15. The hebdomadal revolution of time, generally admitted in the world, is also a great testimony unto the original institution of the Sabbath. Of old it was catholic, and is at present received among those nations whose converse was not begun until of late with any
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of those parts of the world where there is a light gone forth in these things from the Scripture. All nations, I say, in all ages, have from time immemorial made the revolution of seven days to be the second 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 computation of times, but by sleeps, moons, and winters. The measure of time by a day and night is directed unto sense by the diurnal course of the sun: lunar 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 revolu- tion, 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 Jaw of our nature, with the tradition of a sabbatical rest instituted from the foundation of the world. Other original, whether artificial and arbitrary or occasional, it could not have. Nothing of any such thing hath left the least footsteps of its ever being in any of the memorials of times past. Neither could any thing of so low an original or spring be elevated to such a height as to diffuse itself through the whole world. A derivation of this observation from the Chaldeans and Egyptians, who retained the deepest tincture of ori- ginal traditions, hath been manifested by others. And so fixed was this computation of time on their minds, who knew not the reason of it, that when they made a disposition of the days of the year into any other period, on accounts civil or sacred, yet they still retained this also. So the Romans, as appears by the fragments of their old kalendars, had their nundinz, which were days of vacation from labour, on the eighth, or, as some think, the ninth day’s recurring; but yet still made use of the stated weekly period. It is of some consideration in this cause, and is usually urged to this purpose, that Noah observed the septenary revolution of days in sending forth the dove out of the ark, Gen. viii. 10, 12. That this was done casually is not to be imagined. Nor can any reason be given why, notwith- standing the disappointment he met with the first and second time, he should still abide seven days before he sent again, if you consider only the natural condition of the flood, or the waters in their abate- ment. A revolution of days, and that upon a sacred account, was doubtless attended unto by him. And I should suppose that he still sent out the dove the next day after the Sabbath, to see, as it were, whether God had returned again to rest in the works of his hands. And, Gen. xxix. 27, a week is spoken of as a known account of days or time: “Fulfil her week;” that is, not a week of -years,
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as he had done for Rachel, but fulfil a week of days in the festival of his marriage with Leah; for NNt YY can have no other sense, seeing nxt, of the feminine gender, relates unto Leah, whose nuptials were to be celebrated, and not to Y3¥, “a week,” which is of the mas- culine. And it was the custom, in those ancient times of the world, to continue the celebration of a marriage feast for seven days, or a week; as Judges xiv. 12, 15,17. ‘The seven days of the feast” is spoken of as a thing commonly known and in vulgar use.
16. Let us, therefore, consider what is offered to weaken the force of this observation. It is pretended that the ancient heathen, or the contemplative persons amongst them, observing the unfixed, various motions of the seven planetary luminaries, as they used and abused it to other ends, so they applied their number and names unto so many days, which were thereby as it were dedicated unto them, which shut them up in that septenary number. But that the obser- vation of the weekly revolution of time was from the philosophers, and not the common consent of the people, doth not appear; for those observed also the twelve signs of the zodiac, and yet made that no rule to reckon time or days by. Besides, the observation of the site and posture of the seven planets, as to their height or elevation with respect unto one another, is as ancient as the observation of their peculiar and various motions. And upon the first discovery thereof, all granted this to be their order, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sol, Venus, Mercury, Luna. What alteration is made herein by the late hypothesis, fixing the sun as in the centre of the world, built on fallible phenomena, and advanced by many arbitrary presumptions, against evident testimonies of Scripture and reasons as probable as any that are produced in its confirmation, is here of no consideration: for it is certain that all the world in former ages was otherwise minded ; and our argument is not taken, in this matter, from what really was true, but from what was universally apprehended so to be. Now, whence should it be, that, if this limiting the first revolution of time unto seven days proceeded from the planetary denominations fixed to the days of the year arbitrarily, the order among the planets should be so changed as every one sees it to be? For in the assig- nation of the names of the planets to the days of the week, the midst is taken out first, and so the fourth in order inclusive falls to be next, until the whole cycle be finished. Some would take the reason hereof from the proportion of harmony, some from the diur- nal ascension of the planets; which is ridiculous. So Dio Cassius, in the thirty-seventh book of his History (the third of them that remain), treating of the taking of Jerusalem by Pompey on the seventh day of the week, when the people, out of their superstition, made. not their wonted resistance, inquires on that octasion of the