A59693:461
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 156.
It cannot be shown that ever God made himself an example of any act, but that in the present example there was and is a present rule, binding immediately to •ollow that example: if therefore from the foundation of the world, God made himself an example in six days labour and in a seventh days rest, why should not this example then and at that time of innocency be binding? there being no example which God sets before us, but it supposeth a rule binding us immediately thereunto? The great and most high God could have made the world in a moment or in a hundred years, why did he make it then in six days, and rested the seventh day, but that it might be an example to man? Its evident that ever since the world began, mans life was to be spent in labour and action which God could have appointed to contemplation only; nor will any say that his life should be spent only in labour, and never have any special day of rest (unless the Antinomians, who herein sin against the light of nature) if therefore God was exemplary in his six days labour, why should any think but that he was thus also in his seventh days rest? Pointing out unto man most visibly (as it were) thereby on what day he should rest: A meet time for labour was a moral duty since man was framed upon earth, God therefore gives man an example of it in making the world in six days: A meet time for holy rest, the end of all holy and honest labour, was much more moral (the end being better then the means) why then was not the example of this also seen in Gods rest? M. Ironside indeed is at a stand here,1 and confesseth his ignorance In conceiving how Gods working six days should be exemplary to man in innocency, it being not preceptive but permissive only to man in his apostasy. But let a plain analysis be made of the motives used to press obedience to the fourth command and we shall find (according to the consent of all the Orthodox not prejudiced in this controversy, that Gods example of working six days in creating the world, is held forth as a motive