History of the Sabbath and First Day of the Week - John N. Andrews

from labor and to religious worship; the Lord’s
Day."
These lexicographers call Sunday the Christian
Sabbath, etc., because in the general theological
literature of our language, it is thus designated,
though never thus in the Bible. Lexicographers do
not undertake to settle theological questions, but
simply to define terms as currently used in a
particular language. Though all the other days of
the week have heathen names, Sunday alone was a
conspicuous heathen festival in the days of the
early church. The North British Review, in a
labored attempt to justify the observance of Sunday
by the Christian world, styles that day, "THE
WILD SOLAR HOLIDAY [i.e., festival in honor
of the sun] OF ALL PAGAN TIMES."[1]
Verstegan says:--
"The most ancient Germans being pagans, and
having appropriated their first day of the week to
the peculiar adoration of the sun, whereof that day
doth yet in our English tongue retain the name of
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