law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.

For he that

Now, if

said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. thou commit no adultery, yet, if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law."1 The principle here implied would warrant equally the statement, "He that said, Honour thy parents, said also, Remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy. Now, if thou do no dishonour to thy parents, yet, if thou profane the Sabbath, thou art become a transgressor of the law."

1 James ii. 10, 11.

CHAPTER III.

THE SABBATH, UNDER A CHANGE OF DAY, A CHRISTIAN ORDINANCE AND LAW.

"And it shall come to pass, that from one Sabbath to another shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord."

FOURTH PROPOSITION.-A VARIETY OF CIRCUMSTANCES CONCURRED TO JUSTIFY THE CONFIDENT EXPECTATION, THAT THE SABBATIC INSTITUTION WAS TO BE PERPETUATED UNDER CHRISTIANITY.

WHEN this last and best dispensation of religion was introduced the world stood as much as ever in need of a Sabbath. The physical nature and necessities of mankind remained the same as they had been. A time had been predicted when "the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to" should be removed or abated, but it has not yet fully come, and when it shall come, there is no reason for conceiving that it will bring with it the entire cessation of fatiguing exertion. "They shall labour," but "not in vain;" they shall build houses and inhabit them; plant vineyards and eat their fruit. The absence of all labour would be a curse and not a blessing. Far advanced as we are in the nineteenth century of Christianity, we see man and beast still wearied with toil, and still requiring the rest of night and of every seventh day.

When men became Christians, they continued to have mental and religious wants. All of them needed for the improvement of their intellectual faculties a weekly change of employment, and for their moral and spiritual welfare a frequently returning season of rest from their ordinary business, and of instruction, reflection, and devotion. Many of them had scarcely any other means of

mental improvement, or any other opportunity of deliberately attending to their own eternal interests, and those of their children, than a Sabbath afforded. And there is still no possibility that human beings can live piously, morally, and happily, without a day of sacred rest. To imagine that Christianity would, in these unchanged circumstances of man, be without its holy day, would be to suppose that it would be less wise, pure, and benevolent, than preceding economies, or rather, that it would be so different a system as to be no religion at all.

There remained also the irrevocable obligation of worship in all its parts-personal, domestic, and public, and how any human being in the present condition of society could observe that worship in a manner becoming the claims of its great object, and with any satisfaction or advantage to himself, or rather how he could observe it at all, it is for them who would improve on the plans of Divine wisdom and benevolence to show.

Besides the existence of the same necessity for the Sabbath, such an institution was capable of yielding the same advantages as ever, and it was to be presumed from the promises of a happier era that Divine blessings, instead of being restricted, would be continued and even increased.

The statute of the primeval rest, too, was unrepealed. All along from the time of its institution to the departure of Israel from Egypt-even though it were true that in a brief history it is not alluded to-it remained a standing rule for the world. When next expressly introduced, it is in the form not of a revocation, but of a revival. Immediately thereafter, it is solemnly recognised in a law promulgated for mankind. Had the proceedings in Sin, or at Sinai, issued in an appointment that contravened or superseded the original enactment, there would be a plea for the opinion that the Sabbath of Paradise had ceased. what plea of this nature can be preferred where that institution is made the basis of legislation, and its ancient reason, character, and sanction, only in expanded form and more solemn manner, renewed?

But

The law given from Sinai, in like manner as that given in Eden, remained in full force. Christ was careful to clear it from Jewish corruptions, and if there was any precept more particularly vindi

cated by him and honoured than another, it was that requiring the Sabbath-day to be kept holy. It is not the practice of a wise man to repair a house which he is about to pull down.

Add to such reasons for expecting a Christian holy day the fact, that the hope was cherished by Old Testament predictions and promises, which declared that the Sabbath would exist, be honoured and blessed under the reign of Messiah. In more than one part of this volume are the prophetic and gracious intimations on these points quoted and considered. Let us only, after referring our readers to the fifty-sixth and fifty-eighth chapters of Isaiah, where there are glowing representations of the coming dispensation with its Sabbatic blessings for men of all classes, and its house of prayer for all people, advert for a moment to the last sentence but one in the writings of that prophet. It is this: "And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord."1

It is not the meaning of these words, that a time is coming when every day will resemble the day of the new moon and the Sabbath-day, that is, when its holier service of God will be like a worship all the month and week over. It is true that the Word of God holds out the prospect of a time when the labours of our race in procuring what is necessary for food and defence will be diminished, and when their opportunities for attending to the soul will be multiplied. But it is not said that they shall come from day to day, but from month to month, and from week to week. In the language of Scripture as well as in common speech, what is done from year to year, as in the case of the command of Israel to keep the passover from year to year, is done annuallywhat is done from month to month, or from week to week, is done monthly or weekly. Nor is it the meaning of these words, that the stated Jewish days-new moons and Sabbaths-should be continued or revived in future times. The Scripture must be expounded in consistency with itself. If there are to be the Jewish times, there must also be priests and Levites, and an actual repairing of "all flesh" to the literal Jerusalem. If on the other hand, the priests and Levites of a preceding verse denote

1 Isaiah lxvi. 23.

the office-bearers of the Christian Church, and if Jerusalem signify the church itself, then the new moons and Sabbaths must only refer to the seasons of public worship under Christianity whatever these seasons may be. In no other way could the prophet have made himself understood than by mentioning religious observances as they then prevailed. All that we are warranted, therefore, to draw from the verse before us is, that as the people of Judea at set times repaired to Jerusalem to worship, and as they observed their new moons and Sabbaths, so in a future age all flesh, or men of every land, shall connect themselves with the church of God, and engage from month to month, and from week to week, in its stated observances and solemn forms."1

FIFTH PROPOSITION.- -WHILE A VARIETY OF CIRCUMSTANCES HELD OUT THE PROSPECT OF A PERENNIAL HOLY DAY, THERE WERE OTHERS THAT TENDED TO PREPARE THE MINDS OF MEN FOR SOME CHANGE IN THE INSTITUTION.

It had already undergone changes in its relations and bearings. From being a simple rule of duty it became a part of the condition on which depended man's happiness. It passed into the provisions of the covenant of grace. It was received into the Jewish economy, and in that connexion was a memorial of the deliverance of the children of Israel from Egyptian bondage, as well as of the world's creation—a political regulation and a ceremonial type, as well as a moral law. These were precedents which indicated that there might be future changes in the application, which should not affect the substance, of the institution.

A dispensation so important, and in some respects so new as that of Christianity, might be presumed to require, in adaptation to its own character and purposes, some alterations in the Sabbath. It might be expected, for example, that the work of redemption would have a prominent niche and statue in this monumental institute. The Scriptures had presented this work as one that should cast all preceding works into shade. They had told us of a new creation more glorious than the old, and therefore more 1 Alexander's Prophecies of Isaiah.