We are free to admit the positive nature of the Sabbatic institution, so far as it respects the particular day to be observed, and the proportion of time; also as it respects the great reason on which the law is founded. For it is not a dictate of nature, that one seventh part of time is more holy, or has any more demand upon us in a religious way, than one tenth, or one fifth, or any other proportion. Nor is it a dictate of nature, that God created the world in six days, and rested on the seventh, blessing and sanctifying _it_. The light of nature, it is true, teaches that the world was created by eternal Power; but it gives no information of the time occupied in it, nor of the fact of His resting on the seventh day, after it was finished. Therefore, so far as the mere light of nature is concerned, we are left in the dark respecting what constitutes the very foundation of the institution. But after all, we very much doubt the propriety of classing all those precepts which we cannot discover by the mere light of nature, under the sweeping name of positive institutions, as if they were on the same level with the passover, circumcision, the ordinance of the red heifer, &c. Indeed, we utterly protest against it, if the intention is to underrate their importance, or to depreciate them as "_non-essential_," according to the cant term of the day. For what in such case would become of the whole system of Christianity itself? We mean the system of appointing a Mediator, and the redemption of the world through him. It is a positive institution, that is, purely a matter of revelation, and wholly undiscoverable by the light of nature. But shall we therefore call it a non-essential? Shall we regard it as something of minor importance in comparison with the religion of nature? Does it not devolve upon us with obligations just as strong and overwhelming as the moral law? Most certainly it does; not only because it is enjoined by the same authority, but also because it is the only means of promoting a conformity to the moral law. The same may be said of all positive institutions: they are designed to promote a conformity first to that dispensation to which they are peculiar, and second, to the moral law.