THE following is a quotation from a tract on the Christian Sabbath by the late Rev. W. McIntyre, M.A., Sydney, Australia, 1879. It is worth recording in the pages of our Church Magazine.
“In our remarks on the works of necessity and mercy, we made no express reference to the use on the Lord’s Day, of omnibuses, hackney carriages or the railway, which is sometimes pleaded for and justified on the ground of necessity. The use on the Sabbath of one or other of the modes of conveyance mentioned may be necessary it is said for him who uses it to enable him, for example, to attend a place of worship; but, that we may determine whether such use of it is or is not a violation of the Sabbath law, we must view it in its relations to all on whom it imposes work, or who in any way are parties to it. Let us suppose that the conveyance used is an omnibus. That it may be used on the Sabbath, it is obvious that the proprietor must use it on that day; that is, he must to that extent pursue his secular calling on that day which, by a special enactment, God has set apart from the portion of our time which He has allotted for secular occupations; or, in other words, he must disregard the character which God has impressed upon the Sabbath as the consecrated portion of our time, and disobey the law in which He requires that, employing it in accordance with that character, we ‘keep it holy.’ Need we ask whether it can be right for him to do so? Can it be right for him to set at nought God’s distribution of our time, and His express and authoritative requirement with respect to our employment of it? Nor can it be alleged that the running of his vehicle on the Sabbath is on his part a work of necessity. Though it might be necessary for him to add Sabbath work to the work of the six working days, that he might realise a profit, this would not constitute the kind of necessity under the pressure of which work may be done on the Sabbath that, under other circumstances, are to be excluded from it. And quite as little is the work in question a work of mercy. It is not from a compassionate desire to afford succour or relief that it is performed. We must, therefore, hold that the omnibus proprietor, in running his vehicle on the Lord’s Day is guilty of desecrating what God has hallowed. He breaks the divine law, ‘Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy,’ and if he thus sins in running his vehicle on the Sabbath, does not he who uses it on that day participate in the sin? Does he not accept, and endorse the arrangement that the omnibus shall be run on the Sabbath? He clearly does. But there are other parties to the arrangement. At least the driver and conductor are parties to it. These, in carrying out the arrangement, are required to work and do work on the Lord’s Day. And there is this aggravation of the evil in their case, that, while the proprietor, though he runs his omnibus on the Sabbath, may himself, if so disposed, attend on the public ordinance of religion, they are deprived of this privilege. The Sabbath is no Sabbath to them. Now, is there not sin, unmitigated Sabbath desecration in all this? Does not the proprietor desecrate the Sabbath in requiring his servants to reduce it, and in reducing it by their agency, to the character of a working day? And do they not desecrate it in complying with his requirements? But the desecration of the Sabbath in the case does not stop here. The proprietor of the vehicle employs the driver and conductor to act for him in doing the Sabbath-desecrating work under consideration; and constituted thus the agents of the proprietor, he who uses the vehicle employs them to do so much of that work for him as he deems requisite for his purpose; and employing others to do work for him, by doing which they desecrate the Sabbath, he desecrates it himself. It affords no relief from the condemnation that the omnibus used is specially hired to convey those who use it to church, for the arrangement precludes the driver and conductor from attending on the public ordinances of religion, and thus observing the Sabbath Day as the Sabbath. It implies and requires Sabbath desecration on their part; and those who make a contract with them which they cannot fulfil without desecrating the Sabbath, are clearly parties to all the Sabbath desecration which the fulfilment of it involves. And in this respect, those who use their own carriages are in precisely the same position, if their use of them prevents their coachmen from attending on the public services of the Sanctuary.”
The above statement is Scriptural, and most excellently stated. Sabbath desecration has been on the increase in recent years to an alarming extent everywhere, which clearly shows the tendency of man’s ruined nature to oppose God, His law, word, and ordinances. It is of the utmost importance to the Lord’s people and to the cause of Christ in general that men who profess His holy name should observe the Sabbath Day holy to the Lord. Jews, and Roman Catholics have been the bitterest, and most relentless enemies to the Christian Sabbath.—J. M.