§ 185. The abfurdity and madness of infidelity 66 and immortality to light, and to tender them to mankind upon fair and gracious terms; that if they fubmit to his easy yoke and light burden, and obferve his commandments, which are not grievous, he then gives them the promise of eternal falvation; he hath referved for them in heaven, an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away;" he hath prepared for them an unspeakable, unconceivable perfection of joy and blifs, things that "eye hath not feen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man." What a delightful ravishing hypothefis of religion is this! And in this religion they have had their education. Now let us fuppofe fome great profeffor in atheifm to fuggeft to fome of thefe men, that all this is mere dream and imposture; that there is no fuch excellent being, as they fuppofe, that created and preferves them; that all about them is dark fenfelefs matter, driven on by the blind impulfes of fatality and fortune; that men first fprung up, like mushrooms, out of the mud and fime of the earth; and that all their thoughts, and the whole of what they call foul, are only the various action and repercuffion of fmall particles of matter, kept a-while a moving by fome mechanism and clock-work, which finally must cease and perish by death. If it be true then (as we daily find it is) that men liften with complacency to thefe horrid fuggef tions; if they let go their hope of everlasting life with willingness and joy; if they entertain the thoughts of final perdition with exultation and triumph; ought they not to be esteemed most notorious fools, even deflitute of common fenfe, and abandoned to a callouinefs and numbness of foul? What then, is heaven itself, with its pleafures for evermore, to be parted with fo unconcernedly? Is a crown of righteouf nefs, a crown of life, to be furrendered with laughter? Is an exceeding and eternal weight of glory too light in the balance against the hopeless death of the atheist, and utter extinction? Bentley. 186. The books of the New Testament could not have been forged in the dark ages. Some adverfaries of the Chriftian doctrine have been fo bold and thameless as to deny in a lump the antiquity claimed by each of the New Teftament books, i. e. to to deny that they were written in the firft century, by the writers to whom they are afcribed. Toland is charged with having betrayed a fufpicion of this fort in his life of Milton: but in his Amyntor, or defence of the life of Milton, he difavows his having meant the writings, which we receive as infpired, by the words upon which the charge is grounded. But an anonymous Italian, ventured, in a letter to Le Clerc, to throw out the following fufpicion: It is poffible that in the fifth century, about the time when the Goths over-ran Italy, four men of fuperior underlanding might unite in inventing and forging the writings of the apoftles, as well as of the fathers, and falfify fome paffages of Jofephus and Suetonius, in order to introduce into the world, by the means of this fraud, a new and more rational religion. Thefe four men, who must have been very converfant in the Jewish theology, and Heathen antiquity, are here charged with the immenfe labour of forging the writings of the fathers, and of inventing that diverity of ftyle and fentiment, by which they were distinguished from each other. But it would not have been fafe for our fceptic, to attribute to them a lefs laborious enterprize. His credulity, which in the prefent age men commonly affect to call by the name of unbelief, would have been fhocked by the teftimony of the fathers, had he confined his imputation of forgery to the apoftles. Le Clerc returned a ftrong and fenfible anfwer to his letter, in his Bibleotheque ancienne et moderne, tom. xxi. p. 440. However, there are very few unbelievers among Chriftians, who have thrown out this fufpicion against the writings of the apolles; and indeed it is fo manifeftly groundless, that whoever does throw it out, must be impudently invincible by truth and argument. For, 1. The ftyle of the apoftles is fo different, that their epiftles could not with out great difficulty be written by the fame hand. St. Paul is uniform in all his epiftles; his manner is plainly different from that of other writers, and very difficult to be imitated. At least all the epiftles to which his name is prefixed are the work of one hand. St. John again is totally different from him; and whoever writes in a ftyle like that of St. Paul, cannot imitate the style of St. John. 2. In order to invent writings, and af cribe them to perfons who lived fome centuries ago, it is neceffary to have an underftanding and judgment, and a knowledge of hiftory and antiquity beyond the powers of man, elfe the inventor muft commit frequent errors. Now the writings of the New Teftament are unexceptionable in this refpect. The better we are acquainted with Jewish and Heathen antiquity, with the history of the Romans, and the ancient geography of Paleftine, the face of which country was totally changed by the conquefts of the Romans; the more clearly we difcern their agreement with the New Teftament, even ia fome circumftances fo minute, that probably they would have efcaped the moft artful and most circumfpect impoture. The commentators abound with obfervations from antiquity, which may ferve to exemplify this: the learned Dr. Lardner in particular has done eminent fervice in this refpect. 