To Joseph Gedge 9 March 1850

Private

My dear Gedge,

Thanks for the Tracts. They however contain nothing new to me. Their arguments are such as lie upon the very surface of the subject - & being built upon what I feel to be a false view of the Lords Day they are no doubt unanswerable to the minds of those who propound them. I am quite as desirous as yourself that the Lords Day should be kept in a way worthy of our Christian calling - but we necessarily differ as to what that way should be whilst I am believing & you are denying that the Church of God has entered into that rest which the Jewish Sabbath was merely intended to typify. If neither you or I are enjoying this rest to the full extent we might & ought to be, I hold it to be our want of faith, & nothing else that is preventing us. With these sentiments I fear to join you in any of these numerous Societies established for securing what seems to me bye-gone objects - or at least for securing them upon considerations incompatible with the present more advanced position of the church of God. All these efforts have in my mind an appearance of attempting to escape from higher obligation, & I am somewhat strengthened in this opinion by the abusive epithets in the pamphlets so freely lavished upon all who do not agree with the writers. My own view is to leave Post Office arrangements to Post office authorities, Navy arrangements to Navy authorities & urging all such to remember that their Brother Christians are entitled to sufficiency of repose for their bodies & due opportunities for the improvement of their minds. If the Post Office can manage without any labour on Sundays I shall not be sorry - & if our ships could sail on Sundays without helmsmen all the better for the sailors.

Ever most truly Yrs

J. S. Henslow