THE SABBATH. 33 



earth, the sun will be exactly a day behind. Here, then, 

 is the expedient suggested by Dr. Wallis, F. R. S., Sa- 

 vilian Professor of Geometry in the University of Ox- 

 ford, to quiet the minds of those in doubt regarding 

 Saturday observance. He recommends them to make a 

 voyage round the world, as Sir Francis Drake did, " go- 

 ing out of the Atlantic Ocean westward by the Straits 

 of Magellan to the East Indies, and then from the east 

 returning by the Cape of Good Hope homeward, and 

 let them keep their Saturday-Sabbath all the way. 

 When they come home to England they will find their 

 Saturday to fall upon our Sunday, and they may hence- 

 forth continue to observe their Saturday-Sabbath on 

 the same day with us! " 



Large and liberal minds were drawn into this Sab- 

 batarian conflict, but they were not the majority. Be- 

 tween the booming of the bigger guns we have an inces- 

 sant clatter of small arms. We ought not to judge 

 superior men without reference to the spirit of their 

 age. This is an influence from which they cannot escape, 

 and so far as it extenuates their eriprs it ought to be 

 pleaded in their favour. Even the atrocities of the 

 individual excite less abhorrence when they are seen to 

 be the outgrowth of his time. But the most fatal error 

 that could be committed by the leaders of religious 

 thought is the attempt to force into their own age con- 

 ceptions which have lived their life, and come to their 

 natural end in preceding ages. History is the record 

 of a vast experimental investigation of a search by 

 man after the best conditions of existence. The Puri- 

 tan attempt was a grand experiment. It had to be 

 made. Sooner or later the question must have forced 

 itself upon earnest believers possessed of power: Is 

 it not possible to rule the world in accordance with 

 the wishes of God as revealed in the Bible? Is it not 



