Don't Forget to Set Your Scales Back

It's amazing on how this simple trick really works until you try to put your clothes on.  On a more serious note, do you know why we observe Thanksgiving?  Read on and may learn something new today.

The civil war between 1860 and 1865 is the original reason for the observance known today as “Thanksgiving Day.”  (I wonder how many people know that fact?)  A Presidential Proclamation was made in October 1865 by Lincoln’s successor, Andrew Johnson.  His proclamation established the national observance of this secular day, but academia has promoted the idea that the Pilgrims were somehow responsible for it.

  

The Pilgrims were a pious people who were looking for a new life away from religious persecution.  They had a great deal in common with the "Quakers" (Society of Friends) that developed later in the 17th century.  Both sects promoted a separation from the pagan influences that still remained in Protestantism.

   

Below is the proclamation made by the President Andrew Johnson for the observance of Thanksgiving Day, with the reason given. 

(October 28, 1865):

“Whereas it has pleased Almighty God during the year which is now coming to an end to relieve our beloved country from the fearful scourge of civil war and to permit us to secure the blessings of peace, unity, and harmony, with a great enlargement of civil liberty; and

Whereas our Heavenly Father has also during the year graciously averted from us the calamities of foreign war, pestilence, and famine, while our granaries are full of the fruits of an abundant season; and

Whereas righteousness exalted a nation, while sin is a reproach to any people:  Now, therefore, be it known that I, Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, do hereby recommend to the people thereof that they do set apart and observe the first Thursday of December next as a day of national thanksgiving to the Creator of the Universe for these great deliverances and blessings.  (Note: date was changed during the early 20^th century) And I do further recommend that on that occasion the whole people make confession of our national sins against His infinite goodness, and with one heart and one mind implore the divine guidance in the ways of national virtue and holiness.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.  Done at the city of Washington, this 28th day of October, A.D. 1865, and of the Independence of the United States of America the ninetieth.”

In addition, President Lincoln made the following proclamation in 1864:

"It has pleased Almighty God to prolong our national life another year, defending us with His guardian care against unfriendly designs from abroad and vouchsafing to us in His mercy many and signal victories over the enemy, who is of our own household.  It has also pleased our Heavenly Father to favor as well our citizens in their homes as our soldiers in their camps and our sailors on the rivers and seas with unusual health.  He has largely augmented our free population by emancipation and by immigration, while He has opened to use new sources of wealth and has crowned the labor of our workingmen in every department of industry with abundant rewards.  Moreover, He has been pleased to animate and inspire our minds and hearts with fortitude, courage, and resolution sufficient for the great trial of civil war into which we have been brought by our adherence as a nation to the cause of freedom and humanity, and to afford to us reasonable hopes of an ultimate and happy deliverance from all our dangers and afflictions:

Now, therefore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, do hereby appoint and set apart the last Thursday in November next as a day which I desire to be observed by all my fellow-citizens, wherever they may then be, as a day of thanksgiving and praise to Almighty God, the beneficent Creator and Ruler of the Universe.  And I do further recommend to my fellow-citizens aforesaid that on that occasion they do reverently humble themselves in the dust and from thence offer up penitent and fervent prayers and supplications to the Great Disposer of Events for a return of the inestimable blessings of peace, union, and harmony throughout the land which it has pleased Him to assign as a dwelling place for ourselves and for our posterity throughout all generations.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. 

Done at the city of Washington, this 20th day of October, A.D. 1864, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-ninth."