228 ABROGATION OF THE SABBATH. 



An alternative presented. Acts xx. — No Sabbath. 



We are presented then with the folio wing alternative. If 

 this day of Pentecost happened on Sunday, this Sunday could 

 not possibly have been a Christian " Sabbath/' or Luke would 

 have given some intimation of it. He could not have avoided 

 it. It was a matter altogether too important to the Church 

 to entirely escape remark. His silence is an overwhelming 

 battery against J. N. B. — a most decisive refutation of his con- 

 jecture. On the other hand, if the day did not happen on Sun- 

 day, his aerial fabric has not even the sand to rest upon.* 



9. The ninth text is Acts xx. 6, 7 : " And we sailed away 

 from Philippi, after the days of unleavened bread, and came 

 unto them to Troas in five days ; where we abode seven days. 

 And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came 

 together to break bread, Paul preached unto them (ready to 

 depart on the morrow), and continued his speech until mid- 

 night.'' Upon which my friend remarks : '' This passage is 

 so decisive of the custom of the Gentile churches, under the 

 eye and sanction of the inspired Apostles, as to startle even "W. 

 B. T. himself.[!] But he attempts to evade it by siipposingy 

 contrary to the express words of the text, that this meeting 

 was held on Saturday evening, and that Paul had so little re- 

 gard to the First day of the week as to purpose recommencing 

 his journey on that day ! A more gratuitous and glaring per- 

 version of a plain text, I never met with. As the glory of this 

 new discovery is all his own, he may safely be left ' alone in 

 his glory.' '' (p. 187.) 



That I was " startled'' (i. e. that I ^^ ought'^ to have been 

 startled) was probably gathered "from the nature of the case:'' 



Latin versions excellently [optime) read it — " When the days of Pente- 

 cost were accomplished." WiCKLiF renders it in the same manner: 

 *' Whanne the daies of Pentecoste weren fiUid." That is, not when the 

 Pentecost " was come," but when the Pentecost was " over and gone !" 

 Upon such slender cobwebs are suspended even the postulates of Sun- 

 day Sabbatarianism ! 



* See Note B, at the end of this Ftcply. 



