his Sanctifying it or setting that time apart from the common use of Man for the service and worship of his Creator and then we have reason to believe he did immediately reveal the knowledge of it to Adam that he might answer the design of God in sanctifying the seventh day for him and to make it a pattern for aster Ages But some have said That the sanctifying of the seventh-day Sabbath on which God rested from his Work of Creation was written by way of Anticipation of the Order of time in Moses Sacred History and so thô God rested the seventh day from all his Works yet the Sabbath was not sanctified for Man till after Israels coming out of Egypt Answer This is a weak and groundless Notion that some have taken up as will appear from the proper sence of the Text and the Reasons following For 1. It 's said That on the seventh day God ended his Work which he had made and he rested on the seventh day from all his Work which he had made From whence it 's plain that God's seventh day on which he rested from his Work of Creation was that same seventh day on which he ended his Work else how could it be said he rested from his work on the seventh day if his seventh day rest was not immediately aster it was ended 2. It 's said God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made Now what seventh day can this be which God blessed and sanctisied but the same seventh day on which he ended his Work from which sence for any to invert the Text is a gross and paspable wrong to it for God sanctified 〈◊〉 because in 〈◊〉 he had rested from all his Work Note it well that seventh day in which God had rested before Moses wrote this History was the same he sanctified that Man should bound his six working days with a Sabbath 3. No Anticipation is to be put upon any Text of Scripture unless a just necessity compell it H. Scursby Discouise of the Sabbath Page 23. 2â— for otherwise the order of History may be inverted at Mens pleasures And therefore the reason why Anticipations are allowed in any Text of Scripture is because there is some necessity or other arising to preserve the verity or sence of Scripture but there is no such thing to be pleaded in this case Therefore no Anticipation to be intruded on the Text. 4. Anticipations are only to be allowed in any Text when either the same or some other Text discovers that so it is but we presume no such thing can be assigned relating to the thing under consideration therefore none is here to be admitted SECT III. HERE I come to open and explain the Law of God which commandeth the seventh day to be observed and because I find that some have taken up an Opinion and I conceive for the sake of nothing else but to escape the Arguments which some have drawn from the fourth Commandment for keeping the Jewish seventh day Sabbath do assert that there is nothing of the Law as given on Mount Sinai binding to us under the Gospel or that nothing of it is obliging to us but what is given forth again and confirmed to us in the New Testament To remove therefore this mistake and to demonstrate that the Ten Commandments are of themselves binding to all both Jews and Gentiles as a Rule of Holy Life thò not as a Covenant of Justification for so they are done away in Christ I shall discourse the more largely of the Law of God and the Decalogue in general and then of the fourth Commandment in particular And 1. I shall here premise Numb 15.14 15 16. Ex. d. 12.43 48 49. Deut. 5.27 Chap. 4 37 38. Chap. 7 6 7 8. Chap. 9.5 Heb. 3.1 2. that the House of Israel with the Proselytes joyned to them by Circumcision having all one Law were peculiarly concerned in Sinaâ—'s Covenant more than other Nations For God having loved their Fathers Abraham Isaac and Jacob he therefore chose their Seed aster them and delivered them out of Egypt to intrust them with his Oracles and Counsels for all the World And to this end he renewed the Law of Nature at Mount Sinai and directed it peculiarly unto them and brought them under it as a visible Covenant of Works requiring their perfect Obedience thereunto and to his whole revealed Will in the Ceremonial precepts added to it And so the Israelites being thus separated from all Nations and under a special Obligation of Ceremonial and Typical service and having a Sacred Record of the Law of Nature with the Promises and Prophecies of the Messias that was to come â—xod 19.6 Isa 43.10 Heb. 9.9 23. ch 10.1 transcribed by Moses and delivered to them they became the Ministers of the certain knowledge of them to all Nations faâ—ther witnessing to the Messias in the Types and Shadows of the Law and by the writings of other Prophets that were among them Gen. 12.3 chap. 26.4 Galat 3.16 Zach. 10.4 Jer. 23.5 6. chap. 11.1 Micah 5.2 Gen. 49.10 Isa 53. Psal 16.10 Psal 68.18 Joel 2.28 29. That Christ should come of the Seed of Abraham of the Tribe of Judah of the House of David and should be born in Bethlehem of Judea that the Scepter â—â—ould not depart from Judah till Shiloh came of his Susserings Râ—surrection Ascension and of the Ministration of the Spirit c. to point unto all the World where and when they should look for the true Messias and how they should know him when he came So that herein the Jews were peculiarly concerned in Sinai's Covenant that under its Obligations and their trust of the Oracles of God together with it the Messias should be declared and in the Typical service of the visible Covenant of Works they should Minister as Witnesses of the Grace of God in Christ to the Gentile Nations 2. But thô the Jews with the Gentile Proselytes that put themselves under their Covenant of Works by Circumcision were under a peculiar Obligation of the whole Mosaical Lâ—w yet they were not so absolutely tyed up unto this Covenant of Works Deut. 4.13 as to be wholly concluded by it unto their Eâ—ernal State for God did not bring that People absolutely under it in all the rigor of it according to its whole Law and tenor so as to stand or fall absolutely by it Promises or Threatnings for the promise of Grace in Christ being given upon the first entrance of Sin into the World and renewed to Abraham 430 Years before the giving of the Law to his posterity Gal. 3.16 17. there was a blessed relief and Salvation provided therein for the Elect that betook themselves unto it and made use of it against the Curse and Threatnings annexed to the first Covenant broken in and by our first Parents and to our Personal Transgresâ—â—ons of the Law So
