the narrative of the glorious work of creation,* or of the Sabbath being merely a ceremonial rite, if an indifference and weariness for spiritual things had not predisposed the mind to seek any excuse for its worldliness and unconcern. But let us be aroused to real penitence. Let us view the guilt of contemning God in its true light. Let our hardness of heart, and pride of intellectual distinction, yield to the sweet influences of grace, and we shall honor God in the day which from the creation has been dedicated to him. The anomaly of a Christian loving God and undervaluing the day of God, has never yet been known. further,

But

IV. Let us IMITATE THE HEROIC ZEAL of Ezra and Nehemiah in vindicating the sanctity of the Sabbath. Surely the Christian cannot hesitate as to his duty, after considering the conduct of these inspired men. Each should do what his talent and influence in society enjoin and permit. It is the principle upon which I insist. If we cannot absolutely shut the gates of our great cities to the entrance of merchandize, we may do something to lessen the evil. We may shut the door of our houses -we may prohibit the purchase or reception of articles of consumption by our servants and dependants-we may encourage those upon whom we have any influence, to observe the sacred day. Let only the zeal, the courage, the firmness, the disinterestedness of Ezra and Nehemiah be connected with their piety and love to the house of their God, and much would be done. How have national revivals of religion been brought about in other times? In the days of Samuel, in those of Hezekiah or Jehoshaphat or Josiah? The magistrates and ministers of religion took the lead. Men like Ezra and Nehemiah rose up with holy determination and simplicity. Public conscience and sentiment were addressed. Gross infractions of the day of rest were discouraged. Prayer was offered up at the throne of mercy. God answered the petition, and truth and holiness were again established.

V. I add only one more thought; that as the guilt of Sabbath-breaking and of idolatry were united of old in the

* No man ever thought of anticipation in this place, who was not first anticipated with manifest prejudice, says an old writer.

practice of the people, and in the threatnings of the holy prophets, we should especially dread that FALSE VIEW OF THE CHARACTER OF GOD AND OF THE NATURE OF CHRISTIANITY which are generally associated with the violation of the Lord's day. To worship God aright, is to adore him in his perfections, in his manifestations of himself in his word, in his infinite right over man, in his holy law, in his eternal judgment, in the revelation of a way of salvation through the atonement of Christ and in the operations of the divine Spirit, in the communion with himself to which he admits the devout worshipper. All other worship is idolatry in its proper sense. It is the setting up idols in our heart. It is worshipping a God of our own imagination. Now mark the alliance of all this with the sin of neglecting and violating the holy Sabbath. We throw off the day of religion, because we throw off the God whom that religion regards. We set up the god of the infidel, or of the Socinian, or the careless worldly professor, which is such an one as himself; and then we worship that idol, by vanity, by carnal indulgence, by the neglect of all the spiritual duties of the Christian Sabbath. Let the God of the Bible be enthroned in the heart, and the Sabbath which that God blessed and sanctified, will be duly honored. To love him, to glorify him, to worship him, to meditate on his works, to prepare for the enjoyment of him for ever, will fully occupy that sacred portion of time which he has appointed for those ends. Faith in the object of worship will produce the sanctification of the day of worship. And thus shall we join the instructions of the Old Testament on the subject of the Sabbath, with the grace and strength furnished in the New, and have the patriarchal and Christian day of rest united and fulfilled in all their blessings.

8

SERMON III.

THE SABBATH VINDICATED UNDER THE GOSPEL FROM PHARISAICAL AUSTERITIES, AND SET FORTH IN MORE THAN ITS ORIGINAL DIGNITY AND GLORY.

MARK ii. 27, 28.

And he said unto them, The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. Therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath.

