But it is asked, if the observance of the Sabbath be of divine and perpetual obligation, why have Christians changed the day, and why do they not keep the Sabbath in the manner enjoined in the Old Testament? We reply, that the lawgiver, the “Lord of the Sabbath,” has by his own acts, declarations, and example, and by the example of his inspired Apostles, sanctioned both the change of the day, and the alteration in the manner of its observance. Christianity was not to be confined to one country, nor was it necessarily to be a national religion. It was to overspread the world, and was to be suited to all countries and climes. It was therefore necessary that whatever was merely local and national in the observance of the Sabbath, should be relaxed or removed; and this might be done, and was done, without either touching the moral obligation of the law, or taking from its observance a particle of what is vital and essential. [16] Our Lord did not abrogate the seventh commandment when he declared, that the unchaste look was a breach of it. Neither did he set aside the fourth commandment, when he worked miracles of mercy on the Sabbath day; when he defended his disciples who were blamed for plucking ears of corn on the Sabbath day; when he declared it was “lawful to do good on the Sabbath day.” And if the seventh day had hitherto been kept as a sign between God the Creator and his creature man, and as a memorial of creating goodness; surely there was great propriety in changing the day, so as to make the Sabbath observance a sign between God the Redeemer and his redeemed creature man, and a memorial of redeeming love, as well as an emblem of the eternal Sabbath, [17] which is the hope of the christian. Nor can we imagine that the most explicit command for the change of the day, could have come with greater force to the followers of Christ, than the recorded facts, that the Saviour rose on the first day of the week, that after his resurrection, he selected that day to meet his disciples, that his people ever after regularly kept the first day, and that this day bears in Scripture the honoured appellation of “the Lord’s day.” In this change, however, nothing is given up that is essential in the command to keep holy the Sabbath day. One day in seven is to be set apart to the service of God; in it no unnecessary work is to be done; but works of necessity and of charity on that day are sanctioned by our Lord himself. And this is so far from being opposed to what was required under the former dispensation, that it agrees entirely with the teaching of the prophet Isaiah, who instructed the Jews, that the proper and acceptable way of keeping the Sabbath, was, “not to do their own ways,” nor to “speak their own words,” nor to “find their own pleasure;” but to “call the Sabbath a delight, holy of the Lord, honourable.” [18]

Here it will be objected, that this reasoning proceeds on the assumption, that the Sabbath is of divine and perpetual obligation, and that the justness of this assumption is altogether denied. Well then, let us proceed to the proof. It will not be denied, that in the law of the ten commandments, commonly called the moral law, twice written by the finger of God, and delivered to the Jews in the most solemn manner by the voice of Jehovah himself, there is a plain command to “keep holy the Sabbath day.” It will not be denied, that this appointment was made as “a sign” or memorial of the relation that subsisted between God and his Church, and that this sign was to be continued in succeeding generations. It will not be denied, that this appointment was guarded by sanctions of the most important kind—great blessings being promised to its observance, and severe judgments being threatened against those who should disregard it. In all this we see, that to the Jews the observance of the Sabbath was of divine obligation, and that that obligation continued so long as the law itself was unrepealed. In other words, until the same authority by which the law was promulgated, shall plainly declare it abolished, every Jew is bound to keep the Sabbath, on pain of incurring the displeasure of Almighty God.

But was the Jew the only person that was brought under the sanctions of this law? Were not all proselytes from the Gentiles bound by the same obligations, as they were also partakers of the same blessings with the Jews? And does the obligation stop even here? What is the meaning of this passage from the prophet Isaiah? “Also the sons of the stranger, that join themselves to the Lord, to serve him, and to love the name of the Lord, to be his servants, every one that keepeth the Sabbath from polluting it, and taketh hold of my covenant; even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer . . . for mine house shall be called a house of prayer for all people.” [20a] Surely this language must have reference to the times of the gospel, when the gentile nations would be admitted into the church of God, and become partakers of the blessings of the new covenant. In support of this view it may be mentioned, that St. Paul states expressly that gentile believers have no separate and independent standing in the economy of redemption, but are as scions cut out of a wild olive tree and grafted into the Jewish stock, and so with the natural branches, partake of its root and fatness. Or, using another figure, he reminds the Ephesians, that before their conversion they had been “aliens from the commonwealth of Israel,” but that now they were “fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God.” If this view be correct, and we see not how its correctness can be disproved, the Sabbath with its responsibilities and its blessings, is not confined to Jews, or to proselytes to the Jewish religion. Its observance is binding upon all who profess to believe the scriptures and to worship the God of the Bible.

We cannot help regarding as very untenable the opinion of those, who dissever the fourth commandment from the rest of the decalogue, under the plea that it is not properly speaking moral, [20b] and therefore has not the same force as the commandments of the second table—as if the express command of our Maker were not infinitely above every consideration arising from the nature of the injunction given, or as if man’s reason or man’s moral sense were competent to make a distinction where God has made none. What right have we, under any pretence whatever, to deny the obligation of a law, so plainly, so solemnly, so awfully promulgated by the God of heaven himself? The very position of the fourth commandment in the decalogue, might teach men to regard it with peculiar veneration. It is the link that binds together heaven and earth—our duty to God and our duty to our neighbour. It is the pillar that supports the whole moral and religious fabric. To attempt to set aside the obligation to observe the fourth commandment, is therefore, in our view, a daring attack on the authority of the Lawgiver. It is a temerity equalled only by that of the church of Rome in expunging from the decalogue the second commandment.

We acknowledge the greater consistency of those who affirm, that the whole moral law is swept away by the gospel; though we much regret that any true Christians, and those too, persons who are friendly to a proper observance of the Lord’s day, should hold notions which appear to us opposed to Scripture, and calculated to produce among the unthinking multitude, the most serious consequences. If indeed it were true, that the whole decalogue is abrogated by Christianity, no supposed immoral results would deter us from boldly proclaiming the fact. In that case, we should not shrink from telling men that our church is under a serious mistake, when she teaches her members to confess their guilt in breaking each of the ten commandments, to ask for pardon, and to implore grace to keep them in time to come. But it is because we believe in our heart that the decalogue is still in force, and that God’s honour and man’s happiness alike demand its observance, that we are not “bold enough” to proclaim as “liberty” what we are sure would lead to the greatest licentiousness. A theory of the kind may not seriously injure men of real piety and great spirituality of mind; but to others it would be productive of the most lamentable consequences.

But if Christianity has freed us from the moral law, an announcement to that effect must be recorded in the New Testament, and recorded in no obscure or doubtful terms, such as can by any possibility be misunderstood, but in language as plain, as perspicuous, and as authoritative, as that employed in the original promulgation of the law. For here we are not called upon to give up merely some external observance, or to change the mode or the time of performing some appointed duty (for that a less explicit intimation of the divine will would suffice); but we are told to renounce what in its very nature is essential to all acceptable obedience, and what above every other part of revelation bears marks of the divine impress. If the moral law is to be renounced as part of “the weak and beggarly elements” of the Mosaic religion, we must have the voice of God as distinctly abrogating the ten commandments as it was heard in their original promulgation. Nothing less will satisfy us, and nothing else, we venture to say, ought to satisfy any man who believes, that at the bar of God he must answer for the use he has made of the divine revelation contained in the Bible. [22]

Now, can any man shew, or does any man pretend to shew, a single passage of scripture in which it is plainly stated, that the decalogue is abrogated under the Christian dispensation? We are well aware that obedience to the law forms no part of man’s justification—for “Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.” We know too that love is the essence of all obedience—for “love is the fulfilling of the law.” But we know likewise that “this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments.” Nor can we conceive how the purest and most fervent love can be properly manifested, towards God or man, without some infallible guidance for its expression in the different relations of life. [23a] This we have briefly and essentially in the decalogue; while the principles there enunciated, are in the prophets and in the New Testament more fully developed and expanded. And in the absence of some plain revelation to justify such a course, we would fain know on what principle the comment (so to speak) is retained, when the text itself is rejected. If the law written by the finger of God and published by his own mouth may thus be ignored, what reason can be urged for listening to the moral teaching of Prophets and Apostles? But if the law of the ten commandments has not been annulled, the command to keep the Sabbath is still in force. For he that said “thou shalt not kill,” said also, “remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.” On this ground then we rest our defence of the divine and perpetual obligation of the Sabbath. God has not revoked his own solemn decree published with his own lips on Mount Sinai. Till this is done, the decree with all its sanctions continues in full force.

Here we are content to stop; though we feel that the argument might be carried much further. For we believe that had there been no command in the law of Moses, enjoining the observance of the Sabbath; still both Jews and Gentiles would have been bound by the original institution, [23b] coeval with man’s being, and forming the only positive appointment of God, imposed on our first parents in a state of innocency. He “blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it.” This thought will probably have little weight with those who are not convinced by our previous arguments; but it will doubtless lead some to reflect, that if the Sabbath was needed for man’s welfare even in the garden of Eden, much more is it required for the good of both body and soul in his present condition of sin and toil and sorrow; and that if the Father of Goodness gave his sinless creatures a day of rest from worldly employment, and a weekly Sabbath for more continued and intimate communion with himself; the compassion of the same gracious Being would not only lead him to continue the appointment, now so much more needed in man’s fallen state, but also to command such an observance of the day, as man’s altered circumstances rendered necessary. Now, this can only be effected by making it imperative on all to “keep holy” the sacred day themselves, and to afford to others facilities to keep it. If it were to be regarded merely as a privilege, to be enjoyed or neglected at pleasure, it would not answer the end intended. In man’s present condition, he cannot by nature appreciate the boon, nor desire the spiritual blessings that the appointment is especially intended to convey. The observance of the Sabbath must therefore be laid upon his conscience as a duty, that in seeking to fulfil that duty, he may be continually brought under the means of grace, and the influence of Christian principles, until by God’s grace he is led to feel the blessedness of a well spent Sabbath, and keeps from a motive of love, what he at first observed from a sense of duty.

APPENDIX.

Some persons require a proof that the decalogue is binding on Christians. They acknowledge that it is still in force towards the Jews. But assuming that the whole Jewish economy is abrogated with regard to Christians, they demand evidence from the New Testament that the ten commandments are a rule of duty to us. Now this is a demand they have no right to make. It proceeds on an assumption, the correctness of which we deny. It is therefore, the part of those who maintain that view, to prove that the moral law has ceased to be in force; not of us, to shew the contrary.