for forty years, till they came into the land of Canaan. Now this was devised in much wisdom to fettle and determine the day, which, otherwife, having loft their reckoning, during their long fervitude in Egypt, they poffibly would not eafily have been brought to agree upon. For thus, for forty years together, they would be under a neceffity of di ftinguishing the Sabbath, and of refting upon it; having little elfe to do, the greatest part of the time, but to gather and drefs manna; and no manna falling upon that day, they muft of course be affured of the day, and obliged to reft upon it. Note the reftoring and ascertaining the Sabbath, was the firft point of religion that was fettled, after the children of Ifrael came out of Egypt, as being of the greatest moment; and this, in relation to the original inftitution; for the law at mount Sinai was not then given.

Afterwards the ordinance of the Sabbath was inferted into the body of the moral law, under a particular emphafis, Remember the SabbathDay to keep it holy. And the Jew is reminded of the antiquity of this inftitution, in the reafon annexed to this commandment, For in fix days the Lord made heaven and earth, &c. And being thus ranked among the other great articles of our duty, which are of moral obligation, and are always referred and appealed to, by our Lord and his Apostles, as binding to us Christians, it must stand upon the fame ground, and lay the fame obligations upon our confciences. For the fame truth and authority, which enacted the reft, enacted this precept alfo. He that faid, Thou shalt have no other gods before me-thou shalt not bow down to any graven image-thou shalt not take the name of God in vain-honour thy father-thou fbalt do no murder-&c. faid also, Remember the SabbathDay to keep it holy.

The Jewish festivals, new-moons and fabbaths, as they were shadows and figures of good things to come under the Gofpel, our Lord did abolish. When the fubftance was come, the fhadow vanished. And it is of fabbaths in this fenfe the Apostle fpeaks, Col. ii. 16. Let no man judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of a holy-day, or of the newmoon, or of the fabbath-days. But the feventh-day Sabbath was no part of the Levitical law; it exifted long before that, and therefore was not abolished with it. On the contrary, our Lord claims dominion over the Sabbath. Luke vi. 5. He faid unto the Pharifees, that the Son of Man is Lord alfo of the Sabbath. Therefore the Sabbath must be an ordinance belonging to our Lord's kingdom, otherwife he could not be Lord of it. He never pretended to be Lord of circumcifion, or of facrifices; these belonged to a difpenfation of which he was not Lord. But he is Lord of the Chriftian Difpenfation, and its ordinances, and among the reft, of the Sabbath. In confequence of which Lordship,

I. He rectified the fuperftitious abuse of the Sabbath, and reduced it to the original standard. He reformed the traditionary corruptions of feveral of the commandments of moral and eternal obligation (c). But of all others, moft fignally, remarkably, and conftantly, by words and by deeds, at the hazard of his life, he reformed the abuse of the fourth commandment;

(c) Mat. v. 21, 27, 33. xv. 4, &c.

commandment (d); which he never would have done, had the Sabbath been an ordinance that was to die in a little time with the Jewish difpenfation. On the contrary, this demonftrates, that he regarded the juft fanctification of the Sabbath as of perpetual obligation, and as of very great importance in religion.

II. He removed the Sabbath from the feventh to the first day of the week. For we find in the Apoftolic Hiftory that the Difciples met together on that day, (called the Lord's Day, Rev. i. 10.) to break bread, or to celebrate the Lord's Supper, which is the proper and peculiar worship of Chriftians, Acts xx. 7. Now this could not be done without the exprefs injunction of the Apoftles; nor could the Apoftles. do this without a commiffion from Chrift. And as our Lord rofe from the dead on the first day, we fuppofe the Chriftian Sabbath hath relation to his Refurrection; and fo the Lord's Day hath been kept holy by the univerfal Church from the Apoftles days to this time.

Thus there have been three epochas, or dates, from which the Sabbath has been counted, namely, (1.) From the first day of the creation. (2.) From the first day of the falling of the manna. (3) From the first day of the Gofpel Difpenfation. But ftill it is the feventh day makes the Sabbath, which God bleffed; and the feventh, which we now obferve, is as much, and as truly the Sabbath, which God fanctified, as ever it was from the beginning of the world.

