and what is unlawful to be done? Why determine that works of mercy and charity are allowable, thus implicitly prohibiting all other works? Why not silence the Pharisees by declaring that the Sabbath was a merely temporary observance, about to vanish before the permanent law of the gospel? When our Lord, therefore, instead of all this, defends himself and his disciples by a mode of argument in which the permanence of the Sabbath is assumed, we conclude that he meant to teach that the moral obligation of it remained, and would remain under the gospel age.

It is thus he EXPLAINED AND VINDICATED OTHER COMMANDS, taking for granted the validity of the commands themselves, and adding his authoritative expositions. Who ever thought that his extension and new application of several precepts of the moral law, in the sermon on the Mount, was intended to weaken the force of the original commands? Who ever imagined that when the traditions concerning the fifth precept were exposed, and the pretence of Corban swept away, that one iota of the law itself was removed?

And all this receives confirmation from our Lord's SUPPOSING THE CONTINUANCE OF THE SABBATH at a period when all real obligation to a Jewish institution would long have ceased. In foretelling the destruction of Jerusalem, and directing the flight of his disciples (not the Jews generally-but his disciples-Christians--and this in a private and confidential conference, and applying to a calamity nearly forty years distant, when the ceremonial and civil law of the Jews would long have been publicly abrogated by the mission of his apostles) he bids them to pray, "that their flight be not in the winter, NOR ON THE SABBATHDAY;" as these two impediments, the one from the nature of the season, the other from the obligation of the fourth commandment, would obstruct their escape. The observation cannot be expounded of any superstitious fears of violating a ceremonial or Mosaical precept, or even the tradition of the elders; because flight under imminent peril was allowed. The argument, therefore, seems of mighty force.

* Mark the expression, "Wherefore it is LAWFUL to do well (to heal the sick and similar acts) on the Sabbath-day."-Matt. xii. 12.

But how did THE INSPIRED APOSTLES UNDERSTAND their Master's doctrine? What was their conduct immediately upon the descent of the Spirit, and in the interval between the abrogation of the ceremonial law and the change of the day of rest, from the seventh to the first of the week? Did they, or did they not, honor the Sabbath? A very few words will suffice on this point: because no one ventures to deny that their devout observation of the Jewish rest extended even beyond the time when the Christian (as we shall prove in our next discourse) superseded it. They were so far from neglecting the Sabbath, that they kept for a period, in order to conciliate the Jews, both the Mosaical and Christian. I speak not of the holy women who, embued with their Lord's doctrine, and guided by his conduct, hesitated not a moment to "rest the Sabbath-day ACCORDING TO THE COMMANDMENT;' eager as they were to provide spices and ointments for his body. I dwell not upon the notice of the sacred day, which occurs naturally and without effort, in the Acts of the Apostles, even where the Jews are not concerned: "and the Gentiles besought that these words might be preached unto them the next Sabbath. And the next sabbath almost the whole city came together to hear the word of God." Nor will I do more than refer to the apostle's habit, copied from that of his divine Lord, of sanctifying this most ancient of institutions: "and Paul, AS HIS MANNER WAS, went in unto them, and three Sabbath-days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures. And he reasoned in the synagogue EVERY SABBATH."

So contrary to the truth of the case is it, to suppose that our Lord and his apostles abrogated the law of the Sabbath-THEY DID NOT EVEN RELAX it. It wanted no relaxation. Like every other, the fourth commandment was "holy, just, and good." It contained in itself all that principle of suspension in cases of real necessity, which the mercy of the Almighty from the first intended, and which the tenor or the precept was meant to include. Not even the ceremonial and temporary appendages of the Mosaical economy were violated by our Lord. All his conduct exalted and honored the day of his heavenly Father, Acts xiii, 42-45.

* Luke xxiii. 56.

and vindicated it from the false glosses of the masters, which, injurious as they were to the Jewish religion, would have "eaten as doth a cancer" into the Christian-and, in fact, would have been a fatal obstruction to its universality.

To relax, indeed, any one of the moral and essential rules of human duty, would have been the very thing which OUR LORD MOST POINTEDLY CONDEMNED in his sermon on the Mount--it would have been a curse, not a blessing, to man. The moral law is in all its parts a transcript of the divine goodness, and the materials of human happiness. What man wants is, not an alteration of the moral law of his Maker, but pardon, grace, salvation,--motive and strength to love God and to keep his commandments, and more particularly that which is rather a boon and gift than a precept--which was MADE FOR MAN; and which, when cleared by the Lord of the Sabbath from the austerities which perverted all its designs and evaporated all its spirit, is set forth in his kingdom in more than its original dignity and glory.