We now come to a most important part of the argument for the divine authority and perpetual obligation of a day of weekly rest. There has hitherto appeared but little of real weight, or even of plausibility, in the objections raised by our opponents. The fiction of an anticipated history is so groundless, and the attempt to evade the authority of the fourth commandment so violent, that we may almost wonder that any professed believer in Christianity should have advanced them. But the case is different, as it respects the gospel dispensation: our Lord undoubtedly introduced material changes in the observation of the Sabbath as prevalent at the time of his ministry. Undoubtedly he relieved it from many restrictions. On what authority, indeed, these restrictions had been introduced, is another question -but undoubtedly he relieved it. The apostles followed, and transferred the time of its celebration, from the last to the first day of the week; and abrogated finally the

ceremonies and rites of the Jewish law.

All this is con

sidered by many as a repeal of the institution altogether— they view the Christian Sabbath as a new command resting on its own basis-and that basis the mere example of the apostles.

Let us then calmly consider this part of the subject. The authority of our Redeemer, as "Lord of the Sabbath,' to abrogate or dissolve any divine ordinance, is acknowledged on all hands.

Here it will be convenient to divide the question into two parts the divine authority of the Sabbath itself under the Christian dispensation-and The ground on which the day of its observation was changed. In other words, we must answer two questions: Have we a Sabbath under the gospel? and, Is that Sabbath the Lord's day? The first will occupy the present discourse.

Now if the statements we have made in our preceding arguments be at all valid, this question will almost answer itself. For we left the Sabbath on the margin of the Old Testament, ready to step over into the Evangelical dispensation. We had brought up the proof of its continued obligation from its first enactment in paradise, to the very line of separation. The glories of the six days' work, succeeded by a seventh day's repose, as inscribed on the order of creation-the insertion of the law of the Sabbath into the ten commandments--its distinct and lofty position above the ceremonies of Moses in the very midst of that economy-its inculcation by the prophets as of essential moral force, and as about to form a part of the Messiah's kingdom;—all this implies that Christ's religion would not be deprived of its day of rest-that the most perfect dispensation would not be inferior in privilege to the less perfect-that where all is grace, and light, and universality, we should not be allowed a smaller portion of time for the immediate honor of our God, and communion with him, than where bondage and fear prevailed.

We

And this we shall accordingly find to be the case. shall see the ten commandments, and the Sabbath amongst the number, recognized by our Lord and his apostles-we shall observe our Savior honoring it on all occasions by his practice, and vindicating it from unauthorized traditions injurious to its real design. We shall find that nothing with respect

to it is abrogated under the gospel, but those temporary ceremonies and statutes which constituted the peculiarities of the Jewish age. We shall perceive that the especial promise of the New Testament has for its object to render its duties more practicable and delightful, and thus increase tenfold their obligation.

That is, we shall discover that the solemn axiom delivered by our Lord in the text, together with the caution and inference connected with it, lays down the true principle on which the Christian day of rest is to be enforced.

THE SABBATH WAS MADE FOR MAN; was originally granted him as a boon--was appointed for his necessary repose from worldly toil and care--was made, not for the Jew merely, but for man as man; for man as consisting of body and soul; as requiring rest and refreshment for the one, religious instruction for the other; as created for bis Maker's glory, and destined for eternal happiness or misery.

What a noble declaration of the perpetual design and authority of the institution! Of all our Savior's axioms, few are more clear, definite, important, universal. It takes for granted that there would be a Sabbath under his dispensation; and it defines its purposes, that it was made for the advantage and benefit of man-for his highest welfare both as to his body and soul.

Nor is the caution which our Lord adds less appropriate considering the austerities which the Jewish masters had imposed; NOT MAN FOR THE SABBATH. Their error lay in overlooking the grand moral end of the institution. They taught that "man was made for the Sabbath." Our Lord recals the institution to its first and true design; he teaches that it was not a rite ending in itself, and to which all the moral purposes of it should yield; but that God would "have mercy and not sacrifice," and that when the real spiritual and exalted interests of man, for which it was appointed, required a suspension of any of its outward observances, that suspension was lawful.

The axiom and caution explain all our Lord's conduct. The fundamental law of the Sabbath remains unchanged; as it began, so it will end cnly with the world itself. But the embarrassments and trammels of human fancy are dissolved, and its simplicity is restored.