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SERMON II.

ACTS x. 40, 41.

"Him God raised up the third day, and shewed him "openly; not to all the people, but unto witnesses "chosen before of God."

THE return of the season devoted by the church to the solemn commemoration of our Lord's glorious resurrection seemed to admonish us, that we should direct our attention to the evidence by which the merciful providence of God was pleased to confirm so extraordinary a fact. The entire evidence consists of two branches: It is in part human, and in part divine. The attestation of the apostles to the fact makes the human part of the evidence; the testimony of the Spirit in the miraculous powers

exercised by the apostles was divine. The human part is what is chiefly to be examined; for the credibility of that being once established, the force of the testimony of the Spirit is obvious and irresistible : For, provided the fact be once established, that such miracles were performed by the apostles, these miracles were manifestly the "witness of God" which he bore to his own Son. The historical evidence of the fact lies in the testimony of the apostles themselves, and in the concession of their adversaries. The human testimony, therefore, the testimony of the apostles, is to us, who were not eye witnesses of the miracles which they performed, the ground-work of the whole evidence.

In my last discourse I explained to you, in a summary way, that the credibility of this testimony arises from the number, the information, and the veracity of the witnesses. Their number, more than is required by any law to establish a fact in a court of justice; their information infallible, if an infallible knowledge of their Master's person was the result of an attendance upon him for three years; their veracity, by the circumstances in which they were placed, is rendered unquestionable: So that in this singular instance, if in any, the evidence of testimony emulates the certainty of mathematical

demonstration. I shewed you, that the testimony of the apostles to the fact of our Lord's resurrection is not more extraordinary in the degree than in the permanency of the credibility which belongs to it. It is not only so constituted that it must have been satisfactory and irrefragable at the time when it was delivered, but so immutable are the principles on which the credit of it stands, that by no length of time can it suffer diminution. What it was to the contemporaries of the apostles, the same it is to us now in the end of the eighteenth century; and so long as the historical books of the New Testament .shall be extant in the world, (and to suppsoe that a time shall come when they shall be no longer extant, were, 1 think, to mistrust our Master's gracious promise); so long as these books then shall be extant, so long the testimony of the apostles shall preserve its original credibility.

Another circumstance must be mentioned, not less extraordinary than the permanent nature of the testimony, which may be called the popularity of the evidence. It is not always the case that a proof built on true principles and sound in every part, which, when it is narrowly examined, must of consequence be satisfactory to men of knowledge and discernment, is of a sort to be easily and gene

rally understood. For the most part, perhaps, the proof of fact is a thing more remote from popular apprehension than scientific demonstration: For the connexion of an argument is what every one naturally and necessarily perceives; but between a fact and the testimony of the witnesses who affirm it, there is indeed no physical and necessary connexion. A witness may speak rashly, without a sufficient knowledge of the fact which he pretends to assert, or he may speak falsely, contrary to his knowledge. Thus the folly and the vices of men have rendered it for the most part very difficult to perceive, how the certainty of a fact arises from the attestations given to it; and to appreciate the credibility of historical evidence is become a task for the highest and most improved abilities; requiring a certain dexterity and acuteness of the mind in detecting great fallacies, and in reconciling seeming inconsistencies, which is seldom to be acquired in any considerable degree but by a practical familiarity with the habits of the world, joined to an accurate and philosophical study of mankind. And accordingly we see, that men of the slowest apprehension, if they have had but a sufficient degree of experience to make them jealous of being imposed upon, are always the most averse to believe extraordinary narrations. But in the case before us, no

extraordinary penetration is requisite to perceive the infallibility of the evidence. Every man has experienced the certainty with which he distinguishes the person and the features of a friend. Every one knows how dearly he loves himself; with what reluctance he would sacrifice his ease and expose his person in any project, from which he expected no return of profit or enjoyment. And with this experience and these feelings, every one is qualified to sit in judgment upon the fact of our Lord's resurrection, and to decide upon the evidence. And in this circumstance, no less than in the permanent nature of the evidence, we may see, and we have reason to adore the hand of Providence. For to what can we ascribe it but to the over-ruling providence of God, that while the proof of historic facts is, for the most part, of the most intricate and embarrassed nature, the most extraordinary event which history records should be accompanied with a proof as universally perspicuous as the fact itself is interesting? Every man born into the world is interested in the event which has opened to us all the gate of heaven. And the evidence which accompanies the fact is such, that every man born into the world is in a capacity to derive conviction from it.

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