Third, It may even be allowed that the Reformers erred to some extent in regard to the weekly holy day, while it is held that they did not thereby forfeit their claim to be ranked among the friends of the institution. Calvin, Luther, and, indeed, all the principal men of the Reformation except Knox, were of the opinion of Augustine and others of the fathers, that the fourth was distinguished from the rest of the commandments by being partly of a ceremonial character. They seemed not to know how the transference of the sacred rest from the last to the first day of the week could be reconciled to the doctrine of a moral, unchangeable precept, and therefore adopted the theory of a double aspect of the commandment, one part being ceremonial which has passed away, the other being moral and enduring. The distinction is as unnecessary as it is untenable. The Second Commandment might as well be supposed to have a twofold character, inasmuch as the means of worship, which it rules, have been changed from Jewish to Christian ordinances. The alteration in both cases was in the circumstances of the law, provided for by positive appointment and special revelation, not in the law itself. The Sabbath had a ceremonial or typical character under the Levitical economy, but not so its royal precept. This was the distinction that ought to have been made by the Fathers and Reformers, but their adopting another, though an error, did not originate in a low estimate of the day of rest, which they regarded, the typical aspect having disappeared, as still the charge of a moral statute. The error, however, had the effect of perplexing their views on the subject, and leading to the use of certain expressions, which have exposed their respect for the institution. to suspicion, and the cause itself to practical injury. Another matter in which all the Reformers, with the exception again of Knox, appear to us to have more or less fallen into error, was that of holy-days. We have seen that some would have removed such days entirely, which in fact was done in Geneva, and at Strasburg, and that the number of them in several instances was reduced. But none of the Reformers was so decided in opinion and practice on the subject as Knox. Even Calvin treated the question as one of comparative unimportance. Whatever was the cause, Luther's early desire for the abolition of holy days was not fulfilled. The prejudice in favour of some of

them was strong, as we learn from the feelings of the Bernese, of the Belgian magistrates, and of a few in Scotland, who continued to observe certain feast-days for some time after the Reformation. These observances were restored in Geneva, and have been permanently disregarded among Protestants only by the Puritans of England, and the Presbyterians of Scotland, with their descendants in America and other countries, and by the missionary churches which they have planted in various lands. But the failure of the good men of the Reformation to carry into effect Luther's desire for the disbanding of the holy-days, while to be regretted, does not appear a sufficient ground for questioning their respect for the Lord's day, which though in some instances it was classed by them as if it were only the chief in a series of such days, they repeatedly declared to be an express appointment of Heaven, and indispensable to the welfare of the church, withholding, at the same time, that honour from other days of rest and worship.

Having endeavoured to present the Sabbatic opinions of the Reformers in the light of truth and facts, we venture to claim on their behalf from our readers a verdict of, "not guilty" of the offence of hostility or even indifference to the institution. They erred, it is allowed, in some of their expressions and proceedings. They unhappily failed to distinguish between the Sabbath as it stood in the Decalogue, and the Sabbath as connected with the judicial and ceremonial appendages of Judaism, and to eradicate what some of themselves called "the useless and hurtful practice of holiday keeping." Theirs, however, were the mistakes of ardent friends of piety and good morals, who in eagerly opposing enormities fell into some errors, and in checking the gross abuse of the external and preceptive, as well as in aiming at a high measure of the spiritual and the voluntary in religion, did not sufficiently adjust the claims of the outward and the inward, of liberty and law. Knox avoided their mistakes. In 1547, he adopted, as the result of independent inquiry, the great principles, which guided his future career, and by which he was honoured to effect the most thorough of the salutary revolutions accomplished at the Reformation. In that year he taught at St. Andrews the doctrine that everything in religion ought to be regulated, not by the

pleasure and appointment of men, but according to the Word of God, and in the same year maintained in a public disputation, that the church has no authority, on pretext of decorating Divine service, to devise ceremonies, and impose upon them significations of her own. Row, referring to the six ministers, including Knox and himself, who were employed to draw up the First Book of Discipline, says, "They took not their example from any kirk in the world; no, not from Geneva; but drew their plan from the sacred Scriptures.' It was in this way, we believe, that Knox formed those views of the Sabbath, which were afterwards so fully expounded by the Puritans, and to which his country owes so much. That the Puritans were indebted to him on the subject, we do not affirm. We know that he took some part in revising the Articles of the English Church, effected some alterations in her service-book, had much influence with the authorities, and produced great impression by his preaching, while from 1549 to the end of 1553 he resided in England; and we should conceive it more likely that the Puritans borrowed from him, than, as has been supposed, he from them. But it is not necessary to suppose either case, as the more that men make the Scriptures their study and their rule, the more will they "see eye to eye."

