1891 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



639 



opinion in regard to theso matters, and are no 

 donbt conscientious and honest. But is there 

 not a large class who are also conscientious and 

 honest, who have different opinions? Many of 

 us are compeHed to work in stores, factories, or' 

 of'lic(\s. the whole week. Our bread and butter 

 dei)ends upon our sticking to our places unless 

 our busses will let us off for a day now and 

 liien. We need the open air and outdoor rec- 

 nmtion just exactly as much as lyoit do. If 

 there is no' opportunity afforded for taking it 

 any other day in the w<'ek than Sunday, and 

 whih^ our health and the health of our wives 

 and children is suffering for this same rest and 

 recreation in the open aii-, may it not be possi- 

 ble that we are right and you are ivroiujf 



Dear friends, I have considered this matter 

 well and carefully. It has been presented to 

 me by smart, intelligent men — by men who are 

 managers, and who occupy other high positions 

 in our railway corporations; and I have waited 

 until I have examined the evidence carefully 

 on all sides before undertaking to speak to you 

 on this sul)ject in print. 



I confess that, in my boyhood days, I had a 

 sort of feeling in regard to Sunday that might 

 possibly have had some superstition in it. For 

 instance, I satisfied myself by many and repeat- 

 ed trials that nothing prospered in the way of 

 work or play if I undertook it on Sunday; and 

 I have known other boys to say the same thing. 

 If you go fishing you have bad luck, as a gener- 

 al thing. If you go nutting, or go out riding or 

 hunting, there seems to be a sort of fatality fol- 

 lowing such things sooner or later. Now, you 

 will say this surely must be superstition. In 

 one sense it is superstition, and in another it is 

 not. The Christian religion and Bible teach- 

 ings are certainly founded on sense and reason, 

 if any thing in this whole wide universe is 

 founded on sense and reason. Most of you 

 know how little patience I have with any thing 

 that approaches " signs," or even forms or cere- 

 monies. There are places in the world even 

 now wh(M-e they pretend to cure diseases by 

 saying over mysterious woi'ds. There are 

 places where they believe in witches and 

 witchcraft. Yes. there are people among our own 

 neighbors, not to say in our homes, who doctor 

 their horses and cattle, sow their seeds, etc., by 

 rules that have no sense nor reason about them. 

 There are people who follow old supei'stitions 

 that have been handed down for ages, when 

 there is no possible chance for any thing but 

 lujusense about it. Now, is this idea that noth- 

 ing prospers, if undertaken on Sunday, super- 

 stition, or is it sense? You may know of peo- 

 ple who i-efuse to go into any undertaking on 

 Friday because Friday is an unlucky day. I 

 hope there are not very many such, however. 

 Now, perhaps some of "you would ask, " Bro. 

 Root, do you mean to tell us that there is some- 

 thing mysterious about it that makes Sunday 

 an unlucky day in just the same way that 

 these people believe a mysterious fatality hangs 

 over the day of the week called Friday ?" No, 

 I do not believe any thing of the kind? audi 

 do not mean to teach any tiling of the sort. 

 You may remember that I urged very vehe- 

 mently in a former paper that our days of the 

 week were all alike— as much alike as two peas 

 or two grains of sand. The sun shines and it 

 rains im Sunday just exactly as it does on any 

 other day. Furthermore, it is most emphati- 

 cally true (for it can certainly be proved with- 

 out question) that the days of the week as we 

 have them now are sim]/ly of man's making. 

 They were so named for convenicmce; and if 

 people got out of joint, as they used to in earli- 

 er times, and hitched a day forward or back- 

 ward, it would certainlv make no difference to 

 anybody, if all were agreed in the matter. In 



sailing around the world in one direction a day 

 is to be dropped; but if you sail in the other 

 direction, there must be two Mondays or two 

 Fridays as the case may be. This is necessary 

 in order to catch up or " catch " on to the days 

 of the week where you happen to land. If this 

 be true, why shouldn't every one decide for 

 himself in regard to what day shall be Sunday, 

 or whether there shall be any vSunday at all ? 

 Perhaps if you were a Robinson Crusoe, and 

 lived on an uninhabited island, such might be 

 the case. I think, however, our Robinson 

 Crusoe would find it conviuiient to set apart one 

 day as Sunday; and if he had a Bible with 

 him, I am inclined to think he would decide to 

 keep the day according to Bible teachings. I 

 recently heard a public speaker make the re- 

 mark, that, if he were Tving alone on an island 

 he would have no scruples against getting out 

 his horse and buggy Sunday afternoon and tak- 

 ing a little ride all alone. Why, then, would it 

 be right on this island, and not right as we are 

 situated with " neighl)ors " all around us? Be- 

 cause God wishes us to obey his commands in 

 the sinrit of them, and not in the letter. A 

 crazy man, we are told, chopped off his right 

 hand because the Bible commanded it. He 

 took an exceedingly literal interpretation of the 

 Bible teachings, and put it in practice; and I 

 am afraid some, otherwise good Christian people, 

 make mistakes in a like manner, although, of 

 course, none of them carry it to such a terrible 

 extreme as did this jioor brother with his crazed 

 brain. Of course, none but a crazy person 

 would think of doing any thing of the kind. 

 Thank God, we are not crazy— at least not 

 many of us. Now, do you ask if you are to 

 obey the Scriptures, or be religious, simply be- 

 cause our neighbors are looking on ? Not at all. 

 I will try to tell you what I do mean. I said, a 

 little while ago, that the Bible commands are 

 reasonable. If we look into the matter a little 

 we shall find that they commend themselves to 

 reason and good sense. Well, the most promi- 

 nent command in the whole Scriptures — in fact, 

 the first of the ten commandments — enjoins us 

 to turn our thoughts to the great Creator of the 

 universe. A keen critical lawyer gave it very 

 glibly when Jesus turned it back on himself, 

 and asked him how he read the .Scriptures. He 

 said. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with 

 all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with 

 all thy strength, and with all thy mind, and 

 thy neighbor as thyself." Now, we all recog- 

 nize the God of the universe, even if we do not 

 all recognize him at the same time as God the 

 Father. Reason and common sense also indi- 

 cate emphatically that we owe something to 

 the Author of all things. The Being who gave 

 us life and reason and sense is surely entitled to 

 some recognition, from the highest type of life 

 that this world contains. There is "a limited 

 number of people, of course, who say in their 

 heart, '" There is no God." We can not afford 

 to take time just now. to answer or even con- 

 sider this class. The larger part of them have 

 probably denied the existence of a God because 

 they want to be stubborn and contrary, and we 

 are not talking to stubborn and contrary peo- 

 ple on the subject before us to-day. Now, fol- 

 lowing right along in the thought "before us, we 

 have God's command in the language of our 

 text, " Remember the sabbath day, to keep it 

 holy:" and right along with it we read, " Six 

 days shalt thou labor and do all thy work." 

 This is Bible, I know; but is it not sound com- 

 mon sense? The great Author of the universe 

 demands comparatively little of us. We are 

 free agents, and honored with a free will. It is 

 our privilege to step upward toward heaven, or 

 to rush downward to I'uin. But with all this 

 wonderful liberty God insists on and demands a 



