the fourth precept you shall behold it quite deplumed and stript of all legall observances for those things which are all urged as ceremoniall and severall of the Jews touching the Sabbath are all every one Postscripts and By-laws not one emergent from the fourth precept It was a signe betwixt God and his people Exod. 31.17 Ezech. 20.20 It was injoyned with extreme rigour No meat to be drest Exod. 17.5 no fire to be kindled Exod. 35.3 These were all peculiar to the Jews if the commandment of the Sabbath was so too how cometh it to passe they are thus discriminated thus severed Very suspicious it is then that they were not uniform precepts not all of a piece But you will say that Deut. 5.15 the observation of the Sabbath is inserted in the fourth precept as peculiar to the Jews in regard it was a commemorative of their strange deliverance out of Egypt I answer True But there is a great diversitie betwixt the Decalogue given on Mount Sinai and that described in Deuteronomie That appertaining to Gods Church indefinitely taken this to the Jews onely And this is evident from the due consideration of Deuteronomy for though there be many things in it which may of common right belong to the hole Church yet certain it is that book was especially penned for the Jews it being {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} an explanation of that Law whether Morall Ceremoniall or Judiciall which Moses received on the Mount and application of it to the particular state and condition of that people So that this objection doth not onely not evert but establish my assertion it being a manifest argument that the Sabbath of the Decalogue ingraven in the Tables was of larger extent then that mentioned in Deuteronomie for else why should the reason of one be universall viz. as a monument of the creation of the other particular as a memoriall of the redemption out of Egypt and consequently it may perswade that the Sabbath of the one was Morall of the other Ceremoniall And therefore when Aquinas had framed this question Whether the commandment concerning sanctifying the Sabbath was fitly delivered in the Decalogue he found no evasion but this h It is placed saith he in the Decalogue as it was a Morall precept not as Ceremoniall Which is in effect but one and the same thing with what I maintain For I distinguish betwixt those precepts of the Sabbath which occurre elsewhere and the fourth Commandment and therefore I apply what is Ceremoniall in the Sabbath to them what is Morall I restrain to this So much for the Quid and indeed for the precept Survey we now the practice and observation thereof wherein the circumstances which offer themselves to our consideration are these Quando Quomodo By the Quando I understand the Terminus à quo and beginning of the Sabbath which some derive from the evening preceding the artificiall day and deduce it from Levit. 23.22 Others i again suppose it commenced in the morning and are induced thereto by the two Evangelists Matth. 28.1 In the end of the Sabbath as it began to dawn towards the first day of the week Mark 16.1 2. When the Sabbath was past very early in the morning the first day of the week and therefore the Leviticall Law they conceived onely concerned the Passeover and such solemn feasts But I rather imbrace the more received opinion that the Sabbath began at eve and suppose k that the Evangelists respected the manner of the Gentiles whose day commenced from midnight For me thinks the restriction of that ordinance in Leviticus to the solemn feasts onely is more nice then solid and the contrary is very probably indigitated in both the old and new Covenant In the old Nehemiah saith that when the gates of Jerusalem began to be dark before the Sabbath he commanded they should be shut and not be opened till after the Sabbath whence I inferre that the Sabbath began at twilight for else why should the gates be shut up so soon In the new Testament also Luke saith that the women when they had bought their spices rested the Sabbath according to the commandment which seemeth to insinuate that the Sabbath presently succeeded the buying of those spices And though it be {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} give me leave to note to you that by Saint Luke here it is evident the spices were bought on friday towards evening not on munday morning not penitus exacto Sabbato as l Casaubon affirmeth Saint Mark m indeed whom he citeth seemeth to relate it otherwise But I say first with judicious Calvine that n Mark relating two divers things in one and the same context did not so exactly distinguish their times as Saint Luke for what was acted before viz. the buying of the spices he mingleth with the setting out and going forth of the women And in truth S. Mark minded more the substance then circumstance of the story a thing so familiar in Scripture as it hath begot a proverb There is not alwayes an orderly disposition of first and last in holy Scripture Nor doth it reflect at all to the debasing and disparagement of the divine History for a small diversitie touching circumstance is nothing ad summam narrationis to the substance of the narration as the same Casaubon hath well observed Secondly it is very probable what Beza hath applied by way of salve to this of Mark though it relisheth not well and perhaps the worse because Beza's with the learned Heinsius that there is a dislocation of the words by some unwary Scribe who hath put them out of joynt for the latter part of this verse ought as he conceiveth to conclude the preceding chapter as though the words had been thus ordered And Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Jesus beheld where he was laid and bought spices that they might come and annoint him and that