day was appropriated to the fervice of religion by the authority or example of his Apostles?

The practice of holding religious affemblies upon the first day of the week, was fo early and univerfal in the Chriftian church, that it carries with it confiderable proof of having originated from fome precept of Christ, or of his Apostles, though none fuch be now extant. It was upon the first day of the week that the difciples were affembled, when Chrift appeared to them for the first time after his refurrection; "then the fame

day at evening, being the first day of the week, "when the doors were fhut, where the disci

ples were affembled, for fear of the Jews,

came Jefus and ftood in the midft of them." John, xx. 19. This, for any thing that appears in the account, might, as to the day, have been accidental: but in the 26th verfe of the fame chapter we read, "that after eight days," that is on the first day of the week following," again "the disciples were within ;" which fecond meeting upon the fame day of the week looks like an appointment and defign to meet on that particular day. In the twentieth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles we find the fame cuftom in a Chriftian church at a great diftance from Jerufalem" And we came unto them to Troas in

"five days, where we abode feven days; and

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upon the first day of the week, when the difciples came together to break bread, Paul preached

unto them." Acts, xx. 6, 7. The manner in which the hiftorian mentions the difciples coming together to break bread on the first day of the week, fhews, I think, that the practice by this time was familiar and established. St. Paul to the Corinthians writes thus: "Concerning the col"lection for the faints, as I have given order to "the churches of Galatia, even fo do ye; upon "the first day of the week let every one of

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you

lay by him in ftore as God hath profpered "him, that there be no gatherings when I come."

1 Cor. xvi. 1, 2. Which direction affords a probable proof, that the first day of the week was already, amongst the Christians both of Corinth and Galatia, distinguished from the reft by fome religious application or other. At the time that St. John wrote the book of his Revelation, the first day of the week had obtained the name of the Lord's day-"I was in the fpirit (fays he) "on the Lord's day." Rev.i. 10. Which name, and St. John's ufe of it, fufficiently denote the appropriation of this day to the service of religion, and that this appropriation was perfectly known to the churches of Afia, I make no doubt but

that

that by the Lord's day was meant the first day of the week; for we find no footsteps of any dif tinction of days, which could entitle any other to that appellation. The fubfequent hiftory of Christianity correfponds with the accounts delivered on this fubject in fcripture.

It will be remembered, that we are contending by these proofs, for no other duty upon the first day of the week, than that of holding and frequenting religious affemblies. A ceffation upon that day from labour, beyond the time of attendance upon public worship, is not intimated in any paffage of the New Teftament; nor did Chrift or his Apoftles deliver, that we know of, any command to their difciples for a discontinuance upon that day of the common offices of their profeffions: a referve which none will fee reafon to wonder at, or to blame as a defect in the inftitution, who confider that, in the primitive condition of Christianity, the observance of a new fabbath would have been useless, or inconvenient, or impracticable. During Chrift's perfonal miniftry his religion was preached to the fers alone. They already had a fabbath, which, as citizens and fubjects of that oeconomy, they were obliged to keep, and did keep. It was not therefore probable that Chrift would enjoin another

another day of reft in conjunction with this. When the new religion came forth into the Gentile world, converts to it were, for the moft part, made from thofe claffes of fociety who have not their time and labour at their own disposal; and it was fcarcely to be expected that unbelieving masters and magiftrates, and they who directed the employment of others, would permit their flaves and labourers to reft from their

work every feventh day; or that civil government, indeed, would have fubmitted to the lofs of a feventh part of the public industry, and that 100 in addition to the numerous feftivals which the national religions indulged to the people: at leaft this would have been an incumbrance, which might have greatly retarded the reception of Christianity in the world. In reality, the inftitution of a weekly fabbath is fo connected with the functions of civil life, and requires fo much of the concurrence of civil laws in its regulation and fupport, that it cannot, perhaps, properly be made the ordinance of any religion, till that religion be received as the religion of the state.

The opinion that Chrift and his Apoftles meant to retain the duties of the Jewish fabbath, shifting only the day from the feventh to the first,

fems

feems to prevail without fufficient proof; nor does any evidence remain in fcripture (of what, however, is not improbable) that the first day of the week was thus diftinguished in commemoration of our Lord's refurrection.

The conclufion from the whole enquiry (for it is our bufinefs to follow the arguments to whatever probability they conduct us) is this: The affembling upon the first day of the week for the purpose of public worship and religious instruction, is a law of Chriftianity, of divine appointment; the refting on that day from our employments longer than we are detained from them by attendance upon thefe affemblies, is to Chriftians an ordinance of human inftitution; binding nevertheless upon the confcience of every individual of a country in which a weekly fabbath is established, for the fake of the beneficial purposes which the public and regular obfervance of it promotes; and recommended perhaps in fome degree to the divine approbation, by the refemblance it bears to what God was pleased to make a folemn part of the law which he delivered to the people of Ifrael, and by its fubferviency to many of the fame uses.

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