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 1 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 4 
 
 5 
 
 6 
 
^. 
 
 "I 
 
 RESENTlAYfRAGTS. 
 
THE DAT OF BEST 
 
 IN RELATION TO THE WORLD 
 
 I' 
 
 THAT NOW IS 
 AND THAT WHICH IS TO COME. 
 
 f 
 
 BY 
 
 SIR J. WILLIAM DAWSON, 
 
 C.M.G, LL.D, F.K.S. 
 
 Principal ani Vice-ChvicsUor of MoGill University, Montreal, 
 
 AtTHOR OP 
 
 " Points of Contact between Revelation and Natural Scirncr;" "Thr 
 OiiATN OP LrFK IN Gkolooical Time; " etc. etc. 
 
 THE RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY: 
 
 56, Paternoster Row; 65, St. Paul's Churchyard; 
 AND 164, Piccadilly. 
 
^tjjumtttt ot the %x$icU 
 
 4 
 
 After showing that the creative days of Genesis are days 
 of God, Divine periods or ages, the Tract goes on to show 
 the true nature of the Sabbath Law of the Old Testament, 
 as a commemoration of God's finished work of Creation and 
 entrance into His Sabbatism, of the loss of this Sabbatism 
 by man at the Fall, and of the promise of its restora- 
 tion by a Redeemer. In this way it is proposed to explain 
 the position of the Sabbath law in the Decalogue, the 
 importance attached to it in the Old Testament, and its 
 necessary change into the Lord's Day as the memorial 
 of the finished work of Redemption which fulfils the 
 promise of the Old Testament Sabbath. Certain practical 
 deductions from these considerations, bearing on the 
 obligation and use of the Lord's Day, are stated in the 
 concluding portion. 
 
 f 
 
t 
 
 4 
 
 THE DAY OF REST 
 
 IN 
 
 RELATION TO THE WORLD THAT NOW IS, 
 AND THAT WHICH IS TO COME. 
 
 t 
 
 HERE are wonderful links of connection 
 I between the ways of God in creation, 
 I in providence, and in grace, which are 
 always deserving of study, more espe- 
 cially when they are pointed out by the Word of 
 God itself. This is eminently the case with the 
 Sabbath law. Placed in the middle of the Ten 
 Commandments, between the precepts that relate 
 to God and those that relate to man, it must have 
 a moral and spiritual significance. Providing for 
 a weekly day of rest from labour for all men, good 
 and evil, and even for the animals under their 
 control, it should have a direct relation to our 
 external well-being. Enforced by a reason carrying 
 our minds back to the original creation of the 
 world, it should be connected in some way with 
 the great work of constructing the earth for man, 
 and with his own earliest relations with his Creator. 
 I desire in this Tract to direct attention more par- 
 
 Links of 
 
 connection 
 between 
 creation, 
 providence, 
 and grace. 
 
 The place 
 of the 
 Sabbath 
 law. 
 
 The 
 
 provision 
 it makes. 
 
 ."he reason 
 of it. 
 
21ie Day of Rest. 
 
 Tho days of 
 creation. 
 
 No inhfircnt 
 inoral obli- 
 gation to 
 give up onc- 
 scventb. 
 pjirt of our 
 time. 
 
 Tho implied 
 references 
 of tho 
 
 fourth com- 
 mandment. 
 
 ticularly to this last aspect of the Sabbath law, 
 and to its bearing on the others. 
 
 At first sight it seems a very simple explanation 
 of the reason annexed to the commandment, that 
 God made the world and things therein in six 
 natural days, and rested on the seventh, and that 
 He enjoins on us the following of His example. 
 But the more we think of this the more unsatis- 
 factory it becomes. The parallel does not hold 
 good. If it pleaded God to make the world in six 
 of our ordinary days and to rest on the seventh, 
 this was a work done once for all, and bears no 
 analogy to our recurring weeks of toil and days 
 of rest. Nor is there any apparent need for our 
 thus seeming to imitate God's procedure, if that 
 were the only reason. Still less does one see any 
 inlierent moral obligation resting on us to give up 
 one- seventh of our time on account of such imi- 
 tation. This incongruity is only increased by the 
 evident intention of the Lawgiver to represent the 
 Sabbath not as a new institution but as a primitive 
 practice, to be remembered and continued. He 
 says " remember " the Sabbath day, as if speaking 
 of an old institution. There is also in the six days 
 of labour an implied reference to the curse incurred 
 by man at the fall, and in so far as the seventh 
 day is concerned, a partial relaxation of this eating 
 of bread with the sweat of the brow. 
 
 It has long appeared to the writer that the 
 
 4 
 
The Day of Rest. 
 
 proper significance of ^^his command is reached 
 only when we bear in mind that the creative days 
 of the first chapter of Genesis are really days of 
 God, Divine periods — olamirn, or ages, as they are 
 elsewhere called^ — or, which amounts to the same 
 thing, that they are intended to represent or to in- 
 dicate such ages of God's working. This conclusion 
 I desire to rest not so much on the discoveries of 
 modern science, though these fully vindicate it, as 
 on the usage and statements of the Bible writers 
 and their contemporaries, and of the early Christian 
 Church. The writer of the introduction to Genesis 
 sees no incongruity in those early days which 
 passed before natural days were instituted; "in- 
 effable days " as Augustine well calls them. He 
 does not represent the seventh day as having an 
 evening and morning like the others, nor does he 
 hint that God resumed His work on the eighth 
 day. In chapter second he represents the world 
 ds produced in one day, evidently using the word 
 in an indefinite sense. Further, in the succeeding 
 literature of the Old Testament, while we have no 
 actual statement that the creative days were 
 natural days, or that the world was made in a 
 short period, we find the term olam or age applied 
 to God's periods of working, and in the l04th 
 I'Siilm, which is a poetical narrative of creation, 
 the idea conveyed is that of lapse of time, without 
 
 ' Psalm xc. 
 
 The days 
 of creation 
 Divine 
 periods or 
 ages. 
 
 The seventh 
 day in 
 Genesis has 
 no evening 
 and 
 morning. 
 
 The word 
 day indefi- 
 nitely used 
 in the 
 second 
 chapter of 
 Genesis. 
 
 The term 
 "olam'' 
 in the 
 later books 
 of the Old 
 Testament. 
 
 i. 
 
Tho touch- 
 ing of our 
 Lord and 
 tho Apotitles, 
 
 Tho doctrine 
 of *' tiiiie- 
 ■worlJa " 
 common to 
 revolution 
 and sciunco. 
 
