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The Spirit of Prophecy Volume 4
In the movements now in progress in this country to secure for
the institutions and usages of the church the support of the State,
Protestants are following in the steps of papists. Nay, more, they
are opening the door for popery to regain in Protestant America the
supremacy which she has lost in the Old World. And that which gives
greater significance to this movement is the fact that the principal
object contemplated is the enforcement of Sunday observance,—a
custom which originated with Rome, and which she claims as the
sign of her authority.
The spirit of the papacy,—the spirit of conformity to worldly
customs, the veneration for human traditions above the commands
of God,—is permeating the Protestant churches, and leading them
on to do the same work of Sunday exaltation which the papacy has
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done before them. Would the reader understand the agencies to be
employed in the soon-coming contest? He has but to trace the record
of the means which Rome employed for the same object in ages past.
Would he know how papists and Protestants united will deal with
those who reject their dogmas? Let him see the spirit which Rome
manifested toward the Sabbath and its defenders.
Royal edicts, human councils, and church ordinances sustained
by secular power, were the steps by which the pagan festival attained
its position of honor in the Christian world. The first public measure
enforcing Sunday observance was the law enacted [A. D. 321.] by
Constantine, two years before his profession of Christianity. This
edict required towns-people to rest on the venerable day of the sun,
but permitted countrymen to continue their agricultural pursuits.
Though originally a heathen statute, it was enforced by the emperor
after his nominal acceptance of the Christian religion.
The royal mandate not proving a sufficient substitute for divine
authority, the bishop of Rome soon after conferred upon the Sunday
the title of Lord’s day. Another bishop, who also sought the favor of
princes, and who was the special friend and flatterer of Constantine,
advanced the claim that Christ had transferred the Sabbath to Sunday.
Not a single testimony of the Scriptures was produced in proof of the
new doctrine. The sacred garments in which the spurious Sabbath
was arrayed were of man’s own manufacture; but they served to
embolden men in trampling upon the law of God. All who desired
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to be honored by the world accepted the popular festival.