3. The most ancient fathers, even those who were contemporary with the apoftles, Clemens Romanus, for inftance, and Ignatius, quote the books of the New Tellament, and afcribe them to the apostles. We must therefore either fuppofe, with the Italian abovementioned, that all the writ ings of the fathers for fome centuries were forged: a fufpicion which may be more effectually removed by medicinal applications than by the force of argument: or we muit adimit the books of the New Teftament, which they quote, to be in fact as ancient as they are pretended to be. 4. There are fome very old verfions of the New Teftament; the Latin at leaft, feems to have been done fo early as in the first century after the birth of Chrift; and it is highly probable that the Syriac verfion is not lefs ancient. Is it poffible to fuppofe that fome centuries after Chrift, when the Hebrew tongue was not understood in the western church, either fome blind chance proved fo fortunate, or the cunning of fome Italian impoftors was attended with fo much thought and learning, as to add to the credibility of the writings forged for the apoftles, by an extempore Latin verfion full of Hebrew idioms, and by a Syriac interpretation? not to mention the Gothic tranflation of Ulphilas, which, befides, was done before the irruption of the Goths into Italy. But if there writings are as ancient as they they are pretended to be, they certainly carry with them an undeniable and indelible mark of their divine original: for the epiftles refer to certain miraculous gifts, which are faid to have been impart ed by the impofition of hands, and to have been conferred by God, in confirmation of the oral and written doctrine of the apoles. If thefe epiftles are ancient and genuine, and written by St. Paul to the churches to which they are addreffed, then none can deny thefe miracles. The matter is important enough to merit further attention. St. Paul's first epifle to the Theffalonians is addreffed to a church which was hardly founded, to which he had not preached the gospel more than three Sabbath days, Acts xvii. 2. He had been obliged to quit this church abruptly, on account of an impending perfecution, ver. 10. and being apprehenfive left the perfecution fhould cause fome to waver in the faith, he lays before them, in the three Art chapters, arguments to prove the truth of his gospel. The first of these arguments is, that which confirmed his doctrine at Theffalonica, chap. i. 6-10. "For our gopel," fays he, came not to you in word only, but alfo in power, and in the Holy Ghost." Power is an expreffion made ufe of elsewhere in the New Teltament to fignify miraculous acts. Admit him only to have been a rational man, and we cannot fuppofe him to write this to an infant church, if no member thereof had ever feen a miracle of his, or received a miraculous gift, of the Holy Ghost, by the impofition of his hands. He appeals to the fame proof, in his first epifle to the Corinthians, who were extremely diffatisfied with him and his manner of teaching, 1 Cor. ii. 4. "My fpeech, and my preaching, was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonftration of the fpirit, and of power." The fpirit is a word he elsewhere ufes to fignify the extraordinary gifts of the "fpirit," fuch as the gift of tongues, &c. The Ilebrews were on the point of falling cf from Chriftianity, yet he confidently tells them how great their condemnation will be, if they deny a doctrine, to which God had borne witnefs with figns and wonders, and gifts of the Holy Ghoft." Heb. xi. 4. and chap. vi. 4, 5. He re. monftrates to them, that they had been "made partakers of the Holy Ghoft, and had tafted the powers of the world to come." In like manner he endeavours to convince the Galatians, who had deserted the pure doctrine of the gofpel, that the law of Mofes was abolished; by putting to them this queftica, Received ye the fpirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?" Gal. iii. 2. Is it poflible, that a deceiver of a found underlanding, fuch as St. Paul's epiftles fhew him to have poffeffed, fhould refer the enemies of his religion, of his office, and of the derines which diftinguished him from other fects of his religion, not only to the miracles which he pretends to have wrought, but to miraculous gifts which he pretends to have communicated to them, if they had it in their power to anfwer, that they knew nothing of thefe miraculous gifts? In the 12th, 13th, and 14th chapters of the first to the Corinthians, he reprehends the abuse of certain miraculous gifts of tongues, and preferibes a better application of them. If he actually wrote this to the Corinthians, and they had no miraculous gifts, no knowledge of foreign tongues, then St. Paul is not an impoftor but a madman, which, I apprehend, is not the charge of unbelievers against him. But if thefe miracles be true, then the