should withdraw our selves from such It has been great encouragement and sweet satisfaction unto me for divers years that I have Christ and his Word his Will and his Law for me in this Holy Contest His ten Words or Commandments how perfect and complete how standing and unchangeable a Rule of life are they in all and every of the matters of Duty to be performed and of Sin to be avoided It was Jehovah Christ himself who by his Spirit from his Father wrote upon the two Tables the Words of the Covenant the ten Words or Precepts This Scripture more especially I undervalue not any of the rest though this have its signal remark cannot be broken This is a perfect Law These words Jehovah spake and he added no more Christ would not have us so much as think that he came to destroy to dissolve the Law he came not to dissolve but to fulfill He confirms it by an high Asseveration that till Heaven and Earth do pass one Jod or Chirek one either Consonant or Vowel or any thing else originally belonging thereunto shall in no wise pass from the Law till all be fulfilled Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least Commandments and such do the most of men compt the weekly Sabbath though misjudgingly and will teach men so he shall be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven but whosoever shall do and teach men the same shall be called Great in the Kingdom of Heaven This Law is established This Law or Testimony is sure or faithful or firm or constant it endures for ever it is standing-abiding continuing firm yet and perpetually This is the Rule of the New Creature by this must we walk This is to be bound up and sealed among Christs Disciples To the Law and to the Testimony must we refer all our Controversies in Religion for Determination and Resolution If any speak not according to this Word it is because No morning-light is as yet in them Here is the full comprehensive of what is our Duty to do Where or for what no Law is there is no Transgression or neither a Transgression Sin is not imputed where is no Law for Sin is a Transgression of the Law Then a Soul is guilty when it sinneth against any of the Commandments of Jehova in what ought not to be done and shall do against any of them This Law of the Ten words was put into the Ark and this alone and nothing else but this put there in which it was so closed as that it was not to be taken out or changed having a Crown of gold by Jehovah's own appointment put round about it This particular Law of the weekly-seventh day-Sabbath has a special mark of remembrance fixt unto it at the very entrance into it This must not be forgotten to be kept Holy and the Works of our particular Functions are expresly prohibited to be done on it This seventh-Seventh-day must be sanctified as the weekly Sabbath of Jehovah our God because all and every of those weighty Reasons which Jehovah Aelohim the Law-maker the Law-giver himself hath assigned and rendred and no Reasons can be so demonstrative and convincing as those which he doth give who is only wise from whence to inforce and perswade Obedience to his Command in observing of a Weekly-Sabbath-day Holy to him do properly belong and are applicable to the Seventh which is the last day in every Week in Order of time in the weekly returns of it As the weekly Sabbath-day and to no other day of the Week as such neither to the first second third fourth fifth or sixth day Six daies in the week we are to labour and the Seventh day in the same week is the Sabbath The Seventh-day the seventh-day has its peculiar Note of Honour put upon it There can be but one Seventh day in one Week in the weekly Order and Succession of the Seven days though each of the other foregoing six days in the week are one of seven or one of the seven daily parts of weekly time Every one of the other days of the week have another name as one the second the third the fourth the fifth the sixth Only the last day of the week is called the Seventh day and the Sabbath day Weeks will be to the worlds end concluded within the compass of Seven days One of Aelohims Reasons is because he rested upon the seventh day upon that and that only which is the last day in the week and upon no other day in the week as a weekly Sabbath-day This History of the Creation doth go this day over three times on or in the Seventh-day the Seventh-day the Seventh-day Aelohim rested and again a second time He rested Afterwards in Moses time a little before Christ's Proclaiming of the Law of the Ten words at Mount Sinai the Seventh-day and the rest or Sabbath on it are several times mentioned the seventh-Seventh-day the seventh-Seventh-day the seventh-Seventh-day and a fourth time the seventh-Seventh-day The Rest of the Holy Sabbath or a Resting of Holy Rest for Sabbath signifies a Rest a Sabbath the Sabbath the Sabbath the People rested on it At the Promulgation of this Law this same Reason is resumed again For in six days Jehovah made the Heavens and the Earth the Sea and all that in them is and rested the Seventh-day and therefore His people ought to rest on the same day as the Holy-Sabbath-day The Scriptures do carry this further along after the Promulgation of it Six days shall men work but on the Seventh-day the Seventh-day a Sabbath a Sabbath of rest a Sabbath-day the Sabbath the Sabbath Jehovab rested on this day and refreshed himself Six days thou shalt work but on the seventh-day thou shalt rest thou shalt rest Six days shall work be done but on the Seventh-day there shall be to you an Holy-day a Sabbath of rest to Jehovah the seventh-day is the Sabbath of rest the Sabbath the seventh day is the Sabbath to Jehovah Thus also in the After-Prophets in Jeremiah's days Bear no burden on the Sabbath-day the Sabbath-day the Sabbath-day the Sabbath-day sanctifie the Sabbath-day to do no Work therein The Sabbath-day the Sabbath-day Thus in Nehemiah's time that zealous Reformer would not suffer Ware or any Victuals to be brought to be sold on the Sabbath-day on the Sabbath-day on the Holy-day the Sabbath-day the Sabbath the Sabbath-day the Sabbath the Sabbath the Sabbath No burden shall be brought in on the Sabbath-day the Sabbath the Sabbath-day The New Testament also doth take special notice of this The Seventh-day has the name of Sabbath or of Rest given it there above threeâ—â—ore times They rested Christs followers were silent from the Works of their particular Functions the seventh-day The Seventh-day God did rest the seventh-day from all his Works None of all this is said of any other day of the week Particularly not of the first and therein the LORD Jesus
his Dsiciples that when troublous times would be some years after his Ascending into the highest Heavens they would be much in Prayer that upon the Enemies Invading their Land their flight might not be on the Sabbath lest they should be hindered from or disturbed in the Blessings of that seventh-seventh-day which alone has the Name of the Weekly Sabbath Thus is the whole Scripture profitable for the clearing and confirming of these two Reasons of Christs Assigning as I am now also further to manifest that it is so for his third Reason which is this because Aelohim sanctified the seventh which is the last day in every week that and that only and no other day of the week as the Weekly Sabbath-day Thus at the First Creation and Institution the seventh day the seventh-day the seventh-day Aelohim sanctified it because that in it he had rested from all his work which he Created for to make or to do He hath sanctified this same seventh-day he doth and he will sanctifie it setting it apart as the only weekly Sabbath-day for Spiritual services and for other holy ends he segregated it from all prophane common employments and usages and dedicated it to his own peculiar worship It was not to be reckoned nor counted amongst vulgar daies but was to be had and held as solemn and sacred holy and honourable desirable and delightful He hath put a difference between this seventh day and other daies by way of Excellency in a dignifying manner by appropriating and â—evering of it in the special holiness thereof from ordinary foregoing week-daies that are but of a common rank that it may be singularly filled up as becometh the sanctity or holiness of it By this derived or relative sanctity it is the peculiar appropriate day of Jehovah â—lohim He has separated Ordinances for his separated People on this separated day O how holy is Jehovahs seventh-day-sabbath on which he would have his Worshippers to be so Holy All here in this History of the Creation is actual and real Anticipations here have no such place as those pretend who would have this sanctification of the seventh day as a Weekly Sabbath to be only in Aelohims Decree and destination as if it took not place actually till the proclaiming of the Law at Mount-Sinai which was above two thousand years after for this Scripture as others also collated with it do evidently shew that it was thus set apart from the beginning of the World from Adams time and so downwards This History doth treat of Existences of Beings in their Created nature As Aelohim rested on that day Actually and it was made for Adam and for his posterity for that purpose and end that he and they might sanctifie it and that it might be a blessed day to him and to them The Creator and maker of daies did put apart the seventh-seventh-day from all and from every of other daies for peculiar uses and Ends. The Proof is convincing enough to the Ingenious and unprejudiced that the sanctification of the seventh-day-seventh-day-Sabbath was before the promulgation of it at Sinai Moses speaks of it as of a thing known using the same reasons and grounds of equity and much in the same words which Aelohim himself used in the proclaiming and referring to the first institution of labouring on the six fore going daies and Sabbatizing on the seventh where the seventh day is mentioned four times and Sabbath Sabbatism Rest Rested about six times declaring that in times past of old Jehovah had given the Sabbath for this end that in it there should be a ceasing from ordinary Labour and accordingly the People rested on the seventh-day-Sabbath at Mount-Sinai the promulgator of this Law himself delivers his mind to be still the same in much plainness of speech six daies thou shalt labour but the seventh day is the Sabbath in it thou shalt not do any work for six daies Jehovah made the Heavens and the Earth the Sea and all that in them is and rested the seventh day wherefore Jehovah hallowed the Sabbath day he sacrated it consecrated it sanctified it restored it to its holy use he spiritually distinguished it from the other foregoing six daies of the week Setting it apart for his more solemn worship and instituted service And thus you may carry this sanctification of it through the rest of the Scriptures that do treat on this subject for the People of God all along were Sabbath-keepers and Aelohim-worshippers They remembred this as that word of memoir and of remark bringing in this Law upon their hearts as of special observance The sanctification of the sabbath doth set out sometimes the whole worship of God for where this is duly observed it doth promote all other religion and it is put Prophetically by Isaiah for the spiritual worship under the New Testament dispensation it was instituted to the end that solemn service might be performed to the LORD therein therefore did his People hold publick conventions on the seventh day-Sabbath when they assembled to read to Interpret and to hear the word of Jehovah Aelohim And these were stated ordinances on every such day Then they put up their publick requests and made Prayers to the LORD they then pleasantly sang songs to him they had spiritual conferences holy Arguings heavenly meditations merciful actings It being a day of spiritual delight of heavenly joy and of high praising Then they offered up instituted sacrifices unto him to the honour of his name Which sacrifices now under this administration are spiritual glorious heavenly accepttable to God by Jesus Christ Thus and in such like holy services is it to be sanctified by us The seventh-day-Sabbath is therefore said to be holy unto the LORD's People as it is holy in its Institution and holy unto Aelohim And now is it not great and good reason that these reasons of Aelohims own giving should have a convincing-cogency and winning perswasiveness upon our hearts to yield obedience unto this holy Law of his which is every way so designed and fitted for our own Good I pass on to some other spiritual proofs of this After long and serious search into the whole scripture about this matter I find that all the Scriptures through where the holy Spirit doth speak of a weekly Sabbath day there the name and thing of a weekly Sabbath is given only to the seventh which is the last day of the week in the weekly revolutions and returns and successive courses of it and to no other day of the week as a weekly-Sabbath-day That there is no Command given for the Observation of any other day in the week as the weekly-Sabbath-day but only of the seventh day That there is no promise made to the observing of any other day in the week as the weekly Sabbath-day but only of the seventh day and that there is no threatning either Denounced against or executed upon any that have not observed any other day in