2. Thô Adam rested or rather abstained from Work on God's Sabbath before he had passed six working days that he might perform his moral Worship to God before he dressed the Garden or meddled in his own Affairs and praise him for the Lordship he had received over the Creatures which God had made and so with respect to the chief Moral end for which the Sabbath was first made for Man it might have properly been called the first day Sabbath throughout all Generations yet seeing God had also designed the Sabbath to be a figure of a greater rest in the seventh thousand years of the World Heb. 4.3.10 Rev. 20.4 5 7. as it is believed by many Christians it therefore could not have been so glorious a Type if it had been delivered to us under the name of the First day So that the Sabbath-day was appointed in the name of the seventh day not to deny Adam's Moral Obedience in keeping his first day Sabbath before his six working days to be a pattern to his posterity or that Adams first Sabbath could not properly be called afterwards successively Mans first days Sabbath but because the seventh day of God's Rest and so considered as after Mans six working days did better suit the Memorial of God's Creation and Rest and the Typical uses of the Sabbath day 3. The Sabbath was commanded in the Name of the seventh day and not of the first because tho God abstained from Work before the Creation yet it could not be said he Rested Ceased or Abstained from Work a day before a Day was made or there was time measured by a day So that the necessity of Nature placed Gods Sabbath after his Creation days but there was not the like necessity that Adam should have his Sabbath before his six working days and therefore seeing that God sanctified the seventh day on which he ceased from his Works of Creation with respect to Man that Man should abstain from his Work to Worship him Mal. 3.6 Isal 40.28 Heb. 13.8 and not because that God himself had need of rest for he fainteth not nor is weary neither is the most high changeable or subject to accidents in his Nature Then the seventh-seventh-day Sabbath bore this Name from the Necessity of Nature in Gods Example of measuring time more than from its proper Nature immediate End and principal Use to Man for in all these respects Adams first Sabbath was his first days Sabbath 4. The Sabbath was expresly sanctified in Gen. 2.2 3. and in the fourth Command in these Words the seventh day and not a seventh day to preserve the constant Order of our six Working days together and that men should not choose any one day in the Week and at their own Pleasures alter the Sabbath to any different day as to the first day in one Week and the second or third c. in the Weeks following so as they keep one or a day in seven in every Week Moreover it is not said a but the seventh-day to prevent Mens Alteration of it to any other day than what we have a Pattern for in the Holy Scriptures that as it was to bind Adam and others after him to the Observation of the seventh-day successively after his first days Sabbath without Alteration so it was to oblige Israel to keep the seventh-day Sabbath successively after their first Sabbath in the Wilderness without a change and to tye us that forasmuch as the Jewish seventh-day Sabbath is abrogated in the New Testament as you may see afterwards in this Treatise and that we have a Pattern left us to observe the first day of the Jewish Week that from thence we should keep our Christian Sabbath successively on the seventh-day after its first taking place by the abolishing of the Jewish Sabbath in the New Testament without Alteration Colos 2.16 17 as Adam and the Israelits did after their first days Sabbath which if the Sabbath in Gen. 2.2 3. and in the fourth Command had been sanctified in the express Words of a seventh-day and not of the seventh-day it might have occasioned Doubts and Confusions about the Observation of the aforesaid several Sabbaths but it being expresly commanded in these Words the seventh-day it does signifie the Mind of God so clearly as both to prevent such Confusions and yet to preserve the Moral Law in the Fourth Commandment unviolated under the change that hath been made of the Sabbath SECT VII HEre I shall prove both from the Holy Scriptures and the Course and Necessity of Nature that the Jewish seventh-day Sabbath is Ceremonial and not Morally binding to all Nations And 1. This appeareth in that it was not only a sign to Israel as our Gospel Sabbath considered as the seventh-day is to us that in six days the Lord made Heaven and Earth Exod. 31.13 14 15 16 17. and on the seventh-day he rested but it was also a Sign and a Covenant throughout their Generations that they should remember that Israel was a Servant in the Land of Egypt and that the Lord their God brought them out thence through a Mighty hand and by a stretched out Arm Deut. 5.15 Therefore saith Moses the Lord their God commanded them to keep the Sabbath-day So then as their Sabbath was a Sign of their deliverance