afterward was held and maintained by the ancient Fathers that the earth was not round but plain as a Championfield They thought there could be no dwellers under the earth which go foot to foot against us and that if there should be any Antipodes imagined yet them not to be Adams Posterity whom they held to have all dwelt upon the earth and to have been all drowned except eight persons when Noahs flood covered all the face of the earth So strong did this opinion prevail with the said Fathers as that whoever held the contrary was counted near as bad as an Heretick Witnesse Vigilius whom some call Virgilius who was complained of by Boniface unto Zachary then Pope and was degraded for holding that there were Antipodes and that they had a Sun and Moon to shine unto them as well as to us This story may be seen in Aventine a Aven Annal. Bar. l. 3. and in Baronius who sought to cover the fact with fig-leaves Now that the adversaries to the Morality of this law held all those tenents before-said and that they all sprang from this errour of the earth 's supposed plain superficies I will next shew For the clearing whereof I need not cite many of them one may serve for all being approved by them all Neither will I tell here all that he writes hereabout but that which chiefly concernes the point in hand Mr. Ironside a Reverend Divine and of singular gifts and parts but over-swayed by the stream of late times doth in his book called the Seven Questions of the Sabbath dedicated to the late Arch-bishop of Canterbury William Laud tell us First that it is necessary not only for the learned but also for the weak and inferiour sort of people to know to a minute when the Lords day or Sabbath doth begin and when it doth end and that for two special reasons The one is for the Peace and quiet of their consciences which else would be wounded and disquieted The other is for that unlesse the very day and the whole day be kept to a Minute all the duties done on that day are lost His words are these It is necessary to inquire of the dimensions of this day of what duration and continuance of time it must be a Irens 7. Quest pag. 2. Amongst those things which disquiet and perplex the Consciences of the weak concerning the Lords day this is not the least where it is to begin and how long it lasteth For God requiring of us perfect and intire obedience without diminution or defalcation unlesse every minute of time which the Lord requireth of us as his tribute and homage be duly tendred to him our whole labour bestowed upon the parts and pieces of the day is not regarded b Page 126. It is also that which concerns the most sort of our inferiour People to be satisfied in lest the Commandment requiring one thing their employments another they many times wound their consciences and rob themselves of that Peace which otherwise they might enjoy c Page 127. 2ly that God might have his due tribute and the weak if they will may keep their consciences quiet in observing the true and full time of the Sabbath he setteth down the precise day of the Sabbath as he conceiveth and the exact time to a minute when the Sabbath-day is to begin As for the day he tells us that the Sabbath-day must be precisely the day of Gods rest Thus Assoon as God had ended his work he ordained and appointed that the seventh day the day of his own rest else he will not conceive that it can be the seventh day should be that on which the Church should rest d Page 21. Vnlesse we rest that very seventh day in which God rested we no more resemble his rest then a man that hath a ladder resembles Jacob that had a vision of a ladder c Page 90. As for the exact time when the Sabbath is to begin and end he tells us that the very minute in which the Sun is in the Horizon at his rising is the true beginning of the day and he proveth that it must so be for that when the fourth day at the Creation began the Sun was then in the Horizon at his rising so that any of the inferiour sort of people he before spake of may by looking in his Almanack tell to a minute if Mr. Ironsides rule faile him not at any time throughout all the year and in any place through out the world when the 4th day of the Creation and the very day of Gods rest and so consequently when the Sabbath beginneth These are his words If the natural day be measured by the Revolution of the Sunne as all confesse sure it is that until the Sun begin his course the day cannot begin At what time now did the Sun set forth upon the fourth day at the Creation Common reason will say when he first appeared in the Horizon The rising therefore of the Sun in the Horizon must needs be the first Period of the natural day a I rons 7. Qu pag c 123. 