Exercitations concerning the name, original, nature, use, and continuance of a day of sacred…

§. 52 It is yet farther pleaded (Disquisit. p. 9, 10, 11, 12. That no Distinction can be made between a Weekly Sabbath, and the seventh Day precisely. And if any such difference be asserted, then if one of them be appointed in the fourth Commandment, the other is not. For there are not two Sabbaths enjoined in it, but one. And it is evident, that there never was of old but one Sabbath. The Sabbath observed under the Old Testament was that required and prescribed in the fourth Commandment; and so on the other side, the Sabbath required in the Decalogue, was that which was observed under the Old Testament, and that only. Two Sabbaths, one, of one Day in seven, and the other of the seventh Day precisely are not to be fancied. The seventh Day, and that only was the Sabbath of the Old Testament, and of the Decalogue. ⟨p. 204⟩These things I say are at large pleaded by the forementioned Author.

§. 52 It is yet farther pleaded (Disquisit. p. 9, 10, 11, 12. That no Distinction can be made between a Weekly Sabbath, and the seventh Day precisely. And if any such difference be asserted, then if one of them be appointed in the fourth Commandment, the other is not. For there are not two Sabbaths enjoyned in it, but one. And it is evident, that there never was of old but one Sabbath. The Sabbath observed under the Old Testament was that required and prescribed in the fourth Commandment; and so on the other side, the Sabbath required in the Decalogue, was that which was observed under the Old Testament, and that only. Two Sabbaths, one, of one Day in seven, and the other of the seventh Day precisely are not to be fancied. The seventh Day, and that only was the Sabbath of the Old Testament, and of the Decalogue. ⟨p. 204⟩These things I say are at large pleaded by the forementioned Author.

An. 1. These Objections are framed against a Distinction used by another Learned Person, about the Sabbath as absolutely commanded in the Decalogue, and as enjoined to practise under the Old Testament. But neither he nor any other sober Person ever fancied that there were two Sabbaths of old, one enjoined unto the Church of the Israelites, the other required in the Decalogue. But any man may, nay, every prudent man ought to distinguish between the Sabbath, as enjoined absolutely in words expressive of the Law of our Creation, and Rule of our Moral Dependence on God, in the fourth Command; and the same Sabbath, as it had a temporary, occasional Determination to the seventh Day in the Church of the Jews by virtue of an especial Intimation of the Will of God, suited unto that Administration of the Covenant which that Church and People were then admitted into. I see therefore no Difficulty in these things. The fourth Commandment doth not contain only the moral Equity that some Time should always be set apart unto the Celebration of the Worship of God; nor only the Original Instruction given us by the Law of Creation, and the Covenant Obedience required of us thereon, wherein the substance of the Command doth consist; but it expresseth moreover, the peculiar Application of this Command by the Will of God, to the State of the Church then erected by him, with respect unto the seventh Day precisely, as before instituted and commanded,