A59693:90
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 24.
How these things may evince the morality of a seventh part ⟨p. 14⟩§24of time, will be difficult to conceive, unless further enquiry be made, to wit, when and by what rules may it be known that any law is suitable and agreeable unto humane nature, and consequently good in it self? For resolution of which doubt, there is great silence generally in most Writers: Bishop White endeavours it by giving three rules to clear up this mist; but (pace tanti viri) I much fear that he much darkens and obscures the truth herein,1 and muds the streams. For 1. Because the Sabbath is not simply moral, but hath something positive in it, he therefore makes it temporary, as appears in his conclusion of that discourse: when as 'tis evident by his own confession, that some laws positively moral are general and universal. For laws positively moral (he saith) are either personal only, as was Abraham's coming out of his own Country, Gen. 12.1. Some are for one Nation or Republic only, Exod. 22.1, 3•7. Some are common and general for all mankind, as the law of Polygamy. 2. He seems to make laws simply and entirely moral to be such as are in their inward nature morally good, before and without any external imposition of the Law-giver: Now if by external imposition he means the external manner of Mosaical administration of the law, there is then some truth in what he affirms; for doubtless before Moses time the Patriarchs had the law revealed after another manner; but if by external imposition be meant external Revelation, whether immediately by God himself unto mans conscience, or mediately by man, then it's most false that any thing can be morally good or evil, much less entirely and simply so, before and without some such law: for though it may be good and suitable to man before a law pase upon it, yet nothing can be morally good or evil without some law, for then there should be some sin which is not the transgression of a law, and some obedience which is not directed by any law, both which are impossible and abominable. 3. He makes moral laws by external imposition and constitution only, to be such, as before the external imposition of them, are a diaphorous, and good or evil only by reason of some circumstance.