which maketh it seem still to him more probable is an ancient copy reading it {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} i. e. They went and bought spices without repeating the name of any woman The Quando I have briefly dispatched and the dispatch of that giveth me accesse to the Quomodo the manner of observing the Sabbath that is what holy duties were performed that day And from this arise two questions First whether the Law was read publickly every Sabbath or onely in the yeare of release at the feast of Tabernacles and this question is limited too to the period from the Law given to the captivitie The other quaere is what Law whether the hole Pentateuch or Deuteronomie onely was read in that yeare of Release As concerning the First they which hold the negative ground their opinion on these reasons First that there should be any publick or solemn reading of the Law upon Sabbath dayes is not expressely required and commanded in the
day God ended his work perhaps those copies which they followed expressed it so or else their aim was to suppresse the seeming discord which they knew not otherwise how to salve A discord indeed I confesse there is yet such an one as disturbeth not the sacred harmony yea rather a discord elegantly gracefull For you must know that in no operation the end is attained whilest the operation is in progression and untill it ceaseth a rest being Perficientis perfectio perfecti c The perfection of the perficient and of the thing perfected Now because rest demonstrateth the motion consummated therefore God is said most properly to have perfected his work on the seventh day whereon he rested so that the finishing and perfecting mentioned in this verse or period is no actuall operation but a mere desisting à motu creationis And indeed Moses giveth the honour of the perfection of the world to both the sixth and the seventh day not without great and weighty cause to the sixth to exclude all thought that God wrought upon the seventh to the seventh to assure us that he did not rest and give over on the sixth For the end of the sixth day gave end to the work of creation and denihilation and the beginning of the seventh gave beginning to Gods rest Therefore it is said that On the seventh day God perfected the work which he had made viz. on the six dayes before whence it is that Junius and Mercer a render it in the preterpluperfect tense Cùm absolvisset Deus When God had now perfected his work meaning that as soon as the seventh day arrived it might be truly said God had now perfected his work b And perfected it was undoubtedly on the sixth day God did not abruptly break off till he had throughly perfected all I confesse the Jews tell us a pretty story c How that God about the end of the sixth day was making Faunes Satyres and such imperfect creatures and that the evening of the Sabbath overtook him so fast that he was fain to leave them but half made up and therefore on the Sabbath dayes these creatures usually hide themselves in their kennels not daring to look out A perfect Jewish fable and by Mercer suspected to be rather derived from Tradition and heare-say then from any Hebrew Authour extant because he could never in all his reading light upon him for the satisfying of the like doubt in others I have troubled my margine with the Authours name as I find him cited by a Wierus That God gave but one positive law to Adam in Paradise is neither in it self likely nor in respect of repugnant Scripture credible for is it not said that God put Adam into the garden to dresse it was not this a command Augustine b holdeth clear it was so if a command then a law for Lex dicitur à ligando A law is called a law because it bindeth c and every command is so farre as it bindeth a law If then it was a law it must be either merely naturall or positive if merely naturall then immutable still in force and we must all tag and rag turn gardiners or plowmen if it was positive then their Prolepsis halteth on that foot Consider the Law it self and you shall see the positive accrue to the naturall by way of superfoetation Man must be alwayes busie alwayes in action there is the naturall his imployment is limited to tilling of the garden there is the positive law But if Adams apostasie and fall was the same day he was formed as many have thought and is still disputable this argument might well have been spared because the command concerning sanctifying the Sabbath might have been given in his corrupt and vitiated estate If we should yield them what they fain would have viz. that Jacob and the Israelites observed no Sabbath during their thraldome yet shall they never be able to inferre from thence that they had no command concerning it For did they alwayes observe whatsoever was commanded them Moses said to Pharaoh in the person of God Let my people go that they may hold a Feast to me in the wildernesse Was not this Feast some solemn time consecrated and commanded of God to be observed no doubt it was for will-worship is to God abominable Did they keep this Feast Certainly no It is resolved by all Divines ancient and modern the Patriarchs before the Law were by God appointed to offer sacrifice Did the Israelites under Pharaoh keep this commandment the Scripture answereth No God strictly injoyned that every male child eight dayes old should be circumcised was this performed by the Israelites in the wildernesse the Scripture answereth No there was not one circumcised all that while and yet they abode there fourtie years Now if they had upon such occasions a dispensation for not observing of other feasts for not sacrificing for not circumcising might they not have one for the weekly Sabbath also To their last argument from Nehemiah I say The Sabbath was