"The festival of Sunday is more ancient than the Christian religion, its origin being lost in remote antiquity. It did not originate, however, from any divine command nor from piety toward God; on the contrary, it was set apart as a sacred day by the heathen world in honor of their chief god, the sun" (History of the Sabbath, p. 258). VERSTEGAN. "Unto the day dedicated unto the especial adoration of the idol of the sun, they [the pagans] gave the name of Sunday, as much as to say the sun's day or the day of the sun. This idol was placed in a temple, and there adored and sacrificed unto" (Antiquities, p. 68). MORER. "Sunday being the day on which the gentiles solemnly adored that planet, and called it Sunday,... the Christians thought fit to keep the same day and the same name of it, that they might not appear causelessly peevish, and by that means hinder the conversion of the gentiles" (Dialogues on the Lord's Day, p. 22). DEAN MILMAN. "The day of the sun would be willingly hallowed by almost all of the pagan world" (History of Christianity, Book III., chap. iv). DOMVILLE. "Centuries of the Christian era passed away before the Sunday was observed by the Christian church as a Sabbath. History does not furnish us with a single proof or indication that it was at any time so observed previous to the Sabbatical edict of Constantine in a.d. 321" (Six Texts, p. 241). "Not any ecclesiastical writer of the first three centuries attributed the origin of Sunday observance either to Christ or to his apostles" (Six Texts, supplement). KITTO. "Though in later times we find considerable reference to a sort of consecration of the day [Sunday], it does not seem at any period of the ancient church to have assumed the form of such an observance as some modern religious communities have contended for. Nor do these writers in any instance pretend to allege any divine command, or even apostolic practice, in support of it" (Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature, Art. Lord's Day). COX. "There is no evidence, however, that either at this, or at a period much later, the observance was viewed as deriving any obligation from the Fourth Commandment; it seems to have been regarded as an institution corresponding in nature with Christmas, Good Friday, and other festivals of the church" (Sabbath Laws, p. 281). NEANDER. "The festival of Sunday, like all other festivals, was always only a human ordinance" (Church History, Rose's translation, p. 186). DR. HENGSTENBERG.