 ■Worlds 
 exist in 
 time as 
 well as iu 
 Bpaca 
 
 division into days. We shall find in the sequel that 
 the same idea is contained in tho teaching of our 
 Lord, and of the Apostolic Epistles, and was familiar 
 to the primitive Church. That we may fully un- 
 derstand the bearing of these facts on the Sabbath 
 question, it will be necessary for us to c insider in 
 some detail a doctrine common to the teaching of 
 the Word of God, and of natural and physical 
 science, and which we may designate as the doctrine 
 of " time-worlds,'^ or of worlds existing in ages of 
 time as distinguished from "space-worlds," or 
 worlds considered merely as of certain dimen- 
 sions, and existing in space. 
 
 When we speak of the world or the universe, 
 the ordinary hearer has perhaps before his mind 
 merely the idea of bodies occurring in space ; and 
 the vast discoveries of modern times as to the 
 distances and magnitudes of the heavenly bodies 
 have contributed to fill the minds of men with 
 conceptions of the immensity of space, perhaps 
 to the exclusion of another direction of thought 
 equally important. Worlds must, however, exist 
 in time as well as in space. This idea is very 
 familiar to the mind of the geologist, who traces 
 the long history of the earth through successive 
 periods, and also knows that each succeeding age 
 has seen it different from its condition on those 
 which preceded it. This consideration is also 
 before the mind of the physical astronomer, who 
 
 1 
 
Thf Day of Rest. 
 
 thinks of suns and planets as passing through 
 different successive conditions, and as actuc'ly 
 presenting different stages in the present. 
 
 This point is curiously illustrated by a contro- 
 versy which raged some time ago as to whether the 
 planets and other heavenly bodies may be inhabited 
 worlds, and especially whether they may be in- 
 habited by rational beings. 
 
 If we look at this question with reference io our 
 own world, we shall find that each successive 
 stage of its existence whether as a vaporous mass, 
 as a heated molten globe, as the abode of merely 
 inferior animals, has been of vast duration as com- 
 pared with the time in which it has been in- 
 habited by man. Farther, it is gradually approach- 
 ing the condition in which it will no longer be 
 habitable ; and unless some renovating process 
 shall be applied to it, this desolate condition may 
 be of indefinite duration. Thus, if we imagine 
 ourselves to be beings not resident on the earth, 
 and that we could visit it only at one period 
 of its history, the chances would be vastly 
 against our seeing it at that precise stage of its 
 existence in which it is fitted for the residence of 
 rational beings. On the other hand, if we were 
 capable of taking in its whole duration, we would 
 comprehend that it has its particular stage for 
 being the abode of intelligence, and that it has a 
 definite and intelligible history as a world in time, 
 
 The 
 
 qucstio.. ■"♦ 
 to whether 
 othor worlds 
 may bo 
 iuLubitcd. 
 
 The world 
 before inau 
 appeared. 
 
 The 
 
 approaching 
 condition of 
 the world. 
 
 Its history 
 parallel to 
 that of 
 other 
 worlds. 
 
 i 
 
8 
 
 The Day of Rest 
 
 The moon. 
 
 Mars. 
 
 which may be more or less parallel to that of all 
 other worlds. 
 
 This truth also appears if we consider other 
 planetary bodies. The moon may have been in- 
 habited at a time when our earth was luminous 
 and incandescent, but it has passed into a state of 
 senility and desolation. The planet Mars, which 
 seems physically not unlike the earth, may be in a 
 condition similar to that of our world in tho older 
 Jupiter and geological poriods. Jupiter and Saturn are pro- 
 bably still intensely heated and encompassed with 
 vaporous " deeps,"' and may perhaps aid in sup- 
 porting life on their satellites, while untold u~es 
 must elapse before those magnificent orbs can 
 arrive at a stage suitable for maintaining life like 
 that on the earth. Long after all these ages have 
 passed, and when all the planets have grown old 
 and lifeless, the sun itself, now a fiery mass, may 
 arrive at a condition suited for living and rational 
 beings. 
 
 Thus the physical conditions of our planetary 
 system teach that if we suppose all worlds capable 
 of supporting life, all are not so at one time, and 
 that as ages pass, each may successively take up 
 this rdle, of which in greater or less degree all may 
 at some time or other be capable. So when we 
 ascend to the starry orbs, those suns may have 
 attendant worlds, some in one stage, some in 
 another. There may also be stars and nebultn 
 
 All worlds 
 not capable 
 of support- 
 ing life. 
 
 r 
 
 I 
 
 i' 
 
 ) 
 
If 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 9 
 
 
 still scarcely formed, and others which have passed 
 far beyond the present state of our sun and its 
 planets. Thus the universe is a vastly varied and 
 progressive scene. At no one time can all worlds 
 be seats of such life as we know; but of the count- 
 less suns and worlds that exist, thousands or 
 millions may at any one time be in this state, while 
 thousands of times as many may be gradually 
 arriving at it or passing from it. Such are the 
 thoughts which necessarily pass through our minds 
 when we consider the existence of worlds in time. 
 
 Now these ideas, though rendered more definite 
 by modern discoveries, are very old, and they im- 
 pressed themselves on the mind of antiquity before 
 men could measure the vastuess of the universe 
 in space. They are also present in Divine re- 
 velation, and it is necessary to have them before 
 our minds if we would enter into the thoughts of 
 the writers of the Old and New Testaments when 
 they treat of time and eternity. The several 
 stages of the earth in its progress from chaos, the 
 prophetic pictures of its changes in the future, as 
 stated in the Bible, alike embody the idea of 
 time- worlds, or ages of God's working. It is in 
 this aspect that the universe is compared to a 
 vesture of God, which He can change as a garment, 
 while He Himself remains ever the same.^ It is 
 in contrast to the eternity of truth that the heavens 
 
 ' Psalm cii. 2G. 
 
 The 
 
 universe a 
 varied and 
 progressive 
 8cene. 
 
 These ideas 
 ancient. 
 
 They are 
 present in 
 Divine 
 revelation. 
 
 The past 
 and future 
 stages of 
 the earth 
 according to 
 the Hible 
 embody 
 the idea 
 of time- 
 worlds. 
 
10 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 Tj ■ 
 
 The 
 
 Hebrew and 
 Greek words 
 olam and 
 aion bring 
 before us 
 the idea of 
 time-worlds. 
 
 God dwells 
 in the 
 
 succession of 
 worlds in 
 time. 
 
 and earth are said to be passing away; but the 
 words of the Redeemer shall never pass away.^ 
 It is with the same reference that we are told that 
 " the things which are seen are temporal, the 
 things which are unseen are eternal." '^ 
 
 The use made of the Hebrew word olam and the 
 Greek aion in the sense of age, or even of eternity, 
 brings before us still more clearly this Biblical idea 
 of time- worlds. In that sublime " prayer of Moses 
 the man of God" which we have in the 90th 
 Psalm, God, who is the " dwelUng-place of man in 
 generation to generation," who existed before the 
 mountains were brought forth, with whom a 
 thousand years are " as a watch in the night," is 
 said to be from " olam to olam," from " everlasting 
 to everlasting," as the English version his it,^ but 
 more properly from age to age of those long cosmic 
 ages in which He creates and furnishes successive 
 worlds. So when God is said to be the " High and 
 lofty One, that inbabiteth eternity,"* it is not 
 abstract eternity, but these successive olams, or 
 time-worlds, which are His habitation. In the 
 Old Testament, God as revealed to us in His works, 
 dwells in the grand succession of worlds in time, 
 thus continuously and variously manifesting His 
 power, a much more living and attractive view of di- 
 vinity than the mere abstract afHrmation of eternity. 
 