The primary notion of the Sabbath, is a rest or ceffation from the ordinary bufinefs of life. The defign of it is to preferve true religion; which would never have been loft in the world, had the Sabbath been duly obferved from the firft inftitution of it. And therefore we find in Scripture, both under the old and new difpenfations, it was applied to the purposes of religion. It is reprefented as a holy convocation, on which the Ifraelites were to affemble for divine worship, Lev. xxiii. 3. David wrote the 92d Pfalm for the Sabbath-Day, and therein gives us juft ideas of the work of it. On this day the Jews met together in their fynagogues for religious exercifes; and there our Lord honoured and fanctified the Sabbath by his prefence and inftructions. Mark i. 21, 22. vi. 2. Luke iv. 16, 31. xiii. 10. And all Chriftians, in all times and places, have affembled on the Sabbath to hear the word of God, to offer up prayer and thanksgiving, and to celebrate the Lord's Supper, in order to employ their thoughts in pious meditations, and furnish their minds with the beft principles and difpofitions. A work exceeding pleasant and profitable, which demands and deferves the whole of our thought and attention. Therefore, for this good purpofe, we are to rest from ordinary bufinefs, and to avoid whatever may diffipate our thoughts, or indifpofe our hearts for the heavenly work of the day.

Our Lord hath taught us fo to understand this, as not to mix any thing fuperftitious with the obfervation of the Sabbath, nor to conceive of it as fuch a fcrupulous reft, that we may not do any thing fit and reafonable, and which otherwife is a duty; works of neceffity and mercy he exprefsly allows. Whatever cannot be deferred to another day, without lofs

(d) See Mat. xii. 1-12. Luke vi. 1o, 11. xiii. 11–17. John r. 9-19. vil. 19-23. ix. 14, 15, 16.

xiv. I-7.

lofs or damage, may be taken care of on the Sabbath. And in general he hath pronounced, That the Sabbath (alluding probably to the first inftitution of it) was made for man, to be fubfervient to his virtue and happiness; not man for the Sabbath. Man was made for duties of moral and eternal obligation, and is bound to obferve them in whatever extremity or neceffity he may be; but man is not made for the rigorous obfervation of the fabbatical reft, or any other pofitive institution, fo as thereby to embarrass or diftrefs his life, or to neglect any opportunity of doing good.

I conclude with a few reflections upon Ifai. lviii. 13, 14. Having, in the name of God, recommended goodness, charity, and compaffion, in the preceding verfes, and pronounced a fingular bleffing upon those who exercise them, the Prophet adds, by the fame authority, If thou turn way thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day. q. d. "If you confcientioufly fufpend the ordinary bufinefs of life, and forbear * to please and gratify your own inclinations, that with a free and com"pofed mind you may attend upon the fervices of religion, for which I have fanctified the Sabbath; and if thou] call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable, and shalt honour him; if you have such a sense " of the excellency and benefit of the Sabbath, that you take delight "therein, accounting it a pleasure and happiness, as being confecrated "to the worship of the most high God, and therefore honourable and glo "rious in itself; and honourable alfo to you, as it is a mark of the dig"nity of your nature, a token of your intereft in the divine favour, " (Exod xxxi. 13. Ezek. xx. 12.) and of your being admitted to communion with him; if in this perfuafion you fhall fincerely endeavour to honour God by employing the day in the offices of devotion, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleafure, nor fpeaking thing own words; not doing the ordinary works of your calling, nor (pend"ing the time in amufements or diverfions, or in impertinent converfation; then halt thou delight thyself in the Lord; then thou shalt become "fuch a proficient in piety, and gain fuch a fenfe of God and religion, "as will establish in your heart a fund of holy pleasure, comfort, joy, "and good hope towards God." The Prophet, in this chapter, is inculcating real, vital, acceptable religion, goodness and compaffion to our fellow-creatures, and piety towards God in keeping the Sabbath promifing the like bleffings to both those branches of true religion, namely, the favour of God and the conftant care of his Providence. We may therefore take this from the Spirit of God, as a juft defcrip tion of the right manner of fanctifying the Sabbath, and affure ourfelves, that he who bleffed the Day, will blefs us in keeping it holy.

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CHAP. VII,