3ly he tels us that the Jews Sabbath-day was the day of Gods rest and the same with that which God blessed sanctified making no difference between all these three His words are these That particular Sabbath-day given unto the Jews even the day of Gods rest is not a Sabbath but the Sabbath even that which God sanctifyed The Sabbath must be the same with the seventh or else there is no tolerable sense or congruity in that law b Page 70. Whereas he saith the same with the 7th he meaneth by the 7th the 7th day from the Creation even the very day of Gods rest which he proved to begin at the rising of the Sun like as the 4th day did Now whereas some may and that not without just cause doubt how the day of Gods rest which began at Sun-rising as he saith and the Jews Sabbath which ever began at the setting of the Sun whersoever they dwelt could be one and the same day Sith that they as well in respect of their beginnings as also in respect of their endings are heavenly wide the one from the other even as farre as the Sun-rising is distant from Sun-setting between both which there must be half a dayes difference And so the day of Gods rest must begin either at Sun-rising before the Jews Sabbath-day began or at the Sun-rising after If at the Sun-rising before that is on the Friday morning then the Turks Sabbath so Doctor Heylin calleth it may more truly be called the day of Gods rest a Heyl. part 1. pag. 48. then that of the Jews But if at the Sun-rising after then our Christian Sabbath-day ever began on the day of Gods rest the which the Jews Sabbath never did For the wiping off this and all such doubts Mr. Ironside tells us both at what time and also by what means the day
and Assyria under the Assyrian Monarchy in the time the planets were held the gods of the world so counted the week and called every week-day by the name of the same planet as now generally we do They who shall be alive in America three hundred yeares hence and see there so many Nations of different tongues and all to have just seven dayes to the week and all to have Sunday for their seventh sacred day and call every of their other week-dayes alike will they not say or conceive that this could never have so happened had not their Ancestors in Europe observed weeks and had just so many dayes to the week and call every day of the week by the same names before ever they removed thence and were dispersed into so many and various plantations in America The like may we well conceive of the ancient Saxons Romanes Egyptians and other ancient Nations that it could never so have happened that every of them should have weeks and just seven dayes to the week and every week-day to be called by the name of the same planet with them all had not their Ancestors under the Assyrian Monarchs who first set up the idolatry of worshipping the planets observed seven dayes to the week and called the week-dayes by the same names of the planets before they came to be planted abroad in several Nations Secondly Adam at first had no other measure to mete out his age and time but dayes and weeks These he had from the Lords standard who having wrought six dayes and rested the seventh did sanctifie the seventh day Adam knew all ereatures at the first sight of them and gave names to the creatures suitable to their natures He knew them to be not eternal nor a year old and therefore might as well know their age to a day When the Lord brought Eve unto him he knew her by sight He knew she was not three dayes nor a day old He knew that she was made of him and on the same sixth day in which he himself was made and that the Lord on the next day rested from his works of Creation By this patterne and standard of the Lord he might mete out time by weeks before he could have any experimental knowledge of moneths and years which were afterward in time gotten by observation of the course of the Sun and Moon And we finde that in ancient times there was much difference and variation in the count of yeares and moneths with people Some had but three moneths some ten the Jewes had sometimes twelve and sometimes thirteen moneths to the yeare Their moneths did also much differ for length but never was the week counted to be more or lesse then seven dayes with any people Thirdly from the testimony of sundry learned and pious Writers Chrysostome thus Jam hinc ab initio doctrinam hanc nobis insinuat Deus erudiens in circulo hebdomadae diem unum integrum segregandum reponendum ad spiritualem operationem a Chrys Homil 10. in Gen. Aug. Steuchius on Gen. 2. speaking of the seventh day affirmeth it to be in omni aetate inter omnes Gentes venerabilis sacer Beda in his Hexameron testifieth that the rest of the seventh day semper celebrari solebat They who compiled the book of Homilies tell us That it is according to the law of Nature to have a time as one day in the week wherein we ought to rest from our lawful works b Hom. for the time of Prayer Mercer commended by Dr. Heylin for a learned Protestant c Heyl. part 1. page 5. is of opinion that the first Fathers being taught of God kept the seventh day holy Philo Judaeus also maketh this challenge Quis sacrum illum diem per singulas hebdomadas recurrentem non honorat d Phil. de vita Mos l. 2. Josephus to the same purpose Neque est ulla Civitas Graecorum aut Barbarorum neque ulla gens ad quam septimi diei in quo vacamus consuetudo minimè pervenerit f Ioseph Cont. App. l. 2. Fourthly from the testimony of ancient heathen Poets such as Homer Hesiod Gallimachus Liuus who have spoken very laudably of the Creation and of the seventh day g