SERMON V.
THE THIRD COMMANDMENT: HOLINESS OF THE SABBATH.
"Remember the Sabbath-day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work: but the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy sojourner who is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it."—Exodus xx. 8—11.
In the exposition of this Commandment, I propose to present the internal sense first: thus shall we learn the true foundation of the holiness of the Sabbath; an understanding of which will prepare us for forming just ideas in regard to the manner in which the day should be observed.
All the ordinances of the Jewish Church were representative of spiritual and Divine things. All the ceremonies and observances enjoined upon that church represented states of thought and affection in the mind. The Jews themselves, indeed, knew nothing of the interior significance of those ordinances; yet, while they performed them with exactness and faithfulness, and in a spirit of obedience, those observances