out of Egypt with respect to their Beginning and Ending of it from Evening to Evening thereby to suit their other new days Beginning from their first Passover Evening and so to keep that deliverance in fresher Memory it is Ceremonial and ceaseth as other Sabbaths and Memorials of that Deliverance have done by the coming of Jesus Christ 2. The old Jewish seventh-day Sabbath is proved to be Ceremonial by the Apostles Words Col. 2.16 17. Let no Man therefore judge you in Meat or in Drink or in respect of an Holy-day 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in part of a Feast or of the New Moon or of the Sabbath-days Which are a shadow of things to come but the Body is of Christ For as the Holy-day or Feast-days New Moon and Sabbaths herein mentioned must be taken for those written by Moses and given to Israel because those only and not the Heathen Idolatrous Holy-days were given of God as Types and Shadows of good things to come so the Sabbath-days there distinctly expressed from other Holy-days appointed for the Observation of Israel must be taken for their weekly seventh-days Sabbath and the two Verses plainly comprehends all their Sabbaths and Holy-days to be but Shadows of Things to come But saith the Text the Body is of Christ Object But some do say the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Sabbaths here ought to be rendred Weeks as the same Greek Word is rendred John 20.19 Luke 24.1 Mark 16.2 Matth. 28.1 Answer The Word Sabbath in Greek Sabbaton used in those places is not there translated Week for any other Reason than because it was customary to call the days of the Week the days of the
only Judaical and Ceremonial and also that from the Israelites first observing their Sabbath in the Wilderness we have no certain Pattern for having six working days Originally before our Sabbath And having given some New Testament Instances of divers Cases warranted and reformed by the Pattern in our first Parents to shew that their Example of keeping their first Sabbath is also of Moral use to us I shall here speak something farther to explain the Pattern of Adams Sabbath which I have already largely shewed See Page 24. began with the Morning Day-light as our Christian Sabbath doth And therefore I have only here to add That it cannot be supposed but that seeing God rested on the seventh day and sanctified it for Man that he also rested Gen. 2.3 15 18. Mark 2.27 and was not allowed on that same day to dress the Garden of Eden which was his appointed Work in Innocency For if Adam had liberty to dress the Garden on the Day of God's Rest and was bound to begin his Sabbath after his six working days or days wherein he might dress the Garden precisely after God's Example then he did keep his Sabbath on the sixth day after God's Sabbath and not on that seventh day successively which God had sanctified And if he kept no Sabbath till the next seventh day after God's seventh day of Rest then Adam had seven days in which he might dress the Garden before his Sabbath so that Adam must either have kept another seventh day than that precise successive seventh day which God had sanctified viz. the sixth day from God's Sabbath or have seven working days before his first Sabbath contrary to God's Example or else begin his Sabbath before his working days and then it follows that God's seventh day Sabbath after his six days of Creation was Man's First day Sabbath before his six working days and after them the same successive seventh day next following God's seventh day Sabbath was also Man's seventh day Sabbath too And so the sanctifying of the seventh day in Gen. 2. and accordingly in the Moral Law which was afterwards given forth to Israel was answered under the Name either of the first or seventh day Sabbath And farther to explain this Matter God's seventh day Rest after his six Creation days was not designed for a Pattern to Man that he should also have first six working days before he kept his Sabbath for then God would either have Created Adam with some other things in the beginning of his first days Work and have put him in a Capacity to do some business the six Creation days and then to rest the seventh day on which God rested or else some other way have ordered six working days Originally for Man before his Sabbath but seeing it was otherwise it therefore followeth that God's seventh day Sabbath was only a Pattern for Mans dividing and counting his time and for bounding his six working days that he should not have more working days until a Sabbath nor be at Liberty so often as he pleaseth to make any one day in seven his weekly Sabbath viz. to rest on the seventh day in one week and on the sixth fifth fourth third second or first day in the next week after which would have tended to confusion but that Man should have six working days together and no more bounded before and after with a Sabbath as it was in Adams Pattern And thus our Gospel first-day Sabbath answereth the design of God in sanctifying and commanding the observation of the seventh day because it is a boundary before and after to our six working days Moreover As I shewed before it could not be said that God rested a on the day or on the first day before the Creation or time was measured by a Day and therefore the necessity of the Order of Nature placed God's Sabbath after his six Creation days but there was not the like necessity that the same day of Rest which was also made Adams Sabbath should be before his six working days So that it was fixed by the Lord in the Original Order of Adam and Eves time that we should have such a Pattern that not only answereth the principal End of a Sabbath but all Ends and suiteth with the alteration of it and with God's Example too