HOW TO SPEND SUNDAY

The Sabbaths of man's life,

Threaded together on Time's string,

Make bracelets to adorn the wife
Of the celestial King.

HERBERT.

OF

Chapter XI

HOW TO SPEND SUNDAY

In which it is explained how the
Sabbath was "made for Man'

F the problems which young people are called upon to solve, in these strenuous times, none presses more urgently upon our consideration than this, How shall I spend my Sundays? And to a young man in the city, weary of the six days' toil and longing to stretch his limbs, the question is an ever-recurring one.

Its importance will appear from the fact that in an ordinary lifetime, of threescore years and ten, there are no less than ten years of Sundays. Ten Sabbatic years! Who shall estimate the possibilities of eternal good or evil involved in them?

A Scotch minister on his way to church passed a parishioner with this greeting, "How is it wi' you. the day, Janet?" To which she replied, "The adversary's been at me again. "And what's he been saying to you?" "He's been sayin', 'It's a' a delusion; the Bible's a tissue o' lees; there is no heaven, an' no hell; there's no Savior; it's a' a delusion.' " "And what did you answer?" "Ah, minister, I kent better than that. I kent it was nae use to argy wi' him; I just referred him to the Lord." Here is the secret

of a definite and satisfactory decision in all questions of conduct; that is, for Christian people. Would you know what you may do on the Lord's Day? Refer it to the Lord. An opinion of mine is of value only so far as it reveals His will. The word of promise is, "If any of you lacketh Wisdom, let him ask of God, and it shall be given him."

The teaching of Christ in these premises is clear. He says two things: One is that the Sabbath is his: "The Son of Man is Lord also of the Sabbath." It sounds like an echo of the fourth commandment, "The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." This means that he claims a proprietary right in it. And he says also that the Sabbath is ours, "The Sabbath was made for man.

Nor is there any inconsistency here. The day is like a rented house; it belongs to the proprietor; he built it for the occupancy of a tenant. It would not be competent for the tenant to say, "This house is mine to do whatever I please with it.' He may not maltreat it; he is not at liberty to mutilate its walls, turn it into an evil resort, or otherwise abuse it. It is his only to the end that he may take his comfort in it. The Sabbath is ours in the same way. He who diverts it from its proper end robs God, and is, so far forth, a dishonest man. For let it be remembered that God in turning over the Sabbath to our use has never parted with His rightful title to it.

The question will be simplified by a consideration of the things which are right and lawful on this day. The first is rest. All will agree so far. But there are two kinds of rest, which the Romans distinguished

by the wards soper-that is, "sleep"-and solatium —that is, "solace" or "refreshment.'

The rest designated as sopor is for the night-time. In this there is a suspension of the conscious activity of all our powers. It is as when a ship is becalmed upon the open sea; sails are furled and the crew are in their bunks in the forecastle. Our energies are repaired by such an intermission of effort. This is "tired nature's sweet restorer, balmy sleep.

The rest designated by the word solatium is a different thing. Here the faculties are all awake and alert; they are being reinvigorated not by quiescence but by change of activity. The ship is now under way with sails all set; but the stress of Euraquilo is over, and the crew are taking their ease under fair skies and in a southerly wind.

Both of these kinds of rest are necessary to our material well-being. The night is the comma and the Sabbath is the semicolon in the punctuation of our lives.

The average man uses up more strength day by day than he recovers in sleep. A night's rest after a day's work does not afford a complete recuperation of energy; in addition to this he needs the regularly recurring rest of the seventh day. It is a scientific fact that the ratio of this rest or solatium to the normal time of labor is precisely as one to six. To the mind of the socialist Proudhon, who was otherwise indisposed to all religious truth, this afforded the most striking proof of the inspiration of the Scriptures, for, as he said, "no scientist could of himself have discovered it."