 1 Matt. xxiv. 25. » 2 Cor. iv. 18. 
 
 '^ Thia is retained iu the Revised Version, which I think 
 unfortunate. * Isaiah Ivii. 15. 
 
m 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 11 
 
 The same thought is taken up and amplified in 
 the New Testament. The writer of the Epistle to 
 the Hebrews, who treats very specially of the 
 relations of the Old Testament to the ^Tew, speaks 
 of Christ as God's Son, " whom He hath appointed 
 Heir of all things, by whom also He made the 
 worlds,*' ^ more literally " constituted the aions or 
 ages." He does not refer, as one might conceive 
 from the English translation, to different worlds in 
 space, but to the successive ages of this world, in 
 which it was being gradually prepared and fitted 
 up for man. So Paul, in his doxology at the end 
 of the third chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians, 
 ascribes to the Redeemer glory in '* all generations 
 of the ages or ai5ns ;"^ and in the ninth verse of 
 the same chapter he speaks of the gospel as " the 
 mystery which from all ages hath been hid in 
 God who created all things." So, also, in the 
 eleventh chapter of Hebrews, we are told that 
 by faith we underctar^d that " the ages were con- 
 stituted by the Word of God." Another fine 
 illustration of this idea is in Paul's familiar and 
 business-like letter to Titus, "where he says that 
 he lives " in hope of eternal life, which God, who 
 cannot He, promised before the world began, but 
 hath in due time manifested His word."* The 
 expression " the world began " here representb the 
 
 * Heb. i. 2, R.y. margin. 
 
 3 B.V. margin. ^ rpj^ug {.2. 
 
 The same 
 thought in 
 the New 
 Testament) 
 
 Christ con- 
 stituting 
 the ageo. 
 
 St. Paul 
 ascribes 
 glory to 
 Christ 
 
 in all gener- 
 ations of 
 the ages. 
 
 The ages 
 constituted 
 by the Word 
 of God. 
 
12 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 The life of 
 the ages. 
 
 The relation 
 of the whole 
 duration of 
 God's 
 working 
 to us. 
 
 The light 
 thrown on 
 the day of 
 rest by the 
 creative 
 days of 
 geology. 
 
 "ages of time," and the "eternal life" is the 
 "life of the ages." Thus what the Apostle 
 hopes for is life through the unlimited ages of 
 God's working, and this life has been promised, 
 before the beginning of the time- worlds of creation. 
 So the whole past, present, and future of God's 
 working has its relation to us, and is included 
 under this remarkable idea of ages or time-worlds, 
 and is appropriated by faith and hope as the pos- 
 session of God's people. God, who cannot lie, has 
 pledged Himself to us from the beginning of those 
 long ages in which He founded the earth ; He 
 has promised us His favour in all the course of 
 His subsequent work ; He has sealed this promise 
 in the mission of His Son, that same glorious Being 
 through whom He arranged all those vast ages of 
 creation and providence ; and in the strength of 
 this promise we can look forward by faith to an 
 endless life with Him in all the future ages of His 
 boundless working. 
 
 The long creative days of geology may thus be 
 shown to throw a most important light on the in- 
 stitution of the weekly Sabbath and its continuance 
 as the Lord's day. If it is true that the seventh 
 or Sabbath Day of creation still continues, and 
 T^as intended to be a day of rest for the Creator 
 and for man made in His likeness, we find in this 
 a substantial reason for the place of the Sabbath 
 in the .Decalogue. Further, by means of our Lord's 
 
The Day of Best. 
 
 18 
 
 Th( idea of 
 the Sabbath 
 as u day of 
 res<; for the 
 Oraator and 
 man carried 
 further. 
 
 declaration in reply to the Pharisees, " My Father 
 worketh even until now, and I work/' though God 
 has finished His work of creation and now only 
 works in providence and redemption, as well as by 
 the argument in the fourth chapter of the Epistle to 
 the Hebrews, we can carry this idea forward into 
 the Christian dispensation. But these facts are so 
 important to the right understanding of our subject, 
 that it seems necessary to examine them in some 
 detail, and in a humble and earnest spirit, ready 
 to receive new light and to relinquish old pre- 
 possessions, if found to be contrary to the testimony 
 of Scripture. 
 
 At first sight, as already hinted, the place of the 
 fourth commandment in the Decalogue, and the 
 vast importance attached to this law by the Hebrew 
 writers, strike us as strange and anomalous. The 
 Sabbath stands as the sole example of a ritual 
 observance, in those " ten words," which otherwise 
 mark the most general moral relations of man to 
 God and to his fellow-nen. Farther, the reason 
 given seems trivial. If it is meant that God 
 worked on six natural days, and rested on the 
 seventh, the question arises, what is He doing on 
 the subsequent days ? Does He keep up this al- 
 ternation of six days' woilr and one day's rest ; and 
 if not, how is this an example to us? If it is 
 argued that the whole reason of God's six days' 
 work and the seventh day's rest was to give an 
 
 The place 
 of the 
 
 Sabbath law 
 at first 
 sight 
 
 Bfarange and 
 anonuilouB. 
 
14 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 The sup- 
 position that 
 justifies it. 
 
 How the 
 Sabbath 
 becomes the 
 central 
 point of all 
 religion. 
 
 The 
 
 Sabbath 
 the Gospel 
 in the 
 Decalogue. 
 
 example, this conveys the absurdity of doing what 
 is infinitely great for an end comparatively in- 
 significant, and which might have been attained 
 by a command without any reason assigned. But 
 let us now suppose that when God rested on the 
 seventh day He entered into an £eon of vast dura- 
 tion, intended to be distinguished by the happy 
 Sabbatism of man in an Edenic world, and in 
 which every day would have been a Sabbath ; or 
 if there was a weekly Sabbath, it would have been 
 but a memorial of a work leading to a perpetual 
 Sabbath then enjoyed. Let us farther suppose 
 that at the fall of man the Sabbath Day was 
 instituted, or obtained a new significance as a 
 memorial of an Edenic Sabbatism lost, and also 
 as a memorial of God's promise, that through a 
 Redeemer it would be restored. Then the Sabbath 
 becomes the central point of all religion, the 
 standing and perpetual meiaorial of an Eden lost, 
 and of a paradise to be restored by the coming Seed 
 of the woman, as well as a time to prepare our- 
 selves for this future life. The commandment, 
 ** Remember the Sabbath Day," called upon the 
 Israelite to remember the fall of man, to remember 
 the promise of a Saviour, to look forward to a 
 future Sabbatism in the reign of the Redeemer. 
 It is thus the Gospel in the Decalogue, giving 
 vitality to the whole, and is most appropriately 
 placed, and with a more full explanation than any 
 
 « 
 
The Day of Rest. 
 
