any denomination in all Scotland, who does not hold the duty of the entire sanctification of the Lord's day? Did you ever meet with a lively believer in any country under heaven-one who loved Christ, and lived a holy life-who did not delight in keeping holy to God the entire Lord's day ?”1

It is recorded of Eliot, the missionary, "His observance of the Sabbath was remarkable. He knew that our whole religion fares according to our Sabbaths; that poor Sabbaths make poor Christians; and that a strictness in our Sabbaths inspires a vigour into all our other duties. Hence, in his work among the Indians, he brought them, by a particular article, to bind themselves, as a principal means of confirming them in Christianity, To remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy, as long as we live.' For himself, the sun did not set the evening before the Sabbath till he had begun his preparation for it. Every day was a sort of Sabbath to him; but the Sabbath-day was with him a type and foretaste of heaven; nor would you hear anything drop from his lips on that day but the milk and honey of that country, in which there yet remaineth a rest for the people of God."" 2

Howard thus writes, "Turin, Nov. 30, 1769.-My return without seeing the southern part of Italy was on much deliberation, as I feared a misimprovement of a talent spent for mere curiosity at the loss of many Sabbaths, and as many donations [to the poor] must be suspended for my pleasure."

"Hoping," he said, at a later period, "I shall be carried safely to my native country and friends, and see the face of my dear boy in peace, remember, O my soul, to cultivate a more serious, humble, thankful, and resigned temper of mind. As thou hast seen more of the world by travelling than others-more of the happiness of being born in a Protestant country, and the dreadful abuse of holy Sabbaths-so may thy walk, thy Sabbaths, thy conversation, be more becoming the Holy Gospel. Let not pride and vanity fill up so much of thy thoughts; learn here [in Rome] the vanity and folly of all earthly grandeur; endeavour to be a wiser and better man when thou returnest. Remember many eyes will

1 Memoir and Remains (1846), pp. 561, 562.

2 Missionary Register, vol. ii. (for 1814), p. 310.

be upon thee, and, above all, the eye of that God before whom thou will shortly have to appear."

"As will have been gathered from the foregoing, Sunday was with Howard a sacred day—a section of times not belonging to this life or to this world. He never travelled, nor did any manner of work on it. When on the road, he rested the Sabbath over in whatsover place the accidents of the journey might have conducted him to. If no opportunities offered for attending public worship, he retired for the whole day into his secret chamber, and passed it in pious services and spiritual self-examinations."1

1 Dixon's Life of Howard (second edition), pp. 107, 119, 120.

CHAPTER III.

THEORIES TRIED BY THE PRINCIPLES OF THE DIVINE

GOVERNMENT.

It is intended to apply in some following chapters certain tests derived from both Reason and Revelation, to the leading opinions that have been entertained on the subject of the Sabbath, with the view of adjudicating on their conflicting claims. As we proceed, occasion will be afforded for adverting to the more important arguments which have been advanced, and to several schemes which have been propounded, in reference to the institution. The test to be applied in this chapter is furnished in those principles of the Divine government, which are discovered in its history, and more plainly in the inspired volume.

1. One of such principles is unity of plan. In proving "the unity" of God from "the uniformity" observable in the physical universe, Dr. Paley has truly and beautifully said, "We never get amongst such original or totally different modes of existence as to indicate that we are come into the province of a different Creator, or under the direction of a different will."1 In confirmation of this statement, he refers, among various facts, to the one law of attraction carrying all the planets about the sun, one atmosphere investing and connecting all parts of the globe, one moon influencing all tides, and one kind of blood circulating in all animals. What is true of the material is no less true of the moral world in all its known provinces and eras. In physical nature we observe an endless variety of bodies and phenomena under the uniform regulation of great common principles, and in like manner, amidst a diversity of circumstances and forms, we discover a pervading unity in the laws of the moral government of God. We find the same benevolence, sovereignty, and love of righteous

1 Works, Nat. Theol. ch. xxv.

ness reigning in the Divine procedure; one Saviour for Jew and Gentile, one method of justification, and one indispensable requisite of regeneration, in all ages; one kind of worship substantially offered, and one moral code obeyed, by Adam, Abraham, Moses, David, and Paul; and one Church, which, in obedience to the Divine call-"Enlarge the place of thy tent, and let them stretch forth the curtains of thine habitations" (Isa. liv. 2)—has passed from a circumscribed into an extended economy. In holding that the great Master has ever regulated the time of his servantsthat the King of kings has never been without his appointed seasons for receiving the petitions and homage of his subjects, the theories that maintain a permanent and universal Sabbath preserve the consistency of the Divine administration. But the other theories violate this harmony when they suppose that for many centuries there was no Sabbath at all, and then, for many more, a Sabbath rigidly ruled, and when they countenance either the entire abolition of the sacred day, or the new appointment of a partial one, a dies intercisus, or the opinion that the arrangement of resting and holy time has been left entirely to human discretion. We confidently ask whether, in passing from the Patriarchal to the Jewish, and then to the Christian manner of religion and life as represented by these theories, we do not find ourselves amongst so original and totally different modes of existence as to indicate that we are come under the direction of a different will ?

2. It is at the same time a character of the Divine government that its plans are progressive in their development; that, while the great outlines are in all ages the same, there is a gradual filling up of the scheme. Paley and others imagine a transition from no Sabbath to one whose rules were of the most stringent description, a view implying not only a violent change utterly unlike the usual method of the Divine procedure, but the introduction of an entirely new principle, of which we have no parallel case in the history of the moral government of God. We may indeed be reminded of the Incarnation as an unprecedented fact, peculiar to the latest dispensation of religion, but this fact did not burst on an unprepared world; it was intimated in the first promise, it was more clearly made known in the prophecies that followed, it was shadowed by frequent appearances of the Divinity

in human form, and its benefit was really enjoyed by all believers in ancient times. It is like the Atonement, which, though not actually made till thousands of years had elapsed, was from the beginning a declared principle and felt blessing of religion. The objection from the Incarnation would be in point, if the Sabbath had been anticipated and its good realized long before it came into existence. This, however, could not be. Advantage may and does spring from a future moral fact, but not from a prospective institute. Nor is the theory which restricts the Sabbath of Christianity to the old day less opposed to the principle of progress. While Paley introduces an element so new in its nature, and so abrupt in its entrance, as to disturb the orderly and equable march of the Divine government, this altogether arrests it, and stays progress and improvement. It stereotypes a moral precept on a mere accident. It is an attempt, however undesigned, to perpetuate Judaism. It reverses the command to forget the things which are behind, and to reach forth to those which are before. How much more consonant that any of these theories, to an identical and yet advancing scheme, is that of a Sabbath which, as the same holy and benignant institution in all time, presents a history, not of unnatural stagnation or of violent transitions, but of harmony with the unfolding plans of its Author, subserving the piety and bliss of paradise; then sustaining the hope of a coming Saviour, as well as faith in the Creator; now commemorating, along with the ever-to-be-remembered fact of a finished creation, the more glorious fact of a perfected redemption, and offering a more immediate and satisfying foretaste of heavenly joy; and, finally, receiving its highest and most lasting honour at the consummation of all things, when, entirely transferred to the world above, it will be the sole measure of the eternal life!

3. A regard to order is a manifest feature of the Divine rule. "God is not the author of confusion." He who requires that all things should be "done decently and in order," is Himself the perfection and pattern of His own law. The Great Master "gives authority to His servants, and to every man his work." respondence with this principle of order which pervades the Divine administration, and which prevails in every well-regulated society

In cor