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

current of opinion, he declared himself a convert to
the church. Christianity, then, or what he was
pleased to call by that name, became the law of the
land, and the edict of A.D. 321, being unrevoked,
was enforced as a Christian ordinance."[41]
Thus it is seen that a law, enacted in support of
a heathen institution, after a few years came to be
considered a Christian ordinance; and Constantine
himself, four years after his Sunday edict, was able
to control the church, as represented in the general
council of Nice, so as to cause the members of that
council to establish their annual festival of the
Passover upon Sunday.[42] Paganism had prepared
the institution from ancient days, and had now
elevated it to supreme power; its work was
accomplished.
We have proved that the Sunday festival in the
Christian church had no Sabbatical character
before the time of Constantine. We have also
shown that heathenism, in the person of
Constantine, first gave to Sunday its Sabbatical
character, and, in the very act of doing it,
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