"mighty mischief," must continue, because it springs necessarily from the application of the scriptural statements respecting the baptism of believers to the baptism of infants; and while infant baptism lasts, there being only one baptism enacted by Christ, they must be applied.-Essay on Christian Baptism. SPIRITUAL "EXEMPTS." THESE are a class of professors, far more numerous in the church than is consistent with her welfare. They are always willing to have everything done. They complain if it is not done. Very ready are they to bind the heaviest burdens on others; yet, somehow or other, they are always adroit enough to remove their own shoulders from the load. about it, if none of the church were willing to assemble for prayer. They have some recollection, moreover, that they have promised that they would not "forsake the assembling of themselves together." Yet here also we have the supplication which they put up more frequently than any other,"I pray thee, have me excused." As in the former instance they would fain "Oh yes, the sabbath school ought to have the duty devolve on some one be efficiently sustained. It is very else. They do not say, precisely in so necessary to gather in the children, who many words, that others like praying would otherwise be running about, better than they do, they only say that desecrating the holy day, and growing" they have more time." How it may up in idle and vicious habits!" "Well be in other churches I do not know, it then, come, take a class." "Be a may be different with them; but this I visitor." "Let me report you to the can say, that those who compose my superintendent, as ready to begin next own body-guard as a pastor, the picked sabbath." Ah, you get no such per- of the flock who are always there, the mission. You find that by some conve- Aarons and Hurs who stay up the feeble nient method of reasoning, these hands of my ministry, are not by any persons have learned to consider them- means only those who live nearest the selves "exempt" from such service. place of worship, who have the most of They do not indeed wear a badge to this world's good, who are the least inthis effect, like the ex-fireman or the dustrious in their lawful avocations, or soldier who has served his seven years; who are the most able to afford the yet just as coolly as if they did, they loss of their time. refer you to somebody else, as the one who is to discharge their duty. You would naturally suppose (if the thing were not impossible) that they had hired him as their substitute in the army of Christ! The prayer meeting also ought to be sustained. It would look very badly, to say the least, if it were given up. Their pastor would feel very sorrowful We have often puzzled ourselves no little to discover the method by which these spiritual exempts reconcile it with their consciences to live as uselessly to themselves, and as unprofitably to others, as they do. Do they make one duty that is performed stand as a sufficient offset for a dozen that are not performed? That is Romanism. Do they suppose their nightly prayer ob tains forgiveness for their daily and habitual sins of omission and commission? If so, they do not know how to pray at all. Are they looking forward to some time before they leave the world, when they really will begin to live in some measure as they ought to do? This is so much time that can never be regained; so much happiness gone that can never be enjoyed; so much guilt that will loudly call for chastisement and repentance. Is their conduct really an honest index of their delibe rate convictions in this matter? Do they, in fact, believe that there are some in the Christian vessel who are to go to heaven as passengers, while others are to have all the toil and trouble of bringing the ship into port? The sad and most frequent conclusion at which we arrive is, that these selfconstituted exempts are those who are deceiving themselves with a name to live while they are dead, who have the form of godliness but are destitute of the power thereof. FACTS AND OBSERVATIONS RELATING TO THE DAY OF REST. THE labourer needs relaxation from | corruption with which they are surhis toil, and though there is nothing in natural religion or political economy that would lead us to fix upon every seventh day as precisely the requisite period of repose, both agree in concluding some respite to be necessary, and neither can improve upon that arrangement which the all-wise Creator has appointed. Dr. Humfrey of Amherst College records a fact strikingly illustrative of this observation. "Not many years ago, a contractor went on to the west with his hired men and teams to make a turnpike-road. At first he paid no regard to the sabbath, but continued his work as on other days. He soon found, however, that the ordinances of nature, no less than the moral law, were against him. His labourers grew sickly, his teams grew poor and feeble, and he was fully convinced that more was lost than gained by working on the Lord's day."