doctrine, and the book in confirmation of which they were wrought, are divine; and the more certainly fo, as there is no room for deception. A juggler may perfuade me, that he performs miracles, but he can never perfuade me, and a whole body of men of found intellects, that he has communicated to us the gift of working miracles, and fpeaking foreign languages, unlefs we can work the miracles, and fpeak the languages. Michaelis. § 187. The Fxtent, Object, and End of the prophetic Scheme. If we look into the writings of the Old and New Teftament we find, first, That prophecy is of a prodigious extent; that it commenced from the lapfe of man, and reaches to the confummation of all things; that, for many ages, it was delivered darkly, to few perfons, and with large intervals from the date of one prophecy to that of another; but, at length, became more clear, more frequent, and was uniformly carried on in the line of one people, feparated from the reft of the world, among other refons affigned, for this principally, to be the repofitory of the Divine Oracles; that, with fome fome intermiflion, the fpirit of prophecy fubfifted among that people, to the coming of Chrift; that he himfelf and his apoftles exercised this power in the most conspicuous manner; and left behind them many predictions, recorded in the books of the New Teftament, which profefs to respect very distant events, and even run out to the end of time, or, in St. John's expreffion, to that period, "when the mystery of God fhall be perfected." There is no exaggeration in this account, I deliver the undoubted fenfe, if not always the very words of Scripture. Confider then to what this reprefentation amounts. Let us unite the feveral parts of it, and bring them to a point. A fpirit of prophecy pervading all time-charac terizing one perfon, of the highest dignity and proclaiming the accomplishment of one purpose, the most beneficent, the most divine, that imagination itfelf can project. Such is the fcriptural delineation, whether we will receive it or no, of that œconomy, which we call prophetic! 2. Further, befides the extent of this prophetic scheme, the dignity of the perfon, whom it concerns, deferves our confideration. He is described in terms, which excite the most auguft and magnificent ideas. He is fpoken of, indeed, fometimes as being "the feed of the woman," and as "the fon of man;" yet so as being at the fame time of more than mortal extraction. He is even reprefented to us, as being fuperior to men and angels; as far above all principality and power, above all that is accounted great, whether in heaven or in earth; as the word and wisdom of God; as the eternal Son of the Father; as "the " heir of all things, by whom he made the "worlds;" as "the brightness of his glory," the Lamb of God that was flain from "and the exprefs image of his perfon." We have no words to denote greater ideas, than thefe; the mind of man cannot elevate itself to nobler conceptions. Of fuch tranfcendent worth and excellence is that Jefus faid to be, to whom all the prophets bear witnefs! 3. Lastly, the declared purpose, for which the Meffiah, prefigured by fo long a train of prophecy, came into the world, correfponds to all the reft of the reprefentation. It was not to deliver an oppreffed nation from civil tyranny, or to erect a great civil empire, that is, to atchieve one of thofe acts, which hiftory accounts moft heroic. No; it was not a mighty ftate, a victor people Non res Romanæ perituraque regnathat was worthy to enter into the contemplation of this divine perfon. It was another and far fublimer purpose, which he came to accomplish; a purpose, in comparifon of which, all our policies are poor and little, and all the performances of man as nothing. It was to deliver a world from ruin; to abolish fin and death; to purify and immortalize human nature; and thus, in the most exalted fenfe of the words, to be the Saviour of all men, and the blefling of all nations. And now then (if we must be reafoning from our ideas of fit and right, to the rectitude of the divine conduct) let me ak, in one word, whether, on the fuppofition that it should ever please the moral Governor of the world to reveal himself by prophecy at all, we can conceive him to do it, in a "manner," or for "ends," more worthy of him? Does not the "extent" of the scheme correfpond to our best ideas of that infinite Being, to whom all duration is but a point, and to whofe view all time is equally prefent? Is not the "object" of this fcheme, the foundation of the world," worthy, in our conceptions, of all the honour that can be reflected upon him by so yaft and splendid an economy? Is not the "end" of this fcheme fuch as we should think most fit for fuch a scheme of prophecy to predict, and for fo divine a perfon to accomplish? You fee, every thing here is of a piece; all the parts of this difpenfation are aftonifhingly great, and perfectly harmonize with each other. Hurd. § 188. Our philosophical principles must be learnt from the book of Nature, our religious from the book of Grace. In order to attain right conceptions of the conftitution of Nature, as laid before us in the volume of Creation, we