Now let it be supposed that the crucifixion answered to the ancient Passover, and that the apostles proceeded to the determination of the time when the Pentecost would be reached, according to the theory of the Karaites. The first thing which would have been necessary was, the weekly Sabbath, which immediately followed the crucifixion of Christ. Having found it, they would have numbered seven Sabbaths, and have decided that the day immediately following the last of these answered to the feast. But unfortunately for them they would have discovered—had they believed in the modern doctrine that the law of the Sabbath was nailed to the cross, Col. 2:16(?)—that they were deprived of a starting point; for the Sabbath institution is a thing of commandment. Take away the commandment, and the institution is gone. Therefore, as the cross had accomplished its work, and had been taken down on Friday, God had removed the landmark from which they were commanded to measure the time which should bring them to the Pentecost at the very period when they needed it most. In reality, there was left them no Sabbath which answered to the one in Leviticus. Should it be replied, however, that the Sabbath, though gone in fact, existed nevertheless in name, it might be responded that this would indeed be an anomalous condition of things. Mark it: it is not the incidental mention, by its proper name, of an institution which had ceased to be, which we are considering; but it is the deliberate action of that God who knows the end from the beginning, in compelling the disciples to treat the seventh day of the week as the Sabbath, in order to the decision of an important fact; for eight weeks after, as is claimed, it had lost its Sabbatic character. Again; should it be urged, as a means of escape from the embarrassments of the situation, that God did not actually require them to count the seventh day as the Sabbath, since there was really no day of Pentecost which they were obliged to keep on the year of our Lord’s crucifixion, we answer, Very good. Then, of course, we shall hear nothing hereafter from the argument for Sunday sanctity which is based upon the hypothesis that the day of Pentecost fell on the first day of the week in the year in question, since it will have been admitted that there was no Pentecost that year, and consequently that it could not properly be said to have fallen upon any day.