118 ABROGATION OF THE SABBATH. 



JUVEXAL. JUSTINUS. DiON CaSSIUS. JuLIAN. 



The poet Juvenal (a. d. 115) thought it worthy of a 

 passing uotice, as distinctive of these '^ Barbarians/' that they 

 '^observe their festival Sabbaths." (/S^a^/r. lib. ii. sat. vi. 158.) 

 And in a subsequent satire, lie speaks of those who "obey the 

 Jewish law, which Moses delivered in a secret voliime/' as 

 being a bigoted and churlish set, "to whom every seventh day 

 •was idle, and not engaged in any aim of life." (lib. v. sat. xiv. 

 96—106.) 



JusTiNUS (a. d. 150) informs his readers that" Moses, having 

 reached Mount Syna, after conducting the weary Jews seven 

 days through the deserts of Arabia — fasting, on his arrival 

 there, appointed the seventh day (called in their langnage 

 ' sahhatum') to be observed perpetually as a fast-day, in coin- 

 memoration of the day which had terminated their hunger and 

 their wandering!'^ {Ilistor. Philipjiic. lib. xxxvi. cap. 2.) 



Another Roman historian, DiON Cassius (a. d. 220), 

 trcating of the Jews, tells us that " the day which is called 

 Saturn's they hold sacred; and among the observances peculiar 

 to that day, carefully abstain from engaging in any work on 

 it.'' He supposes that the custom of "naming seven days 

 after the seven stars, which the Romans call 'planets,' 

 was derived from the Egyptians:" and adds that this appears 

 to have been wholly unknown among the ancient Greeks," 

 {Rom. Hist. lib. xxxvii.) 



The Emperor Julian, nephew of Constantine (a. d. 362), 

 in a work of which only fragments have been preserved to 

 us, speaks of Unitar ianism and Sahhatism as the two great 

 distinctions of the Mosaic code. After quoting the Decalogue, 

 he contemptuously asks — "What nation is there — verily, 

 which does not agree that (excepting the precept ' Thou shalt 

 not worship different Grods ;' and the one ' Rememher the Sab- 

 hathdai/') all the other commandments should be observed? 



honor Saturn! — by whose name the seventh day was then generally 

 known, as it still is at the present time. 