at the time of the law given made known to them yet not then first but in a more solemn manner then before We have a saying none more frequent when the Sunne hath dispelled a cloud or mist and sheweth it self in its brightnesse we then say the Sunne shineth and yet no man is so simple but knoweth it shined before even while it was most befogged though not with equall splendour So the Sabbath is said to be made known to the Israelites upon mount Sinai because it was then as it were revived and proclaiâ—â—d in more state and pomp then before And if you restrain it strictly to mount Sinai as the letter seemeth to import you must of necessity offer violence to Exodus 16 where at the fall of Manna it is clear the Sabbath was made known before the Law pronounced on mount Sinai And so the Prolepsis faileth in this her last refuge as in the former Having thus disarmed them of those Reasons wherewith they esteemed themselves sufficiently fortified I now apply my self to their Authority the Authority of men many of them singular both for learning and piety But shall we without more adoe yield to bare Authority Doth the end of dispute depend merely upon what they have said May we not examine the matter yet a little further May we not question whether these men spake as they meant whether their arguments jumped together for did they alwayes so No if Hierome be of any credit The Ancients are sometimes enforced to speak not so much what themselves think as what they conceive may most non-plus the Gentiles This was their policy against the Heathen might not they use it also against the Jews with whom they were in continuall conflict If they spake as they thought might not vehemency of dispute transport them to inconsiderate speeches in their heat and through too eager opposition to one errour to incurre
{non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} to preach to pray to break bread on this day and B. White averreth as much And as to that Text of Acts 2. vers. 46. whether the margent of our English Testament transmitteth us I say that it is not inevitably not evidently to be understood of common food For f Humbertus taketh it for the Eucharist Behold the true Evangelist testifieth that the faithfull in the Apostolicall times assembled every day in Prayer and breaking of bread what are you then who say that full Masse that is the celebrating of the Eucharist ought to be performed onely twice a week And though the words {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} may seem to boulster out the contrary opinion yet if you take them as they are both by the Syriack and Arabick and our own margent rendered for At home the meaning may very consonant to truth be as my learned * Tutour conceiveth That when they had performed their dayly devotions in the Temple at the accustomed times of Prayer there they used to resort to this Coenaculum immediately and there having celebrated the mysticall banquet of the holy Eucharist afterward took their ordinary repast with gladnesse and singlenesse of heart In which interpretation there is enough to reconcile both parts something for illustration being super-added For the holy Ghost doth here so I take it regard the practice of the Christians in their Love-feasts g and happily from hence they took their commencement which consisting of divers viands provided by a common purse and collation their fashion was to take so much thereof as they thought sufficient for the Communicants and so to celebrate the Lords Supper together which done they presently fell to their spare and slender chear entertaining and solacing themselves with spirituall and divine colloquies So that the fraction of bread here might have reference to their mysticall repast in the blessed Eucharist which was the first course or part of their Agape and the latter part of the verse might look at the other part thereof viz. corporall refection Their next cavill is that this {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} denoteth not the first but some one day of the week wherein as they are become Separatists from our Church in her most absolute Translation so them and her I leave to end the quarrel We meet with it also 1. Cor. 16.1 and there an ordinance of the Apostles that their oblations should be upon that day Now I would gladly learn why this day rather then any other should be appointed for an Almes-day had it not been observed Holy in those times Lastly we meet with it Apoc. 1.10 but not now as formerly styled the First day of the week but apparelled in a Christian name and called the Lords-day which certainly the holy Ghost would not have done had it not passed for currant amongst Christians by that name and how could it obtain that name had it not been destined then to religious actions as a weekly holy-day Laying all these premised evidences of Apostolick practice together do they not clearly demonstrate the translation of the Sabbath into the Lords day For why should the Christian Church even in those times when every day was sanctified with devout exercises and seemed an holy Sabbath select any one distinct and peculiar day to be kept holy and why one in a week rather then in a moneth or yeare and why not in the weekly circuit the old Sabbath rather then the Lords day had not God some way made known his will to them that he would still have a Sabbath exempted from the common condition of other dayes that Sabbath to be weekly and that weekly not the old Jewish but the new Christian to be the first of the week as dignified by the Resurrection of our Saviour and the Anabaptisme of the Apostles Vtrumque mysterium nostrum utrumque utilitas nostrae as Hierome a in another case Dispensers both of inestimable benefits upon his Church the