Remedies of Sabbath desecration, 541; The preaching of the Gospel, 544; Home Missions, 545; Private remonstrance, 545; The press, 546; Parental influence, 549; Good ex- ample of Christians, 549; Persons of high standing, 552; Prayer, 553. Concluding appeal, 557; The Sabbatic institution has been venerated and observed by the greatest and best of men, 557; It involves the interests of all classes, 563; It has the CORRECTIONS. In p. 74 the title of Bownd's second edition is used. The title of the first edition is, "The In p. 88 a mistake of Brewer in his edition of Fuller's Church History is copied. It was In p. 109, read Uitenbogart. In p. 123, read Nethenus. In p. 150, for low songs, read love songs. In p. 153, for Barlow, read Marlow. In p. 174 the author was misinformed in reference to "Patrick M'Farlane," who was not In p. 177, line 4, for as read and. CHAPTER I. SKETCHES OF SABBATIC CONTROVERSIES AND LITERATURE PRIOR TO THE REFORMATION. THE Sabbath dates, as we believe, from the creation of the world. Traces of it have been found among pagan nations, ancient and modern. It has run parallel in Judea with the greater part of Jewish history. It has been identified for eighteen centuries with the ecclesiastical and civil affairs of Christendom. The object of ardent regard, and of intense dislike, it has been the subject of earnest controversy and of multiplied writings. Although it has not received the attention, still less the full elucidation, which its character, antiquity, and value might prepare us to expect, it could not fail long ere this time to furnish materials for a chapter in the polemics, and another in the literature of religion. And yet these chapters, so far as we know, remain unwritten. A comprehensive view, however, of the manner in which so important a department of knowledge has been cultivated, with some account of the labourers, while fitted as matters of general intelligence to gratify and instruct, seem to be necessary for guiding further research, and for shedding a direct light on the subject of inquiry. As there is little hope that we shall be favoured in this as in various other branches of study, with a reproduction of the abler treatises of former days, might not the authors of the new works, which new times and circumstances demand, supply in some degree the want, and enhance the value, of their own volumes, by presenting a résumé at least of previous theories and arguments? If the following sketches should prove that it is easier to point A out than to supply a desideratum, it will be to the writer a satisfying result of considerable labour expended on an attempt made in a somewhat untrodden walk and with limited space, if by any impulse imparted to more successful exertion, or by the information brought together, a service shall be rendered to the cause which it is the object of this volume to illustrate and recommend -the cause, he believes, of Divine law, and of human happiness. During the period comprehended in the sacred records of the Old Testament, though Sabbatic privileges were in repeated instances despised, no professed friend of the true religion is found to dispute the Divine appointment or sacred character of the seventh-day's services and rest. A similar unanimity prevailed for many centuries among Christians with regard to the claims of the Lord's Day. But there wanted not differences between the Jews and the heathen; and between the Christians and both. And it is necessary to pass these differences under a brief review, before we proceed to describe the strifes by which the Church itself came to be agitated. JEWS AND PAGANS. While kindred observances are discovered in pagan countries from the remotest times, it appears from a few scattered notices in history, that the true Sabbath, as observed by the patriarchs and the Jews, was the object of bitter and even violent hostility to those heathen men who were brought into intercourse with its friends. In Cain and Pharaoh, we see types—the one, of a class who deliberately abandon scenes and seasons of worship uncongenial to their hearts, and so leave to their descendants a legacy of atheism and moral death; the other, of persons in power who refuse to their subjects or servants the periodical respite from labour demanded by the necessities of body and soul. The antiSabbatic spirit comes out subsequently in the conduct of the Babylonian "adversaries of Jerusalem," who not only "mocked at her Sabbaths," but compelled her people to labour without any rest;1 and in the cruel edict of Antiochus Epiphanes, who proclaimed 1 Lam. i. 7; v. 5. |