A59693:235
Theses Sabbaticæ, or, The doctrine of the Sabbath wherein the Sabbaths I. Morality, II.…
Theses Sabbaticæ, or, The doctrine of the Sabbath wherein the Sabbaths I. Morality, II. Change, III. Beginning. IV. Sanctification, are clearly discussed, which were first handled more largely in sundry sermons in Cambridge in New-England in opening of the Fourth Commandment : in unfolding whereof many scriptures are cleared, divers cases of conscience resolved, and the moral law as a rule of life to a believer, occasionally and distinctly handled / by Thomas Shepard ...Theses Sabbaticæ, or, The doctrine of the Sabbath wherein the Sabbaths I. Morality, II. Change, III. Beginning. IV. Sanctification, are clearly discussed, which were first handled more largely in sundry sermons in Cambridge in New-England in opening of the Fourth COmmandment : in unfolding whereof many scriptures are cleared, divers cases of conscience resolved, and the morall law as a rule of life to a believer, occasionally and distinctly handled / by Thomas Shepard ...
London: printed by T.R. and E.M. for John Rothwell, 1650
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Thesis 80.
The Sabbath (saith one) is perpetual and moral, but not the §80Sabbath day, 1the Sabbath (which some make continual and inward only) is perpetually to be observed, but not the Sabbath day; a Sabbath is by Divine ordination, but a Sabbath day is to be observed only as a humane constitution. But they should do well to consider, whether that which they call an inward continual Sabbath be inconsistent with a special day; for I am sure that they under the old Testament were bound equally with us to observe a continual Sabbath in resting from all sin, and resting in God by Jesus Christ, Heb. 4.1, 2. yet this did not exempt them from observing a special day: A special day is a most powerful means to Sabbatize every day; Why then may not a Sabbath and a Sabbath day consist together? An every day Sabbath is equally opposite to a time occasionally set, as to a set day, which the Commandment enjoins; and therefore if it exempts a Christian from observing a set day, it sets him free also from all observation of any such set time; for if because a Christian Sabbath ought to be continual, and that therefore there ought to be no set days, then there should not be any occasionally set times for the worship of God, because these neither can be continual; and if there ought to be no such set times, we may then bid good night to all the public worship and glory of God in the world, like the men with one eye to him who put his other eye quite out: And if any here reply ⟨p. 66⟩that there is not the like reason, because holy time and days are not necessary, but holy duties are necessary, and therefore require some occasional set time for them: I answer, That let the difference be granted, yet that which I now dispute on is, this ground and supposition only, viz. That if all set days are to be abandoned, because a Christians Sabbath ought to be continual and inward, then all occasional set times also are to be abandoned upon the same ground, because these cannot be continual and inward no more than the other: as for them who think no holy day necessary, but holy duties lawful every day, we have already and shall hereafter clear up more fully in its proper place: