not be the same on which God rested, for the name is given to it not only because of his example of rest, but also because of his ordinance of rest. And as to the second part of the dilemma, Christ's resurrection contains not the nature of the Christian Sabbath, but the occasion of it; nor is the day called "Sabbath" from Christ's example and practice on that day, but from Christians resting from their secular affairs, for a religious, grateful, and solemn memorial of the event. It is called "Sabbath" with reference to the creation, because, like God, we rest after six days' works; but with reference to the resurrection it is called "the Lord's Day," because on that day the Lord of the Sabbath showed his lordship and dominion over the devil, death, and the grave. Lastly, to the assertions of Barklay, that Christ did not rest on the day of his resurrection, it is replied, that though he were in action, yet he did not labour; for all the motions and actions of his glorified body were as pleasing to it as any ease or rest could be. "So this notable dilemma," concludes Ley, "brought in with its two horns against the two syllables of the word Sabbath, hath not defaced one letter, but left it entire for a title of the Lord's Day; and Barklay hath but barked at it, not bitten it, to do it any manner of hurt." (P. 145.)

The sum of his reasons why, though neither the Apostles nor the ancient Fathers called Sunday "Sabbath," we are at liberty to do so, is as follows: "In the primitive times the Lord's Day was seldom [in fact never] called the Sabbath, because then the old Sabbath of the Jews was religiously observed with solemn assemblies; and while and where two days were so solemnized (i. e. Saturday and Sunday), it was fit to call them, for distinction's sake and to avoid confusion, by several names: and good reason that the Saturday, having for some thousand of years had possession of the title Sabbath, when yet the Lord's Day, or Christian Sunday, had never shined in the world, should be called the Sabbath rather than any other day, and that the Lord's Day should rather be called by another name than by that. But now, at least among us who use that day which was the Jew's holiday, not as a Sabbath, or a day of rest, but as a work day; now that some Jewishly, some profanely affected do deny the name of Sabbath to the day we celebrate, to supplant the support of it by the Fourth Commandment (not as it is the Lord's Day, but as one of the seven), there is no danger of confusion by calling the Lord's Day the Sabbath, but due caution thereby given against such conceits as tend to impeach the pre-eminence thereof." (P. 167-8.)

His main reason for preferring the name Sabbath to the Lord's Day, is the very one for which, above all, his opponents considered the title so objectionable and misleading-namely, that by using it "we may uphold the tenure of the day, together with the title of it, by the Fourth Commandment: whereto," says he, "I desire to exhort the reader with the more earnest entreaty; first, because some with such supercilious disdain have endeavoured to disgrace that title, that others, as much too modest as they are too bold, have been afraid or ashamed to use it; and I remember one

who was of eminent parts and place, and who formerly had divers times used it in a printed book, having upon occasions named the Sabbath, presently recalled the word as if it had been a fault, and took up the title Sunday instead thereof: Secondly, because, if we let go the name of the time, we may be like to lose the thing in time to come, or at least to loosen and weaken its claim to the best authority on which it depends; for, as it is a weekly holiday, we cannot plead better for it than by the proportion of the Fourth Commandment, and that being made good upon that ground, the difference about the particular day within the circle of the seven will be the more easily composed, since it is no more than other proof and evidence, inferior to an express precept of the Decalogue, may well support." (P. 200.)

But I ask-If the Jewish law of the weekly Sabbath is applicable to every analogous institution which, because of the analogy, may be called a sabbath, what hinders us to apply the law of any of the Jewish sabbaths to all the others, and even to the Lord's Day? For example, may it not be argued that the duty of fasting, which the Jews were commanded to perform on their annual sabbath called the day of atonement (Lev. xvi. 29–34; xxiii. 27-32), was equally incumbent on them each weekly Sabbath, and is in like manner our duty on the Christian festival? The reasoning would be precisely that of Ley :-The day of atonement was a sabbath; the Lord's Day, on which we rest from labour that we may have leisure for Divine worship, is thus de facto a sabbath; therefore the law of the one sabbath applies to the other. Yet not only have the Jews never imagined themselves bound to "afflict their souls" on the seventh day of the week; but of all writers on the Christian Sabbath known to me, only one-and he a lay member of the Sabbath Alliance-has applied the law of the annual Jewish fast to the mode of observing the Christian festival.*