Before concluding our notices of the Sabbath at the Reformation, let us turn for a moment to the Church of Rome, and see how the institution then fared within her pale. The Council of Trent was convened by Pope Paul II. in 1545, professedly for the purpose of correcting the ecclesiastical disorders of which many so loudly complained. In its canons and decrees there are a few references to the Lord's day and holydays as seasons to be devoutly and religiously celebrated, and to be taken advantage of by bishops and preachers for instructing the people in the Scriptures and in the mysteries of the mass. The Catechism put forth by the Council devotes a chapter to the Third (our Fourth) Commandment. There we find it stated that the Sabbath dates from the time of the Exodus; that, while the other commandments of the Decalogue are precepts of the natural and perpetual law, the third, as regards the time of observing the Sabbath, belongs not to the moral but ceremonial law, in which sense the obligation to observe it was to cease with the abrogation of the other Jewish

rites at the death of Christ; that it, however, comprises something that appertains to the natural and moral law-in other words, the worship of God and practice of religion; that the apostles therefore resolved to consecrate the first day of the seven to worship, and called it the Lord's day; and that, in order to their knowing what they are to do and abstain from on this day, it will not be foreign to the pastor's purpose to explain to the faithful word for word the whole precept. The Catechism further represents the Jewish Sabbath as a sign of a spiritual and mystic, and also of a celestial rest. It then, with Rome's usual art, glides into language which identifies the Apostles with the Church "It hath pleased the Church of God, in her wisdom, that the religious celebration of the Sabbath-day should be transferred to the Lord's day. By the resurrection, on that day, of our Redeemer, our life was called out of darkness into light, and hence the apostles would have it called the Lord's day." Proofs from the Scriptures and the Fathers are produced for a number of these statements, but none is alleged for the following: "From the infancy of the Church, and in subsequent times, other days were instituted by the Apostles and by our holy Fathers, in order to commemorate with piety and holiness the beneficent gifts of God." The way is thus prepared for placing the Sabbath and Feast-days in close connexion, and finally, as in the following words, for putting them on the same level: "There are many other things which our Lord in the Gospel declares may be done on Sundays and holidays, and which may be easily seen by the pastor in St. Matthew (ch. xii. 1, et seq.) and St. John" (v. 10, et seq.; vii. 22, et seq.) Thus Rome, faithful to her policy, seeks to neutralize truth by error, and to gain the purposes of error by fortifying and dignifying it with an alliance to truth. She finds in Cardinal Tolet, Sir Thomas More, and others, defenders of her assumed power over sacred times, and in the civil authorities the means of enforcing it, for already (in 1538) had three or four men of Stirling suffered death "because they did eat flesh"-meats which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving-" in Lent," at a marriage; and even while the Council is sitting, a poor man, for working on a holyday that his family might not starve, is consigned to the flames.

SECTION VI.

THE SABBATH AFTER THE REFORMATION.

WE have now reached a point in the history beyond which it is not necessary to trace it particularly, both as the various opinions relative to the institution, held during the period, have already been noticed in the Sketches of controversies, and as many of the facts connected with its observance either have been stated, or will fall to be mentioned in the concluding part of this volume.

Church of Rome. The course of this Church has since the Reformation been one of injury, under a profession of attachment, to the weekly rest. Bellarmine, the Rhemists, and many other writers, have defended her claim of lordship over the Lord's day, while no Roman Catholic divine, it has been remarked, has ever produced a good or able work on the subject. The Catechism of

Trent has been followed by many catechisms, in which the Fourth Commandment is made to require the reader to "Remember to keep holy the festivals," not "the Sabbath-day." The Lord's day has been almost entirely dissociated from its natural and necessary allies of a preached gospel, the use of the Bible, and family instruction and prayer. In only one instance, and that in a Popish country, has the day been expunged from a national calendar; but the disregard of its true law has for a long time been proverbially prevalent throughout the empire of the Pope. The following customs are not of recent origin: When the day of God "is spoken of, it is called a fête or holy day, indiscriminately with the Nativity or Assumption of the Virgin Mary, and these fêtes are the regular seasons of public processions or celebrations. Nay, the newspapers, the theatres, etc., are actually suspended on St. Francis's day, or the Feast of the Virgin, but on the Sunday are regularly carried on, and more eagerly followed than ever."