 16 
 
 other command, between the laws that relate to 
 God and the laws that relate to man. 
 
 The argument in the Epistle to the Hebrews 
 (ch. IV.) may help us to understand this ; and it is the 
 more valuable that it is not an argument about the 
 Sabbath, but introduces it incidentally, and that 
 it seems to take for granted the belief in a long or 
 olamic Sabbath on the part of those to whom it is 
 addressed. It may be freely rendered as follows : 
 
 " For God hath spoken in a certain place (Gen. ii. 2) of the 
 seventh day in this wise : ' And God did rest on the seventh 
 day from all His works ; ' and in this place again : * They shall 
 not enter into My rest' (Psa. xcv. 11). Seeing, therefore, it 
 still remaineth that some enter therein, and they to whom it 
 (God's Sabbatism) was first proclaimed, entered not in because 
 of disobedience (in the Fall, and afterward in the sin of the 
 Israelites in the desert), again He fixes a certain day, saying in 
 David's writings, (long after the time of Joshua, ) ' To-day, if ye 
 hear His voice, harden not your hearts. ' (Psa. xcv. 8.) For if 
 Joshua had given them rest in Canaan, He would not afterward 
 have spoken of anotb3r day. There is therefore yet reserved a 
 keeping of a Sabbath for the people of God. For He that is 
 entered into His rest (that is, Jesus Christ, who has finished 
 His work and entered into His rest in heaven). He Himself 
 also rested from His own works, as God did from His own. 
 Let us therefore earnestly strive to enter into that rest." 
 
 It is evident that in this passage God's Sabbatism, 
 the rest intended for man in Eden, and for Israel 
 in Canaan, Christ's rest in heaven after finishing 
 His work, the rest which may now be enjoyed by 
 Christians, and the final heavenly rest of Christ's 
 people, are all indefinite periods mutually related, 
 and are all Sabbatisms of which the weeklv Sabbath 
 is a continuous reminder and token. 
 
 The 
 
 argument 
 in the 
 Epistle to 
 the 
 Hebrews. 
 
 A free 
 rendering 
 of it. 
 
 The various 
 
 Sabbatisms 
 
 indefinite 
 
 periods 
 
 mutually 
 
 related. 
 
16 
 
 27ie Day of Meat. 
 
 Another 
 reason for 
 the fourth 
 command- 
 ment. 
 
 Perfect 
 harmony 
 between the 
 reasons. 
 
 The sup- 
 position 
 that they 
 are contra- 
 dictory 
 hypercriti- 
 cal. 
 
 The 
 
 primitive 
 obligation 
 of the 
 Sabbath. 
 
 The 
 
 sacrcdness 
 
 of the 
 
 Sabbath 
 
 among the 
 
 Chaldeans 
 
 and other 
 
 nations 
 
 outside of 
 
 Hebrew 
 
 influence. 
 
 In the repetition of the decalogue, in the fifth 
 chapter of Deuteronomy, another reason is an- 
 nexed to the fourth commandment : 
 
 " Eemember that thou waat a slave in the land of Egypt, and 
 Jehovah thy God brought thee out thence." 
 
 This is in perfect harmony with the reason in 
 Exodus, and merely a further development of it. 
 The first reason refers to the rest of the Creator, 
 the second to the rest from Egyptian hondage 
 and the promised rest of Canaan. Both are refer- 
 red f/-> by the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews, 
 who clearly sees the connection between them. 
 The mistake of supposing them to be mutually 
 contradictory is peculiar to a certain stage of 
 modern hypercriticism. 
 
 If this is a correct view of the relation of the 
 Jewish Sabbath to the Creation and the Fall, it 
 enables us to appreciate the force of the injunction 
 to " remember " the Sabbath day to keep it holy, 
 for in this case the Sabbath must have been no new 
 institution, but one of primitive obligation, and 
 dating from the fall of man at the latest. It also 
 enables us to understand the prevalence of Sabba- 
 tical ideas among nations independent of Hebrew 
 influence, and more especially among the Chaldeans, 
 from whom Abraham came. With them, as 
 recent investigations have shown, the seventh day 
 had a certain sacrednesa attached to it from very 
 early timcs.^ 
 
 ^ Sayce, Freeh Light from the Ancient Sfomimevts, 
 
 f 
 
X 
 
 I 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 17 
 
 But what evidence does the Bible itself offer as 
 to this ? We have no Sabbath law till the time 
 of the Exodus, and there is scarcely any reference 
 previously to other religious ordinances than those 
 of sacrifice and circumcision. Still there are in- 
 dications of a Sabbath. We nee^ not perhaps 
 attach much importance to the expression "in 
 process of time," or more literally, " at the end of 
 days,"^ applied to the time when Cain and Abel 
 offered their sacrifices, as we do not certainly know 
 whether a weekly, monthly, or yearly interval is 
 intended. We find, however, Noah reckoning by 
 weeks in sending out birds from the ark.^ Laban 
 and Jacob also reckoned by weeks.^ In Joseph's 
 time also, the Hebrews reckoned by sevens in the 
 division of time.* So in the early part of the 
 Exodus before the giving of the law, the Sabbath 
 is incidentallv mentioned, in connection with the 
 gift of the manna, and in terms which show that 
 it was already known as "a solemn rest, a holy 
 Sabbath unto the Lord." ^ It is interesting, how- 
 ever, to observe that there seems to have been no 
 pre-intimation of the day, except the gathering of ii 
 double quantity of manna on the sixth day, and 
 that the rulers reported the fact to Moses, as if 
 asking instruction. This would seem to imply either 
 that the day of rest had fallen into disuse in Egypt, 
 
 i Genesis iv. 3. " Ibid. viii. 12. ^ Ibid. xxix. 27. 
 
 "» Ibid. 1. 3, 12. 5 Exod. xvi. 23, R.V. 
 
 C 
 
 Bible 
 evideQce. 
 
 Early 
 indications 
 of a 
 Sabbath. 
 
 The 
 
 Sabbath 
 and manna. 
 
 Moses' in- 
 terpretation 
 of the 
 injunction 
 with 
 reference 
 to the 
 
 gathering of 
 a double 
 portion of 
 manna on 
 the sixth 
 day. 
 
 f 
 
I * 
 
 18 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 
 f 
 i 
 t 
 
 The early 
 noticea 
 of tho 
 Sabbath 
 few and 
 casual J but 
 sufflcicnt 
 when taken 
 in connec- 
 tion with 
 other 
 passages. 
 
 or that its occurrence had not at first seemed to 
 the people likely to be recognised as interfering 
 with the gathering of necessary food ; but Moses 
 at once interprets the fact as God's recognition 
 of His own day. 
 