one of her justification the other of her sanctification and so this day a fit memoriall of both But here it will be demanded By whom this translation was made and to clear this doubt Hic labor hoc opus est Athanasius the great hath resolutely affirmed that Christ was the authour thereof {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} The Lord translated the Sabbath into the Lords day But some have found as they think an evasion for this viz. That Christ was not the authour by any mandate of his but onely the occasion of the translation which unparalleled glosse suggests to my memory that of Augustine b It is easie with every man to reply who can not hold his tongue But let us look upon the colour or fucus wherewith this interpretation as false as new is dawbed over and see if it will not with great facility wash off If Christ himself translated it then the Father thwarteth what he said before c where he tells us that the Lords day was taken up as a voluntary usage {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} we honour the Lords day he mentions no command whereas of the Sabbath he saith {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} he commanded it to be kept This indeed were something to decline our objection out of the Father if we were not assured otherwise of his mind for apparent it is that the Father neither regarded in his {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} voluntary usage nor in his {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} imposed command for do we not meet in him the same in effect counter-changed Doth he not elswhere say as much of the Sabbath as here of the Lords day That when God had finished the prime creation he rested and therefore men did OBSERVE the Sabbath in those dayes while the first creation was especially in force d He mentions here no command was therefore their observation of the Sabbath a voluntary usage Nay saith he not as much of the Lords day as of the Sabbath e When God had renewed and restored man by finishing the work of redemption he willed that the same day should be dedicated to that Restauration which the holy Ghost foreshewed by the Prophet saying This is the day which the Lord hath made And again f Gods will was that the Lords day should be manifest and declared that thou mayest know the end of the first generation to be accomplished What say you now Sir will your ingenuity descend to recant or your pregnant invention afford you another refuge Now there be many wayes by which Christ may be said to be the Translatour of the Sabbath Either by immediate institution and example as Junius a or by ratifying and approving the Translation already made by the Apostles as Maldonate b or by giving them direct and expresse commission to do it or lastly by revealing his
the Apostles abrogated it without expresse warrant from God they did it as Pastours and their Pastorall constitutions by your rule ought not oblige the Church for ever But let us take view of the proofs which confirm this your distinction First you say the Apostles considered as Pastours were subject to mistake as appeareth by Saint Peter who living at Antioch as a Pastour was justly reproved by Saint Paul for not walking as behoved a Pastour And Paul and Barnabas dissented from one another and that in such heat as it maketh it apparent they were not both if either directed by the Spirit I answer That Peter and the other two Apostles were too blame I not deny but were they in Cathedra or doing any Pastorall work assuredly No He offended about the choice of meat these about the choice of a companion which are not things relating to the Pastorall office And for ought I see you may as well argue Such a Minister is a temporizer Such and such a Pastour were cholerick one with another Ergò they preach false doctrine and so transferre the faults of the Person to the office or calling Secondly you instance in places of Scripture where you bring in the Apostle speaking some things of himself not as dictates of Gods Spirit I speak this by permission not of commandment vers. 6. To the rest speak I not the Lord vers. 12. And I have no commandment of the Lord vers. 25. And I give my judgement vers. 40. I answer Your first is nothing ad oppositum for the Apostle there distinguisheth not his permissive counsel from Christs command In the following Text where S. Paul is said to speak and not the Lord it is onely meant that Christ did not expresly determine the doubt whilest he conversed on earth it being not then on foot and this is the solution of the 25. verse also Where it is said verse 40. I give my judgement we must not think it to proceed from his own head but dictated by the Spirit and so by way of precaution he telleth us I think I have the Spirit of God Nor do these words I think imply as though the Apostle were not confident of it but by way of Irony seem to gird those who boasted of extraordinary illumination and this is the constant interpretation of all learned Expositours Let us now see how you distinguish Apostolicall Traditions These you say are either such as they received immediately from Christ or such as were suggested to them by the Spirit the first you say they delivered as Apostles and they are therefore Divine the other as Pastours and may be dispensed with I did expect you would have derived this distinction from the Primitive Fathers or some reformed Writers men of some credit with us but I see you are put to hard shifts and are glad to appeal to them whom we renounce as incompetent judges the Papists But you say according to this sense you find the Fathers speak of Traditions Your talk of Fathers at first affrighted me till I saw your instance onely attain a bare singular number But what