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APPENDIX.

66

To the Editor of the Calcutta Journal; dated Central India, Jan. 31, 1820.

Ought Christians to allow People of any Faith or Sect, as Hindoos, Mussulmans, &c., to work at their Houses on Sunday ?"

SIR

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THE only passage in the SCRIPTURES that could have raised a doubt on this head, is the following: "The Seventh Day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God in it thou shalt do no manner of work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, &c., nor thy cattle, nor the stranger that is within thy gate. In this, the prohibition is so explicit, that nothing more than an assurance of its being addressed to Christians can be requisite to enable us to answer the question. Let this point, then, be examined.

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The Jewish Religion was given to the Jews exclusively it did not exact belief or profession from any other nation of the earth; and in no part of the Scriptures were the Jews commanded to diffuse it. For what reason, then, do people, who profess a Religion which superseded and annulled it, suppose themselves bound to pay it obedience? The Jews, we are told, are under

the displeasure of God, for continuing their adherence to it, and for rejecting Christianity: and yet Christians refer to it; and, to supply what they imagine deficiencies in their own Faith, select doctrines and mandates from this.

Conduct so egregiously irrational could proceed only from the supposition of its having been enjoined by our Saviour, or by some of his Apostles. Accordingly, passages from the New Testament are cited to justify it :-" Think not that I am come to destroy the Law, or the Prophets I am come, not to destroy, but to fulfil." "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God; and is profitable, for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness :" (2 Tim. iii. 5-16.) But these passages have not the meaning ascribed to them.

Of the first, the import is this-"I am come to fulfil all righteousness, by a thorough and personal obedience to that Law of Holiness; and no part of the Typical Ceremonies of the Law shall be unfulfilled, and no obligation of the Moral Law shall be waived." Our Saviour having, in his own person, fulfilled all the Typical and Prophetical part, and obeyed rigidly and minutely all the Moral and Preceptive part, abolished the whole; it having answered the ends for which it was given, and having received, in its completion, due honour and glory. This His Apostles declare, in every page of their writings— "We are not under the Law." "We are delivered from the Law, that we should serve God in newness of spirit, not in the oldness of the letter." "The Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ

Jesus hath made us free from the Law of Sin and Death."

With respect to the second passage, the Scriptures may justly be said to have been written for our instruction; as they contain innumerable instances of piety, holiness, and obedience; and will furnish the most instructive lessons on the awful justice and the immaculate purity of the Divine Being, in his dreadful judgments on graceless offenders. They were to be consulted, also, that we might perceive the perfect correspondence of the Prophecies regarding our Saviour, with their accomplishment in Jesus; and that we might, consequently, attain the firmest conviction of the Divinity of our Faith.

It appears, then, that we have no injunction from our Saviour or His Apostles to regulate our conduct by Judaism. And why is this particular Commandment deemed obligatory on the followers of Christ, when many other directions of Moses, and all the Ritual and Ceremonial parts of his Law, are supposed to be abrogated? In the Chapter in which the Ten Commandments are delivered, is an order to Moses to build an altar-and not of hewn stone and the reason assigned is, that the altar would be polluted, if any tool were lifted on it. Why do not Christians avoid building an altar of hewn stone? Why do not we either obey the whole, or reject the whole? Surely we are not to cull such parts of a Religion as may suit our individual inclinations! The truth is this: The Jewish Law was adapted to the rude and unenlightened age in which it was delivered; and it now requires not observance, either from Jews or

Christians it was a "shadow of good things to come:" it has been naturally succeeded and removed by the substance.

The old Law, then, being abolished, by what are we to guide ourselves? The answer is obvious By the Precepts of Christianity; and by those old Jewish Laws which are noticed and imposed on us by Christ and His Apostles. Surely, nothing necessary for our guidance can have been omitted by our omniscient Saviour?-In what part, then, of the New Testament are we prohibited from employing Heathens on the Sabbath? In no part. Then we may employ them? Certainly. Scripture, then, not forbidding the practice, let

us examine if REASON will condemn it.

Now, by employing Heathens to work on the Sabbath, we do not compel them to act in opposition to the dictates of their conscience, or notions of rectitude; or to do any thing, which, if left to themselves, they would refrain from doing. We do not prevent them from discharging any duty, moral or religious; or from the performance of any, to which their reason or inclination might direct them. But, if we dismiss them on Sunday, with orders to return and work as usual the following six days, we shall manifestly deprive them of the produce of a day's labour: we shall cause them to loiter and saunter about, a burthen to themselves, and useless to others: we shall thereby expose them to fall into the vices of idleness, drunkenness, and gambling; and, consequently, to the probability of acquiring habits, which will render them unfit for the sober occupations they have hitherto pursued: hence, in

famy, poverty, and misery, are almost inevitable : in short, from the prevalence of these vices, by which we ourselves have been enabled to gain an ascendancy over them, wretchedness and ruin, both temporal and spiritual, are necessarily consequential.

Such dreadful evils may result from depriving people of employment on Sundays. If we attend to the progress of the human mind, when unoccupied, from folly to folly, and from sin to sin, we shall readily acknowledge the probability of such a lamentable gradation of iniquity. Does it not follow, then, that if, with this knowledge of what is likely to ensue from divesting labouring men of their ordinary occupations, we persist in dismissing workmen on Sundays, we shall not only not be pious and holy, but become ourselves guilty of those crimes which we thus allow them to be excited to commit? Christianity shews us, that it is equally criminal, to commit sin, and not to prevent its commission. The deplorable end above mentioned may certainly not happen to one out of five; but it also may happen to the whole: and, according to our Religion and to Reason, we are criminal, if we do not guard against even the probability of sins being committed.

This practice, however, though proved to be agreeable to reason, and not repugnant to Scripture, is yet productive of an evil.

The Sabbath is set apart for the care of the soul; for the worship of God; for the reading and hearing of His Holy Word; for prayer, meditation, and self-examination; for repentance of

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