 These early notices of the Sabbath are, it is true, 
 few and casual, and remind us of the informal wav 
 in which the Lord's Day is introduced in the New 
 Testament. But when taken in connection with 
 the statement as to God's hallowing the day at the 
 close of His creative work, and with the word 
 ** remember " in the commandment, they are suffi- 
 cient to show tho Patriarchal origin of ihe rest of 
 the seventh day, and to carry it back to the gate 
 of Eden. We may further note here that the 
 Israelites when enslaved in Egypt must have been, 
 to a great extent at least, deprived of the Sabbath 
 rest. The Egyptians, even if they had themselves 
 some notion of a Sabbatism, whether on the tenth 
 or the seventh day, were not likely to have con- 
 sulted the scruples or the comfort of their foreign 
 slaves in such matters, any more than modern 
 pleasure- sepkers are disposed to regard those of 
 railway employes or museum curators. The 
 Hebrews had thus known the bitterness of ceaseless 
 labour, and so are reminded in Deuteronomy of 
 those past sufferings as a reason for their holding 
 fast to the privilege restored to them iu their 
 nowly-fouud freedom. It would be well if those 
 
 Israel in 
 Egypt. 
 
 The 
 
 llebrewB* 
 experience 
 of ceaseless 
 labour in 
 Egypt. 
 
 ^f 
 
 i 
 
The Day of Rest. 
 
 10 
 
 I 
 
 The 
 
 Sabbath in 
 the post- 
 Mosaio 
 8ta(t''!8 of 
 Jewish 
 history till 
 the time of 
 Christ. 
 
 modoi'ii nations wliicli neglect the Lord's day 
 could see it in this light, and rf>coivc it as a part 
 of that liberty with which Christ makes His 
 people free. 
 
 The post-^Iosaic stages of Jewish history show 
 that the ideas of the connection of the Sabbath 
 with the primitive promise of redemption and with 
 the liberation of the chosen people, are carried 
 onward to the time of Christ. At some periods of 
 Jewish history the Sabbath no doubt fell greatly 
 into neglect, but these were times of general 
 decadence and of lapse into idolatry, and every 
 prophetic or priestly revival of religion exalted the 
 obligations of the Sabbath. Isaiah laments the 
 misuse and neglect of the day, and promises even 
 to the eunuchs and the strangers in Palestine that 
 if they will " keep the Sabbath, and hold fast by 
 God's covenant " implied in it, He will give them 
 
 In the time 
 of Isaiah. 
 
 ' ' a memorial and a name better than of Bt ns and of d&.ughterB 
 . . . an everlasting name." "I will bring them to My holy 
 mountain, and make them joyful in My house of prayer." ^ 
 
 It is the same prophet who intensifies its blessings, 
 while connecting it with the patriarchs and with 
 the covenant of God, in the grand words : — 
 
 " If thciu turn away thy foot from the Sa ibath, 
 
 From doing thy pleasure on my holy day ; 
 
 And shalt call the Sabbath a delight 
 
 And the holy of Jehovah honourable. 
 
 And shalt honour it, not doing thine own ways^ 
 
 Nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words ; 
 
 ^ Isa. Ivi. 4-8. 
 
20 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 Jeremlah'H 
 view of it. 
 
 Ezekicl's 
 view. 
 
 The 
 
 significance 
 of prophetic 
 doctrine. 
 
 Then shalt thou duiigia iiiyrtuit' in Jehovah, 
 And I will make thee rule upon the high places of the earth, 
 And I will feed thee with the lieritage of Jacob thy father, 
 For the mouth of Jehovah hath spoken it."^ 
 
 Jeremiah connects in the strongest manner its 
 observance, as an efficient cause, with God's 
 blessing, and with prosperity, and regards the 
 keeping of the Sabbath as an essential condition 
 of national welfare.^ Ezekiel expressly calls the 
 Sabbath a sign or pledge that God would sanctify 
 His people.^ The profound significance of this 
 prophetic doctrine becomos evident only when we 
 connect the Sabbath with God's olamic rest, with 
 man*s fall and with the promise of a final and 
 eternal Sabbatism, in the manner explained in the 
 passage already quoted from the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews. There can be no doubt that these 
 strong statements of the prophets were influential 
 with the Jews in the captivity, and were important 
 means of preserving them from idolatry and for- 
 getf ulness of their God, and that when they were 
 again delivered from bondage they would return 
 with enhanced ideas of Sabbath obligation, akin 
 to those of their fathers at the time of the Exodus. 
 We see this in the legislation of Nehemiah, and in 
 a debased and ritualistic form in the Pharisaic 
 strictness of the time of Christ. 
 
 Let us further note here that there is a strict 
 consistency throughout in the Biblical history of 
 
 The eilect 
 of prophetic 
 statements. 
 
 The con- 
 sistency of 
 Sible 
 
 history on 
 the subject 
 throughout. 
 
 u 
 
 1 Isa. Iviii. 13, li.V. ^ Jer. xvu. 24, 25. ^ Ezek. xx. 12. 
 
1 w 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 31 
 
 h 
 
 The pre- 
 suppositions 
 of the 
 Sabbath of 
 the Exoduti 
 and of the 
 Psalms and 
 Prophets. 
 
 The 
 
 Sabbath in 
 our Lord's 
 time. 
 
 the Sabbath, from the first announcement of the 
 rest of the Creator in the second chapter of Genesis 
 till the advent of the promised Redeemer, and no 
 room is left here for attributing a late origin to 
 the Sabbath law, without throwing the whole 
 history into confusion. The Sabbath of Exodus is 
 meaningless without the Creative days, the Fall, 
 and the promise of Redemption. The testimony of 
 the Psalms and Prophets pre-supposes the Sabbath 
 law, and its spiritual relation^. The attitude of 
 the post-exilic Jews pre-supposes and results from 
 the law and the prophets. Among the sectaries of 
 the time of our Lord, the Sabbath had only ex- 
 perienced the fate of other spiritual elements of 
 the old dispensation which they had ** made void 
 by their traditions," substituting form for sub- 
 stance. 
 
 These considerations not only give a high and 
 spiritual significance to the Sabbath and the Lord's 
 Day, and connect them with God's great working 
 in the universe, and with the fall and redemption 
 of man, but they give us practical information 
 respecting the manner of keeping the Lord's 
 Day and its relation to Christian doctrine and 
 practice. 
 
 We can thus understand the attitude of Christ 
 Himself with regard to the Sabbath. While He 
 denounced that Pharisaical rigidity which made 
 the day a burden rather than a privilege, and which 
 
 The 
 
 Sabbath 
 in its 
 various 
 relations. 
 