as after Adams six working days And thô Adam's First-day of Rest or abstinence from his own Business was on God's seventh day Sabbath yet seeing that Man 's Original Sabbath was not appointed to be kept after God's Example of working six days first before his Sabbath we have reason to believe that we also are not to follow it farther than we find by the Example of our first Parents that he designed it should be of use to us But that Adams Pattern was to explain the Mind of God in sanctifying the seventh day which I believe cannot rationally be denyed nor that it should be of Moral use to us to justifie our keeping of the Sabbath after the Gospel Pattern to answer the design of God in the Moral Precept and in his first sanctifying of the seventh day against this Exception that it cannot be said to be Originally introduced by only six working days after God's Example of making the World seeing our First Parents did not follow it in this particular SECT XI HAving thus far treated on the Sabbath Day I shall now proceed to shew that there is a first day to be observed holy under the Gospel from the Types and Shadows of it under the Law for all the 〈…〉 and the Law prophesied until John Heb. 9.23 Colos 2.16 17 and was a shadow of 〈◊〉 my things under the Gospel And as other things were typed out undâ—â—â—he legal Administration so also the Gospel First-day Sabbath was typed forth under the Law as it s said the Feast of Tabernacles and ingathering of the Fruits of the Land shall be for seven days unto the Lord. On the first day shall be an holy Convocation ye shall do no servile work therein Levit. 23.34 to 40. Seven days ye shall offer an Offering made by fire unto the Lord on the eighth day shall be an holy Convocation unto you and ye shall offer an Offering made by fire unto the Lord it is a solemn assembly and ye shall do no servile work therein on the first day shall be a Sabbath and on the eighth day shall be a Sabbath Ver. 10.15.16 21. ye shall bring a sheaf of the first-fruits of your harvest And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the Sabbath from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave-offering seven Sabbaths shall be compleat even unto the morrow after the seventh Sabbath shall ye number fifty days and ye shall offer a new meat-offering unto the Lord and ye shall proclaim on the self-same day Levit. 25.3 4 8 9 10 11 12. c. that it may be an holy Convocation unto you ye shall do no servile work
he cometh home the first-day in Canaan is by his account but the seventh-day and contrarywise if he Travelleth round the World Eastward he loseth in the length of his days but gaineth a day in Tale so that by his account the first day in Canaan falleth to be his second day at his return from whence some have argued that neither a Law nor Example can bind us universally to the Observation of any one Day and therefore if it were agreed amongst men any day of the Week or one day in seven may be made our seventh-day Sabbath boundary to six working days and so would answer the Moral Law Answer 1. The Question is Whether the Moral Law bindeth us to keep the seventh-day which men may appoint at their own pleasures or the seventh-day that we are directed unto in the Holy Scriptures Phil. 3.17 2 Thes 3.9 Surely we ought to exert our Obedience to Gods Precepts after the Examples of those that are set forth to be an Example to us I say not that we should follow them in all things they ever did but in all things they did which were essential to answer any Moral or Gospel Precept given for our Practice and consequently in this particular of the first-day Sabbath For seeing the Ceremonial Precept for the Sabbath is abroga ed and the Course of Nature maketh it impossible to be morally binding to all Nations we have then no other Directions how to answer the Moral Law but the Gospel Pattern justified by the Example of our first Parents and therefore we having a positive Law to keep the seventh-day Sabbath we are under a necessity to make that our Pattern For tho' the Apostle did go into the Jews Synagogues and there preâ—â—â—hed the Gospel on their seventh-day Sabbath 2 Tim. 4.2 as the meetest time to Convert both the Jews and Gentiles who assembled together on that day Yet we no where sind in Scripture that the Apostles Disciples of Christ and Primitive Churches did of choice set a-part that day but the first day of the Week for Gospel Service and this being Recorded as the only Example of the Gospel Churches Obedience to the Moral Law in this particular of the Sabbath surely it is lest for our Directions whatever is otherwise handed down by Humane History as the Practice of some Christians for the Scriptures snew that divers were under mistakes and errors Acts 15.1 c. Gal. 2.12 Ch. 4.21 and Ch. 3 and very Subject to Judaize even in the Apostles days 2. Mr. Chasie saith That Mr. Ironside also from the Diversity of Meridians proveth that one and the same day cannot be universally kept and therefore never commanded the whole Church One and the same day sath he could not possibly be observed a Sabbath by all the Jews in the East parts and West parts 〈◊〉 of Judea and in Babilon and in Rome by Reason of their Diversity of Longitudes And if it be supposed to be but two or three 〈◊〉 difference of Longitudes yet will that difference make the days as truly to differ from being the same as will an hundred and three tho it will not make them so much to differ But altho' this be true and the Law of Moses for sixing the Jewish Sabbath to begin at Even in the Wilderness and in the Land of Canaan was never designed to bind the Israelites to that which is impossible viz. to begin their Sabbaths both at the same time of day and at the precise