new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaketh better things than that of Abel."*

The

The two dispensations are essentially different. former was in many respects a national code under a theocracy, so framed as to govern a stubborn, rebellious, unwilling people by strict laws and temporal sanctions; and that in an age, when all the rest of the world had lapsed into idolatry, and in a country where they were surrounded by, and even intermingled with, idolaters, who under the instigation of the great patron, and inventor, and teacher of idolatry, used every enticing means to seduce them from their rectitude and allegiance: so that, although a revelation was entrusted to them for the Gentile world as well as for themselves, to be communicated at a fitting time; yet for the present they were prohibited from having any communication with them. We see in Numbers xxv. how immediately any intercourse with the surrounding nations led to idolatry, and how that idolatry was both the cause and the consequence of all manner of sinful indulgence, and punished with the most awful and devastating visitations.

Compare the above description of St. Paul of the giving out of the law on Sinai, with the sermon on the mount, and we see the difference between the two dispensations. The former to rule and curb a stiff-necked and revolting people, by specific national laws, in a great measure applied to outward actions, so openly promulgated as to be liable to no mistake, and admit of no excuse, and enforced by immediate and temporal sanctions. The latter, after having provided an atonement for sin, and held out a spirit of reconciliation, and opened a fountain for sanctification, be

"The blood of Abel," means "sacrifice of Abel," and the meaning is that the sacrifice of Christ under the new dispensation, speaketh better things than the sacrifices under the old dispensation.

ginning at the heart, and cleansing the source from whence, in its natural state, proceed evil thoughts and all manner of uncleanness,—first cleansing, and then captivating, — making a willing people anxious to know, and delighting to obey, his will,—and then, instead of writing his laws on tables of stone, impressing them upon the softened and sympathizing tables of their hearts, until perfect love should cast out fear, and love be the fulfilling of the commandment. It is manifest that a different mode of promulgation of law would be adopted in the latter case: and any mode of communication, to faithful children, of their Father's will would be a sufficient promulgation. But the difference between the two dispensations is a fruitful subject, and would require a treatise. Enough has been said for our present purpose to show, that we are not to expect the same mode of promulgation under the Christian, as under the Jewish dispensation.

We come now to the last question or argument with which I intend to trouble his Grace or my readers, but it is a fruitful topic. His Grace denies that there is even any tradition of the apostles having made a change of the day of the sabbath, but thinks it abundantly plain that they made no such change. But he acknowledges, that there are sufficiently plain marks of the apostles and early Christians having observed the Lord's-day, even from the resurrection.

Now this argument still turns on his Grace's finely-pointed pivot of the English definite article,—that the Jews were bound to keep the seventh, and that a festival established on the first never could coalesce with that established on the seventh. Now in opposition to this, I have endeavoured to prove, that we are bound by the commandment to keep a seventh, and not the seventh. I have also proved that Christians are bound to keep the decalogue, and particularly the

fourth commandment, and therefore bound to keep a sabbath, as a perpetual ordinance resting upon the authority of God; and this I proved, not only from the Old Testament, but also from the New. And the arguments I used, furnished entirely by the Bible, are so powerful and conclusive, that I am convinced that this was the opinion of the apostles and the early Christians, and that they considered a new promulgation of the sabbath unnecessary, and a specific law for the change of the day as not required. I consider it decided that the observance of a sabbath must make a part of the Christian religion wherever planted, and that it must have continued a part of the system from its very first establishment. Where, then, are we to look for it in the Christian system as handed down to us, if not in that day called the Lord's-day? I have, I think, given very good reasons why the change was not publicly made before the final dissolution of the Jewish state. And I have the strongest proof from Heylyn, the chief of the anti-sabbatarians, that a change might be made-nay, was made— silently, and without command, as in the cases of Joshua and Hezekiah. We have, also, abundant proofs, as all our adversaries admit, that the Lord's-day was established by the apostles; and we have abundant tradition of its having been constantly and continuously observed as a religious festival from that day to this. That establishment, and that tradition, I shall endeavour to prove from the Scriptures, and from testimonies quoted from our adversaries themselves. I think we shall also find proof of the apostles having connected the sabbath and the Lord's-day together. In fact, it would have been impossible for them to have added the observance of a weekly festival in memory of the finished work of redemption, to that in remembrance of the finished work of creation, without changing the day. Thus as Job says of the day of his birth, "Let the day perish wherein I

was born: let it not be joined unto the days of the year; let it not come into the number of the months." So this change has blotted out the day upon which the Saviour lay in the grave from the books of everlasting remembrance, and brought the sabbath to unite with our Lord's-day, and the day of the resurrection.

I must here mention a very extraordinary fact, which I have not before seen noticed by any writer. We know that the grand promulgation of the gospel was made on the day of Pentecost,—the very day kept in remembrance of the delivery of the law on Mount Sinai. We know that this grand promulgation, made in presence of people of all nations, (Acts ii.,) was made on the day of the week of our Lord's resurrection; and we know that this is considered by all Christians as a strong proof of divine authority for the establishment of the Lord's-day on the first day of the week. But we do not, perhaps, consider, that this very day was also a Jewish sabbath. The day of Pentecost, on whatever day of the week it fell, was a sabbath. (Lev. xxiii. 21.) So here, on the very day of the commemoration of the promulgation of the old law, we have also the promulgation of the new, which we may consider as the virtual repeal of the temporary part of the old,-as the substitution of the new for the old dispensation,-here, on this very day, we have the Lord's-day and the sabbath combined together:-the Lord'sday and the sabbath riveted together become the connecting bond of the two dispensations.

A sabbath on the first day of a period of seven days was familiar to the Jews. The feast of unleavened bread consisted of seven days; the first was a sabbath, the day of the passover, the day of the feast of the paschal lamb, the type of our Saviour; and the seventh was a sabbath: no servile* work was to be done in them.

*It is remarkable, that frequently, in Scripture, when work is

The day of Pentecost was, as I have observed, a sabbath. On this day the first-fruits of the wheat harvest were offered; and, as I have before observed, the first-fruits in this case were to be offered perfect and complete in the form of loaves; whereas the first-fruits of the barley-harvest, offered at the time of the passover, were presented in an imperfect form, in sheaves. The former, offered on the day of Pentecost, were typical of the perfect form and promulgation of Christianity on this day, the first upon which converts were made, when three thousand joined them, as the first-fruits of the numbers who were afterwards converted.

The first day of the seventh month was the memorial of the blowing of trumpets, and was a sabbath: the tenth was the day of atonement, and a sabbath; and on the fifteenth commenced the feast of tabernacles, of which the first day was a sabbath, and the eighth day was a sabbath. And this eighth day, in John vii. 37, is called the last and great day of the feast. This was the day on which "Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink." Therefore a sabbath on an eighth day was no unusual occurrence; neither was a sabbath on a first day unusual. Adam and Eve were created in the end of the sixth day. The next day was the sabbath; therefore they kept the first day of their first week, commencing the very evening of the day of their creation, and so on continually every week after ;—or, most probably, as they understood it and were taught it, they kept an insulated day between the periods of six days each.

prohibited on the sabbath, the word "servile" is added, as if to mark that the work prohibited is such as consists in ordinary weekly occupations. This word alone is a sufficient answer to many of the archbishop's arguments about "making clay of spittle," carrying a bed, &c., and tends to show the real spirit of the commandment.