 The 
 
 attitude 
 of Christ 
 to the 
 Sabbath. 
 
22 
 
 The Day of Rest 
 
 directed attention to minute details of its observance 
 rather than to its higher significance, neither His 
 example nor His teaching took away from its 
 sacred n ess or diminished its obligation, except 
 when opposed to works of necessity or mercy, or 
 of direct service to God. The Sabbath was made 
 for man as — 
 
 "a means, and not an end; worth nothing unless it conduced 
 to the end — man's welfare, man's refreshment in body, mind, 
 and spirit."^ 
 
 How tho 
 Lord's Day 
 is to be 
 kcp*:. 
 
 Thus if we ask how the Lord's Day should be 
 kept, we are referred at once to the examples of 
 God the Father and of God the Son. The Creator's 
 rest with reference to this world, is one of contem- 
 plation, and of beneficent and merciful attention 
 to its interests. He regards His work and pro- 
 nounces it good, and then enters into His rest. So 
 the Redeemer entered into His rest when He could 
 say, " It is finished." God in His Sabbath sustains 
 and nourishes all His creatures, and relieves their 
 wants. This is the force of our Lord's reply to 
 the Pharisees : " My Father worketh even until 
 now, and I work," and they seem so to have 
 understood the reference to the creation and to 
 Livinc providence, that they had no rejoinder 
 sStTsmf' to make. God occupies His Sabbatism, lost 
 to man by the fall, in that work of redemption 
 by which it is to be finally restored. The rest 
 
 ' Sundai/, by Pluiuptre, 18()<>. 
 
 How God 
 
 and how 
 Jesus 
 occupies 
 Uis. 
 
 1 
 
 " 
 
h 
 
 <• 
 
 I ■ 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 23 
 
 into which Jesus entered is occupied in preparing 
 a place for us, and in acting as our great High- 
 Priest in the most holy place on high. In like 
 manner our Sabbath should be a time of communion 
 with God, and a time for acts of love and mercy 
 to our fellow-men. There is a Divine activity 
 which is not incompatible with, but a fulfilment of 
 the Sabbath law, and the examples given by Christ, 
 as that of the ox fallen into a pit, the healing of 
 diseases, and the Temple service, all point with 
 perfect consistency to the ultimate and higher 
 benefit of man. 
 
 This was the ground of the often- recurring con- 
 flict between the Christ, who knew what the Sabbath 
 really means, and the Pharisees, A^hose tradition 
 had turned it into a day of mere austerity and 
 unmeaning ritualism. Surely if this was true of 
 the Jewish Sabbath, it is true of the Lord's Day. 
 It is to be observed in this connection that when 
 Christ claims the Loidship of the Sabbath, He 
 does this in the capacity of the Son of Man, " the 
 Son of Man is Lord also of the Sabbath," for it 
 is essentially as Eedeemer that He is the Fulfiller 
 of the Sabbath law, and so its Lord. May we not 
 also sec in this a prescience on the part of Christ 
 of that change in the day which would be a neces- 
 sary consequence of His resurrection on the first 
 day of the week, and which would mark the com- 
 mencement of the new dispensation by a day com- 
 
 Our 
 
 Sabbath 
 should be 
 a time for 
 communion 
 with God, 
 and for 
 acts of 
 love and 
 mercy to 
 man. 
 
 The ground 
 of conflict 
 between 
 Christ and 
 the 
 
 Pharisees 
 as to the 
 Sabbath. 
 
 Christ as 
 Son of Man 
 claims the 
 Lordship 
 of the 
 Sabbath. 
 
24 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 ^ 
 
 The 
 
 connection 
 
 between the 
 
 Old 
 
 Testament 
 
 Sabbath 
 
 and the 
 
 Lord's Day 
 
 of 
 
 Christians. 
 
 memorative of tliis rather than of the work of 
 creation. 
 
 The right understanding of the Old Testament 
 Sabbath aids us in comprehending the con- 
 nection of the Lord's Day of Christians with the 
 Jewish Sabbath. If the latter had a reference to 
 a Sabbatism lost by the fall and restored by the 
 Eedeemer, the Son of Man must be " Lord of the 
 Sabbath," in the sense of fulfilling and realizing its 
 prophetic import. Therefore, the day on which 
 He finished His work and entered into His rest 
 must of necessity be that to be commemorated by 
 Christians, until the time when the return of Christ 
 shall inaugurate that final and eternal Sabbatism 
 which remains to His people. Thus the Lord's 
 Day comes to occupy the same important place 
 formerly occupied by the Jewish Sabbath. In this 
 as in other things, the Old Testament saints with- 
 out us are not complete, for our Lord's Day is the 
 completion of their Sabbath. It links together 
 God's creative work and Christ's work of redemp- 
 tion ; the Sabbatism lost in the fall and restored 
 in the Saviour ; the imperfect state of the militant 
 Church, still having only a pledge of a rest to 
 come, and the Church triumphant, which will enjoy 
 this rest for ever. If the Sabbath that carried with 
 it the mournful memory of the first sin was holy, 
 much more that which points forward, through 
 Christ's finished work and present rest, to a 
 
 How the 
 Lord's Day 
 comes to 
 occupy 
 the place 
 formoily 
 Occupied by 
 the Jewish 
 Sabbath. 
 
 What it 
 
 I'nks 
 
 together. 
 
 4 
 
 I 
 
 i 
 
 
 tt 
 
'^T 
 
 The Day of Best. 
 
 25 
 
 i 
 
 ; 
 
 
 heavenly paradist. If the ohligation to rememher 
 it was to the Hehrew equal to that of the most 
 binding moral duties, still more must the Lord's 
 Day be a day to be remembered by the Christian, 
 as the memorial of Christ's finished work, and of 
 our heirship of all the divine ages, past, present, 
 and to come. Thus we see that the moral and 
 spiritual dignity and obligation of the Lord's Day 
 rise far above those of the Jewish Sabbath, and 
 we can understand how naturally the apostles and 
 primitive Christians, almost without note of the 
 change, and without requiring any positive enact- 
 ment, transferred their allegiance from the seventh 
 to the first day of the week. 
 
 It may be useful to mention in this connection 
 the strong statement in relation to the Jewish 
 Sabbath contained in the Epistle to the Colossians 
 (ii. 16), The Christians of Colossae had appa- 
 rently been urged by some of their teachers to 
 keep the Jewish Sabbath as a matter of legal 
 obligation, either along with or instead of the 
 Lord's Day. Paul repudiates this in the words, 
 
 ** Let no man therefore judge yon in meat or in drink, or in 
 respect of a feast day, or a new moon, or a Sabbath day ; " 
 
 adding as a reason, 
 
 •' which are a shadow of the things tc corae, but the body (or 
 Substance) is Christ's." 
 
