Page:Sermons on the Ten Commandments.djvu/67

 we may perceive the ground of the exceeding holiness of the Sabbath-day: it represented man's regeneration, angels' joy, and the Lord's glory.

By examining, now, the particulars of this Commandment, in their internal sense, we shall perceive more clearly that the things above mentioned are signified by the Sabbath.

"Remember," says the text, "the day of the Sabbath, to keep it holy" (or, as the Hebrew word might be translated, to regard it as holy, to sanctify it). "Remember" signifies not only to keep ever in mind, but, spiritually, it signifies to hold as a ruling or an inmost principle of the mind—for what is a ruling principle in the mind is ever present, influencing man's thoughts, even though he may be unconscious of it. "The day of the Sabbath." "Day," in the spiritual sense, signifies state. Hence, "the day of the Sabbath" signifies the state of the conjunction of goodness and truth in the mind; also the state of rest and peace in the heavens, from their conjunction with the Divine Humanity of the Lord; and, above all, the state of Divine Peace in the Lord Himself, when by conquests over the hells he had glorified his humanity, and united it perfectly to the essential Divine within him. "To keep it holy," or "to regard it as holy," means that man should have for an inmost or governing principle in his mind a reverence for and worship of the Lord in his Divine Humanity. He should also have for his ruling end the attainment of the conjunction of good and truth in his own spirit, for such conjunction is heaven in the soul. These are things