Point of Time to contemporize in all places where they sojourned yet it doth not from hence follow as some have argued that such differences of days do free us from all Obligations to keep any one particular day so that if Christians agree upon the fourth fifth sixth or any other day of the Week to make it the seventh-day Sabbath after our six working days it does answer the Mind of God in the Moral Law as well as by keeping our first-day Sabbath For altho as I have proved the Jewish Sabbath being by Law to begin at Even was therefore never designed for a universal Pattern to all Nations yet who will say that it was not a Pattern for the Jews in all places that had Evenings where they did sojourn and where the days have no Evenings for many Revolutions of the Sun there was no Provision made for their Sabbath in the Ceremonial Law which they were under For God had placed Israel within other Nations and required all their Males three times a Year to appear before him in Jerusalem And therefore Dem. 16.16 they were not to sojourn so far amongst the Heathens as those Northern or Southern Parts while they were a free and peculiar Kingdom of Priests to God Exod. 19.5 6. So then notwithstanding the Ceremonial Precept for the Sabbath was neither designed to oblige the Heathens In those Northern Countreys if they were then inhabited nor could by Reason of the difference of their days accommodate the Jews to keep their Sabbaths there Yet if that Law was binding at all under the least Alteration of their Day as I think none can doubt of that nor consequently that it was obliging to the Jews in other parts of the World also where the days differed more in Point of Time to begin their Sabbaths at Evening with allowance to comply with the Necessity of the Course of Nature I say then seeing that Ceremonial Precept was binding under such Alterations of their day it must be granted that it obliged them not to vary from one another in the time of keeping their Sabbath farther than the Necessity of Nature did compell them for the beginning and ending of it at the time prefixed by the Law Otherwise if their Law did not so restrain them it was of no force nor use to them and consequently if the Gospel Pattern for us to keep the first day Sabbath be any Pattern at all for us to follow as I have shewed it is it doth then oblige us to observe it with no farther Allowance to alter the day than to accommodate the Necessity of Nature in every Countrey where we dwell Object 4. Tho' Gods seventh-day Sabbath on which he rested after his six Creation days was Adams first-day Sabbath of Abstinence from work before his six working days yet that was properly Gods own Sabbath on which he rested and not Adams because he could not be said to rest before he had any working days and therefore tho Adam abstained from work on Gods Sabbath yet the Moral end of Gods Example fixed Adams first Sabbath to begin on the next seventh day after the Sabbath on which God had rested from his Work of Creation Answer 1. Adam was either allowed to dress the Garden on Gods seventh-seventh-day of Rest which he sanctified and so to have seven working days as hath been said before he could rest on the next successive seventh-seventh-day or have his seventh-day rest a day before it which I believe
the beginning and ending of their days to what they were before the Israelites were delivered out of Egypt or before their Bondage 1. For thô it 's said Gen. 1.2 3 5. That darkness was upon the face of the deep And God said Let there be-light and there was light and the evening and the morning was the first day Yet from hence there is no sufficient ground to conclude Mr. Tho. Chasie in his Tract on the Sabbath p. 4. saith The first things God made was day and night or light and darkness There was in Nature before thô not in time a mixed or confused darkness which Moses called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Arias Montanus correcting Pagnin translateth and calleth it Caligo it was neither perfect day nor perfect Night that the Night was created before the day for Mr. Chasie observes that the Hebrew word signifieth a mixed darkness neither perfect Day nor perfect Night and its rational to believe that those words In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth should be taken for God's creating the matter of the Heavens and the Earth before their form As it s said The Earth was without form and void and darkness or gloominess was upon the face of the deep And then the light and darkness was mixed and confused together and so if the order of expression of Gods perfecting any piece of the Creation does carry any precedency in order of time then the Day-light did Originally go before its Night but I conceive that neither of them was perfectly formed before the other for it s said ver 4. that God divided the light from the darkness which plainly sheweth they were mixed together and that he separated the Day from the Night that they should no more be mixed and confused together as they were before but should be distinctly placed in the two Hemispheres successively to circulate round the Heavens So that at the same time when the Light was separated into one Hemisphere or half part of the Heavens the Darkness was placed in the other and therefore neither of them were perfectly formed before the other in time It s true Isal 45.7 Moses was under a necessity to set either the Evening or the Morning or the Light or Darkness first in the account of the order of God's Creation which he wrote after the change of the account of the day And therefore least he should seem to dislike the Alteration which God had then but newly made of the beginning and euding of the account of the Natural