stones
for the foundations of a gOdly common
wealth.
Whatever may be the force of the
Commandment regarding the Sabbath,
good people lapse quickly into a prac-
teal neglect of it, whenever it suits
their convenience. The evolution of
the Sabbath in modern days pushes the
Commandment aside, for few indeed OF
the strictest Sabbatarians even pre-
tend to obey the divine order not to
work thy manServant, nor thy maid
servant or thy cattle on the Holy day.
As the Commandment makes no ex-
ceptions, saving as it is interpreted in
the New Dispensation, men are coming
to an accord in the matter of observ
aHce, and the people of the great COM
monwealth snow this unanimity, by
making the general want, or conven-
fence of the community the rule Of IN
depreciation. That is, SO long as only
a few persons used the railway car
riages on the Sabbath. there was a
clear violation of the Commandment. |
When, however, large number used
of the day.
While many moralists do object to |
what they call violations of the Sab
bath, as they become part of the social
and economic life of the people of Mas
sachusetts, other moralists, of equal
intelligence and virtue do not object, |
and they are in the majority in many |
communities. For the most of the |
moralists employ cooks and require
them to work on the Sabbath. Pros |
porous people refuse to initiate the old |
Puritans who lived on cold victuals on
Sunday, and, were from a physiolOgi- |
cal point of view, the better for it. |
During the Mosaic period cooking was
in it's infancy, and there was no hard-t
ship in giving to the maid servant her
entire Sabbath. Our views, moulded |
by the anomalous situation of races |
here, are, one may infer from our
practices, to exclude the Asiatics from
the sphere of influence designated by |
the PRONUNCIATION of the Command |
ment