successive courses are as the daies and week of that one Created week were At the First Creation was this Law given to Adam in respect of his humane Nature and in him given to all the World of Humane Creatures Even adversaries themselves in their Writings against the seventh-day-Sabbath have confessed that the Law given to Adam from the beginning is unalterable and therefore remains still in full force so that all men to the Worlds end are bound to yield obedience thereunto and that the Rest of the seventh-day-Sabbath was entred into from the Foundation of the World Christ himself the Creator rested the seventh day from all his works and that Aelohims resting on that seventh-day-Seventh-day-Sabbath doth necessarily imply Mans Resting on that day as well as Gods resting God's entring into that rest being the ground of Man's rest at the same time which they prove from Heb. 4. 3 4. The created nature of it as the seventh day and the cogent reason of it as the Weekly sabbath-Sabbath-day not being peculiar to the Israelites but common to the Gentiles the Command is not proper to one of these only excluding the other but doth belong unto both the LORD 's resting on it which gave such occasion to his Blessing and Sanctifying of it has an Universal preceptive respect to Adam and to his whole Posterity it is a common Instruction and a general Command unto all men in all ages to labour in their particular callings functions and employments on those six fore-going days of the Week wherein Jehovah Aelohim made the Heavens and the Earth and to cease and rest from such labour on the seventh-day because in it He Sabbatized or rested from all his work This Law was made and it came with Authority in the beginning of the Created World and it shall continue and last to the end of the World Adam the Father of Nations and of Generations was put under the obligation of it and so are all his Off-spring from first to last throughout all Nations in all Generations Every Man has a teaching light and law of Nature which he doth carry about with and in him and is born and bred together with him There are still some reliques and remainders as dark Letters in an old Monument of those Holy Just Good and spiritual Laws of the Ten Words still to preserve and keep alive the memory of Man's first created Honour and Dignity His Rectitude and Uprightness as also for some other ends Though those seeds are corrupted now Natural right reason will teach men that seeing all men in all Nations do measure their time by Weeks and their Weeks by seven days they should besides what part they separate of their time as due unto God every day set apart one whole day of every week unto their Maker who has allowed them so liberal a portion of time wherein to provide for themselves and for their families there being no other proportion of time that can so well provide both for the worship and service of God every day as Evening and Morning of every day and every week as the whole Seventh which is the last day and also for the necessities of all Families as that which remaineth of the several six fore-going days of the Week and that is so well fitted to all functions and Callings and Employments There is that in every man who has the due exercise of his right reason that will directly answer unto this especially when compared with these created beings and more especially yet when having the advantage of Scripture-revelation The light and law of Nature when cleared up will tell men that all mens labour and motion being in order to Rest and Rest being the perfection and end of Labour into which labour and work and motion do pass that therefore the seventh which is the last day in every week is the most fit and proper whole day for a weekly religious rest unto the Creator for his Worship service and honour The natural reasonableness of this Command for observing the seventh-day-Sabbath doth suggest That Man and Beast should have his Resting-day every week The Ass that poor beast so much used to burdens and drudgery on other days must rest and the Stranger be refreshed on the weekly seventh-day-Sabbath That word in the Original which doth set our conventions for Worship to those who do understand it and who will make a diligent observation and due improvement of it would inform them that they may with their own eyes discern something of this in the motion of those Heavenly lights which would instruct men that set times of their Creator's appointing for solemn Assembling and for his instituted Service are directed to and pointed at by those Great Luminaries which the All-wise Aelohim hath set up in the Heavens As for many other good purposes so also particularly for this Great and Holy end This naturalness of the Weekly-seventh-day-Sabbath should make all the judgments and wills of grown reasonable Creatures to bend and to bow before it and should for ever stop the mouth of all gain-sayers never more to speak or write or print a word against that which is so Legible in its own created Existence Pure Primitive nature in Scripture is put sometimes for the essence of a being or for the Essential Properties of it Thus the Goddy-nature is His Essence His unchangeable Being a lively resemblance unto which communicable properties in Him such as His Wisdom Goodness Truth Holiness and such like are impartable to rational creatures especially to new creatures For otherwise as for His very Essentiality This is incommunicable to any meer Creature Hence as to Creatures Nature is put for the person or thing it self Indeed or In-truth really so For the essence and being of a Creature for that which is Concreated born with a Creature Connatural with it For that which is proper Genuine and Innate For the Natural Law particularly Aelohim will not change what He did create to be pure and good naturally essentially so It is the Seventh-days proper nature to be the Weekly-Sabbath This Seventh-day and the Weekly-Sabbath were Concreated It was so made and ordained according to pure Primitive Creation When the first pure created state of what Aelohim made was defaced by sin much of his doing in the World is to bring back to that Original purity and goodness Therefore the work of Redemption is set out by Creation and for the same reason it is called a renewed Creation So is his work of Preservation of and of Providence over his creatures So will his work of Regeneration and of Conversion still be Thus also his constituting of his Church Thus also his work of Instauration and of Renovation of the Heavens and of the Earth This work of first Creation by the creating Messiah is the rule and Standard the pattern and exemplar to which all must be brought It is as to the final cause
Instruments Meats and to other things It is also applyed to the seventh-Seventh-day Sabbath which Aelohim did sanctifie for holy Uses and to no other day of the whole week as such at the first Creation according to the Nature of its Essence in the order of its being before those after superadded Ceremonies and Shadows So that in this sense Right Reason would inform all reasonable men and women in the World that the Seventh the last day in every week has a concreated adaptness to be a day of holy Rest for the worship of their Maker and that they themselves should be an holy people separated to the service of the holy God Though his Church and People are thus sanctified and severed from other people by Jehovah in a peculiar especial manner his Elect yet more especially As for the Law of the ten Words if we look upon it in its superadded Ceremonies and some such other intermixed Annexes so it had somewhat peculiarly belonging to the Israelitish Church and people in Moses's time and to those of other Nations who were prosâ—lited to that Ceremonial Typical way under that Administration Whereas we under the New Testament have another manner of Dispensation of the same Grace in a more spiritual heavenly glorious way Although this Typical Figuring part made no real change even of old upon the Law of the ten Words If this be considered as it is an absolute and perfect Rule of Life comprehending all duties whatsoever and being that Image and Samplar unto which all mankind at the beginning in their representative Head were created in Wisdom in Holiness and in Righteousness which was afterwards promulgated and proclaimed by Jehovah Christ with a Covenant of Grace intermingled so it is that Law of Nature which inlightned Intellect or right Reason doth teach some notions whereof are still retained even now in man's fallen corrupted estate There are some Seeds of those Eternal Truths and Things some common principles of good and of evil both for the knowledge of God and of his Service and for those Duties which we owe unto our selves and unto our Neighbours This is born and bred with reasonable man every one doth carry it about with him every one coming into this World is inlightned therewithal which Remnants of this Law do serve for many good uses and purposes in civil converse amongst men and for some other ends In this sense the Law of the ten Words particularly that of the weekly seventh-Seventh-day Sabbath is given to the whole World All mankind had it in their common representative the first Adam clearly fully perfectly and have still some Relicks of it left within them by the Law of Nature in the Light of Reason demonstrated by concreated Principles the foundations and grounds of which are knowable by Humane Intellect In this sense the Law of the ten Words particularly that of the weekly Seventh day Sabbath is given to the whole World all mankind had it in their common representative and have still some indwelling Notions of it left within them This Law in some parts of the natural Duties of it may yet by the Institution of Jehovah Aelohim be a sign of some mystical thing signified which doth make any real change in the natural Duty it self this standing still in its due force as before but it may have something further significant in it by the LORD 's special appointment As the State Duty and Priviledge of Marriage in the fifth and seventh Words Instituted in Paradise doth figure the great Mystery of that Mystical Union which is between Christ and his Church People come next to be considered People are sometimes in some Scriptures more especially taken for the Israelites and the Jews These are sometimes in the plural Number called Peoples This People had some peculiar Priviledges beyond other Peoples particularly as to the kingly manner of proclaiming and revealing the Law of the ten Words more in their sight and hearing at Mount Horeb and as to some things afterwards annexed to it which was the Pattern in the Mount Thus Jehovah's holy Sabbath was made known unto the Israelites after another manner than to other Nations Whilst they walked by this Rule of Life they were a wise and prudent people But when they transgressed greatly they were a rebellious people The Israelitish people so constituted as it then was are called The people of God The people of the God of Abraham These had some distinguishing favours in that day People in some other Scriptures are some times taken for all Nations besides Israel and besides those other Lands who were brought over to the true Religion Thus the Uncircumcised Nations strangers from the Covenant of God Indels profane and ungodly they also are called People and the People of the Earth and the abominable People Though these whilst such did not share in choice special Church-Priviledges yet some ways they had the Law of the ten words and amongst others the Law of the weekly Seventh-day Sabbath particularly As this Law of the Decalogue is the natural concreated Law There are divers Records in Humane Authors for those to search after who are curious in such Disquisitions which do evidence that the seventh-Seventh-day Sabbath was generally observed by the Pagans as the weekly Holy Day The remaining Relicks of their Natural Life and Right Reason dictating the equity of this Law which also might be traditioned down to them The Pagan Idolaters so far conforming to the Laws and Practice of the Church of God They acknowledged the seventh-Seventh-day as more holy and owned its Rest from labour And the Ethnick Doctors in this way of teaching would Philosophize only on the seventh-Seventh-day Sabbath Then did they frequent their Temples and then some of them sung their Hymns to their Idol God These Precepts of the Decalogue were the Law of our Creation they are the natural Dictates of the Humane Essence in its rational Exercise ingraft Notions concreated Characters wrought into the essential composition of our natural Being the Sanction whereof has more or less a living impression in the Humane Existence The very order of the Days in the first created Week did teach the observation in the weekly Seventh-day Sabbath and made it a part of the Law of Nature Aelobim's Method in the Creatures Production which did so dispose of his Works and of his Rest hath confirmed this Order in laying its foundation in created Beings And this is a very forcible way of right arguing used by the LORD himself in his Word in divers cases The six forgoing Days of the Week for Work and the seventh the last Day of the Week for Rest These were from the beginning of the Creation Designed they were thus originally appointed by the Creator himself and so laid as a standing Law upon the Rational Creatures The natural equity whereof man's Representative in Adam readily submitted and subjected and conformed to there being both
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ΣΑΒΒΑΤΙΚΗ ΗΜΕΡΑ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Septima dies Dies Desiderabilis SABBATUM JEHOVAE The Seventh-Day-Sabbath the Desirable-Day The closing completing DAY of that FIRST Created Week WHICH Was is and will be the just Measure of all succeeding Weeks in their successive Courses BOTH For Working in the six foregoing DAYS and for Rest in the Seventh which is the Last Day by an unchangeable LAW of well-established Order Both in the REVEALED WORD AND IN CREATED NATURE The SECOND PART By FRANCIS BAMPFIELD Printed in the Year 1677. THE SUMMARY CONTENTS OF THE Second Part OF THIS TREATISE ATransition from the First to the Second Part Page 1 2 3 Of the Seventh-Day p. 3 4 Q. Whether the Seventh-day which is the last Day in every Week in the weekly Revolutions and orderly Returns thereof have been from the Beginning and so continued to be all the Old Testament-administration of Grace thorow and be so under the New Testament dispensation of Grace all along to this Age of the Church and will be so to the End of the World the weekly Sabbath day 4 The Answer at large given to this Inquiry is in the Affirmative that it is so from 4 to 149 Vnder this Answer are divers particular useful Truths and Duties opened As that the seventh-Seventh-day was Created for to be the weekly Sabbath the last day of the week being that Seventh and no other day of the week so Thus it was in the Primitive Creation 4 5 6 7 Which matter is resolved into a Scripture Determination 4 5 6 7 That all the Reasons which Jehovah Aelohim doth give for the due Observation of a weekly Sabbath do belong to to the Seventh which is the last day in every week and to no other day of the week as such 7 8 9 10 That Aelohim rested from his Works of the foregoing six days of the week on the Seventh day as the weekly Sabbath-day Which Seventh day Sabbath righteousness in Christ is that Righteousness which a Believer is to apply himself to cover his Sabbath-unrighteousness 7 8 That Aelohim Blessed the Seventh which is the last day in the week that and that only and no other day of the week as the weekly Sabbath day 8 9 That Aelohim sanctified the Seventh which is the last day in the week that and that only and no other day of the week as the weekly Sabbath-day 9 10 That all the Scriptures thorow where the Holy Spirit doth speak of a weekly Sabbath-day there the name and thing of a weekly Sabbath is given only to the Seventh which is the last day in the week in the weekly Revolutions and successive Courses of it and to no other day of the week as a weekly Sabbath-day Page 10 11 That no Command is given for the observation of any other day in the week as the weekly Sabbath-day but only of the Seventh which is the last day in the week in the weekly returns of it 11 to 15 Where is also further discovered that pretended unwritten Institutions for a First-day weekly Sabbath are a false deceitful wrong cooked rule which we may neither measure nor walk by 12 13 That Christ as Mediator had it not