UNCLE IN ENGLAND. 53 



sixth day bread for two days.' He mentions the 

 Sabbath as a divine command, with which the 

 people were well acquainted ; for he alleges the 

 well-known sanctity of the day, to account for 

 the extraordinary supply of manna on the pre- 

 ceding day. But the appointment of the Sabbath, 

 to which his words allude, must have been earlier 

 than the appointment of the law, of which no part 

 had yet been given. For this first gathering of 

 manna was in the second month of the departure 

 of the Israelites from Egypt ; and they did not 

 arrive at Sinai, where the law was given, till the 

 third month. 



" An institution of this antiquity and import- 

 ance could derive no part of its sanctity from 

 the authority of the Mosaic law ; and the abro- 

 gation of that law no more releases the worship- 

 pers of God from a due observation of the 

 Sabbath, than it cancels the injunction of filial 

 piety, or the prohibition of theft or murder. 



" The worship of the Christian church is pro- 

 perly to be considered as a restoration of the 

 patriarchal church in its primitive simplicity and 

 purity ; and of the patriarchal worship, the Sab- 

 bath was one of the noblest and simplest rites. 

 As the Sabbath was of earlier institution than 

 the religion of the Jews, so it necessarily survives 

 the extinction of the Jewish law, and makes a 

 part of Christianity. 



F 3 



