Abram Herbert Lewis - Spiritual Sabbathism

NO-SABBATHISM AND THE SUNDAY I
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of death. . . . With the remark, 'Now let us cast
away all duplicity,' he honestly admitted the conflict
of two antagonistic principles which swayed his private
character and public life."
It was this famous compromiser, whose life is
stained with gross crimes and gross duplicity,
who introduced Sunday legislation. There was no
reference to Christian motives in the edict, which
was issued March 7, 321. All judges, all city people,
and all tradesmen are to rest on "the venerable
day of the sun." Farmers are exempted. Such
was the first Sunday decree, and its expressed motive
was frankly pagan. Throughout the Empire that
phrase, "the venerable day of the sun," would be
welcomed by all the followers of Elgabal, Mithra,
Apollo, and ^Esculapius. The following day,
March 8, 321, a second edict commanded that In
case of a public building's being struck by lightning,
the ceremonies for propitiating the gods should be
performed, and the secret meaning of the
calamity
sought from the haruspices. The two commands
are on an astrological par. The sun, the Emperor's
star, is to be propitiated by a festival, and the lightning
is to be understood by observing the movement
of a slain beast's entrails. The holiday and the
magic go together.
It was not for nothing that Constantlne