in Commission from his Father to change the weekly Sabbath-day from the Seventh to the First 13 14 15 That there is no Promise made to the observing of any other day in the week as the weekly Sabbath-day but only of the Seventh-day which is the last day in the week in the weekly returns of it 15 16 That there is no threatning all the Scriptures thorow either denounced against or executed upon any that shall not observe any other day in the week as a weekly Sabbath-day but only against and upon such as will not observe the Seventh-day which is the last day in every week 16 to 19 That Aelohim bath put this weekly Seventh-day Sabbath into Created Nature by a standing unchangeable Law 19 20 21 22 Here is declared what is meant by Nature in Scripture 20 21 22 Where also seeing it is called for by some as an argument to men is disoovered That this particular Seventh-day which we now count to be the last day of the week is the Seventh-day by the Judgement and Tradition of such Historical Records as many are so fond of although we do bottom our judgment and practice upon Scripture Revelation and created Nature 22 23 24 25 Objections against this Seventh-day Sabbath are answered from 25 to 147 Here is proved that it was not a seventh part of weekly time or a seventh day But the Seventh-day the last day in every week this and this only is the weekly Sabbath-day having a special honour put upon it by Aelohim himself by notes of Demonstration by particles by pronouns by praepositions all significant in their places to point out the Seventh-day to be the only certain known determinate fixed particular unchangeable day of the weekly Sabbath where the emphatickness of the Hebrew Ha is asserted 25 to 33 It is further evidenced that what is in the English Transsation in seven places of the New Testament the first day of the week is in every one of them in the Greek one of the Sabbaths in propriety of speech and so its colourable pretence for a First day weekly Sabbath is convincingly reprehended as Scriptureless from 33 to 45 That five of these seven places mentioned in the four Evangelists relate to the Paschal Sabbaths and not to the weekly Sabbath 33 to 41 That Believers in the times of Christ and of his Apostles before the New Testament was written could find nothing in all their Scriptures of the Old Testament for a pretended First day Sabbath 32 33 That in one place where it is The first of the Sabbath this speaks nothing to any change of the weekly Sabbath from the Seventh to the First day but has a quite another meaning both in the significancy and in the intendment of that phrase 35 36. 37 38 That the weekly Sabbath under the New Testament is not barely or no more than an half-holy-day between Sun rising and Sun set but that it is an whole Seventh-day from Evening to Evening 38 That Christ's Redemption Work as well as his Creation Work has established the Seventh-day to be still the weekly Sabbath day 39 40 That Acts 20. 7. is no firm ground to bottom the pretended First day Sabbath upon 41 42 43 Neither is 1 Cor. 16. 2. 43 44 That the eleven Disciples did not meet on Christs Resurrection Day as a newweekly Sabbath day in memory of that Rising 45 That the weekly Sabbath under the new Dispensation is not left so much in the dark and deep as some pretend but is clearly the Seventh-day in the plain Precept as of old 46 47 That the true stating of the Matter of right in this Question about the weekly Sabbath doth not depend upon Ecclesiastical History Page 47 to p. 62 That mens cause of
on the Sabbath In obedience to this Law and Command of Christ it was that Paul preached and the People heard the word of God on this sabbath-Sabbath-day some years after Christ was Ascended up into Glory Whither can the Observers of the First day as the Weekly sabbath-Sabbath-day go to find out Commands in the whole Scripture for their day One of the adversaries of the seventh-day-seventh-day-Sabbath who appeared in Writing against a Letter of another to him upon his own desire which conteined some reasons and Scriptures for the weekly-seventh-day-weekly-seventh-day-Sabbath He in delivering his Judgment concerning the First day upon this Question whether there be any Express word for the Institution of the first day of the week to be observed as the Lords-day the day for his Weekly Sabbath has these passages we might say that it might be Instituted though it be not Recorded he meaneth in the Scriptures When and where and again t is acknowledged saith he we have no express word in so many letters and Words or Syllables for the Institution of the First day of seven And a Third time what if it should be said that he that is that Jesus Christ the Mediator did according to his Power actually change the day though when and how it be not recorded And a Fourth time why might he not Institute this he intends the first day although it be not expressed when or where and though it be not recorded Observe here thou who readest this with a desire to have the mind of Christ in this matter Suppose in the serious tenderness of thy Heart thou shouldest enquire of this Answerer whether there be any Institution of the First day of the week to be Observed as the Weekly Sabbath-day under the New-Testament in the Room of the weekly seventh-day-Sabbath and he should say there may be an Institution of the First day of the Week as the Weekly-Sabbath-day though it be not recorded Suppose thou shouldest further ask when for the time might this Institution be if it were at all And he should reply there might be an Institution though it be not recorded when for the time Put case thou demand of him further where for the Place might this supposed Institution be And he should tell thee there might be an Institution though it be not Recorded where for the place Upon this thou further propoundest this to him how is this pretended Institution for the occasion or manner that I might be somewhat Directed in my practise if it were manifested to be my Duty to observe the first day as the weekly Sabbath-day To which he should return thee these words there might be an Institution though it be not recorded how for the occasion or manner Can such answers as these give thee any Convincing Demonstration or satisfying Evidence What After all thy Trading in Sabbath-Religion wilt thou at last be sent thou knowest not whether to pretended unwritten verities for thy Religion Art thou under any Obligations of Conscience in these matters to beleive further than what is written Can thy spiritual Appetite savour in such Cases what is not written As for any other Framed Fancyed Forged Grounds of Instituting the First day as the weekly sabbath-Sabbath-day from pretended practise of the Apostles for this end in this or any other Author I meet with or from what other Reasons Conjecturally unscripturally suggested it will be spoken unto in its place Only here is one part of the fore-mentioned passage which I would write somewhat about lest the force of the answerers Arguing should be thought to be passed by unobserved which is that expression according to his Power whereby the answerer intends that Jesus Christ as Mediator had Power to Change the Weekly Sabbath from the Seventh which is the last day to the First day of the Week What Power the LORD Jesus Christ as Mediator has received I thankfully acknowledge and through Mercy and Grace purchased by him for me and freely richly given from the Father to me in the supplies of the holy Spirit I have been for several years an applyer of a liver upon and somewhat an Improver of though I find great cause to be deeply humbled for that I have put it to no better use As for the Power of Christ considering him as mediator we have it from his own Mouth in his life time that the Father had given all Judgment unto the Son That the Father hath given unto Christ Power to do Judgment because he is the Son of Man that the Father hath given all things into his hand And a little before his death that the Father gave him power of all Flesh And after his Resurrection that unto him all Authoritative Power was given in Heaven and on Earth This is my Faith and my Food Yet withal it must be considered that Christ as Mediator was one put into Office by his Father and sent by him in a delegated Function having his proper work assigned him And thus his Power was Limited Let us search whether the whole Scripture be profitable for this In the Law of Moses there is a Prophesie that Jehovah the Aelohim of his People would raise up unto them a Prophet meaning the LORD Jesus Christ as is manifest by a collation of those other Scriptures which do so interpret this from the midst of them of their Brethren like unto Moses unto him they were to hearken and I said Jehovah the Father will give my words into his Mouth and he shall speak unto the People all that I shall Command him And it shall come to pass that the Man who will not hearken to my words which he shall speak in my name I will require it of him Remark here It was the Father who raised up Christ to this Office of being a Prophet they were the Fathers words which were given into Christs Mouth and Christ was to speak unto the People all that which the Father should Command him They must be the Fathers words and it must be in the Fathers Name that Christ was to speak To this Clause in the Commission must Christ keep close And accordingly so he did In the Book of the after-Prophets you may read Jehovah the Father thus speaking concerning his Son Christ behold my servant whom I uphold mine Elect my Soul delighteth I have given my spirit upon him he shall bring forth Judgment to the Nations Christ as Mediator was his Fathers Servant he took upon him the Form of a Servant and the Servant must keep close to the will and word and Command of him whose Servant he is especially in this case where all and every of the words and wills and Commands of the Father are Holy just and good And it is fore told of Christ that he would when he had a bodie Prepared for and taken to him thus bespeak his Father I take pleasure O my Aelohim to do thy well-pleasing thy will as Christ else where in the history of
thereof for the glory of Aelohim The glory of Christ The good of the Elect and of the Believing The work of Creation in that one week of the Erected World was a glorious work every way perfect particularly of Man as Man That Sabbath which was thus from the beginning must still stand The first created Seventh-day-Sabbath is throughout the Scripture most natural according to the Scripture This alone and no other Day is the Sabbath in pure created Nature This Seventh in order has the natural name of Sabbath which the First second third fourth fifth and sixth have not The creation has a natural order The several works thereof having been so created in such due order in six distinct days doth carry that along with it in the very nature and order of their creation which would convince a natural conscience exercising right reason especially when the true information and clear discovery thereof is brought unto him by Scripture-revelation that the Creators wisdom doth shine forth in that order and that this self-evidencing light should be received entertained and improved with ready submission to its obliging Law which doth bind such a natural conscience to believe observe and obey it The first created time as to the weekly Sabbath was perfected and appointed in its proper prime pure and natural Created state and therefore the created order of the seven days of that one week must still keep their natural Names and so the last day of the week and no other is alone the seventh-day and the Sabbath-day Which day then cannot be altered unto a working-day Aelohim's Law must still be obeyed and his Example followed whilst Time has duration To carry the Sabbatizing rest from the seventh to the first day and the Labouring-service from the first to the seventh-day is contrary to the purest Created Nature There is not a translating either of the Work or of the Rest from one day of the week to another Aelohim would not have either of these to be separated from his from their appointed seasons It must abide to the End what was thus from the Beginning What the Holy Law of pure Nature doth confirm doth remain unmoved through all the Dispensations of Grace both of the Old and New-Testament-Administration This doth not destroy that which is pure and perfect in its natural created Being Scripture and Nature are in Harmonious Concord in this matter This seventh day is peculiarly sequestred by Aelohim for a Sabbath and has this Preeminence beyond all the rest the Vote and suffrage of Primitive Nature doth determine and conclude it to be so And what is Man that he attempts to change this Time and Law by a Devising of his own heart and to level this Honorable Day with the rest seeing it was the Institution of Aelohim in the very Forming of Created beings The Holy ends whereof were concreated uses natural and permanent for this portion of Time Which seventh day may not therefore be employed about the common ends uses and works of the six foregoing days of the Week Which six days in their order and names have their several distinct Existence as sense doth plainly demonstrate by the continued successive courses of Night and Day in their seasons At the first framing of Nature the very time it self of the seventh day was on that same day created and made an Holy Rest and was by Law and Sanction so declared The time it self of the seventh-day-Sabbath As such was and is and will be That distinct part of Time which was the object of Aelohim's blessing and sanctifying of it as the natural Weekly Sabbath to be a day of Holy Rest having Foundation in its own natural Existence This is manifestly evidenceable to every rational Man's revived nature and it is perfectly demonstrable by Scripture-revelation to every considering Believer who gives himself impartially to understand the substance and the end of Aelohim's creating of such a separated determinate portion of Time This is the true Doctrine and the Genuin meaning of the weekly-Weekly-Sabbath Man and this seventh-day-seventh-day-Sabbath being created in one and the same week will be coeval whilst Weeks do last They will live and stand together The fittedness of this Day was a Creating-Act The reason of which Day is of natural self-Manifestation and Obligation in which we are confirmed by Word-revelation This is the prime Make of it having its first rise with Created Nature and so is Perpetual and unchangeably fixed An Individual-Sabbath-day untransferrable to any other Day of the Week Sabbath-day and seventh-day are Connatural and Reciprocal Sabbath-worship and service must be done on the Day thereof All days of the week are not of equal accompt with God neither have they the same Honour Christ Himself hath put the Crown upon the Head of the Seventh-day and so let it enjoy its sole and lasting Royal Dignity It having a concreated Excellingness which will be and abide with it through the duration of the World A Primitive Constitution that must stand firm It is a distinct day and has a distinct word for it Thus let the Scriptural compleat Journal and its perfect Diary of that one Created Week in seven distinct days remain in its unmoveable Order And now if this Argument drawn from pure Primitive Created Nature be convincing and demonstrative let that Great Ratiocinator call to mind his Expressions I can consent saith he that all They take the seventh-day for the Sabbath who can prove it to be by meer natural evidence and in another place he thus writes This is the very hinge of all our Controversie For if this be once proved we shall easily consess that it he speaks of the Seventh-day-sabbath is not abrogated For Christ came not to abrogate any Law of Nature And further he writes That the great Laws of nature containing Man's Duty to God resulting from and manifested in our nature As related to God and in the nature of things or the works of God was still made the chief part of the Redeemer's Law So that this Law of nature whose sum is the love of God and of his Image is ever the Primitive unchangeable Law No title of this shall ever cease if Nature cease not The seventh-day thus speaks for it self and has its Creator and his word cogently pleading for it No other day of the week either in name or in nature is the Seventh-day The order of the Days is sensible from the first to the seventh He that can tell the days and knows their number understandeth that there must six go before in the same week ere he can come to the seventh A day which cannot be lost by all Mankind Will any apprehend that all and every of reasonable creatures have out slept just one whole day or more whereby this accompt is disturbed What colour is there for such an apprehension And if for Disputes sake such a groundless supposition were admitted yet the Day if thorowly searched after