III. We proceed, then, to our next point, which is indeed implied in what we have already proved--That nothing is abrogated under the Christian dispensation with respect to the Sabbath, but THOSE TEMPORARY AND figurATIVE ENACTMENTS WHICH CONSTITUTED THE PECULIARITIES OF THE JEWISH AGE.

For that these are abrogated it is important for us to remember. We maintain not now the Jewish Sabbath, nor the Mosaic Sabbath, nor the ceremonial Sabbath. Here we request a particular attention. It is a misconception almost constantly made. The moment we defend the original institution of the Sabbath in paradise, and its perpetuity and authority as a part of the moral law, we are suspected of leaning towards the Jewish Sabbath. And when we go on to show that our Lord never violated the Mosaic enactments but honored them in his whole ministry, and left the Sabbath in its full force, we are condemned at once as bringing in again the abrogated ceremonies. We assert, then, just as strongly, that the Jewish Sabbath is abolished, as we maintain that the primitive and patriarchal is restored and reanimated with the peculiar grace and motives of the Christian dispensation. The moral, essential law of the

day of rest remains, nay is increased in obligation, like every other precept of the decalogue; the ceremonial and judicial superadditions have passed away with the dispensation which gave them birth.

Our argument from the example and doctrine of our Lord went, indeed, to prove, not only that he recognized the moral law of the fourth commandment, but that he also honored its Mosaical ceremonies, because he was “a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God." What we now assert is, that after the resurrection of Christ, and the descent of the Holy Spirit, the gospel-day burst upon the world, and dissipated "the shadows" of the Jewish law-the Mosaic covenant "decayed and waxed old and was ready to vanish away," and the evangelical covenant took its place-all that part of the sabbatical observances which was temporary and figurative, and dependant on the Jewish theocracy, was carried away; and nothing left but the primary essential law of one day's religious rest, after six days' labor, as first promulgated in paradise, as re-established and reduced to a written precept in the moral law, and as explained and vindicated from Pharisaical impositions by our gracious Redeemer. We have now a better covenant, a nobler mediator, a more glorious high priest, a more free and unembarrassed way of access, a richer sacrifice; other altar, temple, worship, and sacraments; a new and simpler sanctification of the season allotted for all these duties. The introductory dispensation is taken out of the way, the scaffolding removed, the emblems abrogated; and the last dispensation, the spiritual building and perfect atonement, are come.

The Jewish Sabbath is no more in force SINCE, than it was BEFORE, the Mosaical economy. The double sacrifices, and indeed all sacrifices of animals; the shew-bread; the holy vestments; the Levitical priesthood itself; the civil and judicial statutes; the signs and badges of a national covenant; the ceremonial ablutions; the limitation to the particular day of the seven for its observance; the spirit of bondage; the whole manner and tone of worship as suited to that servile and imperfect state of things, are gone. These, if now insisted on (and possibly they have been in some periods of the Christian Church) may be justly denominated, carnal ordinances; "weak and beggarly ele

ments; a yoke which neither we nor our fathers were able to bear."* We are, in all these and similar respects, to stand fast in "the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and not be entangled again in the yoke of bondage."t The converts, indeed, from the Jewish people were permitted to observe for a season the injunctions of the Mosaic institutes-and those connected with the Sabbath amongst the number-supposing they relied not upon them for justification. Thus St. Paul circumcised Timothy, fulfilled his vow as a Nazarite, kept the Jewish Sabbath after the Christian had commenced, walked unblameably in the ordinances; that is, "to the Jew he became a Jew, that he might gain the Jews; to them that were under the law, as under the law, that he might gain them that were under the law."‡

But the authority of all that was ceremonial, was void, and the practice gradually ceased. The Gentile converts were strongly urged to resist all imposition of the antiquated yoke, and were taught the true spirituality of the Christian. "Blotting out the hand-writing of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross. Such is the apostolic declaration; to which succeeds the inference—“Let no man, therefore, judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holy-day, or the new-moon, or of the Sabbath-days; which are A SHADOW OF THINGS TO COME; but the body is of Christ."

And yet more pungently to the self-justifying Galatians; "How turn ye again to THE WEAK AND BEGGARLY ELEMENTS, whereunto ye desire to be in bondage! Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years. I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed on you labor in vain."||

So, with his wonted tenderness where sincerity of faith appeared, to the unestablished Roman converts, "Him that is weak in the faith, receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations. For one man believeth that he may eat all things; another who is weak, eateth herbs. One man esteemeth one day above another; another esteemeth every day alike: let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind."¶

* Gal. iv. 9. Acts xv. 10. Col. ii. 14-17.

+ Gal. v. 1. Gal. iv. 7-11.

1 Cor. ix. 20. Rom. xiv. 1, 5.