Day for Sacred things he named the Evening before the Morning in the History of the Creation But yet we may plainly see that as the light was put tho not precreated before the darkness in the account of the first days Work of Creation and as it s said That God made two great lights Gen. 1.3.10.18 the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night to rule over the day and over the night and to divide the light from the darkness So the light was counted afterwards for the former part of the Natural Day which consisteth of a Day-light and its Night or the revolution of the Sun in twenty four hours time For 2. We find that God created the Fowls of the Air on the fifth day and the Beasts and Cattel and every creeping thing of the Earth on the sixth day and made Adam and put him into the Garden of Eden and then brought them to him that he should give them Names before that God had caused a deep Sleep to fall upon him while he took out one of his Ribs and formed Eve and brought her unto him It is therefore rational to believe seeing it must necessarily take up time to name the Creatures and that Adam could not so well behold them in the Night as in the Day to distinguish every little Bird and every Fowl of the Air and all the Cattel and every Beast and creeping thing from each other to give them proper Names and to know them again by sight that he was formed in the day-light of that Hemisphere and that he spent the remaining part of it in that affair and that his sleep was in the following Night as the most proper time for it and then from this foot of account after Eve was formed at the Conclusion of the sixth days work of Creation both Adam and Eve first entred on God's seventh and their first day Sabbath at the beginning of the day-light or morning of the day to adore and worship God For as they had no need of the Night to sleep in for that they were newly made and fresh in the Strength and Perfection of their Nature Gen. 1.27 28. and as it best became our First Parents for the Lordship they received of God over the Creatures which he had made immediately to Attribute their Worship to him So it was most proper they should have first the Day-light to behold the Beauty of the Creation thereby to be excited from the Objects of their Eyes together with the Light of their Understandings to glorifie God on the first sanctified Day of his Rest from all his Works So that it is Rational to believe that Adam began his first first-First-day Sabbath with the morning or Day-light and consequently the following working days and Sabbath-days were all so to begin and successively to continue to others after him and according to this it s said a Exod. 10.13 Chap. 13.21 Lev. 8.35 Deut. 28.66 Job 26.10 Jer. 33.20 in Gen. 7.4 I will cause it to rain upon the Earth forty days and forty nights And so in Ver. 12. Forty days and forty nights And Moses was in the Mount forty days and forty nights Exod. 24.18 And in Gen. 8.6 At the end of forty days From which last place it is observable as well as from many other Scriptures b Gen. 8.10 12 Chap. 17.12 Exod. 21.21 Numb 14.34 that the Day and Night together is commonly called Day which is the most excellent part of that which is called the Natural Day of twenty four hours and therefore God might also give it the precedency in respect to its revolution with its Night originally unto Man 3. Leaving what I have already said of the beginning of the Natural Day to the serious Consideration of those that desire Information herein hoping it may be of use to them I proceed to bring in other Scripture Evidence also to prove that before the Israelites were delivered out of Egypt or were in bondage there the Day-light See Purchas Pilgrimage Page 118. lib 2.77 Emend Tem. lib. 1. Ainsworth on Gen. 10.10 Ezek. 23.15 Dan. 1.1 2. Ains Gen. 1.5 See Mr. G. Hughes Analytical Exposit of Genesis on Chap. 1.9 Gen. 10.8 9 10. Gen. 11.27 28 31. and not the Night was counted for the former part of the Natural Day As Purchas tells us citing Pliny and Scal. That the Babilouians began
thereby maketh a new Sacred fifteenth day of the Night of the Civil fourteenth day and the Day-light of the Civil fifteenth Day put together and from thence in an orderly Succession their Sacred time was measured for the due observing of those Feasts Sabbaths and Holy-days which God commanded the Children of Israel But for their Civil Affairs they still accounted their days from Morning to Morning as in 1 Sam. 19.10 And David fled and escaped that night Saul also sent Messengers unto Davids house to watch him and to slay him in the morning And Michal Davids wife told him saying If thou save not thy life to night to morrow thou shalt be slain from which Scripture it plainly appears that after that night the nex Morning or Day-light was accounted the Morrow which was another Day and not belonging to the Night going before And to this Mr. Tho. Godwin witnesseth in his Book called Moses and Aaron page 80. where he tells us That the Jews Natural Day was two-fold Civil a working Day which was destined for Civil Businesses and Works This saith he began at Sun-rising and held till the next Sun-rising Matth. 