were with a Finger the Seventh day to be the Remarkable day of the whole Week a day to be Sabbatized and rested in distinct and separated from all and every of the other foregoing daies in the same Week All these scripture-Scripture-reasons are strong and might be enlarged upon This Note of Demonstration doth come from a word which doth signifie Lo Behold So that it doth set out the Gesture Posture and carriage of one who doth plainly and particularly point out a day to be specially observed by the Beholders and Hearers It doth significantly note a certain day and doth restrain and confine it to that and to that only It doth plainly Import an Emphatical Certitude Whence the Greeks have taken their Significant Article this being the Initial Letter of a Demonstrative Article And this the Hebrew Grammarians do generally acknowledge that It doth denote an Emphasis and is used to a Certain and known thing so distinctly and expresly is the Excellency of this Seventh day indigitated as its being the only day of the whole Week for the weekly Sabbath day to prevent any the least doubt or question about the matter For which end also there is this Emphatic-Article prefixed before the Sixth day in order of time which doth in that place Demonstrate that as the work of that Sixth day was somewhat more remarkable and that Aelohim has perfected all the Works which he propounded and purposed to Create in the foregoing Six daies of this one week of the Created World shewing a thing known and Signally illustrious and commendable So also that that day only was the Sixth day in the Weekly revolution and no other day and that the Weekly Sabbath must be reckoned in order of Created time the immediately next succeeding after that Sixth which was the seventh day the last day in the week Thus also in another place before the Promulgation of this Law of Mount Sinai these Emphatic Articles are Remarkable where it is once before the Sixth day to fix that to a certainty Which is the Immediate preceding day once before the Sabbath day and four times before the Seventh day that there might be not the least Colour or pretence for any mistake in that forementioned place in the History of the Creation There is a Particle which is not only a Note of the accusative Case but it doth also signifie the very self-same-substance of a thing Which together with this Notificative doth point out the seventh day Sabbath to be the most Glorious Renowned day of the hebdomadal revolution or weekly return of dayes not only Grammatically in the signification of these Prefixes but also Physically in the nature of the thing it self as the Seventh day the last day in the week That Particle is significant of a Person or thing which cometh from a word that doth denote a coming with speed It denoteth this Created day passive upon which the Creator Acted signifying the substance of the seventh day made being a note of an Article and also of Demonstration This Seventh-day besides its being thus notedly expressed is also set out by a Primitive Noun signifying him or it and also by an Affix contracted of another word which doth obtain the Nature and significancy of a Pronoun For Affixes are Demonstrative Pronouns signifying in him or in it The proper significancy of a Pronoun is to set out a certain and a Finite substance it signifyes somewhat more certain and more First than a Noun or a proper Name As if thou say this is my Father he is my Brother pointing but both the one and the other with the Finger to some by-stander it is better known than if thou shouldst say John is my Father Thomas is my Brother because there may be and are more Johns and more Thomas ' s. I Thou and he do more set out an Individuality than the Name of Caesar for neither when I say I canst thou understand another or communicate it with another Whereas when I say Caesar my understanding also may transmit it to another as from Augustus Caesar to Tiberius Caesar Hence the Hebrews call the Pronoun by a word which doth signifie Cognames because they are another kind of Cogname of the Principal name or Nown Nouns do properly signifie things and Cognames are Accessions to Names from some vertue or vice or event or such like in the things In the present Case the Seventh-day-Sabbath is an Hereditary Cogname received all down along in Scripture from the first Week of the Created World and is Inherent in its own excellency of Created Nature As a Noun doth Enuntiate what a Person or a thing is all the Affixes are Demonstrative To question the Emphaticalness of this Notificative besides that it is contrary to the Judgment of the exactest of Hebrew Lexicographers and Grammarians is also chiefly opposite to the true genuine Proper Signification and usage of the Letter in the Scriptures whoever doth assert that it doth not at all limit specifie or determine doth speak too hastily and unadvisedly It is Emphatically discretive that by which one thing is differenced and distinguished from another even where some other Hebrew Letters Consonants do exclude this Emphatick Note yet there the excluding Letter doth receive the point of the Excluded For Twelve times it is prefixed before those Letters which doth manifestly shew that this Letter will have some signifying place in the word It being a prefix of use and of some notable meaning where it is and will some way or other maintain its title and have a Compensation It s Primary signification is to hold forth what is joyned to it and to make its significate the more known A late learned Writer should therefore a little look over what he hath Written about this and somewhat further Consider and not conclude that the discerning inquirer in this age of growing Light will be so imposed upon by any mans bare say of Magisterial dictate without any probation at all to assert that this prefix to Sabbath in the Fourth word is Redundant and doth tend nothing to the Determination of a Certain day but only denotes one of seven Which doth now lead me to another cogent Reason for the Demonstrativeness and Notificativeness of this Prefix because the Law of the Seventh-day-Sabbath in the Ten words being much in the same words and expressions with the forementioned place in the History of the Creation has not only a special Note of Remembrance set before it remember thou or rather to remember and it doth set out one Main great End of Mans being Created even to remember the Seventh-day-Sabbath Man is bound for ever for it is infinitive indefinit to keep this in mind for himself and to mention and to speak of it to others It is the Duty of Created Man to look well to this that the Seventh-day-Sabbath be not forgotten by him but duly remembred in
third and sourth Chapters to exhort the Christianized professing Hebrews to take great heed lest they were shut out of it by their unbelief unperswadableness and disobedience as the unbelieving unperswadable and disobedient of old amongst the Israelities did not enter into the Land of Canaan which was a Type of this Rest The parallel of the As the Believers resting from his Works as God Christ God man rested from his Works holds here exactly enough in the sense of this Objector himself For he affirms that in the tenth Verse of the fourth Chapter of this Epistle and in his expression upon it that the Works which Christ did rest from were all that he did and suffered from his Incarnation to his Resurrection as the Mediator of the Covenant with all the Fruits Effects and Consequents of what he so did and suffered as belong to these Works And so shall Believers Rest when they shall pass into Glory from what they did and suffered for Christ here As Christ shall suffer no more and dye no more so Believers shall suffer no more dye no more when once raised as Christ is risen As Christ so ceased from Working as yet to continue the Work of his Grace in the preservation of the New Creature and orderly increase and propagation of it by the Spirit so shall Believers so cease from this working here as yet to continue in the full supplies of the holy Spirit for ever in the acting of Grace perfected in Glory in the freest largest exercising and putting forth thereof according to the capacities and powers of the New Creature when thus growing up to it s well proportioned measure of a perfect man keeping the New Creature by a Power received from Christ in its due order and putting it forth to the Glory of Jehovah Aelohim As Christ so Rested from his Works as to take Refreshment in his Works to have satisfaction and complacency in them as those which did set forth his praise and did satisfie his glorious design Thus Believers so far are delighted with what they have done and suffered for Christ as the Father is delighted and pleased in what his holy Spirit through Christ has in wrought in them and inabled them to Work for the setting forth of his Praise and for the promoting of his Glorious Design in the World whilst they were in it and so far they were conformed here to Christ in their doing and suffering here for Christ who will be their Eternal Righteousness even in Glory though they own nothing in any or in all their own Works as Meritorious of Reward or satisfactory to Divine Justice these being the Works of Christ the Mediator by his alone All-suffering Sacrifice So that here is a fair apt resemblance as to Works and as to Rest They do answer each other so far as Believers have a capacity in a way of similitude And this kind of doing and of suffering doth last as long as a Believers life doth last even upon the Seventh-day Sabbath in their weekly Returns according to the Duties of those Days as Christ's doing and suffering did last as long as his life did last even upon the Seventh-day Sabbath There is a Sabbath-service which a Believer is to do for Christ in Obedience to his Command and men of persecuting spirits will be laying on of crosses upon the Believer for his thus keeping the Seventh-day Sabbath holy to Jehovah though a Believer will rejoyce in such sufferings for Christ Only here the Reader may take notice that this Objector doth lay the foundation of his Sabbatizing on the Morning of the First Day of the Week when he supposeth that Christ by his then first rising from the dead did lay and perfect the Foundation of the New Creation I desire that this may be considered How can a serious inquiring spirit be satisfied from the Objectors arguing concerning a Weekly-day of Rest or Sabbath from Sun-rising to Sun-set of that First Day by an Argument drawn from Christs ceasing from his Works of Redemption on that Morning as he affirms when withal he doth acknowledge that Christ works did continue from his Inearnation to his Resurrection without any interruption never ceasing from it all the First Days of his Life Can a weekly half-day of resting from work be demonstratively inforced upon a rational intellect from three and thirty years continued working without any cessation from that working For that is the shortest time assigned to Christ's abode here on Earth though some do reckon more years than three and thirty The Creation of the World was finished in six Days which did lay the foundation of the weekly Seventh-day Sabbath both in Word and Nature to continue every Week As a Law Rule and Pattern for man's working the six foregoing Days and for his resting on the Seventh which is the last Day of the Week Whereas now this Objector would urge upon our consciences a weekly observing of half a Day as a weekly Day of Rest or Sabbath from a continued Work thirty years out-right if not more The Conjunction For in the tenth verse of the fourth Chapter comes next to be searthed into This word doth set out a further Reason of the Conclusion which the Author of this Epistle had drawn from that Psalm and the Parallels which I mentioned before which was in the Sixth and Ninth Verses of the fourth Chapter that there was yet remaining a Sabbatism for the people of God For as God did work and then Rested from His Labors so must Believers work here which when they have finished they also shall Rest from their Labors For is a word which hath such a Syllogistical sense by which often the Reason of a thing is rendred by a Causal Rationality As also in other Languages There are such Conjunctions Rational Sometimes it sets out such a Probation as is by way of Special Declaration of that which before was spoken of in a more general position other times it is a rational transition of another Member of two or of more things propounded Sometimes it is a rational repeating of a Sentence begun a little before and it doth absolve and complete it though by another manner of Speech to mention no more Still it is a Rational All which do well agree here The Believing Israelites had their Work and Labour and then their Rest ensued thereupon when they entred into the Typical Land of Promised Rest and quietly enjoyed it when they had subdued their Enemies And so shall Believers after their Working-Labouring-Season is over here enter into that Promised Rest of which the other was a Type So did Believers who died in the Faith under the Old Testament-dispensation of Grace So do Believers now who so live and so die And so will Believers in the Ages after us As for the Import of the change of the Number from the Plural to the Singular which the Objector would fetch about to his own purpose thus The
