the breakers of this commandment may efcape punishment from men, or may even escape outward judgments from God in this world; yet there is a day coming, when he will call them to account for it. Oh finners! the day of the Lord is like to be a dreadful day to you that defpife the Lord's day.

Queft. VI. What is that proportion of time which is to be fequeftrated and allowed for the Sabbath day? and when doth it begin and end?

Anf. The fourth command requires one day in every feven; by which we are not to understand only the artificial day from fun-rifing to fun-fetting, or from the break of day until the darknefs of the night come on, and think then the Sabbath is over, and that we are no longer bound to abstain from our own works; and far lefs are we to think that the Sabbath is no longer than the time of public worship doth laft, and that we are at freedom from the work and duties of the Sabbath when that is over: This fome fay in words, and many more in their practice.

But, confider what abfurdities would follow hereupon: For, if no more time be allowed for the Sabbath, but the time of public worship; then it would follow, that God requires no private or fecret duties from us on that day, fince thefe will need fome more time: But that cannot be; for, if private and fecret duties be required of us on week days, then much more on the Sabbath day.

Again, it would follow, that some must keep longer Sabbaths, and others fhorter; nay, the Sabbath of many shall not be above an hour or two of the day; for there are minifters and people who are fcarce fo long at public worship: But the whole day is the Lord's, and not a part only. You will have your fervants to work the whole fix week days for you, from morning to night, and not be contented with their working an hour or two only of thefe days: So neither fhould you yield lefs to God than you require for yourfelves. Nay, if attendance on the public worfhip were all that is requifite this day, by virtue of the command, it would follow, that a man would be loofed from the obligation

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of the command, if he were in a place of the world. where God is not publicly worshipped.

But all these things being abfurd, I do upon folid ground, affert, that the whole natural day, confifting of twenty-four hours, is to be fet apart for the Sabbath day; and that we ought to measure this day, and be-. gin and end it, as we do other days, that is, from midnight to midnight; during which time we are to abftain from our own works, and fanctify the Lord's Sabbath For the fourth command binds us to confecrate the seventh part of every week to the Lord, who challengeth a fpecial property in one of feven, and afferts his juft title thereto, faying, "The feventh day is the Lord's :" And alfo Ifa. Ivii. 13. he expressly calls it," My holy day." It is all holy; and therefore no part must be profaned or applied to common uses. It is all the Lord's; and fo it is unlawful for us to rob him of any part of it, and alienate it to our private use. Object. But who is able to spend the whole twenty four hours in religious duties?

Anf. I do not fay that this is to be done without any intermiffion; for we do not this in following our employments on other days: A due proportion of every day is to be referved for the natural fupport of our bodies, and particularly for moderate eating and fleeping, which are works of neceffity, and must be allowed _on the Sabbath, as well as other days; with this difference only, that, whereas they are done on other days to enable us for labour, they are to be done on the Sabbath to ftrengthen us for holy duties; and fo cannot properly be called our own works: Neither can the doing thereof be called a taking of God's time to our own ufe, fince this contributes to our better spending of God's time, and is truly neceffary for God's fervice on the Sabbath. But, befides the time requifite for the works of neceffity and mercy, the whole natural day, as above described, is holy unto the Lord, and ought to be employed in religious duties; and not a part of the day only: Both Sabbath morning and Sabbath night, fhould be fpent in prayer and praises, as is plain from the 92d Pfalm, which is intituled, "A

pfalm

pfalm or fong for the fabbath day," ver. i. and ver. 2, we are told, that " It is good to give thanks unto the Lord, and fhew forth his loving kindness in the morning, and his faithfulness every night." But more of this afterwards, when I come directly to treat of the fanctification of the Sabbath. And, before I do this, I judge it neceffary to answer fome objections brought against the morality of the Sabbath, and the change of the day.

Quakers, Familists, and others, holding that there is no difference of days, and fo denying the divine authority of the Sabbath, I fhall confider what they say.

Some objections against the former doctrine answered.

Object. 1. "Every day ought to be a Sabbath to a Chriftian, and fo there is no need of a fet day."

Anf. Though Chriftians fhould ferve God, and walk with him every day, yet they cannot make every day a Sabbath for the public worship of God, fince God calls them to other neceffary work and bufinefs thereupon, which are inconfiftent with the folemn fpiritual em ployment of the Sabbath.

