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able and best-tempered religion, as if it had not a due regard to human infirmities, wants, and conveniences, or even to those very ends of piety and devotion which we affirm, and affirm truly, to be intended and promoted by it.

"But then I would have it observed, that the relaxation here allowed and defended is no more, and no other, than is fairly consistent with the due sanctification of our Lord's Day. For I have admitted of no recreation or divertisement whatsoever, but what is for the kind or quality lawful, innocent, and inoffensive; for the time of using it reasonable; for the manner decent and becoming; and for the degree or measure moderate." (Pp. 223-5.)

Of the first promoters of the Book of Sports he speaks with unusual respect: "We have learned by a late experience the ill consequences of abused liberty; I say, abused; for though I shall not pretend to justify any such liberties, yet I doubt not to say that the liberty which made, or occasioned rather, such a noise and ferment in the last age, had been more excusable, if it had not been abused, and much more excusable if it had not been so liable to be abused. Nor do I in the least doubt, but that before such experience men of great piety and integrity, as well as sense and learning, were really persuaded, that the liberty then granted was in that juncture as seasonable and convenient, as it was undoubtedly well designed."* (P. 233.)

On this subject the following opinion (partly quoted before) is expressed by Southey in his Book of the Church, chap. xvii., p. 447, 4th edition :

"Laud was loudly arraigned for profaneness, because the King, as his father had done before him, published a Declaration authorizing lawful sports on Sundays, in opposition to the Sabbatarian notions with which the Puritans were possessed. These factious people, although impatient of any observances which the institutions of their country enjoined, were willing to have imposed upon themselves and others obligagations far more burdensome: they would have taken Moses for their lawgiver, so ill did they understand the spirit of the Gospel; and they adopted the rabbinical superstitions concerning the Sabbath, overlooking or being ignorant that the Sabbath was intended to be not less a day of recreation than of rest.

"The motives for this Declaration were unobjectionably good; but the just liberty which, in happier times, and under proper parochial discipline, would have been in all respects useful, proved injurious in the then distempered state of public feeling. It displeased the well-intentioned part of the Calvinised clergy, and it was abused in officious triumph by those who were glad of an opportunity for insulting the professors of a sour and dismal morality."

Coleridge says: "The English Reformers evidently took the same view of the day as Luther and the early Church. But, unhappily, our Church, in the reigns of James and Charles the First, was so identified with the undue advancement of the royal prerogative, that the puritanical Judaising of the Presbyterians was but too well seconded by the patriots of the nation, in resisting the wise efforts of the Church to prevent the incipient alteration in the character of the day of rest."-Table Talk, vol. ii., p. 316.

209. PATRICK, SIMON, D.D., Bishop of Ely (born 1626; died 1707).-A Commentary on the Old Testament [to Esther]. Lond. 1704. 9 vols. 4to.

This is included in "A Critical Commentary and Paraphrase on the Old and New Testament and the Apocrypha, by Patrick, Lowth, Arnold, Whitby, and Lowman, corrected by the Rev. J. R. Pitman." 6 vols. royal 4to. Lond. 1822. Another edition of the same collection, with the text printed at large (not formerly given), was published in 1853, &c., in 4 vols., imp. 8vo. See the comments on the texts most frequently quoted in the Sabbath controversy.

210. ABENDANA, ISAAC, a learned Jew, who resided many years at Oxford, and elsewhere in England, before 1706.-Discourses of the Ecclesiastical and Civil Polity of the Jews, viz., of their Courts of Judicature; Laws concerning Tithes; Institution of the Priesthood; their Liturgy; their Schools; their Feasts, Fasts, Coins, Weights and Measures. Lond. 1706. 8vo. Pp. 200.