the Prophets Should not those who are fellow-members with them of the same body under that one Head the LORD Jesus Christ rejoyce together O how delightful is it to be with them in the Spirit The Church of Believers of old was then more in her Infancy she is now grown up they now have all their Veils of Figures and Types taken off and they see and enjoy Christ face to face They are brought into the light of the Divine Majesty which is in Christ cloathed in our Flesh Christ is now no longer hidden to and from them under shadows these former Coverings are now removed and the clear Light is not kept away They are now able to look into the bottom of Moses's Ministry They now so behold the Glory of the LORD as to be possessed of the heavenly things themselves having a clear view of Christ who is the Image of the invisible God the brightness or resplendence of his Glory and the Engraven Form of his Person There they receive their Reward which God doth graciously give unto his Servants the Prophets and to his Saints and to all that fear his Name Having thus at large manifested it to be according to the Word that there was a Covenant of Grace under the Old Testament-administration and that the privileges of the LORD's Covenant-people even then were the same for kind with Believers now though differently dispensed I shall here further discover that the Seventh-Day-Sabbath it self was some ways a sign of this thus improving this Expression and Meditation to a right useful purpose which some Adversaries do wrongfully pervert to an ill end Thus they object The Seventh Day-Sabbath was a sign of their Sanctification to whom it was given and therefore of a Ceremonial nature and not given to all men These to whom the Sabbath was given to them it was a sign of their present Sanctification but it was no sign of the present Sanctification of all people over the whole World And therefore it was never given to all the people of the whole World but only unto God's people Israel And therefore of no Natural Consideration therefore Ceremonial Thus it is objected This Objection is like to have the more satisfactory Answer if there be a due clear distinguishing of the several things which are contained in it and a proper Application of each Particular unto the present matter in hand that so the understanding Reader and the spiritual Discerner may see that way plain before him which may directly lead him into the Mind and Will of Christ and he may the better learn the Truth as it is in Jesus I purpose therefore to distinguish of Signs of Sanctification of the Law of the Ten Words of Peoples of Ceremonials of Giving this Law of the Ten Words Signs are either natural Signs such as have a force of signifying from the created Nature of that thing which is the Sign Thus the Heavenly Luminaries are Signs of divers things particularly with respect to the Seventh-Day-Sabbath There is the same word in the Original A diligent Observer with the eye of the motions of those Luminaries may see that set Times and fit Seasons for solemn Assembling and for Instituted Worship are directed to and pointed at by these shining Lights to measure out Daily-Evening and Morning and Weekly-Seventh-Day-Sabbath Opportunities for our direction in Working and in Resting or the conserving of the orderly course and state of this World in the required matters of appointed Services due from Man to his Creators and Makers throughout all the Ages all the days of this Earth Which is also put into a Promise And the Covenant of Grace is confirmed by these natural Signs If these be Signs of created Nature of the weekly Seventh-day-Sabbath after the six foregoing working Days in the same Week and this Seventh day-Sabbath have foundation in created Nature and both these be by the Ordination and appointment by the All wise Creator then this being so established by an unchangeable Law of pure Primitive Creation the weekly Seventh-day Sabbath must continue as long as those Luminaries do continue to be such a Sign Which seventh-day-Seventh-day-Sabbath is also a sign of Aelohim's creating the World of Heaven and of Earth and of all things therein in the six foreging Days and of his Resting on the Seventh which is the last Day of the Week This being expresly rendred by himself as the Reason why it is called a Sign Or Signs are instituted which do signifie somewhat by Vertue of some special appointment by the only Supreme Soveraign LORD and Lawgiver Jehovah Christ Thus the Typical Sacrifices and such Ceremonial Figures as were after wards annexed for a time to the weekly Seventh day-Sabbath were Signs and Shadows Types and Figures These were significative of a Christ who was then under that Dispensation to come to be born of a Virgin So they were perfected and accomplished in and by Christ when God was thus manifested in the Flesh when Christ was then born of the Virgin Mary But the weekly Seventh day-Sabbath had its created Being before this and distinct from this and so continued after this did pass into its Antitype This weekly Seventh-day-Sabbath doth stand firm established for ever in the Word and in Nature If the Objector or any other do further affirm that the weekly Seventh-day-Sabbath is still a significant Sign by Institution and that this significativeness is a part of it If they mean that it is thus a shadow of that Spiritual Eternal Rest that Sabbatism which doth yet remain for the people of God in the Heavens let them look well to their Scripture-proofs for this but I shall not contend with them about it it rather making for the cause I undertake For the Type must continue till the Antitype come Let these men therefore keep the Seventh-day-Sabbath till they get to Heaven if ever they come there and then and there they will know more clearly and fully If any further Typical significativeness be pretended and urged when I understand what it is it is like to pass under Examination and Consideration with me Observe here that the Typical Signs superadded unto the Law of the ten Words did establish that Law in the natural unchangeable Holiness and Righteousness of it Only by Institution they did put some further thing into it during that former Dispensation of Grace Or they are notifying-testifying-certifying-Signs By these somewhat is made known and witnessed unto them unto whom these are given from the LORD for some particular use and end Thus the weekly Seventh-day-Sabbath is a Sign Consider here the Law of the Seventh-day-Sabbath as proclaimed and given by Jehovah Christ put into a Covenant of Grace as have been proved Thus it was is and will be a Sign For there is no particular Verb of definite time expressed in one of the places in the Original to determine when and how long so as if then and
spake all and every one of them in a singular emiment manner at the Mount Sinai he spake at other Seasons but this Law was spoken with more solemnity of proclaiming This is that Law which the Apostate Angels were and are trangressors of Satan is the Evil one he sets himself up as a God to be worshiped which is against the first and second he is a blaspheming spirit against the third Word He keeps not the Seventh-day Sabbath and tempts men to profane it against the fourth Words He has broken the Law of his Relation and tempts all both Superiors and Inferiors to break the established order according to the fifth Word Christ calls him a Murderer against the sixth Word An unclean spirit against the seventh Word He is a Thief a Robber a Stealer Robbs men of their holiness and happiness steals away the Word out of their hearts against the eighth Word He is a Lyar against the ninth Word A covetous craver of what is not his own And he sollicits men to covet what is their Neighbours against the tenth Word For this Decalogue is the Rule of Holiness and of Righteousness given to Angelical Natures who were summoned to appear at the solemn promulgation and proclaiming of this Law Even the Holy Spirits are doers of Jehovah's Commandments and they hearken unto the Voice of his Word And what is more yet this Law will be the perfect establish'd continud Law and Rule of Holiness and of Righteousness of the glorified ones for ever in Heaven How great therefore is there ignorance and how gross their mistake and dangerous their errour who daringly assert that this Law was temporay given only to one national people of Israel and some few more as if others were not under the obligation of it at least in part if not in whole Whereas it is a Kingly Law to which all mankind ought to be subject and conforming all being concern'd in this Law all being to be judged by this Law all sin and duty being to be measured by this Law There must an universal regard had to all and to every one of the Commands in the Decalogue both by Prince Minister and People There is a note of universality requiring Obedience to all these Commands and a word of singularity forbidding the breach and violation of any one of them Though Christ have Redeemed his people from the Curse of this Law yet not from the Rule of it the Redemption from the Curse of it doth still establish the Rule of it And as to this particular Law of the weekly seventh-Seventh-day Sabbath there was a mixed multitude of others with the Israelites at the very time of proclaiming it And the Stranger yea the very Cattel are expresly comprehended within the bounds and in the very Letter of this Word and natural Reason for the observation thereof And if men will still be so adventurous in this age of clear Light and of shining discovery as to go on to do the labour and work of their particular Functions and Imployments on the Seventh-day there is no Word of God that doth dispense with this neither can any word of man bear them out in it against a direct prohibition The ten words or the Law of the Decalogue being that perfect Image and exact Sampler according to which all Mankind in the loyns of Adam were at the first created in all Wisdom Holiness and Righteousness as their finite Capacities could take in and it being still the Rule and Direction for the renewing and restoring of Wisdom Holiness and Righteousness in any of the sons and daughters of men it is therefore in a proper sense the Law of Nature and it being so it hath some foundation in the Humane Nature and so doth respect all Mankind Jew and Gentile Male and Female no Sex nor Age no Language nor People excepted which Law when proclaimed at Mount Sinai universally concerned all the men and women that then were since have been now are and that shall be in the after Generations the Head and Representative of us all was under the Direction and Obligation of this Law and so are all the Posterity of Adam Sin was in the World from Adam even unto Moses and Death was reigning in the World from Adam even unto Moses and the Law was existing in the World from Adam even unto Moses when it was a new promulgated for where the Law is not in being sin is not reckoned Thus was the first Adam the representing Type of all Mankind who had this complete Law concreated with the Humane Nature This Decalogical Holiness and Righteousness though not the very natural Essence and real Substance of the Humane Nature nor necessarily flowing from the very principles of that Humane Nature yet was a concreated perfection in him and a connatural suitableness to him it was implanted in Adam's heat which Law and Obedience thereunto was the greatest part of his resembling the Image and likeness of his Creators and Makers it being after the same Pattern a Law commanding all Good and forbidding all Evil a Law of hidden ages without limitation of any time place or person serving all times all places all persons being an absolute full Directory both before and since the Fall whether this Law were given outwardly by the Creator to Adam by word and voice is not now the matter of inquiry Let it suffice that it was given to Adam which all his Postery should conform unto It was continued in the Church all along as a Rule of Life so it was to Noah one of the Fathers of the Gentile Nations who was a just man perfect in his Generations walking with Aelohim and finding Grace in the Eyes of Jehovah he was a Preacher of Righteousness a very Holy Righteous Man and an Obedient Believer The Anomous or lawless times of the later days are compared to Noah's days in that corrupt age Thus also to Abraham who was the Father of many Gentile-Nations of a multitude of them this Abraham had an express full Testimony from the LORD himself that he was such a one as obeyed the voice of Jehovah and kept his charge his commandments and Laws which three words are the same that are afterwards used by which to express the ten Commandments the Judgement and the Statutes which God gave by Moses Aelohim knew Abraham how that he would command his sons and his house after him and they should keep the way of Jehovah to do Justice and Judgement Thus also to Moses and to those of his time before the promulgation of this Law of the ten Words at Mount Sinai Jehovah Aelohim by Moses rebuked those who contrary to their LORD's commandment went out to seek food on the Seventh-day Sabbath and he expresseth himself thus in his convincing reproof How long will ye refuse to keep my commandments and laws the same words again implying that that rebellious disobedient people did continue on to be transgressors
