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not profaned, but honoured. But in our daily Talk, and Communication with each other, it is our Saviour's peremptory Precept, Swear not at all: a Rule fo evidently right and important, that even Heathens have ftrictly enjoined and followed it, to the Shame of too many, who call themselves Chriftians.

Together with common fwearing fhould be mentioned another Sin, very near akin to it, and almost always joined with it, that monstrous Cuftom of curfing; in direct Contradiction to all Humanity, and to the exprefs Words of Scripture, Blefs, and curfe not. To with the heaviest Judgments of God, and even eternal Damnation, to a Perfon, for the flighteft Caufe, or none at all; to with the fame to ourselves, if fome trifling Thing, that we are faying, be not true, which frequently after all is not true; amounts to the most defperate Impiety, if People at all confider what they fay. And though they do not, it is even then thoughtlessly treating God, and his Laws, and the awful Sanctions of them, with Contempt and blotting out of their Minds all ferious Regard to Subjects, that will one Day be found most ferious Things. His Delight was in Curfing, fays the Pfalmift, and it shall happen unto him: he loved not Bleffing, therefore fall it be far from himTM.

3. Befides the Offences already mentioned, all indecent and unfit Ufe of God's Name in our Discourse, though it be not in fwearing or curfing, comes within the Prohibition of this Commandment. All irreverent Sayings, and even Thoughts, concerning his Nature and Attributes, his Actions and his Commands, fall under the fame Guilt; unless we are tormented with fuch Thoughts, whether we will or not: for then they are only an Affliction, not a Sin. All Sorts of Talk, ridiculing, mifreprefenting, or inveighing against Religion, or whatever is connected with it, incur the like Condemnation. Nay, even Want of Attention in God's Worship, drawing near to him with our Mouths, whilft

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we remove our Hearts far from him", if it be wilfully or carelessly indulged, makes us chargeable, in its Degree, with the Sin of taking his Name in vain.

4. Though we no Way profane his Name ourselves; yet if we intice others to Perjury and Falsehood; or provoke them to rafh Oaths and Curfes; or give them any needless Temptation to blafpheme God; to speak difrefpectfully, or think flightly, of their Maker, or his Laws, natural or revealed: by fuch Behaviour also we become acceffary to the Breach of this Commandment; and rank ourselves with thofe, whom it exprefsly declares God will not hold guiltless: that is, will not acquit, but feverely punish.

Let us therefore be watchful to preferve continually fuch an Awe of the Supreme Being upon our own Minds, and those of all who belong to us, as may on every Occafion effectually influence us to give him the Glory due unto his Name, both in our more folemn Addreffes to him, and in our daily Words and Actions. For God is greatly to be feared in the Aembly of the Saints; and te be had in Reverence of all them, that are round about him”, • Pfal. lxxxix. 7.

* Ifa. xxix. 13.

LECTURE

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Fourth Commandment.

XXI.

F the Worship of God were left at large to be performed at any Time, too many would be tempted to defer and poftpone it, on one Pretence or another, till at Length it would be performed at no Time. And therefore, though he were to be adored only by each Perfon feparately, and in private, it would be very expedient to fix on fome ftated returning Seafons for that Purpose. But Reafon fhews it to be requifite, and the Experience of all Ages proves it to be natural, that as

we are focial Creatures, we should be focial in Religion, as well as other Things, and honour in common our common Maker: that we fhould unite in giving Thanks to him for the Bleffings of Life; a very great Part of which we fhould be incapable of, without uniting: that we fhould join in praying Forgiveness of the Sins, which we too often join in committing: petition him together for the Mercies, which we have Need of receiving together; and, by affembling to learn and acknowledge our feveral Duties, keep alive in one another, as well as ourselves, that conftant Regard to Piety and Virtue, on which our Happiness depends, here and hereafter.

