which therefore takes e. place with us corresponding to the sabbath in the Law and circumcision among the patriarchs. Nevertheless, the grounds on which the sabbath was selected as the symbol of the covenant of the Law are wider than the dominion of Israel, and deserve to be inquired into with a view to ascertaining their perpetual significance, I. Tmi SANCTITY OF THE SABBATH WAS ASSOCIATED WITH NATURE. God rested from creation (Gen. ii. 2). 'l'his fact is stated in primitive language. But the latest science shows that the course of nature is not a mechanical revolution, but a sort of vital pulsation. Its movement is rhythmic. It goes by shock and pause. It has its work and its rest. Summer activity and winter sleep, day and night, storm and calm, are nature's alternate week-days and sabbaths. We are part of nature, and must observe its methods. JI. THE SANCTITY OF THE SABBATH WAS ASSOCIATED WITH THE NEEDS OF MAN. "The sabbath was made for man." Therefore man needed the sabbath. 1. He needed the rest. Ceaseless toil wears and frets the very fibre of life. Masters and slaves, as well as the beast of burden, were benefited by the Jewish sabbath. We are not under the same formal regulations as those by which Israel was governed. But the conditions of business life in the modern world are so much more exacting than any that can be imagined to belong to the simple pastoral and agricultural life of the ancient Jews, that the requirement of some equivalent to their sabbath must be much stronger with us. 2. He needed the opportunity for remembering God. The sabbath was sacred to the covenant. Sunday is sacred to the resurrection of Christ. The congenial thoughts and holy occupations of such a day are helpful. "The Sundaies of man's life, Thredded together on time's string, l\fake bracelets to a.darn the wife Of the eteme.l, glorious King. On Sunday heaven's gates stand ope; Blessings are plentiful and rife, More plentiful than hope." (Geo. Herbert.) III. THE SANCTITY OF THE SABBATH WAS ASSOCIATED WITH GoD. God ordained the sabbath; it was typical of his resting; and it was the seal of his covenant with Israel. Thus it was in a threefold sense God's day, Christ has warned us against the fo1mal abuse of its sanctity, and St. Paul has dared to assert a large Christian liberty in regard to it. Anything that makes its use formal savours of the Law, is J udaistic, is anti-Christian, Anything that makes it a day of gloom and repression is even coutro.ry to its old Jewish observance as a festival. But, on the other hand, God has claims of worship. If SLrnday is given up to amusement or toil those claims are ignored. It is our duty to give them all possible range in this age of driving secular interests. Thus a.re we led on to "The se.bbaths of eternity, One se.bbath, deep and wide." (Tennyson, • St. Agnes.') Ver. 35.-A human wilderness. I. WHAT IT 1s. Israel is to be brought "into the wilderness of the peoples." The wanderings of their lathers was in "a waste howling wilderness" (Deut. xxxii. 10), among the wild beasts and far from the cities and homes of men; but the exile of the nation in Ezekiel's day was a transportation into the midst of the settled populous countr:;· of Babylon, Chaldca was no Siberia. Banishment from Canaan did not lead to a return to the freedom and the hardships of a nomadic life. '!'he captive Jews were planted among other nations. Although a strange blight has since fallen upon the scene of the exile, and tho ruins of the great cities of the Euphrates have now become a veritable wilderness, haunted by lions and hyenas, those cities were at the height of their prosperity and splendour when the prophet lived and wrote. How, then, could he speak of them as II wilderness? 1. A great city is £i human w-ilderness. The greater the city, the more desolate is the wilderncs~. The social li!'e of small cities like Jerusalem and Athcus u,ust have been stro:ig am\ pleasa,,l. 362 THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET EZEKIEL. [en. :xx.1-49.
But this life is swamped in the myriads of unknown faces that one sees in a vast city. Great Babylon, Rome, and Londou-the modern Babylou-have the char~cter of a wilder- ness. 2. Th.ere u; '110 bnnish.ment so terrible as th.nt of being lost in a, human wilderness. People who could be tracked over Dartmoor aud among the fells of Yorkshire may be utterly lost in Lond0n. Every year there are many broken lives that go down in the awfnl misery that floods the lower parts of a great city, and no one misses them. Their individuality has beeu drowned in a sea of humanity. 'l'he most heart-rendin"' loneliness is that of a friendloss man in a crowd-so many fellow-beings, and not~ spark of fellow-feeling! II. How IT rs USED. The city-wilderness is used for the punishment of the Jews; but not for that only. 1. God meets his people in the wilderness. Success blinds us to the presence of God. Society makes us deaf to his voice. Adversity and solitude pre- pare us to remember him and to hearken to his Word. We need not flee to the wilder- ness of a John the Baptist-to the seclusion of a hermitage among the silent rocks--in order to meet with God. He will visit us in the crowded city. When the heart sinks, sad and faint at its own loneliness amid the din of a crowded life in which the lost wanderer has no share, God is ready to whisper words of comfort. He can find his poor suffering child in the crowd, and draw near to him there as well as in the field, the chamber, or the temple. God comes into most intimate relations with his people in their hour of desolation. He meets them "face to face." In the old wilderness of Sinai the Jews shrank from such near contact with God, so that it was reserved for Moses alone (Exod. x.xxiii. 11). Now it is to be for a.11 Israel. 'l'hus deep distress has its privileges. 2. God pleads with his people. He desires to save; he urges repentance. "Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord" (Isa. i. 18). When men are most cold and repellant, perhaps our heart may be open to the sympathy of God. Then we can see that he seeks us in a great, undying love. Note, it is a shame to Christendom that there should be a human wilderness among us. Heathen cities were cruel. But brotherhood is essential to Christianity. May we not say that, after pleading with us for our own sakes, God also pleads with us that we may save our lost brothers and sisters?