Order to the Glorifying of Jehovah This special Mark is put upon this day to distinguish it from all and every of the other daies of the Week to note the Importance of it and to signify the Antiquity of it It being as old of as Antient constitution as the very first Week of this Created World which Aelahim did expresly command to be observed as a distinct separate Sanctifyed day it being the Last day in the Week And therefore his people have need to remember it that when the time did come about in its Weekly returns it might not be forgotten and neglected as neither its natural Equity There being the same Reasons now as ever which the Lawgiver himself has repeated and revived in the Fourth word or Command which doth set out the weight of this precept and the necessity of Mans obedience unto it The Three former Commandements or words of the First Table are much in order unto this to Remember the Seventh-day-Sabbath For if this be not kept Holy those Foregoing three will be broken as Scripture and experience doth prove Let several other expressions in this Fourth word be yet further Considered with seriousness For besides many other Peculiar Honours which the Adored Almighties the great Law giver hath put upon this Law of the Ten words in some respects beyond any other part of the whole Scripture take we notice of what doth follow more specially and particularly as to the Fourth word about the Law of the Weekly Sabbath This Fourth Command hath Double Accents and particularly that word Seventh which do call upon the understanding Reader for this special Noting of some singular matter in this Law about the Seventh-day-Sabbath There are Four of these forementioned Notes of Demonstration put before that particular day of the Week two of them before the word Sabbath and two other of them before the word Seventh that all may mark it which is the day and what a kind of day it should be observed to be This Demonstrating Note being prefixt when the speech is of a thing certain and known And therefore it is called by some skilfull Hebricians a prefix of Knowledge of the Knowledge of that particular thing Besides two other Particles which do put a great significancy upon that day that particular day And moreover there is one Letter put before the word day In a day that Seventh which doth lead and direct the Observer of the Weekly Sabbath into that particular day the Last day of every week keeping him within the limited bounds thereof to mind and to doe what the one and the only LORD over the Conscience and Lawgiver to the Soul hath appointed him to If any where in the Scriptures of Truth this Note of Demonstration have a more Remarkable Significancy it is in this Law of the Weekly-Seventh-day-Sabbath both at the first Creation and Institution of it and as it is one of those Ten words which alone of All the word of God was more signally written by the Finger of the Law-giver himself Which Ten words are so few and yet with all so full and Comprehensive particularly this of the Fourth word That Particle being a sign which alwaies by hastning is referred to the following word with which it is Construed doth in this place signifie a particular certain day noting an excelling thing known to All to whom the speech is directed This Aeth is twice prefixed to the seventh-day-Sabbath that Jom the day is four times mentioned That Author whom I answer in this doth so far acknowledge the Emphitie Prefix that he saith it may possibly denote an Excellency in the thing it self But his may and may possibly are Diminutive uncertain Termes doing injury to this Scripture which by those Prefixes joyned with the other special remarks doth and must certainly not only denote an Excellency in the thing it self the weekly Sabbath but also tends expresly to the determination of the certain day thereof the seventh which is the last in Order of every Week A case so clear to an impartial Judgment that one who has written both against Seventh-day and First-day-Sabbath yet confesseth And he passeth for a potent Ratiocinator that the day of Gods Rest was that particular Sabbath which Jehovah gave at Mount Sinai It is not A Sabbath but The Sabbath even that which God sanctified and it is as antient as the first week of the Creation the Sabbath must be the same with the seventh Thus he There might be a large enumeration of many particular words in Hebrew which are of common universal use such as no institute custom or consent of men has imposed upon things but created Nature it self by a secret instinct and impulse has assigned to and imprinted on real beings thus as to the present case this Hebrew letter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heh doth take its name from that gesture which generally all mankind do express when they do demonstrate a person or thing Hea Hin Hinnea in Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greek En Ecoe in Latin As when we see a Man that has Hou in Hebrew that is Substance Wealth Riches we crie with some admiration Ha Ho or Hah there goes such a Rich Man and we are ready to point him out with a Finger for that doth please such Men when they are so noted by others The Demonstrative Letter is Consignificative and is not idle in the beginning of those words but doth Super-add a certain signification to them What colour of Reason can there be to exclude the Notificativeness here This being a word or Command so express so weighty so significant with such an Awakening word set at the beginning of it and there being such need that Jehovahs Instituted time for his Weekly-Sabbath-worship be determinately fixed and certainly known How great care should men in Reputation for Learning and for Godliness take whose words with many do go for Oracles and whose mistakes too often do grosly impose upon ignorant understandings of the vulgar and upon the Lazy minds of Semi-Scholars who are loath to be at the pains to satisfie themselves by a diligent search but take up things over credulously upon trust without tryal As this Learned man is an Opposer of those prefixes in the Hebrew so also of the Prepositive Articles in the Greek as if these also were sometimes Redundant thereby Insinuating that it is so in this case Whereas there is much of significancy in those which are Emphatical and Deictical noting some certain thing in a Limited sense not indefinitely That the prepositive Articles in the Greek are not insignificantly redundant but demonstratively Emphatical is an assertion capable of clear proof As also that they are so in this particular Case relating to the Seventh-day-Sabbath as I have already discovered And I am now to give it forth to the Reader in some other Cases For this Objector doth not afford us any Light by which wee might discern when
Believers are said to Rest from What the force of the Conjunction is in this place What the change of the Number from the Plural to the Singular may import As for the meaning and scope of this Scripture in this Epistle The Considerate Reader is desired after his serious seeking of the LORD by the prayer of Faith to be taught of Him and to be led into the Truth diligently to observe how the Aim and Design of this Epistle in this part of it is to confirm and establish the professing Hebrews in the Faith and Doctrine of the LORD Jesus Christ which would be the better done if they hearkened unto what Christ had said in a both Historical and Prophetical Psalm to this purpose and to caution and charge them against an evil heart of Unbelief that would fall off from the Living God and harden them through the seducingness of that sin that he might the more speedily and thorowly awaken and quicken them up to attend unto and to follow his spiritual and wholsome Counsel which was so seasonable in such a time when they were so persecuted for their Discipleship to Christ He sheweth what dangerous Evils were near and what great Mischiefs would follow if they did give way to their unbelief distrust and carnal fear they would then backslide from their Heavenly Calling and from their Holy Profession And if they did live and did in such a state of unbelief and of unperswadedness of unrepentingness and of disobedience they would be shut out of that Spiritual Heavenly Eternal Rest of God in Christ And that his manner of Arguing might be the more convincing and prevailing he brings a strong evident proof of it out of one of the Psalms it being that Scripture which the Author of this Epistle doth Comment upon and expound here Where the Holy Spirit by the Prophet David who penned that Psalm for him having exhorted the Israel of God to laud Jehovah the Messiah The Rock of His people's Salvation and to obey His Voice whilst the Day of His Grace and of their life did last Earnestly dehorting those of his Time and Age from that unbelief which would have an hardening effect upon their heart and exclude them out of Aelohim's Heavenly Rest As the like prevailing unbelief and hardness and disobedience and unperswadableness had shut out many of their Fore fathers out of that Canaan-Rest which was a Type of the Heavenly Rest the Figure of a Better Rest in a Better Country For the preventing of which Exclusion that his speech might come with the more weight upon their spirits David doth bring in Aelohim himself exhorting the people that they would not follow the bad Example of their Fore-fathers who were not of a Teachable Mind nor of a Practical Understanding nor of an Inclinable Will nor of an Obedient Carriage and so die away in their Wilderness-state This dreadful Example he makes use of to awe the Christian Hebrews in his Day unto an abiding stâ—dfast in the Christian Religion lest otherwise they also did fall after the same Example of unbelief and of disobedience and so loytered behind and came not safe-full-home to the Heavenly Rest That the forcibleness of his right Arguing words might not be abated by any who would be Replying that there were other Rests besides the Heavenly Rest which also were spoken of in the Word of God as if it may be the Psalmist spake of one or other of those Rests and not of that Spiritual Eternal Heavenly Rest therefore he reckons up several kinds of Rests There was the Rest of the Seventh-day Sabbath This the Prophet David did not particularly mean in that Psalm because this Rest of the Seventh-day Sabbath was from the foundation of the World the last day of the first created Week Which therefore being from the beginning thus honoured both by Aelohim's Word and in its own Created Nature must remain the Weekly Sabbath-Day to the end of the World And this Rest as to the outward part at least of keeping the Seventh day as the only Weekly Sabbath-day they in David's time had already actually entred upon in the Weekly returns of it Further There was the Rest of and in Canaâ—n which is called the Rest of Jehovah and expresly the Rest where after their Travels and Journcyings their Warrings and Conquests Jehovah Christ gave Rest unto his people Jerusalem in Canaan has more particularly and specially the Name of the Rest he doth declare that neither was this the Râ—ll which David threatned the unbelieving and disobedient in his time to be shut out of For David and they had been and then actually were in Canaan that promised Land of outward Rest Jehovah Christ by his servant Joshua had led their Fore-fathers into that Rest long before some hundreds of years ago before David's Day David therefore speaketh of another Day after those things in a prophetical manner and of another Rest than either of the two forementioned the Seventh-day Sabbath Rest or the Canaan Rest neither could it be meant of any other Rest by any Enumeration of any other particular but only of the Spiritual Eternal Heavenly Rest of and with a God in Christ If any thought that that passage in the Psalm might be understood of any other Rest but this Heavenly one the Author of this Epistle would readily have demonstrated the mistake The Rest that David spake of out of which Jehovah Christ from his Father by his Spirit in his Word threatned confirmingly by an Oath to shut the unbelieving and unrepenting the disobedient and the unperswadable they living and dying such was such a Rest as those who were in a state of unbelief were not actually possessed of A Rest in a Promise a Rest yet further to come offered and tendered unto them set plainly and openly in a Wor. Revelation before them if they did not by their own affected ignorance and wilful transgression exclude themselves out of it A Rest into which sound Believers had entred did and should enter and so cease from their own works Seeing therefore that there yet further remaineth such a Rest so glorious a Sabbatism for the people of God he presseth the professing Hebrews to study and endeavour how to enter into this promised Rest by yielding the due Obedience of Faith in and unto Christ Having thus opened and applyed the Scriptures that we might look the deeper and see the clearer into the sense and scope of it I am next to shew that the Day to Day or this Day expressed in the Psalm and referred unto in the Epistle is not to be understood of the First Day of the Week in the weekly returns of it so as to shut out all and every of the other Days of the Week and particularly as to this of Rest excluding the Seventh day from being the weekly Sabbath for Christians to observe under
the New Testament Administration of Grace Of this I give these Reasons grounded upon Scripture because that Day which is spoken of in that Psalm and made use of in this Epistle is such a Day as doth take in every Day in the Week as the Author himself doth interpret in the same Epistle speaking of the same Day in this very ease and instance now under debate where he puts the Christian Hebrews upon the faithful discharge of that Gospel-fellowship-duty of mutually exhorting one another daily or according to every Day as the Duty of every Day was when they had occasion and opportunity so to do whilst it is called to Day this Day and the next and still the next after that every Day whilst Grace is offered and whilst your time doth last whilst Christ's Voice from his Father doth speak unto you and whilst the Spirit of Christ in the Word and Ministry thereof doth call upon you That Hodiernal Day of which the Holy Spirit doth make mention in this Exhortation has its duration full home to this our Day and it appertaineth no less unto us than it did unto in David's time For the Illative Conjunction Therefore in the beginning of the seventh Verse of the third Chapter doth properly belong to Take heed in the beginning of the twelfth Verse as went before and so must be here understood Therefore as the holy Spirit exhorted your Fathers to obedience under pain of exclusion from the Rest of God so see ye well unto it that you yield obedience lest otherwise you also be shut out of the same Holy Heavenly Rest The Seventh-day is in this place mentioned with a double mark of Honour put upon it that Day that Seventh The Law concerning the Seventh-day Rest or Sabbath was given to Adam from the beginning and put into Created Being in the first Week of the Created World and is therefore unchangeable still standing in its due Force and in its full Authority Whereas in all this passage of this Epistle there is no mention made of the First Day either in express words or by any necessary consequence So that I may use the force of Christ's Reason and the strength of his Argument here which he did in another case bearing yet a very clear like date from the founding of the World from the beginning the First Day of the Week was not the Sabbath whereas the Seventh day was made Instituted and appointed for the Day of weekly Rest the same Week of the Creation when the foundations of the World were laid and when the Glorious Creator did set up his great Works The Day thereof prefixed by David must in this case be some other kind of Day even the determinate day of Grace and of Life and of Christ's speaking Voice during this Day and of the present time That expression in the Psalm to day or this day was spoken and written by David to the Priests and People in History if it refer to that special occasion of the transferring of the Ark when David called upon them to come unto that place of solemn convention for