28.1 Or Sacred a Festival or holy-day destined for Holy Exercises This began at Sun-set and continued till the next Sun-set From all which both Sacred and Humane Evidence I shall make this Inference That if the Patriarchs before and after the Flood and the House of Israel successively had either kept the same precise seventh day Sabbath from the Creation or had reckoned the time of their beginning and ending of their Days and Weeks precisely and successively from thence althô their Sabbath might not have been duely observed in their bondage then the Jewish Sabbath from Evening to Evening after the Alteration of the account of the day could not be the precise successive seventh day from the Creation And seeing the Scripture is silent in fixing the Jewish seventh day or any other Day as that precise successive seventh day we cannot tell which is the same successive seventh day from the first seventh day of Rest which God Sanctified 3. I premise That if the Reasons I have given for Adams beginning his first Sabbath day in the Morning with the Day-light in that Hemisphere of the Garden of Eden should be counted by our Opponents too weak to draw a conclusion for a pattern to justifie us in beginning our Sabbath in the Morning and any should still hold the keeping of the Sabbath from Evening to Evening to be successively from the Creation then we have this to argue against their Opinion That as they have no Scripture for it so the Sun was not made till the fourth day of the Creation and we know not in what part of that day it was Sun-rising or Sun-setting or Noon or Mid-night in any Horizon or Hemisphere except we acknowledge that Adam began his first Sabbath with the Morning and then it follows that a little before the fourth day was ended it was about as much before the beginning of the fifth day with the Morning or Sun-rising in Eden otherwise as it cannot then be known where the seventh day of God's Rest which had the same successive proportion of time as the six days of Creation was bounded with the rising and setting of the Sun but that when God's seventh day of Rest after his sixth day of Creation began and ended any where it began and ended every where at the same instant season and it was no where then any other than the seventh day which began in some places at Evening in others at Morning in others at Midnight in others at Noon and in some or other places at all hours of the Day and Night and the Revolution of the Light and Darkness was the Day which is called Natural in distinction to that which is by some called the Artificial Day or Day-light only There cannot therefore from the first seventh day of God's Rest be any footing of account to measure out to us the time of day for the beginning of our Day nor consequently for the beginning and ending of our Sabbath-day for that it is not known to us where the Sun was when that seventh day of God's Rest first began unless we give way to what hath been clearly demonstrated from the Scripture that the Sun arose or was about rising then to Paradice and to believe as there is reason for it that Adam had that whole Day-light sanctified which preceded the Night of his Sabbath 4. It is very clear that God did never design the Law and Institution of the Sabbath to Israel in the Wilderness to bind either Jews or Gentiles to the observation of the precise orderly Succession of their seventh day Sabbath as from the Creation to the end of the World because we find that God himself did afterwards make an interruption of the Natural Order of the account of Time when the Sun was brought backward ten degrees in the Dial of Ahaz and when it stood still in the midst of Heaver about a whole Day 1. As to the Suns going backward ten degrees Isai 38.8 See his Book Page 157.158 Mr. Weems in his Christian Synagogue has made a draught of Ahaz Dial and explained the matter telling us that that Day was prolonged twenty two hours reckoning the ten degrees or divisions on the Dial to be five hours backward and then the Suns going forward again is 5 hours more with twelve hours is twenty two hours Day-light in all 2. It is said Josh 10.13 So the Sun stood still in the midst of Heaven and hasted not to go down about a whole day Now if we duely consider this place it seems by the Suns standing still in the midst of Heaven that it stood still in the Meridian or Noon-tide of Canaan about a whole day and add to the time of its standing still the half or that part of the Day that was past before and that followed after when the Sun moved forwards to its going down and then that Day or Day-light continued twenty four hours or was about as long as the Day and Night together and so if the Jews did reckon all that large Day-light to belong to the preceding Night then the beginning of their next Sabbath fell later than its usual course about twelve hours time and if they divided that long Day-light and put half of it to the former and half of it to the following Night then they did thereby alter the beginning of their Natural Day for Sacred things and reckon that last twelve hours of Day-light for the former part of the Day belonging to the following Night but such a succession of days for Sacred things was against the Command of God for the Time and Order of beginning and ending all their Sabbaths and Holy-days But instead of these if any should yet say That when the Sun had continued in their Hemisphere about twenty four hours time the Natural Course of the Night being altered