Bernard's Judgment of the late Archbishop of Armagh, &c., 1657, contains an extract from a letter written by Usher to Ley, evidently before the publication of his book on the Sabbath. The primate there remonstrates against the "waterishness" of a proposition which Ley had communicated to him as to the permanence of a law (regarded by Usher as juris divini positivi) that some one day in seven should be set apart for God's solemn worship. The proposition was, that "this doctrine, rather than the contrary, is to be held the doctrine of the Church of England, and may well be gathered out of her public Liturgy, and the first part of the Homily concerning the place and time of prayer.” "Whereas," says Usher, "you should have said that this is to

The author alluded to is Mr James Miller, Professor of Surgery in the University of Edinburgh. See pages 4 and 50 of his Physiology in Harmony with the Bible respecting the Value and Right Observance of the Sabbath. Edin. 1854. The reader who takes the trouble to compare Mr Miller's application of this article of the Mosaic law with the entire passages in Leviticus above referred to, will judge whether or not he writes with the candour that might have been expected.

be held undoubtedly the doctrine of the Church of England. For if there could be any reasonable doubt made of the Church of England in her Liturgy, who should better declare her meaning than herself in her Homily? where she peremptorily declareth her mind, That in the Fourth Commandment God hath given express charge to all men, that upon the Sabbath-day, which is now our Sunday, they should cease from all weekly and work-day labour, to the intent that like as God himself wrought six days, and rested the seventh, and blessed and sanctified it, and consecrated it to quietness and rest from labour; even so God's obedient people should use the Sunday holily, and rest from their common and daily business, and also give themselves wholly to heavenly exercises of God's true religion and service.' Than which, what could you devise to say more yourself?" From the same letter we learn what MS. it was that Ley received from Usher, as mentioned at the beginning of this article: "For the farther maintenance of which doctrine," adds the primate, “ send you herewith a treatise, written by a learned man (now with God), against Theophilus Brabourne, who gave occasion to the raising up of these unhappy broils; which, if it may any way con. duce to the furtherance of your more exact treatise, &c., I shall be very glad." (Bernard, pp. 105-7.)

*

"I

103. L'ESTRANGE, HAMON.-God's Sabbath before the Law, under the Law, and under the Gospel, briefly vindicated from novel and heterodox assertions. Camb. 1641. 4to. Pp. 122.

The opinions here maintained coincide so closely with those of the Westminster Assembly, which met in 1643, that the author may have been assisted by some divine who, in due season, became a member of it, and shared the work of preparing its Catechism. At all events, L'Estrange's treatise must have been one of the books in the hands of the committee on whom this labour was imposed.

As both his father and his brother, the famous Sir Roger, were most zealous and active in the royal cause, it is surprising that the Puritan opinions should find so strenuous an advocate in a quarter so unlikely, and that the book should be dedicated first to the Long Parliament (which is extolled as a "glorious Assembly, and bright constellation of the chief and prime lights of the kingdom"), and then to "the right worshipful his highly honoured father." If he was as unscrupulous as Sir Roger, it may, without much uncharitableness, be suspected that one of his objects in setting himself so prominently in opposition to White, Heylin, and Ironside, was a desire to place a member of the family upon friendly terms with the party whose increasing power might soon endanger the adherents of the king.

• Mr Hely of Berry.-Note by Bernard.

In Part I. he argues for a primeval Sabbath, quotes many eminent divines who had taught its institution, and ridicules the proleptical mode of interpreting Gen. ii. 3. Acknowledging that Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Eusebius, and Damascen, represent the Sabbath as having originated in the time of Moses, and allowing that the Fathers were men, many of them, singular both for learning and piety," he asks-" But shall we, without more ado, yield to bare authority? Doth the end of dispute depend merely upon what they have said? May we not examine the matter yet a little further? May we not question whether these men spake as they meant; whether their arguments jumped together? For did they always so? No, if Hierome be of any credit. The ancients are sometimes enforced to speak, not so much what themselves think, as what they conceive may most nonplus the Gentiles.' This was their policy against the heathen; might not they use it also against the Jews, with whom they were in continual conflict? If they spake as they thought, might not vehemency of dispute transport them to inconsiderate speeches in their heart, and through too eager opposition to one error to incur the contrary." (Pp. 14-15.)

In Part II. (on the Sabbath under the Law), he thus handles the great question, On whom was the Decalogue imposed?