In chap. vi., entitled, "Of the Jewish Kalendar," &c., he says: "The first feast or day of observation which falls under our cognisance is the Sabbath, or day of rest, being the seventh day which God Almighty blessed and sanctified, because that on it he rested from His work of creation; from whence the observation of it is derived to us by a regular circulation, as we shall endeavour to make out. That the Patriarchs did so observe it is highly probable, because the Scripture is positive that Abraham kept the Divine commandments, amongst which it is not likely the observation of the Sabbath was neglected by him; nor can any proof to the contrary be produced. But we shall not insist peremptorily on this, because we shall not lay any stress upon it. The grounds of our certainty in this matter we derive from the time of the manna in the wilderness of Sinai. For the Scripture assures us that the manna did not fall on the seventh day, and the reason is because that was the Sabbath; and it is here very remarkable that the text expressly says, ' Behold God hath given you the Sabbath-day,' and therefore He did not then first institute it. But now we know of no other Sabbath which God had given them but that only on which he rested from all his works, and that which he blessed and sancti'fied; and therefore he obliged them to the precise observation of that Sabbath; and consequently, however careless or forgetful the whole nation might be thought to have been, yet God Al"mighty undoubtedly knew the precise day, and here reminded them of their obligation to sanctify it; and this is agreeable to the judgment of Philo Judæus and other Fathers in this particular. And it is further remarkable to this purpose, that in the

Fourth Commandment we are commanded to remember the Sabbath-day,' which therefore must have been enjoined before, and consequently could be no other than the seventh in a regular circulation from the Sabbath of the creation; for we know of no other. Lastly, it is yet further remarkable, that whereas in the 9th chap. and 13th verse of Nehemiah it is said, 'Thou (O God) gavest them right judgments,' &c., it is added in the 14th verse, ' and madest known unto them thy holy Sabbath,' and at the 15th verse, 'And gavest them bread from heaven;' hence we may observe that the Almighty plainly declared (by the sending of the manna) which was the Sabbath, whereon he rested from all his works, and which he commanded to be thenceforward observed by all those to whom he vouchsafed to give the manna; and therefore hereby we certainly know the precise Sabbath, and accordingly celebrate it, which God Almighty blessed and sanctified. Now, to say that any seventh day after six days of usual labour will answer the design of the institution of the Sabbath, is not only improbable, and so fit to be rejected by us, but overthrows the very ground of the Fourth Commandment; which is, that therefore we are to keep holy the Sabbathday (not the seventh day), because that on it God rested from all his work. And to say he rested from his works any seventh day, seems a very harsh interpretation; and therefore must we understand it precisely of the Sabbath immediately ensuing the work of the creation; and consequently that is the precise day we are obliged to celebrate, called the Sabbath by way of eminence, and as such distinguished from all other whether seventh day or days of rest. Hence Jonathan in his Chaldee Paraphrase ascribes a peculiar excellency to this Sabbath, saying, 'God blessed and sanctified it before all other days, all other days in the week.' And if we be charged to have forgot it, and instead thereof to have adopted another quite different from it, this is what no tolerable proof can be given of. That it might possibly be forgotten is what we need not dispute, but to infer from thence that it was actually forgot is a very precarious conclusion; especially if we consider the great improbability there is that a whole nation which constantly computed their measures and periods of time by weeks, should forget one whole day in seven; or that if they had at any time been so forgetful, none of the prophets or holy men whom it pleased God continually to raise up unto them should reprove them for it. Besides, it may be considered that notwithstanding the many great corruptions and idolatrous practices of our church and nation, there were yet constantly some pious and upright men, who were careful observers of the Divine law; even in that defection and apostacy under which God was pleased to declare he had reserved to himself 7000 men, who had not bowed the knee to the image of Baal, 1 Kings xix. 18. And is it at all probable these should utterly forget one of the ten commandments and express no concern for the observation of the Sabbath? But further, if all this be not thought satisfactory, we add, that however likely it may appear to some that a whole nation should for

get one day in seven, and however strongly they may fancy that it is even so; yet it was not possible (as we have said) that God Almighty should forget it. Now we are assured he was pleased to renew the remembrance of it, in giving of the manna in the wilderness, Exod. xvi. ; I say to renew it (if indeed it was forgot, which we have already made out to be very improbable); and consequently from that time at least we go upon sure grounds as to our conduct in this affair." (Pp. 178-182.)

211. HAMERSLEY, RICHARD.-Advice to Sunday Barbers against Trimming on the Lord's Day. Lond. 1706. 8vo.

212. STRYK, JOHN SAMUEL, a German Jurist.-Commentatio de Jure Sabbathi, quam, cum ejusdem programmate de incommodis Festorum, observationibus notatis auxit J. G. G. Volkhartus. Jenæ, 1756. 4to.

