“At the commencement of the seventeenth century, tailors, shoemakers, and bakers in Aberdeen were accustomed to work till eight or nine every Sunday morning. While violation of the prescribed ritual observances was punished by fine, the exclusive consecration of the Sunday which subsequently prevailed was then unknown. Indeed, there were regular ‘play Sundays’ in Scotland till the end of the sixteenth century.”[982] But the Presbyterian church, after Knox’s time, effected an entire change with respect to Sunday observance. The same writer says:— “The Presbyterian Kirk introduced into Scotland the Judaical observance of the Sabbath [Sunday], retaining with some inconsistency the Sunday festival of the Catholic church, while rejecting all the other feasts which its authority had consecrated.”[983] Dr. Hessey shows the method of doing this. He says:— “Of course some difficulties had to be got over. The Sabbath was the seventh day, Sunday was the first day of the week. But an ingenious theory that one day in seven was the essence of the fourth commandment speedily reconciled them to this.”[984] The circumstances under which this new doctrine was framed, the name of its author, and the date of its publication, will be given in their place. That the body of the reformers should have failed to recognize the authority of the fourth commandment, and that they did not turn men from the Romish festivals to the Sabbath of the Lord, is a matter of regret rather than of surprise. The impropriety of making them the standard of divine truth is forcibly set forth in the following language:— “Luther and Calvin reformed many abuses, especially in the discipline of the church, and also some gross corruptions in doctrine; but they left other things of far greater moment just as they found them.... It was great merit in them to go as far as they did, and it is not they but we who are to blame if their authority induce us to go no further. We should rather imitate them in the boldness and spirit with which they called in question and rectified so many long-established errors; and availing ourselves of their labors, make further progress than they were able to do. Little reason have we to allege their name, authority, and example, when they did a great deal and we do nothing at all. In this we are not imitating them, but those who opposed and counteracted them, willing to keep things as they were.”[985] CHAPTER XXIII. LUTHER AND CARLSTADT.