find you in Cyprian your Fathers or universall particular when Stephen accused his Anabaptisme for novelty and repugnant to the ancient Tradition True saith Cyprian but whence is this Tradition from Christ in the Gospel or from the Apostles in their Epistles For what is written must be observed There you say we have the first kind But elsewhere Saint Cyprian saith that the choice of Bishops and Ministers in the presence and with the approbation of the people was of Divine and Apostolicall Tradition Now who seeth not that here Saint Cyprian speaketh of those other Traditions delivered and practiced by the Apostles as the Churches Pastours which are no longer in force then the Church you forget your self you mean the Pope for so your Canus singeth shall like I answer what you see I know not this I dare affirm that whosoever shall behold directly and with equall angles this passage of Cyprian will clearly discern these two things First that he couples Divine and Apostolicall Traditions together Secondly that he annexeth to Apostolicall Tradition an observandum tenendum est it must be observed which implieth their perpetuall Obligation and by both these Cyprian will be discovered to differ from your assertion secundùm terminos oppositos as wide as may be And whereas you would enforce your interpretation upon us as agreeable to the mind of this Father from an assurance that such a choice of Bishops and Ministers is neither delivered in the Gospel the Acts or the Epistles the thing is not so evident as you perswade yea the contrary is the more probable for Acts 14. vers. 23. where it is said they had ordained them Elders in every Church the word is {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} which most properly implieth that the suffrage of the Laity was used therein Mistake me not I say not the Popular vote made but onely confirmed the Election to chuse is one thing to ratifie the choice made another therefore to commentatours and others who render the word {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} To elect by Popular suffrage I cannot subscribe The energy of the word may best be collected from Junius his description thereof Chirotony saith he is a signification of suffrage by the hand the people being entreated thereto by the common cryer in this form {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Let him that approveth not of this lift up his hand And in like manner I have observed Xenophon a bespeaking his Souldiers {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} This description with some small elucidation will give you a plenary notion of the Athenian Chirotony For further illustration therefore you must know that regularly in whatsoever thing this Popular suffrage was required the matter it self was first debated and resolved upon by the Nomothetes or Legislatours in their counsel-house and after such consultation it was then posted up in the most remarkable place of the Citie some few dayes to the end the people might have time to consider of it which time elapsed the common cryer in open Market propounded it to the people next an Oration b was made to them wherein the convenience and necessitie of the thing offered was laid open that Oration ended the people were last demanded by the publick cryer their vote ut suprà according to whose suffrage the businesse in agitation or stood or fell Conformable to this custome Apostolicall practice in the ordaining Ministers most probably was viz. That they first chose the men and then presented them to the people who if they had any thing to oppose against them were then required to declare it And this is the rather likely because the Primitive Church curious in imitating Apostolick usage did universally a observe the same order which is still retained also in our
{non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} adorations to be made {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} towards the holy Table and this we all know is a piece of yesterday the Authour whereof was in being not full six hundred years past which we are also as certain was the very time about which the Incarnation of Bread or Transsubstantiation began first to be whispered I should not have dwelt so long upon this but that I find it pressed as a necessary dutie yea a dutie of necessity adequate to the observation of the Lords Day a Tenet which deserveth rather to be hist at then answered But to return from whence I have digressed Let whatsoever is positive in the fourth Commandment stand for a cipher is the Lords Day to be observed one jot the more remisse doth not Apostolicall Institution imply an equall Obligation both concerning the continuance of time and restraint from labour what did they ordain what institute was it not That the first day of the week should be consecrated to God and spirituall negotiations you cannot yield us lesse If then it was the first day of what is it meant of a naturall day from sun to sun or of an artificiall from the sun-rise to his set I answer of the first for these reasons If all the other dayes of the week contained both night and day why should not the Lords Day have as large a proportion of time as the rest do not all the dayes in the week hold by Gavelkind and if it contained onely daylight then there was a night to spare whereof I would gladly know what should become Should the Saturday have it all If so then this would by sesquialter proportion exceed all the rest should it passe by way of dividend amongst the other six then there would be two houres in every day more then the suns revolution maketh Moreover when God requireth any thing dedicated to him his constant caveat and proviso is that it be {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} not