Clem. Alexan. Strom. l. 5. This knowledge of the Creation and of the seventh day and consequently of the count of dayes by sevens or weeks they could not have but by tradition or from the Books of Moses From the Books of Moses doubtlesse they had it not for they were not extant in the Greek tongue untill Prolomie prevailed to get seventy two Seniors of the Jewes to turn them into Greek which was many hundreds of yeares after Homer While-as the Kingdomes of Israel and Judah flourished the Gentiles could never get the least parcel of sacred Scripture The Jewes counted it to be an high prophanation of the Books of Moses if they were any wayes communicated to the Heathen John Gregory plentifully sheweth and proveth that before this interpretation was made by the said 72 Seniors the Heathen had no light from the Books of Moses a Jo Greg. discourse of the seventy c. If it should be supposed that the Poets got the knowledge of the seventh day from the Books of Moses then must it be the Jewes saterday-Saterday-Sabbath which they spake so laudably of but they knew that to be an holy day with them no ancienter then Moses Septimum diem more Gentis Sabbatum appellatum in omne oevum jejunio sacravit Moses The seventh day with that Nation called the Sabbath Moses made a perpetual Holy day saith Trogus b Trog l. 36. for which supposed innovation brought in by Moses the Heathen generally envied them and their Poets wrote very disgracefully of them about their Sabbath-day It was not then from Moses but by tradition that they had the knowledge of the Creation and of the seventh day Fifthly Gomarus who with all his might opposed the Morality of the Sabbath-day doth yet acknowledge that Adam Methuselah Sem and Abraham had knowledge of the Creation and of the seventh day c Gomar de Sab. p. 113. And why not Moses also and thousands beside them Moses indeed had a full knowledge by divine revelation and infallible inspiration by the Holy Ghost which guided him in the Historical relation of the Creation of all things and of the day of Gods rest as well as of other things related in his books yet questionlesse he had some general knowledge by tradition of most things he wrote of as they were delivered from father to son unto his dayes It would have been a very wilde conceit of Gomarus to think when he wrote that the knowledge of the Creation and of the seventh day came from Adam to Methuselah and from him to Sem and from Sem to Abraham that the knowledge thereof was intailed to the heires male or to some persons in a lineal descent from Noah to Abraham and
not to others also Incredible is it that Noah should teach the knowledge thereof to Sem only and not to Cham and Japhet too and that Sem should reveal the same to Arphaxad only keeping it as a secret from all other his sonnes and daughters and that Arphaxad should do the like unto Sala and he to Heber and he to Peleg and he to Reu and he to Serug and he to Nahor and he to Terah and he to Abraham and that none of them should impart that knowledge to any other of their sonnes and daughters and that the remembrance as well of the seventh day as of the Creation was wholly extinct with Abraham Without all peradventure Cham and Japhet and their Posterities had and retained the knowledge thereof for many generations some of them to the dayes of the before-named Poets and long after too Orpheus Aeschylus Aratus Pindarus Epicharmus and others mentioned by Clemens could else never have spoken so truly of Jehovah whom they called Jove as he relateth them to have done a Clem. Alex. Strom. l. 5. Sixthly from the testimony of those who have been the chief Writers against the Sabbath 1. Mr. Ironside professeth that he maketh no question but that the Heathen who never heard of a seventh-day Sabbath have weeks as well as moneths and years b Irons chap. 4. But he thinks they had the knowledge hereof by the subdivision of moneths as if knowing most of our moneths to consist of one and thirty dayes by subdividing them there must be just seven rather then eight dayes to the week And a little after It is true saith he that Clemens Alexandrinus brings many Authorities out of Homer Hesiod and Callimachus to prove that the very Heathen knew that the seventh day was to be kept holy c Irons chap. 9. which they could not know or do without the observation of weeks but herein he holds them to be thieves of holy things having stolne this light out of Moscs writings which they had translated whereas the Heathen had not Moses books translated hundreds of years after Homer as I before shewed concerning which I referre the Reader to that learned Discourse of John Gregory of the seventy Interpreters 2. Dr. Heylin in his History of the Sabbath and in the second part tells us That Christians of the first ages called the dayes of the week according as they found the time divided and that we retaine those names amongst us whereat some are become offended which were commended to us by our Ancestors and to them by theirs a He l. Part. 2 pag. 61. He sheweth out of Polydore Virgil that Pope Sylvester hating the name and memory of the Gentile gods by whose names they called