ot
permissible to assert that the former number is derived from
the latter."[290:1]

"Carried by the Jews into their dispersion, adopted by the
Chaldaean astrologers for use in their divinations, received by
Christianity and Islam, this cycle" (the free week of seven
days), "so convenient and so useful for chronology, has now
been adopted throughout the world. Its use can be traced back
for about 3,000 years, and there is every reason to believe
that it will last through the centuries to come, resisting the
madness of useless novelty and the assaults of present and
future iconoclasts."[290:2]

The fourth account of the origin of the week is that given us in the
Bible itself.

"In six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all
that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the
Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it."

The institution of the sabbath day is the crown of the work of creation,
the key to its purpose. Other times and seasons are marked out by the
revolutions and conjunctions of the heavenly bodies. This day is set
apart directly by God Himself; it is His express handiwork,--"the day
which the Lord hath made."

The great truth taught in the first chapter of Genesis is that God is
the One Reality. All that we can see above or around was made by Him. He
alone is God.

And His creative work has a definite goal to which its several details
all lead up--the creation of man, made in the image of God.

As such, man has a higher calling than that of the beasts that perish.
The chief object of their lives is to secure their food; their
aspirations extend no further. But he is different; he has higher wants,
nobler aspirations. How can they be met?

The earth was created to form an abode suitable for man; the varied
forms of organic life were brought into existence to prepare the way for
and minister to him. For what was man himself made, and made in the
image of God, but that he might know God and have communion with Him?
To this the sabbath day gave the call, and for this it offered the
opportunity.

"For what are men better than sheep or goats,
That nourish a blind life within the brain,
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer?"

FOOTNOTES:

[284:1] This is learnt from a single tablet of a Babylonian Calendar
(preserved in the British Museum), which unfortunately contains one
mont