Publick Worship to the Faces of Aelohim the Ark being a sign of this he threatens those of that Day and Age to be shut out of God's Rest of Eternal Life as their Forefathers were shut out of Canaan in case that they did harden their hearts through unbelief as those had done before them which therefore cannot be understood of the First Day oi the Week as a New Sabbath-day take it as in part Historical though it be further Prophetical also which the Objectors would set up in the room of the Seventh day Sabbath For then according to this arguing the people in David's time were bound to alter the weekly Sabbath-day from the Seventh to the First Day of the Week It is evident by divers particular passages as well as by the whole drift of that Psalm that is was somewhat fitted for David's Day and time and for the people of his age although withal there is a Spirit of Prophesie in it For those Hebrews in the days of the Author of that Epistle to them and we in the present Generation are concerned in that Scripture as others also will be in the Ages after us Whatsoever is written in the Holy Scriptures is written unto all of us calling us unto Faith in and Obedience to the LORD Jesus Christ What God spake unto Moses in his time was spoken by God unto them in Christ's time when he conversed for some years visibly openly here on Earth in the Flesh and it is still spoken unto us and in this place to the Hebrews that Day did reach to the time of this Epistle and continueth to this Day and will preach to after times That expression in that Psalm to day or this day is that Day wherein the Voice of Christ by his Spirit from his Father in his Word and the Ministery thereof may and ought to be harkned unto believed and obeyed that is as long as this Call of Grace doth continue and the time of ones life doth last the whole season of Grace is this Day It is a Day taken largely For so a Day is sometimes taken for the whole time of conversation here on Earth For Time consisting of Days Months and Years For the Time of Life The Day of the Israelites was a long Day A Day of about forty Years with some of them in the Wilderness wherein they tempted and provoked God as is declared in that Psalm and elsewhere The Gospel the glad-tidings of Salvation by Faith in the Messiah was preached and the Doctrine of Redemption work revealed to the Israelites in Moses's time and long before that in Abraham's time and further back also and in David's time afterwards though unbelievers did not savingly profit by it To day or this day is every present Day whatever Day of the Week that Day be as it passeth along in order several Scriptures do lead to this sense and for every present Day of the time of the New Testament ministration of Grace There needs no further evidence of this than the diligent comparing of the Scriptures in hand That limited determinate Day is that Time which the Sovereign LORD over all hath set unto his speaking to particular persons and to their Life-time of hearing and it doth much refer unto that term of Years which he did set and fix in Moses his time to the unbelieving murmuring rebellious Israelites and is referred unto in another Psalm If To Day were meant of the First Day as the Weekly Resting Day then the Israelites had not been the same Example not so proper so resembling an Example of Admonition for the Prosessing Hebrews to take warning by lest running into their Sin they fell into their Judgments For the Israelites Sin and Judgments for the which they
derivation from hence What is its Alpha Beta Gamma Delta but Aleph Beth Gimel Daleth the power and force the vertue and value in the sound for the manner of pronunciation is much the same and many particular words do in their very sound declare though in some things the Greek Tongue is defective at least as now it is in use particularly in that it wants a Jod Consonant as also in that it has not an H in the middle or in the end of a word which is the reason why we so seldom meet with the Word of Words Jehovah or Jah or Ehieh in the Greek of the New Testament though the citations brought out of the Old into the New have often the word Jehovah and Jah expressed The Original of this Greek word Sabbatismos or Sabbatism is from the Hebrew word Shabbaton as the Greek Sabbaton is from the Hebrew Shabath The sound and the sense going together do enough speak this to every intelligent Man's Ear Thus in Chaldee Syriack and Arabick Shebath is a Sabbatism Shabbathon or Shabbaton which is the Original of that Greek word Sabbatismos or Sabbatism doth sometimes set out the Seventh-day-Sabbath or rest which Seventh day is expressed by this word as one of its Names and Appellations by which it is called Sometimes the first day of the seventh Moon is expressed by this word at another time the seventh year has that denomination and the day of explation also on the tenth day of the seventh Moon is so stiled The reason whereof is that these days and years were observed as Sabbaths when there was an Actual rest a cessation from Work and Labour The Context in this place of this Epistle doth evidence that what is expressed by Sabbatism in one Verse is in other Verses relating to the same matter called hy another word which is a resting reposing a cessation a rest from labour a ceasing from work Which two words much denoting one and the same thing here rest resting Sabbatism or Sabbatizing-rest are both of them in this place distinguished and severed from the weekly Seventh-day Sabbath to be observed here now Whereas the other promised is yet remaining to be enjoyed This discourse being grounded upon the ninty fifth Psalm it is observable that the word used there in the last verse is Menuchah rest quietness a quiet rest an acquiescing from Nuach he rested he was quiet he was at rest he acquiesced A place of quiet and of quiet rest in that place of the Psalm is set out by that word relating to a former passage in Moses time The Land of Canaan was a place of quiet rest when peaceably possessed by the Israelites And it was a Typical Figure of the promised rest and Sabbatism mentioned in this place of this Epistle Which word is applyed to several other things besides the weekly Sabbath As it is the word used to set out the shadowy rest in the Land of Canaan It is applyed to a Man a Man of rest It is attributed to an House an House of rest It is ascribed to Waters Waters of rest of rests and to divers things distinct and different from the weekly Sabbath-day or resting day as such As for the phrase of keeping Sabbath the Scriptures do usually add some other word unto Sabbath whereby to denote that expressiveness Such as to remember a Sabbath-day to this end of sanctifying it To sanctifie a Sabbath to keep Sabbaths to do the Sabbath and such like And some such phrases are applyed unto somewhat else besides the weekly Seventh-day Sabbath As to Sabbatize a Sabbath which was on the seventh year thus to enjoy or to accept or to will Sabbaths meaning the seventh years The next particular which I expressed that I would discover is that the He mentioned in one passage of this part of this Epistle is meant of the Believer The grounds why I so apprehend are as follow Because The tenth Verse of this fourth Chapter doth resume that which was spoken of in the third Verse in both which there is express mention made of the same rest and of the same persons in some of the same expressions where believing ones are said to enter into that rest The He is every such He as is believing and all such The ninth Verse is an inference from the sixth Verse and it hath respect unto that by a corollary he forceth the remainingness of a rest to the people of God Which rest is defined in the tenth Verse by Believers cessation from his works and this Definition is Illustrated by a collation of the example of God who then rested when he ceased from his works Seeing therefore it remaineth some to enter into that rest there remaineth therefore a Sabbatism to the people of God It must evidently follow that seeing the unperswadeable ones to whom this was first Evangelized or to whom the Gospel was first preached did not enter into the Typical rest of Canaan therefore there is a rest yet still behind which the believing people of God have a promise of entring into in the first Verse which is Typilied by that Prophetical word in the fifty ninth Psalm of which more in the next reason The Sabbatism or rest spoken of in the ninth and tenth Verses of this fourth Chapter is that which being Typified doth answer directly unto the Type thereof This Type in the eleventh Verse of the nineth fifth Psalm was the Land of Canaan which is called a rest out of which those of the Israelites who were twenty years old and upward were shut such as were unbelieving murmuring and unperswadeable who revolted from Jehovah Aelohim and in their heart returned back again into Egypt Their evil heart of unbelief made them depart from the living God Those of them who were believing as Caleb and Joshuah Caleb has a remark of He put upon him as the He eminently that had another Spirit with him and that did fulfill after Jehovah Christ and Joshuah was another such He. These and such as these did enter into that Typifying rest where after they had driven out their Enemies they enjoyed a peaceable rest and a quiet safety This Typical rest in the Land of Canaan did not Figure out a first day weekly Sabbath rest into which day as into a resting day weekly none of the Israelites either unbelieving or believing did enter upon as an Hebdomadal Sabbath But it did Typifie that rest in the better the Heavenly Countrey as is expressed in this same Epistle into which none do enter but the believing So that the He who entring into the rest of God in the tenth Verse is any one of the Believing people of God for whom the promised Sabbatism was said to be remaining in the words immediately foregoing in the ninth Verse Which also the reason brought to prove the soundness of the inference doth shew The Illative particle
Scriptures which he doth cite where the word Aemesh is used some of the best Lexicographers and Translators do render it past time and the Past night As for the LORDS appearing to Isaac The same night or that self same night there is nothing either expressed or implyed in this that doth say it was the night belonging to the immediate preceding day light neither any such thing in the forementioned Scriptures in the margin but that self same night doth point out that eminent remarRable night of Jehovans appearing to Isaac to encourage him against his fears promising unto him his presence blessing of him and confirming his faith in the multiplication of his seed the place in Numbers has a quite contrary proof to what this Author doth bring it in for For this morrow did make up the self-same-day with the foregoing Night as may be discerned if that Scriptures cited in the Margin be compared with it That self-same-day That same which followed after in time did belong to that Night that very Night that same For otherwise the Israelites did not come out of Aegypt in one day but in part of one day and in part of another day the same Passover day which began at even was the day of their going out and this Author confesseth that the Natural day began at even when the Israelites were come out of Aegypt The night was made the former part of such a day This was prophesied of four hundred years or more before the full accomplishment thereof That place which he doth urge out of Samuel doth shew that Saul had an intention to have David to be slain in the Morning if he did not make an escape in the Night but that it should therefore hold forth the Morning of another natural day to which the foregoing night did not belong is this Authors meer saying without any evidence in this place Those expressions in Matthew and in James To Morrow doth signifie the time coming but how can this convince us that This To Morrow doth demonstrate the Natural day to begin in the Morning for we have the same expression in the significancy of it in Hebrew above threescore times in the Old Testament after the Israelites coming out of Aegypt relating some to Religious others to Civil affairs in which time this Author doth acknowledge that the Night was made the former part of the Natural day amongst which these in the Margin are some so that even Then as to Civil affairs the Israelites did not commonly account the Artificial day of day light to be the former part of the Natural day which though sometimes asserted by this Author is yet elsewhere in the same Treatise contradicted by him when he confesseth the week days had the same measure even then with the seventh day Sabbath which began at even so that how to reconcile such contrary sayings to one matter I discern not much less to reconcile them both to the Scriptures of truth when men do forget in one part of a book what they write in some other part of it inconsistent with a former passage His other Scriptures out of Exodus Leviticus and Numbers do not witness what he doth bring them into the court for seeing although the Day-part be set in order of place in those citations before the night-part yet this doth not there testifie that therefore the Day-part must in order of Nature and of Time be before the Night-part in the Natural-day for divers other Scriptures do place the Night before the Day and that after Israel came out of Aegypt when he himself owneth the Natural-day to begin at even The same we may also find in the New Testament both before and after Christs resurrection after which this Author would have the morning of the Natural-day to be in time before the Evening of it He that would be informed in the true right order must resort to the first established Law in primitive created Nature and in Scripture determinations when this case is professedly treated of and therefore both in the Hebrew and in the Greek when both the parts of a Natural day are joyned together in one Word the Evening and the Night are put before the Morning and the day So that there is no putting back by Moses nor bringing forward by Christ the account of Nights and of Days but they have all along continued as they were at the first made by the unchangeable Laws of the Creation For hereby doth the LORD prove the unchangeableness of his Covenant of Grace The first Creational days and week were the just measure of every after week and of the days thereof in the ordinary course succession and revolution and particularly the fourth fifth sixth and seventh days of that first created week were measured out by the heavenly luminaries and the three foregoing days of that week were of the same nature As to evening darkness and night going before the after morning light and day all and every of the seven days of that week As days were such as the after-days and were the measure of after-days in their stated order it was night and day in the several parts of the earth as it is now the well setled frame of the standing statute of created Nature is not to be inverted Could not did not the creating Aelohim carry the foregoing created evening darkness and night and the following morning light and day in the same moments of time to cause the same beginnings continuings and endings of nights and of days wheresoever and whensoever it is night and day any where in any part of the earth then as it is now Darkness and light were severed then both in nature and in time this Author doth acknowledge a revolution of them on the first created day and that the night was before the day in one Hemisphere From this part of the earth is the Scripture account in the opposite part it is Sea by his own arguing it could not be night every where at the same time for light was in the other Hemisphere and so the first day did not every where begin at the same time for it could not be day where it was evening and dark nor night where it was morning and light thus has he intangled himself in his own net of humane reasoning which he so spread to have catched seventh-day-sabbath observers If when Sun Moon and Stars were created and put into their moving walks on the fourth day they made an universal day that so all seven might in a just proportion of length and number answer to one another as he affirmeth Then at the same time it was night in some parts at full noon when the Sun shone in its strength and the light was clearest and fullest and then also it was day in some parts at the mid of night when it was darkest as the two parts of a natural day are distinguished and yet