 There can scarcely be a question that the Old 
 Testament Sabbath is intended here, and the as- 
 
 The 
 
 enhanced 
 obligation 
 of the 
 Lord's Day. 
 
 The 
 
 statement 
 in the 
 Epistle 
 to the 
 Colossians 
 
 The Old 
 
 Testament 
 
 Sabbath 
 
 intended. 
 
26 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 The 
 
 assertion 
 in harmony 
 with other 
 parts of 
 Scripture. 
 
 The 
 
 description 
 of the day 
 as observed 
 by 
 Christians. 
 
 The 
 
 meaning 
 of Christ's 
 saying 
 that "the 
 Sabbath 
 was made 
 for man." 
 
 The 
 
 Sabbath a 
 spiritual 
 privilege to 
 fallen man. 
 
 sertion that it was a " shadow " of the future 
 coming of Christ is in perfect harmony with the 
 testimony of other pailis of Scripture, and with 
 the idea that when Christ, who is the Substance, 
 had come, the old Sabbath, as the anticipatory 
 shadow, must pass away. It is to be noticed, in 
 accordance with this, that where the day observed 
 by Christians is mentioned in the Now Testament 
 it is called simply " the first day of the week,** 
 except in that passage of the Apocalypse where 
 for the first time we find the term, afterwards 
 general, "the Lord's Day.'*^ 
 
 We learn also from this view of the day of rest 
 the full meaning of that weighty saying of Jesus : 
 " The Sabbath was made for man, and not man 
 for the Sabbath." Man, as originally created, 
 needed no Sabbath law, for he had entered into 
 the perpetual rest of the Sabbatism of his Creator. 
 But when he fell from this high estate the Sabbath 
 was made for him, not as a mere legal obligation, 
 but as c great spiritual privilege. For this reason 
 faithful men and women in Israel of old clung to 
 it as the earnest of the great salvation which 
 was to restore the lost paradise for which their 
 hearts yearned, and with reference to which their 
 cry w^s, "0 that I had wings like a dove, then 
 
 ^ Acts XX. 7 ; 1 Cor. xvi. 2 ; Rev. i. 10. In the Peechito 
 
 version the expression " Lord's Day " occurs in 1 Cor. xi. 
 ?0. (EtheriJ.f,'e's Translation, p. 272.) 
 
 i. 
 
 4 
 
The Day of Rest. 
 
 27 
 
 i 
 
 would I fly away and be at rest." ^ So it is in 
 regard to the Lord's Day. Just as we honour and 
 trust in the Saviour, so shall we regard the day 
 which commemorates His entering into His rest. 
 Just as we appreciate that rest which He gives us 
 in part here, and as our hearts long for that rest 
 which remains in the Father's house, so shall we 
 hold in loving remembrance the day which points 
 to it, and which enables us to have some faint 
 realization of it in the midst of sorrow and trouble. 
 In a lower sense the Sabbath was made for man 
 as a relief from the heavy curse of unremitting 
 labour, and though the world will never gain much 
 spiritually by a merely legal observance of the 
 Sabbath, even this is of pricelfjss value to the 
 working man in a moral, social, and physical point 
 of view. It is thus not merely an arbitrary en- 
 actment, but a statement of an effect depending on 
 an adequate cause, that the man or the nation 
 honouring God's day of rest will itself be honoured 
 and prospered. 
 
 The primitive Sabbath of Genesis and of the 
 Moral Law has thus a definite connection with 
 human labour and with the physical well-being of 
 man. "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread," 
 is the doom of fallen humanity — a doom too fear- 
 fully felt in the whole history of the world, and 
 strange to say, apparently not less so in our times 
 
 •Psalm Iv. 6, R.V. 
 
 As we 
 honour the 
 Saviour 
 we shall 
 regard His 
 day. 
 
 The 
 
 Sabbath a 
 relief from 
 unremitting 
 labour. 
 
 The 
 
 connection 
 of the 
 primitive 
 Sabbath 
 with labour 
 
 i 
 
28 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 The 
 
 Sabbath 
 the only 
 means of 
 alleviating 
 the life of 
 labour. 
 
 The law 
 extended 
 even to 
 domestic 
 animals. 
 
 The phy- 
 siological 
 necessity 
 for a 
 
 {)eriodical 
 nterruption 
 of toil 
 foi" man 
 or beast 
 afflrmcJ. 
 
 A nation 
 without a 
 Sabbath 
 must ]ive- 
 niaturely 
 decay. 
 
 of mechanical invention and mastery over nature, 
 tlian in ruder ages. How terribly would this 
 doom have been aggravated had man been expelled 
 from Eden to a life of unremitting toil. But the 
 Sabbath stood between him and this fate, and so 
 far as human experience has shown, was the only 
 possible means of alleviating his life of labour. 
 Hence Moses impresses on his nation of emancipated 
 slaves the constant remembrance of this day, and 
 enjoins on them the extension of its benefits to 
 their own slav^^s and to strangers within their 
 gates, even though not believers in Jehovah. 
 Hence also the provisio) s of the law are extended 
 even to domestic animals, which, though destitute 
 of spiritual natures, have bodily organisms, which 
 under ceaseless labour will be worn out prematurely 
 and subjected to a living death while they survive. 
 These lower animals have no share in the moral 
 law directly, but it is immoral to deprive them of 
 the littlo happiness of which they are capable, and 
 to subject them to conditions inconsistent with 
 their physical well - being. The physiological 
 necessity for a periodical interruption of toil, 
 whether for man or beast, is thus afiirmed in the 
 law, and it is verified by all that we have learned 
 of the constitution of living things. It is con- 
 firmed by the experience of all thoughtful men 
 and of all nations. A nation without a. Sabbath 
 must fall to a low ebb of civilisation and efficiency, 
 
The Day of Rest. 
 
 29 
 
 The inter- 
 vention of 
 Divino 
 ■• ■:tice 
 Li*rdly 
 needed to 
 inflict the 
 penalty for 
 disregiird of 
 the Sabbath. 
 
 or its people must become prematurely old and 
 worn out. It scarcely needs any special interven- 
 tion of Divine justice to inflict on those who 
 disregard the Sabbath the penalties denounced by 
 the Hebrew prophets. Those who would take 
 away the day of rest from the working man on 
 any pretext, are not his true friends ; and it is one 
 of tho hopeful signs of the times, that in recent 
 discussions of this question the working men and 
 those who might most truly be considered theii 
 representatives have shown themselves opposed to 
 innovations, which however plausible and harm- 
 less in appearance, might be the thin edge of the 
 wedge which would break down this great privi- 
 lege. It seems to be a result of physiological and 
 social laws, as well as of moral laws, that the 
 man who works six days and rests on the seventh, 
 will do more and better work than the man who 
 works without interruption, because the Sabbath is 
 a mental and physical restorative to wearied nature. 
 Thus nations which are so unwise as to sacrifice 
 the day of rest find that instead of promoting their 
 wealth and happiness they have involved them- 
 selves in hopeless slavery. 
 