defective and without blemish not lame or imperfect Now that which wanteth one minute of its full time cannot properly be called a day regularly I say and de jure of right it cannot where the day is seposed by divine designation And this is the more evident by observing what God required under the law it being no lesse then a full and complete naturall day from eve to eve which was not as a learned Doctour conceiveth and I think aright to set out the beginning and end the boundaries of a naturall day but to declare his own claim of a naturall day to be dedicated to him which should begin at evening If then the day must be understood of a naturall day of 24 houres it will then necessarily follow that vacation from labour during that time must be concomitant with it For vacation from worldly affairs which may impeach the worship of God is so inseparable from times consecrated to that worship as it is by Brerewood rightly accounted part of the moralitie and substance of the fourth Commandment and so in the Christian Church perpetually to be observed If any shall now object that this vacation is onely necessary and required during the time of publick assembling in the Church and that no more is exacted of us then that we attend such assemblies I answer that God will admit no sharer in any thing consecrated to him and though the cardinall and chief end of the Sabbath is that God be publickly honoured yet doth he not leave the remainder thereof so at our dispose that we may dispend it either in carnall pleasures or terrene negotiations Those oratories which from their dedication to the Lord are in English denominated Churches do from their destination to publick and solemn addresse contract the name and repute of sacred and though they be superlatively and above all venerable while employed to their destinate end yet alwayes even at times of Cultustitium as I may so say or vacation from publick worship there remaineth in them an indeleble impression of awfull regard which ought to preserve them from all profanation inviolable Mistake me not I place no inherent sanctitie I immure not God in them I approve not of their decoring even to effeminate curiositie nor allow them an honour as some of late too close followers of Nazianzene a even to ridiculousnesse superstititious yet this I hold Gods houses they are places where his honour dwelleth for which cause such a relative veneration is due to them as alwayes dignifieth and ennobleth them above any other house whatsoever and secureth them from common use and in this men both learned and moderate have led me the way as Zanchy b Hospinian c c. Now * Places and Times consecrated to Gods name are to be sanctified with equall religion and so the Rituall of the old Testament coupleth them together Ye shall keep my Sabbaths and reverence my Sanctuaries And then I say that the Lords house may as well be impropriated to a ware-house as his day to a work-day when the congregation is dismissed And this priviledge it as well deriveth from Evangelicall as Legall institution Therefore Leo d when he made that edict of generall restraint on the Lords day pleadeth conformitie wth the evangelicall constitution We ordain as it seemed good to the holy Spirit to them whom he instructed But it will be here opposed that neither the Apostles themselves nor the Primitive Church observed this day with any such strictnesse untill Constantine's decree and therefore it is like they enjoyned it not I answer as touching the practice of the Apostles there is I confesse nothing either the one way or other clearly evident nor much of that of the Primitive Church during the time limited Onely Justin Martyr e if I be not mistaken hath something reflecting that way for in his description of the custome of publick assembling in those times upon the Lords day after he hath insisted awhile upon the duties performed in the Church he setteth down what the Christians did postea after their dismission as their visiting relieving the poore their consorting together and their repeating to one another what they had learned that day in the Church Of the remainder of time the solemn assembly being ended I understand this postea probably enough yet will not warrant it with over much pertinacitie if any other construction can vouch better reason in its defence let that obtain But though we should find no evidence of the Primitive practice of cessation from labour on this day yet will it not follow that they did not forbare it if possibly they could for we meet with exhortation to it by Origen f On the Christian Sabbath day we ought not to do any worldly businesse if therefore thou dost surcease from all secular affairs and dost nothing but employ thy self in spirituall negotiations this is
take a full effect untill the Church should attain her land of Canaan a settled and flourishing peace And the event seemeth to prove the ordinance for no sooner did Constantine a second Joshuah or Josiah sit sure in his throne then Gods externall worship began to be magnificently solemnized and as an especiall badge thereof his day superlatively honoured both by Imperiall edict and example and that with strict vacation from all worldly avocations ab omni opere from all work so his Histriographer m reporteth Elsewhere I grant there occurreth a constitution of this Religious Emperour tolerating labour on this day but it was in countrey villages onely and that too but in case of necessitie n lest pretermitting the opportunitie offered by the divine providence it might not occurre again o This dispensation is much urged by the Anti-sabbatarians but it hath no great force with us For first it may be well controverted whether Constantine ever made any such indulgence