the week-dayes gave order that the dayes should be called by the name of Feriae and the distinction to be made by Prima feria Secunda feria c. And out of Honorius Augustodunensis that the Hebrewes call their dayes he meaneth their week-dayes the first of the Sabbath c. The Pagans thus The day of the Sun the day of the Moon c. And Christians thus The Lords day Feria Prima c b Page 62. He saith further That they are more nice then wise who out of a desire to have all things new would have new names for every day of the week he meaneth or call them as sometimes they were The first day of the week the second day of the week c. and all for feare lest it be thought that we do still adore those gods whom the Gentiles worshipped St. Augustine as it seems had met with some this way affected and thus disputes the Case with Faustus Manichaeus The Gentiles saith the Father gave unto every day of the week the name of one or other of their gods and so they did also unto every moneth If then we keep the name of March and not think of Mars why may we not preserve the day of Saturn and not think of Saturn Dr. Heylin addeth Why may we then not keep the name of Sunday and not think of Phoebus or Apollo or by what other name soever the old Poets call him a Heyl. par 2. Pag. 63. 3. Dr. Francis White late Bishop of Ely who hath also written against the Morality of the Sabbath doth yet acknowledge one day in seven for Gods worship to be most agreeable to reason b Dr. White de Sab. pag. 90 107 151. which presupposeth weeks to be from the beginning unlesse men were then void of reason 4. Gomarus also who hath stoutly written against the Sabbath doth confesse that Methuselah Sem and Abraham retained the knowledge of the Creation and of the seventh day c Gomar de Sab. p. 113. though he will at no hand grant that they kept it holy yet their retaining the memory and knowledge of the seventh day proveth them to have observation of weeks Seventhly they who compiled the book of Homilies tell us That it is according to the law of nature to have a time as one day in the week wherein we ought to rest from our lawful works d Hom. for the time of Prayer but this could never be done without the observation of weeks Lastly Dr. Twisse sheweth and proveth that the distinction of time by weeks was observed by the Gentiles from all Antiquity and confirmeth the same out of many learned Writers to whose book of the Morality of the fourth Commandment I referre the Reader and therein chiefly to these pages 12 13 15 59 60 63 77 78 151 152 153 189 199 200 208. to 214. As also to Rivetus de Origine Sabbati and therein chiefly to the pages 15.16 63 64 65 66. to 81. CHAP. XIV Objection against Antiquity of weeks answered The hourely Government of the Planets is feigned THere be many who have published abroad to the world that there is a certain hourly Rule or Government which the planets have given them of the Creator by which every of them successively and in a vicissitude doth govern his houre according to this common distich Cynthia Mercurius Venus Sol Mars Jove Satur Ordine retrogado sibi quivis vindicat horam Hence they say that until this hourely Government was by skilful Astronomers found out and known the Gentiles had no weeks and having no weeks they could not have the seventh day sacred supposing none before this to have weeks but the Jewes only and therefore none but they to have a Sabbath-day Among many other Doctor Heylin was of this opinion who from hence doth argue the Sabbath-day not to be moral being not observed or known but by the Jewes only He would have us take it for granted that no Nation without the knowledge of Astrology the Jewes excepted whereby men came first to know the planets hourely Government and so consequently what planet governed the first houre in every day could have weeks or call the week-dayes by the names of the planets The
and the same day Sith it was the fourteenth day at Even when he ate the Passeover and gave then his body and blood Sacramentally when he instituted the Lords Supper but it was the fifteenth day when he wrought our full Redemption and actually and really gave his body and blood for us on the Crosse The answer to both these are the same It was on one and the same day of their week but not of their moneth for it was on the fourteenth day of Abib on which the Israelites ate the Passeover in Egypt but their going out of Egypt from Rameses was on the fifteenth day So also Christ are the Passeover with his disciples on the fourteenth day of the first moneth according to the law of the Passeover but he was crucified on the next day which was the fifteenth day In the fourteenth day of the first moneth at Even is the Lords Passeover and on the fifteenth day of the same moneth is the Feast f Numb 28.16 17. Lev. 23.5 6. Yet both in one and the same day of their week for the dayes of their week ever after their freedom from slavery were as I shewed before Horizontal dayes every of which began at the Sun-setting of the former day at the time they ate the Passeover in Egypt so they were commanded to begin their Sabbath-dayes g Lev. 23.32 and therefore