"In Germany," says Hengstenberg, "the agitation of the Sabbath question in Holland (see above, p. 6.) was watched with great attention. The more stringent views, which commended themselves by the appearance of greater piety, and promised to do much to stop the prevalent neglect of the Sunday, were preferred by most of the theologians to those contained in the works of the Reformers. But they were kept very quiet during the whole of the second half of the seventeenth century, from a knowledge that they were held in direct opposition to the powerful authority of the Confessions of Faith. In 1688, however, Fecht, a theologian at Rostock, entered the lists against these views, and amongst other things, quoted the whole list of historical witnesses against them, whom many would gladly have buried in oblivion. No one ventured to oppose him. But this did not prevent their gaining fresh adherents, with such rapidity, that at the beginning of the eighteenth century, the more zealous advocates, believing that nearly all the orthodox theologians were on their side, ventured to make a fierce assault upon the few who still defended the more liberal views.” (The Lord's Day, pp. 70, 71.)

After mentioning the slight contest excited by Lünekogel in 1700 (above, p. 119), Hengstenberg proceeds: "Far more important was the agitation caused by the work of Stryk, a jurist in Halle, on the Sabbath. This man, who was actuated by truly religious zeal, and inclined to the views of the pietists, was led especially to oppose the doctrine which had become prevalent regarding the Sabbath, from the fact that it seemed to him to promote generally a merely external fear of God, a kind of Christian pharisaism. He himself says, in his answer to Mayer, which appeared in 1707: This dissertation is written with no other object than to show how, in the present day, men are relying upon out

ward worship alone, so that the real inward worship, the worship in spirit and in truth, is almost entirely forgotten.' He borrowed his weapons chiefly from Spener. In the first part of the treatise, which consists of four chapters, he treats of the origin and progress of the Sabbath, and its force under the New Testament. He maintains that the Sabbath was not prescribed by any law before the time of Moses. From this it follows that it affects the children of Israel alone. This is still further confirmed by the fact, that the reason stated for the institution of the Sabbath only applies to the Jews. It is said to be appointed, in order that they may be reminded on the Sabbath of their bondage in Egypt; that the Sabbath may be a special sign between God and the Jewish people; and that the children of Israel may be preserved by it from idolatry. If the commandment had been a moral one, no alteration could have taken place under the New Testament in reference to the day. The Sunday of Christians does not stand on any common ground with the Sabbath of the Jews. It has not been introduced by a direct Divine command; for it cannot be proved that the observance of it originated with the apostles; and even if it could, they evidently did not wish to lay down any law with regard to it. The observance of the Sunday rests entirely upon a simple arrangement of the Church. In the second chapter the author proceeds, on this ground, to examine the rights and duties of a government with respect to the Sunday. He maintains that a prince has authority to appoint another day for public worship instead of Sunday, though this would be a decidedly impru dent course. His duty, in reference to the Sunday, is to see that the design of it is secured. He must therefore make a difference between his subjects. The rude and inexperienced in Christianity he must urge to attend upon public worship; but the more advanced, on the contrary, who no longer need a Sunday, he has full liberty to leave to themselves. Such men serve God at all times in spirit and in truth, and must therefore enjoy the full liberty which Christ has gained for them. All worldly amusements, which interfere with the design of the Sunday, ought to be forbidden. In the third chapter he treats of the rights of individual Christians. He maintains that the Christian ought to be bound to no day, as that on which he must worship, but that he has a perfect right to set apart now one day, and now another, for the worship of God, as the Spirit prompts him. But this right does not belong to all who bear the name of Christians, but only to the true members of Christ and the new covenant, with whom the whole life and every day is nothing else than a Sabbath. But those who are not established in the true faith are bound to keep the Sunday, not because of the commandment of the Old Testament, but from a knowledge of their condition, which makes the observance of the Sunday a useful arrangement of the Church. "This work," continues Hengstenberg, "as we may easily imagine from its contents, excited great attention. It was soon translated into German; and by the year 1715 had reached the fifth

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