and them, that they might know that I am Jehovah, that doth sanctify them." This was what they needed, and what, to accomplish the end for which they were made, they must have. And they must observe it, or they will fail of its benefits. Hence the command, "Hallow (that is, keep, observe in a sacred manner) my Sabbaths, and they shall be a sign between me and you, that ye may know that I am Jehovah your God." The proper observance of that day will be instrumental in communicating this knowledge, and in rendering it efficacious over their hearts and lives; especially when, from earliest childhood, they have been, by their parents, uniformly trained up in that way.

But let men work seven days in a week, or be employed continuously in worldly business and cares, from month to month, and year to year, without days for rest and spiritual duties, and they will remain ignorant of God as their Sanctifier, and destitute of that holiness without which they cannot enjoy him. Their children will not be governed or instructed according to his will; nor will they be trained up in the way they should go. You may give them the Bible, but they will not read it. You may preach the gospel, but they will not hear it. You may circulate religious tracts, but they will be neglected; or, if they are sometimes read, and seem for a moment to make an impression, unless they lead men to keep the Sabbath, the cares of the world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the pride of life, will choke all, and render it unfruitful. The good word of the kingdom will be as water falling upon a rock, and making no impression. It will be as seed sown by the wayside, which the fowls of the air pick up; or among thorns, which spring up and choke it; or on stony places, where it has no depth of earth, and it will wither away.

Though diligence in business, useful, appropriate

business, six days in a week, is a duty, and, next to true religion, is the great safeguard of man, especially in youth, although it is required by God, and is the appropriate manifestation of true religion, yet if, against the known will of God, it is continued uninterruptedly seven days in a week, for the purpose of making money, it will, notwithstanding all the means of grace, drown men in destruction and perdition.

Or, if they stop their business on the Sabbath only to spend the day in idleness and sloth, in travelling, amusements, dissipation, and wickedness, this will work out damnation. All the efforts of infinite kindness for their restoration to holiness, and preparation for heaven, will be counteracted; worldly-minded they will live, and worldly-minded they will die. With carnal hearts they will go to the judgment, and reap the fruit of everlasting enmity to God.

Hence the command, obedience to which was required by all that is blissful in heaven, and all that is agonizing in hell: "My Sabbaths ye shall keep; for it is a sign between me and you, throughout your generations, that ye may know that I am Jehovah, that doth sanctify you." "Ye shall keep the Sabbath therefore, for it is holy unto you." "Six days may work be done, but on the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the Lord." "For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed."

To hedge up the way against the violation of the Sabbath, and to make it not only the duty, but for the interest of men, physically and morally, to keep it, God has made both man and beast with a nature that cannot be employed continuously seven days in a week to advantage, or without the diminution of health and the curtailing of life.

He has also made but six days in a week for secular business and cares; has given to men no more, and has rendered it impossible for them to take any No. 3.

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more, without taking what is not theirs, and thus showing that they are at heart dishonest; and by acting out that dishonesty, exerting a most deleterious influence on themselves and others. In addition to this, he has written with his own finger, and placed on a permanent record, among fundamental, unchanging and universal laws, the moral obligation which grows out of this nature of things, which he has established; and has proclaimed, in the most explicit and positive manner, his command, saying, "Remem ber the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work; but the seventh day” (which is the day that comes next after the sixth working 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 the stranger that is within thy gates," or under thy control.

From the form of this command, addressed as it is to the head of the family, requiring all under his control to keep it, it is evident that it is a FAMILY INSTITUTION. Like the obedience of children to their parents, God has made it the duty of the head of the family to see that it is observed. And one great object that God had in view in the establishment of family government was, that through its influence the observance of the Sabbath might be secured, and thus its benefits be obtained by the children. Hence, before they are old enough to know that there is a Sabbath, or even a God, they must be taught to obey their parents; and the habit must be so firmly fixed, that when they come to know God and the Sabbath, obedience to their parents, as well as obedience to God, will lead them to keep it. If they do not, but openly violate it, sentence against that evil work must be executed speedily, as it must be when they disobey the known command of their father or their mother, and as it is when they put their hand into the fire.

If nothing else will prevent it, parents who obey God will chasten them betimes, while there is hope, and not spare for their crying.

With regard to the Sabbath, the government of the parents and the government of God coalesce: one is the means of preparing the children for, and securing their obedience to the other. It is the great institution, through the influence of which those who have been trained into the habit of obeying their parents are to be initiated into the habit of obeying God; so that by practice, while they are young, it may become so firmly fixed, that when they become old they will not depart from it. And it is the institution which God blesses for that purpose, and without the observance of which they will never become accustomed to obey him, or receive those blessings which that obedience confers. Of course, parents who do not require their children to keep the Sabbath, but who suffer them openly and habitually to profane it, are not only disobeying God themselves, but are taking the course which is adapted to perpetuate everlasting disobedience in their children. If it be continued, he may say of them as he did to Eli, "I will do a thing at which the ears of every one that heareth it shall tingle;" because their children made themselves vile, and they restrained them not.

On the one hand, many a parent, as a punishment for his sin in allowing the breaking of the Sabbath by his children, whom, when young, he did not restrain, in after life has had his gray hairs brought down with sorrow to the grave.

On the other hand, parents not a few, who accustomed their children, when young, promptly and uniformly to obey them; and who, when they became old enough to understand, communicated to them a knowledge of the character and will of God, and of their relations and duties to him who set them a good example, and who accustomed them to keep the

Sabbath holy, and spend it in worshipping Jehovah, and in learning, for the purpose of doing, his will, have had the unspeakable joy of seeing them, in after life, walking in the truth, growing up in the fear and love of God, and in the esteem and confidence of men, to be ornaments to society, pillars in the church, and benefactors to the world.

There is something in the nature of the Sabbath, and in the effect which the proper keeping of it has on the minds of children, which is adapted to produce these results. In addition to this, there is the special blessing of God which he bestows upon those who thus observe it, in fulfilment of his promise, "Those who honor me I will honor."

As the earth, prepared of God, and treated by men according to his appointment, brings forth fruit, first the blade, then the ear, and then the full corn in the ear, so the Sabbath, with its means of grace, in the closet, in the family, in the house of God, treated according to his appointment, under his blessing, is instrumental in bringing forth and maturing fruits of righteousness to the praise of the glory of his grace. Sons and daughters are born of the Spirit, and prepared for glory, honor, immortality, and eternal life. No one can witness the effects of the keeping of the Sabbath on little children, and follow its influence up through youth and riper years, without feeling that it was made for them by Him who made them, and understood perfectly their character, condition, and wants. As a means of making known God, and of enlightening, renewing, and sanctifying souls, it is, indeed, VERY GOOD." It speaks as with a thousand tongues of the wisdom and goodness of its Author; and in harmony with angelic strains, proclaims, "Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, good-will to men." Its calm and heavenly stillness, when, after six days of labor and amusement, the activity, bustle, noise, and tumult of worldliness die away, speaks of