Since therefore, on thefe Accounts, there must be public Worship and Inftruction: it is not only expedient, but neceffary, that there fhould be alfo fixed Times appointed for it by fufficient Authority. And how much and what Time should be devoted to this Purpose, every Society must have determined for themselves, and would have found it hard enough to agree in determining, if God had given no Intimation of his Will in the Cafe. But happily we are informed, in the Hiftory of the Creation, that the Maker of the World, having finished his Work in fix Days, (which he could as eafily have finished in one Moment, had it not been for fome valuable Reafon, probably of Inftruction to us) blessed the feventh Day, and fanctified it: that is, appointed every Return of it to be religiously kept, as a folemn Memorial, that of him, and therefore to him, are all Things. It is much the most natural to apprehend, that this Appointment took Place from the Time, when it is mentioned; from the Time, when the Reason of it took Place. And it is no Wonder at all, that, in so short a Hiftory, Notice fhould not be taken of the actual Obfervation of it before Mofes: for Notice is not taken of it in 500 Years after Mofes. Yet we know of a Certainty, that in his Time, at leaft, it was ordered to be

• Gen. ii, 3.

b Rom. xi. 36.

obferved,

obferved, both in this fourth Commandment, and in other Parts of the Law, which direct more particularly the Manner of keeping it.

The Thing, moft expressly enjoined the Jews, in each of thefe Paffages, is, refting from all Manner of Work; and not fuffering their Families, their Cattle, nor even the Strangers that lived amongst them, to labour on that Day. And the Reafon of this Reft, given in the Commandment, as you have it in the Book of Exodus, is, that the Lord rested on the feventh Day from his Work of Creation. Not that this, or any Thing, could be a Fatigue to him. For the Creator of the Ends of the Earth fainteth not, neither is weary. But the Expreffion means, that having then finished the Formation of the World, he ceafed from it; and required Men also to cease from their Labours every feventh Day; in Memory of that fundamental Article of all Religion, that the Heavens and Earth were made, and therefore are governed, by one infinitely wife, powerful, and good Being. And thus was the Sabbath, which Word means the Day of Reft, a Sign, as the Scripture calls it, between God and the Children of Ifrael; a Mark, to dif tinguish them from all Worshippers of falfe Deities.

But befides this principal Reason for the Repose of every feventh Day, two others are mentioned in the Law: that it might remind them of that Deliverance from heavy Bondage, which God had granted them; Remember, that thou waft a Servant in the Land of Egypt, and that the Lord brought thee out thence; therefore he commanded thee to keep the Sabbath Day: and likewise that their Servants and Cattle might not be worn out with inceffant Toil; that thine Ox and thine Afs may reft; and the Son of thy Handmaid, and the Stranger, may be refreshed. Such Mercy indeed is little more than common Prudence: but there are in the World Multitudes of hardhearted Wretches, who would pay fmall Regard to that Confideration, were they left to their own Liberty.

c Ifa. xl. 28.

• Deut. v. 15.

d Exod. xxxi. 13, 17. Ezek. xx. 12, 20. f Exod. xxiii. 12.

H 3

Now

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Now merely abftaining from common Work on this Day, in Obedience to God's Command, for fuch religious and moral Ends as thefe, was undoubtedly fanctifying, or keeping it holy. But then we are not to fuppofe, that the Leifure, thus provided for Men, was to be thrown away juft as they pleased, instead of being ufefully employed. God directed the Jews: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy Soul and with all thy Might; and the Words, which I command thee this Day, fhall be in thy Heart; and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy Children; and fhalt talk of them, when thou fittest in thine Houfe, and when thou walkeft by the Way, and when thou lieft down, and when thou rifeft up. Now, as he required them to attend fo conftantly to these Duties; he could not but expect, they should attend more especially to them on that Day, when the great Foundation of all Duty, his creating the World, was appointed to be commemorated; and when they had Nothing to take off their Thoughts from what they owed to God their Maker. There was a peculiar Sacrifice appointed for that Day: there is a peculiar Pfalm compofed for it, the Ninety-fecond; and thefe Things are furely further Intimations to us, that it must have been a Time, peculiarly intended for the offering up of Prayers and Thanksgivings to Heaven.

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Few indeed, or none, of God's Laws were well obferved in the Days of the Old Teftament. But ftill, as the Priests and Levites were difperfed through the Jewish Nation, that they might teach the People Religion; fo we read, that in good Times they did teach it accordingly and when could this be, but on the Sabbath Day? We fee it was the Cuftom of religious Perfons, on that Day, to refort to the Prophets, that were in Ifrael; doubtlefs to hear the Word of God from their Mouths. We fee public Happiness promised on this Condition, that Men fhould honour the Sabbath of the Lord, not doing their own Ways, nor finding their own h 2 Kings iv. 23.

Deut. vi. 5, 6, 7.

Plea

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