-J. B. Pike. THERE are (in Louisiana) American planters, I am happy to say, not only Christians, but men of the world, who set a noble example in the midst of the rounded, of resting from all unnecessary labour on the Lord's day; and it has been tested beyond the possibility of a doubt that those who do so make more sugar, in proportion to the number of hands they employ, than those who work seven days in the week. Besides, those who labour during the seven days of the week, and pay no attention to the day of sacred rest, become so completely fatigued and jaded with continued labour that they are incapable of accomplishing as much in seven days as they would accomplish in six, provided they rested on the first day of the week. The divine appointment of one day in seven as a day of rest for man and beast, is wise and merciful, and it never can be violated, except in cases of absolute necessity, without incurring the frown of the Almighty.— Dr. A. Maclay. IN 1822, the Marquis of Londonderry, better known as Lord Castlereagh, then secretary of state, died by his own hand. On hearing of it, Mr. Wilberforce writes thus :-He was certainly deranged-the effect, probably, circulation as necessary to the restorative power of the human body. The ordinary exertions of man run down the circulation every day of his life; and the first general law of his nature by which God (who is not only the giver, but also the preserver and sustainer of life) prevents man from destroying himself, is the alternating of day with night, that repose may succeed action. But although night apparently equalizes the circulation well, yet it does not sufficiently restore the balance for the attainment of a long life. Hence one day in seven, by the bounty of providence, is thrown in as a day of compensation, to perfect, by its repose, the animal system. of continual wear and tear of mind. But the strong impression of my mind is, that it is the effect of the non-observance of the Sunday, both as abstracting from politics, from the constant recurrence of the same reflections, and as correcting the false views of worldly things, and bringing them down to their true diminutiveness. . . . He really was the last man in the world who appeared likely to be carried away into the commission of such an act. So cool, so self-possessed. It is very curious to hear the newspapers speaking of incessant application to business, forgetting that by the weekly admission of a day of rest, which our Maker has graciously enjoined, our faculties would be preserved from the effects of this constant strain. I am strongly impressed by the recollection of your endeavour to prevail on the lawyers to give up Sunday consult-treatment of the animal creation. The ations, in which poor Romilly would not concur. If C. had suffered his mind to enjoy such occasional remissions, it is highly probable the strings would never have snapped, as they did, from over-tension. Alas! alas! poor fellow, I did not think I should feel for him so very deeply! As a day of rest, I view it, says Dr. Farre, as a day of compensation for the inadequate restorative power of the body under continued labour and excitement. A physician always has respect to the preservation of the restorative power, because if this once be lost, his healing office is at an end. If I show you from the physiological view of the question that there are provisions in the laws of nature which correspond with the divine commandment, you will see from the analogy that the Sabbath was made for man as a necessary appointment. A physician is anxious to preserve the balance of THE necessity of some regular seasons of repose is manifest from man's proprietors of coaches which ran every day always appointed fixed rest days for their horses; and this not so much out of mercy to their cattle as from a regard to their own interests. Experience proved that unceasing labour was unprofitable labour-that their horses could not permanently endure it; and, therefore, periodical days of rest were appointed them. Frequently these were not every seventh day, but every fourth day, which only renders the argument for the necessity of a seventh day's rest to the health and physical well-being of the working man the more conclusive. Every one accustomed to horses knows that if a certain number of miles has regularly to be travelled in a week, say 112 miles, a horse will keep in much better condition if he run the distance in six days, and thus have one entire day of rest, which is at the rate of eighteen miles per day, than if he were travelling every day, though then his daily distance would be but sixteen miles. This is evidently upon the principle explained by Dr. Farre, the application of which to the case of the working man is obvious. Unremitting labour saps the vital energy, it diminishes the productive powers, its monotony jades the spirits, and cannot be persevered in without an influence most injurious to health being exercised upon the physical frame. The law, therefore, which enjoins a stated periodical rest from toil is a beneficent one; it is framed by divine wisdom and goodness, it consults the temporal welfare of man, and cannot be violated with impunity.