or no because if he had is it credible it could have escaped Eusebius who was not onely contemporary but in a manner companion with this Emperour who took speciall notice of all his actions having in designe the compiling of the Historie of his life and who over lived him yet this Bishop hath not one word of it But be it Constantine's sure we are it was after rescinded by Leo with a We ordain that all men cease from labour on the Lords day that neither husbandmen nor any other take in handwork unlawfull on that day And before Leo divers of the Fathers in their popular tracts or sermons pressed this vacation upon the people On the festivall day all handy-work is prohibited to the end that men may more intirely exercise themselves in sacred matters So Cyril o Chrysostome p calleth it {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} an immoveable law {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} that this first day of the week be holly set apart for sacred exercâ—sâ—s But there are also fathers you will say that seem to incline to the contrary First Hierome he relateth of a religious woman governesse of the Nunnes at Bethlehem how she every Lords day resorted to the Church and after service she and her company fell to their ordinary work of making garments for themselves or others To this I answer consider Paula as a subject and then tell me how can you acquit her of the breach I will not say of the fourth but of the fifth precept if Bethlehem was within the latitude of Constantine's decree and certainly it was for that reached Omnes Romano Imperio parentes all men subject to the Romane Empire And if this Lady was not within the verge of the dispensation for that was for husbandmen onely was not then this her act a disobedience to her Princes law and therefore her example no rule of those times it being it self irregular Besides S. Hierome telleth us of religious persons of the other sex Monks that they did orationi tantùm lectionibus vacare busie themselves in prayer and reading on the Lords day Now consider Paula and her Nunnes as women and compare their practice with that of these Monks and then if the masculine practice be not more worthy then the feminine let Grammar scholars judge Out of Gregory they tell us that he giveth it as one cognizance of Antichrist q That he shall enjoyn the Lords Day and the Sabbath to be oâ—served with abstinence from all work To which I answer There are two things which Gregorie here reproveth in the observation of the Dominicall Day first a Jewish not a moderate and sober restraint and this is certain for in the very same epistle he saith r On the Lords day we must cease from labour and by all means attend our prayers secondly the celebrating it together with the Sabbath for it is Diem Dominicum Sabbatum the Lords Day and Sabbath both which was the errour of the Ebionites And therefore Gregorie for ought I see standeth their friend no more then Hierome This Gregory was a man of the sixth Centurie an age wherein themselves acknowledge this restraint took deep root and so it continued successively downward even to the times of Reformation nor did the first Reformers those of our Church especially exercise themselves in varying any thing at all in this point from the received practice as may appear both in the statute and canon laws both of this and other countreys But hitherto I have onely insisted upon restraint from labour and servile work there is yet another question concerning restraint not from work but play and from recreations viz. Whether recreations such as are at other times lawfull are tolerable and lawfull on the Lords day To this I answer in short All recreations at other times lawfull are interdicted on this day but such whereby the mind is better disposed towards the sanctification of the day or such as are no impediments to that sanctification For the day is appointed to be sanctified that is to be an holy not a playday and it is a rule in the decalogue and all other divine laws that where any thing is commanded to be done all things subservient to the performance of it are consequently enjoyned as also all lets and hinderances prohibited Besides Gods house hath been ever thought profaned and polluted by sports and meetings of good fellowship why also not his day Nor is it enough that these recreations be not an hindrance to publick exercises in the Church but they must not disturb even private duties at home as meditation prayer holy conference c. For God commandeth not the sanctification of some few houres but of a day that is an hole day allowing sufficient time for repose and repast to the body And so our Church a interpreteth the command Gods obedient people saith she should use the Sunday holily and rest from their common and dayly businesse and give themselves wholly to heavenly exercises And consonant to her her sister the Church b of Ireland The Lords Day is wholly to be dedicated to the service of God If holly to Gods service where have recreations a room These articles are it seemeth called in for what reason I not dispute sure I am the nulling of them was very acceptable to the disciples and followers of Arminius Men too bold and frequent in these Dominions c whose accursed tenets were there damned As an appendix to this discourse of recreations if now my opinion be demanded concerning his Majesties book I shall say of that onely this His Princely intentions were therein I doubt not pious enough not so I fear theirs who first suggested the convenience and fitnesse of that liberty unto him But in regard the foundation thereof seemeth especially to be the preserving in observation Encaenia or Church dedications of them I shall say somewhat perhaps not known to all Of their