†Or within a very small time of it viz. of their seventh or second-day in the Land of Canaan And therefore seeing the Sabbath cannot be begun universally both at the precise Point of Time and Time of day as it should begin in the Land of Canaan to contemporize with them there And considering that Adams Sabbath was not only designed for the Moral end of Mans abâ—inence from Work for a time of solemn Worship to God but that it had its Memorial of the Creation and that the Jewish seventh-day Sabbath afterwards bearing that Memorial was also appointed for â—loral Ends and for a Ceremonial Memorial that rendred it uncapable of being a universal Pattern and that the Memorial of Christs Purchase of our Spiritual and Eternal Salvation should be preferred before that of Israels Deliverance out of Egypt then we ought to observe our Christan Sabbath as much as can be to Answer thereunto the end of its chinge which may be done by all Nations including those Northern People keeping their first-day Sabbath in Distinction to and from the Jewish seventh day And as for its beginning early in the Morning or at the dawning of the Day the Scriptures shew that so it began in Judea Matth. 28.1 In the end of the Sabbath as it began to dawn or as John 20.1 While it was yet dark i. e. not light day towards the first-day of the Week came Mary Magdalen and the other Mary to see the Sepulchre c. And in Mark 16.2 It 's said they came unto the Sepulchre at the rising of the Sun and ver 9. Now when Jesus was risen early the first-day of the Week he appeared first to Mary Magdalen and said unto her John 20 1â— Touch me not for I am not yet ascended to my Father but go to my Brethren and say unto them I ascend unto my Father and your Father and to my God and your God And therefore seeing the Evangelists have Recorded the Time of the dawning and Sun rising of the Day to the History and Circumstances of Christs Resurrection and that we find he was then but newly riten because he had not yet ascended unto the Father when Mary first saw him We have then greater Reason to six the beginning of our first-day Sabbath in all Nations where we can at the dawning of the day expressed in the Scripture to bare the fuller Memortal of the Resurrection of our Lord than at any other time of the day And this we may strengthen from the Example of the Jews beginning their Sabbath in the Evening here in England and in other Nations tho our Evenings here differ and in other Nations are farther from the precise Time of the Evening in the Land of Canaan and their Reason for it is taken from the Precept of Moses which bindeth them to celebrate their Sabbaths from Evening to Evening Lev. 23.32 Exod. 12 18 19. And therefore seeing God was pleased under the Type of the Gospel Salvation Church and Sabbath to require the Memorial of that Deliverance by beginning their Sabbath in the Evening as the most proper time to bear its lively remembrance and that from thence they conclude it best answereth the express command of God and his End and Design in sixing the Jewish Sabbath to begin at Evening in the Land of Canaan for them to begin it so in other Countries also rather than to begin it at the precise Point of time of its beginning in Canaan and differ in the Time of day then we have Reason from the Type and their Example to begin our first-day Sabbath rather at the dawning of the day in all the World where we can than at the precise Point of Time at a different time of day to contemporize in all places And whatever the Jewish Sabbatharians may invent to say from the Necessity of the Course of Nature in those Northern or Southern Parts against the beginning of our first-days Sabbath early in the Morning or at the dawning of the day in all other Parts of the World the same Arguments will equally serve against the beginning of their Sabbath in the Evening where it can be so observed so that they cannot gain the least Advantage by opposing us in beginning our Christian Sabbath early in the Morning unless they can first invalid and disprove the Authority we bring for our keeping the first-day it self that it does not answer the Pattern of Adams Sabbath the Moral Law in the fourth Commandment and the Example of Christs Disciples and the Primitive Churches with all the ends of a Sabbath which is a task too hard for them And seeing the Scriptures sheweth by the Resurrection of our Lord that our Sabbath should begin at the dawning of the first-day of the Week it must consequently not end till the dawning of the second-day Mark 15.42 Luke 23.54 See Mr. Heemse Christ Synagogue Page 74. Who tells us the Jews had three Preparations to their Sabbaâ—h Succeeding each other And from the Custom of the Jews to make Preparations for their Sabbath the preceding Time from twelve a Clock on Saturday Night vulgarly so called till the dawning of the first-day it that time be not spent in our Nights rest it should be employed to prepare our Minds for the Worship and Service of God on the approaching Sabbath day But to proceed That I may remove any doubts that may yet arise about the usefulness of the Pattern of Adams Sabbath to us under the Gospel I shall add something to demonstrate how far it is of a Moral Nature for seeing I have forborn to call it a Moral Pattern because no one Pattern respecting the beginning and ending of the Sabbath can be wholly alike universally so to all Nations I think it 's therefore needful to explain the Moral use that is to be made of Adams Sabbath that so whatever different Apprehensions there may be about the use of the Word Mortal â—o Adams Pattern the thing it self may be understood and the Controversie may not be fomented about Words which some have made the Subject of much Discourse when they have not been able to Confute the thing that was plainly intended by them 1. Therefore as I shewed Page 2. that from Gods sanctifying the seventh-day for Man the Light of Adams Nature taught him that it was most meet to divide his time like his Creator and so it became the Moral Duty of Men as Men to have no more nor less than six working days to one Sabbath 2. See Page 24. I have also shewed the Reason we have from Scripture to believe that after Adams first sleep in the Night when the Hamane Nature was compleatly formed and Eve was brought to him at the end of the sixth Creation day their Sabbath began with the Morning day light of the seventh-seventh-day and the first day after the finishing of the Creation which seeing the Order of Gods Working and Rest and the Original Moral Duty of Man