the last and best day of the Week to take my sweet repose in him who formed all these things and who had brought forth such a world somewhat for me vile unworthy sinful me But that which was and is through the Grace of God an Holy Rest to me has been and is like further to be through the corruptions of men a troublesom Controversie from them Must I now be made a man of contention who have so much desired and endeavoured to be a man of Peace My LORD is going forth in his comely Honour riding upon the word of his Truth and he will prosper His Truth is victorious for this must I be valiant and earnestly contend in his strength For this end was he born and for this cause came he into the world that he should bear witness unto the Truth Every one that is of the Truth heareth his voice Happy is he who has a good report of the Truth it self In the Order of my pursuit after the refining and raising of useful Arts and profitable Knowledges I am now led to that day the Seventh which is the last day in the week wherein Aelohim the Creator himself did Sabbatize on this day he rested to contemplate his own Works For having now framed and disposed the glorious Fabrick and the goodly structure of the whole Universe and having put it into its beauteous ceconomy and regular Polity he closeth the week with a day blessed above all the other foregoing days of the Week The righteous cause of which sanctified Day I am now to plead against the many Contenders against it Having thus in a former Treatise attended followed and walked with Aelohim in some of his great Works on the several distinct six foregoing days of this created World I am now brought to Sabbatize and rest with and in Him on his Weekly-seventh-day-Sabbath There are divers profitable Disquisitions that might be made with respect to the Seventh which is the last Day of every Week For the advancement of this Holy Art and for the Improvement of this Spiritual Science which would be a great promoting to this useful Learning As Q. Whether every Day of the week be of equal length Particularly whether the Seventh-day which is the last day in every week be not longer in time and have more minutes in it than the First day of the week If the Seventh-day be found longer in time it has a concreated Excellency in nature unchangeable dignoscible to Sense Q. Whether 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be from Shabath or from Jachab If from Shabath there are many Truths and Duties which that word would clear up and also demonstrate the Observation of the weekly-seventh-day-Sabbath before the Promulgation of the Law of the Ten words at Mount Sinai Q. Whether 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do point out the daily and weekly seasons of created instituted time for daily-evening-and-morning-Worship and for weekly-Sabbath-Worship Q. Whether 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 do not in divers Scriptures set out the Seventh the last day of the Week and this in some places before Aelohims proclaiming of the Ten words at Horeb Q. Whether the LORD Jesus Christ having risen again the Third day according to the Scriptures that Third day be the Full complete Third day from the time of his burial and what that particular large day of the week was and what the certain hour of that particular large day was in which He did actually arise and what Scripture-evidence there is of this which is queried not at all in the least to question the Truth of his Resurrection which we firmly believe but rather to strengthen our Faith therein and to promote Scripture-knowledg of the Doctrine of Christs Resurrection upon which the whole of the Christian Religion doth so much depend and for some other good ends For the present there are some weighty reasons why I do not interpose my own Apprehensions about these Quaeries but leave them to those who are of studious inquiring Spirits who by a deeper search into the word of Truth in the Supplies of the Holy Spirit may make those Discoveries that will at once both convince and shame the ignorant-mistaking-World Whilst for the better satisfaction of serious seekers after Christs mind about the weekly-Sabbath I shall in a Word-way through the whole Scripture where this Case is spoken to and of treat of this one Enquiry returning a plain and as I judge a full Answer thereunto Q. Whether the Seventh Day which is the last Day in and of the Week in the weekly Revolutions and orderly Returns thereof has been from the beginning and so continued to be all the old-Testament-administration of Grace through and be so under the New Testament Dispensation of Grace all along to this Age of the Church and will be so to the end of this World the weekly-Sabbath-day A. The Seventh-day which is the last day in and of the week in the weekly Revolutions and orderly Returns thereof has been from the beginning and so continued to be all the Old-Testament-Administration of Grace through and is so under the New-Testament-Dispensation of Grace all along to this Age of the Church and will be so to the end of this World the weekly-Sabbath-day The whole Scripture is profitable for this Doctrine and for this Duty This closing part of the History of the Creation is express for it When Jehovah Aelohim had finished all his Works relating unto the six foregoing days of this one week The LORD Christ now on the Seventh-day actually perfected and will continue actually perfect in the whole and in every part of it His delegated-work which he had made adornedly-really to exist preparedly perfected and He did then Sabbatize and his will was is and will be that from thence his people shall Sabbatize ceasing resting from other motion and work of the fore-mentioned creating kind In a Day that Seventh from all his Work the which he had made and he did and will bless in word and in deed in a continued way in the weekly revolutions of it as long as weeks shall last in this world That day That Seventh and he did and will sanctifie by severing it from a common use and destinating it to an Holy Use accomodating it to instituted Ordinances of solemn Worship the same because in it he hath sabbatized and will Sabbatize from all his work the which he had created pure without spot or blemish of corruptness or uncomeliness for to make This Seventh is a Number completely perfecting the Week For when such a number of days hath filled up the week then we begin again with one second third fourth fifth and sixth till it comes to another seventh And there the Week in the continued revolutions thereof doth still receive a perfective end The Greek Interpreters here as in a many of other Scriptures else where are Corrupters of the Hebrew Text who do translate in the sixth day for the Seventh and
their pretended reason is frivolous lest the Heathen should think mistaking the phrase that Aelohim did work upon the Seventh-day-Sabbath Whereas he had finished the whole and every part of his creating work upon the several six foregoing days of this one week of the created world Only he did that on the Seventh-day which was proper Sabbath-Work As the making of the Seventh-day the resting from other Functions upon it to institute and observe Sabbath-duties employments and priviledges the blessing of it the sanctifying of it together with his preserving of the Creatures which he had made on the six foregoing days and with his and his Fathers providential working to the upholding of them in their Being Those who do call the First day the Seventh day and the Seventh day the sixth day making the First day to be both the First and the Seventh day and so do alter the names of the number of all the rest do invert the Order of nature in the First Creation For although in consistent quantity such as Extension of parts one beyond another there is not one second third fourth and so on or not one first and another last put into the nature of that created Being because these are not really in the confistent Nature thereof it being consistent altogether and so the first part may be the last part or the last part the first part according to mens common notion and reckoning and appointing of it to be so the LORD not having instituted herein any such Order of Numbring where we are to begin and how to go on and where to end yet in quantity successive as in duration and in time this is of a different consideration both in the nature of the thing and in Aelohims institution For this is really such in existence truly subsisting whether we imagine it or not neither is it left in our power to our disposal to put them into any other Order than the creating Messaiah hath so far as doth respect his established times and his instituted Seasons There is one day a second day a third day a fourth day a fifth day a sixth day and a seventh day in the several successive natures and durations of every one of them Here is part after part by temporary succession in a most direct line and in its proper Partitions and terminating points by an unchangeable Law and well-setled-order of the standing Creation The Work of the six foregoing Days Aelohim did rest from leaving man an example to follow him herein on the Seventh-day-Sabbath The Seventh-day is to be remitted unto Workers who laboured in their several lawful Functions on every day of the week before and therefore Aelohim blessed this Seventh-day because he himself rested on it and sanctified it unto Adam the Sabbath was made for Adam for all mankind in him He hath made he doth he will make it a blessed day in its weekly returns unto the due diligent observers thereof in obedience to his Command in obsequiousness to his Will in Conformity to his Example in Faith on his Truth Power and Promise For this Day hath he severed unto his own service along That Expression For-tomake or to-do doth not so appear to belong unto he had created as to relate unto he will sabbatize or ceasingly rest The preceding Hebrew accent doth somewhat teach this which doth often distinguish so that it signifies that Adam and his posterity ought to do this to observe the Seventh-day-Sabbath as holy and consecrated to Jehovah Aelohim it is their bounden duty to do the same The like phrase we find elsewhere in the Hebrew to make or to do the Day of Sabbath or the Sabbath Which is to observe to keep or to celebrate it The expression is full noting that that Instituted-Seventh-day-Sabbath-work may not be left undone for that time or put off to any other season either before or after Having thus somewhat explained and applyed the Expressions concerning the Weekly-seventh-day-Sabbath in its primitive Creation and unchanged Institution I am now to make a little way for the giving the Reader a more particular distinct full Account according to the Scriptures of Truth why I do judge that the Seventh-day which is the last day in every week in the weekly Returns of it is alone that particular peculiar day in every Week which is the Weekly Sabbath-day to be kept Holy unto Jehovah Aelohim in obedience to his command as such that is to say as the alone weekly Sabbath-day If any man hereafter will engage by Writing or Printing in this Controversie against me whereby to endeavour to build up if he could his first day on the ruines of the Seventh-day-Sabbath let him take notice and remember that I mention my Judgment on this as in other cases Subject-matter to be according to the Scriptures of Truth and that I expect both he and I should submit our Judgment and Practise unto the Autoritative decisive Judgment of the Spirit of Christ in the word of Truth Those that do resolve such cases of Conscience about Duty or Sin into other Authorities do judge but according to appearance That judgment which is righteous judgment is such as is according to the Scriptures Words of Rightness O how powerful are they As for other arguing it hath not that Efficacy of convincing Pauls way of reasoning was out of the Scriptures and his Method of proving was from the Scriptures and Apollos took the same course to convince the erroneous They are the Scriptures that we are to search which those of Berea did daily even when a Paul was the Speaker to them which did evidence them to be a good kind of Christians and Believers These Holy Scriptures are the Scriptures of Truth The Word of Christ is the Word of Truth It is The Truth If any bring a Doctrine or a Reproof or a Correction or an Instruction they should have whatsoever things were written aforetime to be written for these the whole Scripture must be shewn to be profitable for these it was given for such an end That the Man of God may be perfect throughly furnished unto all good Works We may not add unto the Word which Jehovah doth command us neither are we to diminish ought from it that we may keep his Commandments who is the God of his people which he doth command us These Holy Scriptures are they which are able to make us wise to Salvation Though eminent Apostles or an Angel from Heaven preach any other Gospel unto us than we have received we should carry our selves towards him as towards one excommunicate If any let him be what he will though he have never so great a name for Learning and for Religion do teach otherwise and come not up to wholesom Words the Words of our LORD Jesus Christ these are nourishing healthy food other words not agreeing with these are empty Chass and to the Doctrine which is according to right Worship we