"Disputed it is, whether the Law, considered as delivered on Mount Sinai, and abstracted from the ratification which it derived from Christ and his apostles, was only given to the Jews, and so only obliged them; or under them, the Gentiles also, who were to become the church and people of God. Zanchie (in Decalog.), Dominicus à Soto (lib. 2, De Justitia et Jure, qu. 5, art. 4), and some others, are of opinion that it was peculiar to the Jews only, from these reasons.

"First, laws only bind them to whom they are only given: But the Decalogue was given only to the Jews, as is manifest by the preface: Ergo, it only bindeth them.

"Answer. The Decalogue was, indeed, given to the Jews; but was it as Jews or a nation distinct by themselves? No; rather as covenantees, and the then select people of God, so that whosoever were after implanted in the Covenant, and enrolled God's people, to them, as post nati, did and doth the Decalogue belong. Nor was the preface prefixed to invest the Israelites with a sole propriety therein; for God, being now to give them (as they were then his holy and chosen church, which is always formally, though not materially the same) his moral and immutable laws, had here just reason to apply himself first to them as Jews, and to rouse their attention, by inculcating into their memory the recent and signal blessing lately conferred upon them, thereby to excite their more strict observance of what he was now to give them in charge. So that this introduction might, I confess, be proper to the Jews only, and yet the Decalogue itself have a larger province and extent, and be spoken omnibus similiter, to all alike. (Irenæus, 1. 4, c. 31.) Though should I deny what I partly grant, I could vouch men of no mean note to rescue me from error.

In this preface, God bespeaketh the Israelites more especially, but yet so as under them he comprehendeth all the Gentiles.' So Beza (Thes. 29, art. 5). And for the Roman party, Bellarmine (De Justif., 1. 4, c. 6).

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Secondly, if the Law, as given on Sinai, obliged the Gentiles, then were they at that time, before, and now are, since Christ, bound to observe the Sabbath: But they neither were, nor now are, astricted to that observation: Ergo, &c.

"Answer. That some Gentiles were thereto bound, the pellucid fountain of verity showeth plainly; Let not the son of the stranger that hath joined himself to the Lord speak, saying, God hath utterly separated me from his people' (Isa. lvi. 3). If you say that these were Israelites by covenant, though not by seed, then why may not the Christian Gentiles, who are covenantees as well as the Jews, who are also the seed of Abraham, and heirs according to the promise, and united in Christ Jesus' (Gal. iii. 28-29), why may not they observe it also? Will you say, because the day is abrogated and annulled? and can you demonstratively prove it is so? The Jewish Sabbath was questionless indeed abolished, but was the Sabbath of the Fourth Commandment so? If you say, yea, for they were both one, I reply, it is with greater facility said than proved." (Pp. 40-42.)

L'Estrange, it will be observed, omits to put to his objector the most important question of all-" Will you say, because covenantees under the new covenant have no concern with observances

prescribed under the old?" A discussion of this point would have been acceptable to some even of those who (after considering Exod. xix. 3-6; xx. 2; xxxiv. 10, 27; Deut. iv. 8; v. 1–6; Psal. cxlvii. 19, 20) saw no reason to doubt that the Decalogue was given to the Jews, not as a nation, but as the select people, or then-existing Church, of God.

In Part III. he maintains that the Sabbath-day was changed by Christ at the resurrection. "There was no interregnum, no vacancy at all, no cessation of a Sabbath; no, not the first week; no sooner was the old Sabbath abolished, than the new established and installed. The Jewish Sabbath, that slept (we all know) its last in the grave with our Saviour; its ghost (according to country dialect), or the shadow of that shadow, walked, indeed, a while after; but itself, the old Sabbath, expired then, and immediately entered the Lord's Day." (P. 71.) He relies on the texts cited in the Westminster Catechism, and on some of the Fathers who lived after the time of Constantine; but makes no allusion to Rom. xiv. 5, 6; Gal. iv. 9-11; or Col. ii. 16-17. The Fourth Commandment, he holds, applies as strictly and literally to the Lord's Day as to the older Sabbath. The "moral equity," or law of nature, usually recognised as contained in that precept, (viz., "to yield God a competent and convenient time for his worship,") is held by him to be no sufficient rule of Christian duty in this respect, though admitted to be tacitly implied in the commandment. "But so it was," he adds, "in the institution of all other ceremonial festivals, the Passover, Pentecost, &c., to