The following are all the hints respecting the nature of first-day observance during the first three centuries. The epistle falsely ascribed to Barnabas simply says: “We keep the eighth day with joyfulness.”[586] Justin Martyr, in words already quoted at full length, describes the kind of meeting which they held at Rome and in that vicinity on that day, and this is all that he connects with its observance.[587] Irenæus taught that to commemorate the resurrection, the knee must not be bent on that day, and mentions nothing else as essential to its honor. This act of standing in prayer was a symbol of the resurrection, which was to be celebrated only on that day, as he held.[588] Bardesanes the Gnostic represents the Christians as everywhere meeting for worship on that day, but he does not describe that worship, and he gives no other honor to the day.[589] Tertullian describes Sunday observance as follows: “We devote Sunday to rejoicing,” and he adds, “We have some resemblance to those of you who devote the day of Saturn to _ease_ and _luxury_.”[590] In another work he gives us a further idea of the festive character of Sunday. Thus he says to his brethren: “If any _indulgence is to be granted to the flesh_, you have it. I will not say your own days, but more too; for to the heathens each festive day occurs but once annually; you have _a festive_ day _every eighth day_.”[591] Dr. Heylyn spoke the truth when he said:— “Tertullian tells us that they did devote the Sunday partly unto mirth and recreation, not to devotion altogether; when in a hundred years after Tertullian’s time there was no law or constitution to restrain men from labor on this day in the Christian church.”[592] The Sunday festival in Tertullian’s time was not like the modern first-day Sabbath, but was essentially the German festival of Sunday, a day for worship and for recreation, and one on which labor was not sinful. But Tertullian speaks further respecting Sunday observance, and the words now to be quoted have been used as proof that labor on that day was counted sinful. This is the only statement that can be found prior to Constantine’s Sunday law that has such an appearance, and the proof is decisive that such was not its meaning. Here are his words:— “We, however (just as we have received), only on the day of the Lord’s resurrection, ought to guard, not only against kneeling, but every posture and office of solicitude, deferring even our businesses, lest we give any place to the devil. Similarly, too, in the period of Pentecost; which period we distinguish by the same solemnity of exultation.”[593]