 The right understanding of the Sabbath also 
 throws light on the true relation of the moral law 
 to the Christian system. That specially Jewish 
 law which related to the Temple service and the 
 Aaronic priesthood, was, we are informed in the 
 
 Tho man 
 who work's 
 six days 
 and rests 
 ou '.llO 
 
 seventh 
 will do 
 more and 
 better work 
 than the 
 man who 
 works un- 
 ceasingly. 
 
 The 
 
 relation of 
 the moral 
 law to the 
 Christian 
 system. 
 
80 
 
 The Day of Rest. 
 
 The 
 
 Decalogiio 
 tho rulo of 
 life. 
 
 Tho 
 
 Decalogue 
 does not 
 pass away 
 till men 
 ■will have 
 entered 
 into an 
 eternal 
 Sabbatism. 
 
 The Lord's 
 Day points 
 forward to 
 the second 
 coming of 
 Christ. 
 
 New Testament, of temporary obligation only, and 
 was annulled in Christ. But the Decalogue still 
 remains as the rule of life. It is, however, exalted 
 in the teaching of Christ by His directing special 
 attention to the summing up of the whole in the 
 two great commandments, and also by His adding 
 to the second that new sanction, which He calls a 
 new commandment, " Love one another, as I have 
 loved you." So in like manner the old Sabbath 
 becomes the Lord's Day, with the higher sanction 
 of being the memorial of the finished work of re- 
 demption, as v/ell as of creation. So spiritualized by 
 the teaching of Christ, and the example of the 
 primitive Church, the Decalogue does not pass 
 away until the time shall come when it will be no 
 more needed, because men shall themselves be like 
 the Lord, when they shall see Him as He is, and 
 because they too, like Him, will have entered into 
 an eternal Sabbatism. 
 
 Thus the Lord's Day also in its true significance 
 points forward to the second coming of Christ, and 
 to the New Jerusalem. Christ our Forerunner 
 has entered into His Sabbatism, and that rest 
 remains for us — to be fully enjoyed in that blessed 
 time of the restitution of all things which He is to 
 inaugurate, and when Eden will bloom again, or 
 rather will be replaced by the city of God, which 
 comes down from heaven. Then God's Sabbatism 
 will be fully restored to man never again to be 
 
The Day of Rest. 
 
 31 
 
 broken, and the weekly day of rest will bo swal- ^^ ^^^ **' 
 lowed up in that eternal Sabbatism, of which it sSiowod 
 is but a feeble and transitory type. Then the day eternal 
 of the Lord will be revealed in its full force and 
 
 meaning. 
 
 After what has been said above, it is scarcely 
 necessary to ask the question, What is the rela- 
 tive religious sacredness or obligation of the Lord's 
 Day and the ancient Sabbath ? We should, how- 
 ever, regard the former in the full light of the new 
 dispensation. In this, love to God as the reconciled 
 Father in Jesus Christ, takes the place of legal 
 obligation, and the love of our brother is raised to 
 a higher plane by the new commandment of Christ 
 — " Love one another, as I have loved you." We 
 are therefore not surprised to find that in the New 
 Testament the Lord's Day does not appear as a 
 stringent law to be enforced by pains and penalties, 
 but as a loving tribute to our best friend, as a com- 
 memoration of the completion of that work of self- 
 sacrifice which has secured for us the highest bless- 
 ings in this world and that which is to come, as a 
 means of attaining even here to that blessed rest 
 which He has prepared for us, and as a presage of 
 a still happier rest in the future. Such a day can- 
 not be enforced on the unwilling or inappreciative. 
 God may invite them to His feast ; but they will 
 make excuse, and man cannot force them to partake 
 of it. But is it on this account less sacred than the 
 
 The rclativt' 
 obligation 
 of the 
 Lord's Day 
 and tho 
 ancient 
 Subbath. 
 
 Why the 
 New Testa- 
 ment does 
 not enforce 
 the Lord's 
 Day by 
 pains and 
 penalties. 
 
33 
 
 The Day of Rest 
 
 The Lord's 
 Da/ not less 
 Bacred than 
 th(] old 
 Sabbath. 
 
 What 
 Christians 
 should aim 
 at. 
 
 We are 
 
 called to 
 enter into 
 rest. 
 
 old Sabbath ? Is it not rather incomparably more 
 holy ? And should it not be one of the highest 
 aims of Christians to guard it for its highest uses, 
 and, while entering themselves into that happy 
 Sabbatism of which it is the emblem, to induce all 
 others to accept Christ's gracious invitation to enter 
 into this rest, and to respect the day which is at 
 once its sign and its means of attainment. It is 
 to be feared that inattention to the sacredness of 
 the Lord's Day, and inability to enter into the in- 
 ward peace and rest which it represents, are beset- 
 ting evils of our time, and hindrances to our attain- 
 ing to the highest type of Christianity. We are 
 called on by our Redeemer to enter into rest ; but 
 like Israel of old we may fall short of it, and be 
 doomed, because of want of faith, to wander long 
 in the desert of disappointed hopes. 
 
 "Let us therefore give diligence to enter into 
 that rest, that no man fall after the same example 
 of unbelief." 
 
 — . ^ 
 
 -->^j Present Day Tracts, No. 50.}'^ 
 
I 
 
 Note. — The writer had not observed, till the foregoing pages 
 were in type, the recent controversy as to the origin of the 
 week, ariaing from an article by the Bishop of Carlisle in the 
 Contemporary Review. No scientific importau<;e can be attached 
 to the hypothesis that the week has a merely astronomical origin. 
 The naming of the days after plansts or planetary gods was 
 probably an afterthought, not likely to have suggested itself to 
 primitive man, especially as some of the planets are too in* 
 conspicuous to have early attracted attention. The week does 
 not actually correspond with quarters of a lunation ; and these 
 are not definite marks of time, like complete revolutions. The 
 week must thus depend, as stated in Genesis, on some different 
 basis from the other divisions of time. These, in so far as days, 
 months, and years are concerned, arise from definite astro- 
 nomical revolutions, and are, no doubt, of priceless value to 
 man, as the basis of "times and seasons," without which 
 civilisation would have been impossible. But the week and the 
 Sabbath rest on the revealed stages of the creative work, and 
 hence occupy a special place in relation to God's providential 
 procedure, and mark a different connection between man and 
 his Creator from that indicated by the suitableness of merely 
 astronomical arrangement. For this reason the week becomes 
 the basis of other sevenfold divisions of time having a religious 
 significance, as, for example, the Sabbatical year. In the words 
 of Mr. H. Grattan Guinness, "the entire meaning of the 
 Sabbath depends on its connection with the rest of the Creator 
 in a perfected creation, before the entrance of moral evil.