Object. 2. "Paul, in his epiftle to the Galatians, and elsewhere, condemns the observation of days under the New Teftament.”

Anf. The apoftle fpeaks only of the Jewish Sabbath and feftivals, which where fhadows of things to come, and abolifhed by Christ's coming; but not of the Lord's day, which the apostle himself observed, and did particularly recommend to the Galatians their obfervation, 1 Cor. xvi. 1. 2.

Object. 3." The Sabbath was given as a type or fign only to the Jews; therefore it must be abolished with the rest of their types and ceremonies."

But

Anf. 1. The Sabbath is indeed said to be given as a fign betwixt God and his people, Ezek. xx. 12. that is not confined to the people of the Jews, (except as to the feventh day Sabbath only, of which I fpoke before) but to be extended to all God's people to the end of the world.

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2. There is a great difference betwixt a fign and a ceremony, which is an alterable thing. The rainbow is called a fign, Gen. ix. God's moral precepts are called figns, Deut. vi. 8. Yet none will fay that these are ceremonies, or alterable things.

3. Some figns are ceremonial and alterable; others are moral and perpetual: The Sabbath is not a fign of the first, but of the latter fort. Indeed, all the figns and types of the facrifice of the Meffiah, and justification by Chrift to come, were nailed all to the cross with him, and abrogated; but all figns were not of this kind. The rainbow is given as a fign of the world's prefervation from a deluge, and is perpetual: The Ten Commandments are given as probative figns of our obedience, and are perpetual, and fo is the Sabbath. Indeed, the Sabbath is a more peculiar fign than any of the reft of the commands, and therefore is emphatically called a fign several times in scripture.

1. It is a fign of God's special love and favour to his people: The Sabbath is a great bleffing and privilege to them; for which Nehemiah gives God thanks in a fpecial manner, Neh. ix. 14. of which more afterward. 2. It is a fign of that eternal rest above, provided for the people of God.

3. The religious obfervation of the Sabbath is a declarative fign of our fanctification; therefore it is faid, Exod. xxxi. and Ezek. xx. that the Lord gave his people Sabbaths and figns, that "they might know that he was the Lord that fanctified them." So that it is plain from these, that the Sabbath is a sign to us as well as to the Jews.

Object. 4. "But, (fay Quakers and other fectaries,) there is no holiness in days, one time is not better than another; and therefore the Sabbath doth not differ from other days in the week."

Anf. í grant, one day is not holier than another in itfelf, (as one place is not more holy in its own na ture than another) yet it may be holier in respect of its ufe. Thus the Sabbath day hath a relative holiness in it, as it is defigned and appropriated to God's ufe and fervice, and therefore muft not be alienated to ufes

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of our own; for this would be facrilege, which is a heinous crime. Hence it is, that the Lord doth exprefsly call the Sabbath a boly day, Ifa. lviii. 13.

Object. 5. "But (fay they) doth God require us. to be more religious and godly at one time than auother?"

· Ans. There are sometimes that God requires us to give ourselves more to religion, and to exprefs it more by outward acts of worship, than at other times. I grant, that we ought always to be religious, and to ferve and worship God every day of the week; but God, in his wifdom, hath thought fit to fet apart a certain season, wherein he requires more of the folemn, external and visible exercifes of religion, and performance of holy duties, than at other times. The rea. fons of his so doing I mentioned before.

Some objections against the change of the day answered. Object. 1. "The feventh day Sabbath was inftituted in the state of innocency; therefore it is to be held as moral and unalterable."

Anf. The inftitution of the Sabbath, or confecration of" one day in seven to the Lord," may be hence concluded moral and perpetual, fince the reafon and ground of it is fuch, as was fhewed before; but it will not follow, that the determination of the precife day of the week is moral and unalterable alfo, fince the Lawgiver, who appointed it, not only could, but actually hath altered it, as was fhewed already. Every thing that God did bid or forbid our first parents, in a state of innocency, was not moral or unalterably good or evil in itself, as appears from the inftance of prohibiting to "eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil;" this was a law merely pofitive, and alterable in itself. Lafly, Though the Sabbath of the feventh-day was appointed. in the state of innocency, and probably would have continued unalterably, if the fall had not intervened, and no greater work than that of the creation had been wrought: Yet, after the fall, God made the feventh, day Sabbath peculiar to the old œconomy or difpenfation of the covenant, and alterable together with it, K 2 upon