so also did they begin the dayes of their week called the Sabbath for meting out to them their Sabbath-dayes And herein the Romanists do not a little Judaize who continued the like custome of beginning all their sacred dayes as Lyranus tells us In diem feriam viz. decimam quartam c. On the fourteenth day of the moneth in the Even whereof the Lamb was sacrificed and the solemnity of the Passeover began which was celebrated on the fifteenth day of the moneth According to which custome the solemnities of our Church do begin with the evening of the day before going a Lyra. Postil in Joan. 13. Christ with the disciples ate the Passeover and was crucified also on one and the same week-day which was the sixth day of the week with the Iewes which consisted partly of our Thursday and partly of our Friday as their Sabbath-day consisted partly of our Friday and partly of our Saterday 2. If it be demanded Whether the demand made by the disciples where they should prepare the Passeover and their killing the Paschal Lambe and their eating the Passeover and Peters denial and the Cocks crowing were all done in the same day The answer hereto is like the former They were done in the same day of the moneth but not in the same day of their week The disciples demand the killing and preparing the Passeover was all in the fifth day of their week but their eating it and Peters denial and the Cocks crowing were done on the sixth day of their week Yet all on the fourteenth day of the moneth and all done on our day of the week which we call Thursday 3. If it be demanded How we may conceive it to be on the first day of unleavened bread in which the disciples asked of Christ where they should prepare for him to eate the Passeover Sith the Evangelists Mark and Luke do affirm it to be on that day c Mar. 14.12 Luke 22.7 yet the first of the seven days of unleavened bread began not til the time of eating the Passeover The answer is as before The first day of the week of unleavened bread was not then begun but the first day of the moneth of unleavened bread was begun long before Though there was just one week or seven dayes of unleavened bread yet were there eight dayes of the moneth of unleavened bread On the fourteenth day of the first moneth they were commanded to eat unleavened bread and so to the one and twentieth day at even d Ex. 12.18 From the Even of the one to the Even of the other was just a week or seven dayes but sith they began to eat unleavened bread on the fourteenth day according to the Commandment that fourteenth day of the moneth was properly their first day of unleavened bread and the one and twentieth was the eigth or last Thus St. Matthew calleth the first of those eight days in which they ate unleavened bread the first day of the feast of unleavened bread f Mat. 26.17 The like answer is made unto those who object out of Iohn 13 a Iohn 13.1 that Christ ate not the Passeover on the feast-day of the Passeover but on the day beforegoing And many more such like questions and doubts may hereby be resolved CHAP. VII What kinde of day the Sabbath-day is Not known when the day of Gods rest beginneth THe Sabbath-day of the Lord is not an Artificial day which hath no night nor is but a part of the Horizontal day a See chap. 1. For the Sabbath-day is proportionable unto the other six dayes of the week allowed for labour every of which hath a night or darknesse as well as day-light and in which night men may as lawfully labour as in the day-light Ioseph and Mary fled by night b Mat. 2.14 The disciples of Christ rowed by night and in the fourth watch of the night Iesus went to them c Mat. 14.25 Some Countreys are so hot that their chiefest work is in the night and so dangerous by reason of wilde beasts that their chiefest care over their flocks is by night Iacobs special care over Labans flock was such d Gen. 31.40 And when Christ was borne an Angel brought the glad tidings thereof to the Shepherds by night as they were watching their flocks e Luke 2.8 If the six dayes of labour which God alloweth man be such as have nights as wel as day-lights then such ought the Sabbath-day of the Lord to be also Neither is the Sabbath-day here commanded an Universal day such as was the very day of Gods rest For then there would have been an impossibility in respect of the thing it self for men to keep the same and that for these two reasons First it is unpossible for any man to know within halfe a year what time of the year it is with us when the first yeare of the world began Some have presumed to tell the same to a day and in the Calendar prefixed to our Church-Bibles and common-prayer-Common-Prayer-books suppose it to be the five and twentieth day of March and there the same day is supposed to be that in which Christ was conceived in the womb of the Virgin Mary which if granted the thirtieth day of the same moneth of March must be yearly the day of Gods rest For if one be the first day of the Creation the other must be the seventh Again let it be as supposed so granted that the 25. day of March yearly is truly the first day of the Creation yet not a man living is there that can tell