forswear thyself, but shall perform unto the Lord thine
oaths."

[Footnote 3: Matt. v. 33.]

"But I say unto you, swear not at all, neither by heaven, because it is
God's throne."

"Nor by the earth, for it is his footstool: neither by Jerusalem, for it
is the city of the great King."

"Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, because thou canst not make one
hair white or black."

"But let your communication be yea, yea; nay, nay: for whatsoever is
more than this cometh of evil."

It is said by those, who oppose the Quakers on this subject, that these
words relate, not to civil oaths, but to such as are used by profane
persons in the course of their conversation. But the Quakers deny this,
because the disciples, as Jews, must have known that profane swearing
had been unlawful long before this prohibition of Jesus Christ. They
must relate, therefore, to something else, and to something, which had
not before been forbidden.

They deny it also on account of the construction of the sentences, and
of the meaning of the several words in these. For the words, "Swear not
at all," in the second of the verses, which have been quoted, have an
immediate reference to the words in the first. Thus they relate to the
word "forswear," in the first. But if they relate to the word
"forswear," they must relate to perjury, and if to perjury, then to a
civil oath, or to an oath, where an appeal is made to God by man, as to
something relating to himself. The word oath also is explicitly
mentioned in the first of these verses, and mentioned as an oath which
had been allowed. Now there was one oath, which had been allowed in
ancient time. The Jews had been permitted, in matters of judgment, to
swear by the name of God. This permission was given them, for one, among
other reasons, that they might be prevented from swearing by the name of
those idols by which their neighbours swore; for a solemn appeal to any
Heathen god necessarily includes an acknowledgment of the omnipresence
of the same.

That they related to this oath in particular, the Quakers conceive to be
obvious from the prohibition in the verses which have been cited, of
swearing by heaven, by earth, and by other things. The Jews, knowing the
sacredness of the name of God, had an awful notion of the consequences
of perjury, if committed after an appeal to it, and therefore had
recourse to the names of the creatures, in case they should swear
falsely. But even the oaths, thus s