-J. B. Pike. To the working man the sabbath brings an inheritance to which his reprieve from bodily toil is a matter of only secondary consideration. It brings a stated opportunity for the cultivation of his best family affections, as well as for the improvement of his own mind, as under the convenience of the day's respite from secular concerns, the mind is let free from the arbitrary toils of common drudgery into the true liberty of life, like a bird escaped from the confinement of a cage to rejoice among its native branches; or like a plant laid open to the sun, the sympathies of his soul are drawn out and fostered into blossom and fruit, through the benign influences of the Sun of Righteousness." -J. Younger. THE great Dr. Johnson, on his deathbed, sent for his friend Sir Joshua Reynolds, and required of him, on the strength of their friendship, that he should promise three things. The first and hardest to be obtained was, that Sir Joshua would promise him that he would never again paint on the holy sabbath. What a noble subject would this interview have made for the pencil of Reynolds ! Oh, that persuasion, mightyas that of Johnson, and entreaty, thrilling as that of a dying genius, might fall upon the ears and the hearts of all the people of God in this land, till they awake to the sanctification of the sabbath !-J. Todd. It is powerfully urged by the believ ers in a primitive sabbath, that we find from time immemorial the knowledge of a week of seven days among all nations, Egyptians, Arabians, Indians,— in a word, all the nations of the east, have, in all ages, made use of this week of seven days, for which it is difficult to account without admitting that this knowledge was derived from the common ancestors of the human race.-Dr. Kitto. ALL nations in all ages have from time immemorial, made the revolution of seven days to be the first stated period of time. And this observation is still continued throughout the world, unless amongst them, who in other things are openly degenerated from the law of nature, as those barbarous Indians who have no computaand tion of times but by sleeps, moons, winters. The measure of time by a day and night is directed unto sense, lunar by the diurnal course of the sun; months and solar years are of an unavoidable observation unto all rational creatures. Whence, therefore, all men have reckoned time by days, months, and years, is obvious unto all. But whence the hebdomadal revolution, or weekly period of time, should make its entrance, and obtain a catholic admittance, no man can give an account, but with respect to some impressions on the minds of men from the constitution and law of our natures, with the tradition of a sabbatical rest instituted from the foundation of the world. Other original, whether artificial and arbitrary, or occasioned, it could not have. -Dr. Owen. in NOR is there anything lost to the community by the intermission of public industry one day in the week. For in countries tolerably advanced population and the arts of civil life, there is always enough of human labour, and to spare. The difficulty is not so much to procure as to employ it. The addition of the seventh day's labour to that of the other six, would have no other effect than to reduce the price. The labourer himself who deserved and suffered most by the change would gain nothing.-W. Paley. THE spot, of all places in North or South America, to my mind the most hallowed is the island where the fatigued, desolate, almost perishing, pilgrims spent their first sabbath. Yes! there they stopped and rested the seventh day, and hallowed it, because they would not desecrate it, even in seeking rest. O noble commencement of the foundations of an enterprise, like which the world never saw, nor, probably, will again see ever! Within half an hour's sail of the coast, nay, within ten minutes' sail, if the wind and tide favoured, of the place where they were to abide all the rest of their pilgrimage, they moored at the island, and would not again set a sail that day, or take an oar in hand, or do aught of worldly work, because it was the Lord's day. And there, upon that desolate island, frost-bound, habitationless, beneath a snowy sky, or what was worse, a freezing sleet, they dedicated the hours of the sabbath to the worship of God! There is no spot in all this scene, on which the vision rests with so solemn VOL. XII. -FOURTH SERIES. and thrilling an interest as that.-Dr G. B. Cheever. Ir was an honour to the legal profes sion, and one that deserves to be recorded of them, that, when a few years since proposals were made for a Sunday delivery of letters in the metropolis, an immense body of the solicitors signed a protest against the plan, claiming for themselves that exemption from secular business which the sabbath of God has given to them, and the blessings of which they had, from experience, learned the value of.-J. Jordan. Take a Scotchman from any of the sabbath-keeping districts of his native land, and place him in London, and, at first, he is appalled at the way in which the sabbath is desecrated, through labour and pleasure, in that great city; but he gradually conforms to its usages, mingles in its scenes of pleasure, and if needs be, engages in its heaven-defying labours. Take the same Scotchman, and place him in Paris, and there, too, he is staggered on the first appearance of the sabbath; but he soon becomes inured to its desecrations - his conscience is hushed asleep by the din of labour, and the music of pleasure. H attends its theatres, dancings, boxings, gambling-houses, and other innumerable modes by which the rest of the sabbath is abused, by which its moral effect is enfeebled and destroyed. Unnecessary encroachments on the sabbatical rest may find a people obeying the sacred claims of that day, but it gradually diminishes respect for these claims.— D. Farquhar. I HAVE advised clergymen, in lieu of the sabbath, to rest one day of the weck; it forms a continual prescription of mine.-Dr. Farre. |