rthly father
may incorporate, among other things, conditions, in his testament, or
will, and it is in force, by his death, even though his children find
fault with it. So it mattered not whether any man in ancient Israel was
satisfied with that ancient "testament." But the Bible nowhere limits the
term covenant to the people's agreement to keep the decalogue. On the
contrary, it is said, "And He declared unto you His covenant, which He
commanded you to perform, even ten commandments; and He wrote them upon
two tables of stone." Deut. iv, 13. These commandments were AFTER THE
TENOR of all that was given by Moses, as we learn in the thirty-fourth
chapter of Exodus. After Moses had given many precepts, the Lord said,
"Write thou these words; for after the tenor of these words I have made a
covenant with thee and with Israel. And he wrote upon the tables the words
of the covenant, the ten commandments." This covenant, or testament, like
all other institutions which the Lord established with the children of
men, is accompanied with reasons for its existence, and all the laws and
instructions necessary to carry out its principles. The reasons were
placed upon the tables of stone along with the commandments. When
Sabbatarians hang up their copy of those tables, it is always a mutilated,
partial copy. The whole is given to us in the fifth chapter of
Deuteronomy. No Seventh-day Adventist dare exhibit the full copy before
his audience, unless he does it at the peril of his teaching. Here it is:
"I am the Lord thy God which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from
the house of bondage. Thou shalt have none other Gods before me. Thou
shalt not make thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is
in heaven above, or that is in earth beneath, or that is in the waters
beneath the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them nor serve
them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquities of
the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them
that hate me, and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and
keep my commandments. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in
vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in
vain. Keep the Sabbath day to sanctify it, as the Lord thy God hath
commanded thee. Six days thou shalt labor and do all thy work, but the
seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do
any work, thou nor