are not to affume hypothefes and notions of our own, and from them, as from established principles, to account for the feveral phanomena that occur; but we are to begin with the effects themselves, and from these, diligently collected in a variety of wellchofen experiments, to inveftigate the caufes which produce them. By fuch a method, directed and improved by the helps of a fublime geometry, we may reasonably hope to arrive at certainty in our phyfical enquiries, and on the bafis of fact and demon ftration may erect a fyftem of the world, that that fhall be true, and worthy of its author. Whereas, by purfuing a contrary path, our conjectures at the beft will be precarious and doubtful; nor can we ever be fure that the meft ingenious theories we can frame are any thing more than a wellinvented and confiftent fable. With the fame caution we are to proceed in examining the conftitution of Grace, as unfolded to our view in the volume of Redemption. Here alfo we are not to excogitate conceits and fancies of our own, and then distort the expreffions of holy writ, to favour our misthapen imaginations; but we are first to advert to what God has actually made known of himself in the declarations of his word; and from this, carefaly interpreted by the rules of found criticiim and logical deduction, to elicit the genuine doctrines of revelation. By fuch an exertion of our intellectual powers, affted and enlightened by the aids which human literature is capable of furnishing, we may advance with eafe and fafety in our knowledge of the divine difpenfations, and on the rock of Scripture may build a them of religion, that fhall approve itfelf to our most enlarged underftandings, and be equally fecured from the injuries and its of enthusiasts and unbelievers. On the other hand, previously to determine from our own reafon what it is fit for a beg of infinite wisdom to do, and from that pretended fitness to infer that he has really dcre it, is a mode of procedure that is litte fuited to the imbecility of our mental culties, and ftill lefs calculated to lead us to an adequate comprehenfion of the will or works of Heaven. Hallifax. 5189. Comparison between Heathenifm and Chriftianity. The apoftle faith," After the world by wildom knew not God, it pleafed God to fave believers by the foolishness of. preaching." That is to fay, fince the mere fyftems of reafon were eventually infficient for the falvation of mankind; and ince it was impoffible that their speculatons should obtain the true knowledge of God; God took another way to inftruct them: he revealed by preaching of the gofpel what the light of nature could not difcover, fo that the fyftem of Jefus Chrift, and is apoftles, fupplied all, that was wanting in the fyftems of the ancient philofophers. But it is not in relation to the ancient philofophers only, that we mean to confi der the propofition in our text; we will examine it allo in reference to modern philofophy. Our philofophers know more than all thofe of Greece knew: but their fcience, which is of unspeakable advantage, while it contains itself within its proper fphere, becomes a fource of errors, when it is extended beyond it. Human reafon now lodgeth itself in new intrenchments, when it refufeth to fubmit to the faith. It even puts on new armour to attack it, after it hath invented new methods of felf-defence. Under pretence that natural science hath made greater progrefs, revelation is defpifed. Under pretence that modern notions of God the Creator are purer than those of the ancients, the yoke of God the Redeemer is broken off. We are going to employ the remaining part of this difcourfe in jullifying the propofition of St. Paul, in the fenfe that we have given it: we are going to endeavour to prove, that revealed religion hath advantages infinitely fuperior to natural religion: that the greatest geniuses are incapable of difeovering by their own. reafon all the truths neceffary to falvation: and that it difplays the goodness of God, not to abandon us to the uncertainties of our own wifdom, but to make us the rich prefent of revelation. We will enter into this difcuffion, by placing on the one fide a philofopher contemplating the works of nature: on the other, a difciple of Jefus Chrift receiving the doctrines of revelation. To each we will give four fubjects to examine: the attributes of God: the nature of man: the means of appeafing the remorfe of con- . fcience and a future ftate. From their judgments on each of thefe fubjects, evidence will arife of the fuperior worth of that revelation, which fome minute philofophers affect to defpife, and above which they prefer that rough draught, which they sketch out by their own learned fpeculations. 1. Let us confider a difciple of natural religion, and a difciple of revealed religion, meditating on the attributes of God. When the difciple of natural religion confiders the fymmetry of this univerfe; when he obferves that admirable uniformity, which appears in the fucceffion of seasons, and in the conftant rotation of night and day; when he remarks the exact motions of the heavenly bodies; the flux and reflux of the fea, fo ordered that billows, which fwell |