The Reasonableness of Christianity, as delivered in the
Scripture. By JOHN LOCKE, Esq. Lond. 1727. p. 1.
This Treatise was first published in 1695, without Mr. Locke's
name; he concealed his being the author of it from his most inti-
mate friends, and in one of his letters to Mr. Molyneux, at Dublin,
he desired to know what people thought of it there; for here, fays
he, "at its first coming out, it was received with no indifferency,
"some speaking of it with great commendation, and most cenfur-
ing it as a very bad book." His friend, in reply, informed him,
that a very learned and ingenious Prelate faid he liked it very well,
and that, if Mr. Locke writ it, it was the best book he ever la-
boured at; "but," says he, " if I should be known to think so, I
"should have my lawns torn from my shoulders." Abroad it was
greatly esteemed by two of the best divines which were then living-
Le Clerc, and Limborch. Le Clerc, in his Bibliotheque Choisee,
faid, that it was " un des plus excellens ouvrages qui ait été fait de-
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puis long-tems sur cette matiere et dans cette vue:" and Lim-
borch preferred it to all the Systems of Divinity that he had ever
read.. Dr. Edwards wrote against it; and his objections produced
from Mr. Locke two vindications of it; these merit the reader's
attention as much as the work itself, which has long been very ge-
nerally approved.
written; and derive fingular benefit from that part of it which
treats of the Evidences of revealed Religion. In compofing this
part, Dr. Clarke is said to have availed himself of the second part
of Mr. Baxter's Reasons of the Christian Religion, published in
1667; and it would certainly be of use to the reader to peruse that
excellent difcourse, and to compare it with this of Dr. Clarke.
This discourse is taken from a Volume of Difcourses by John
Smith, formerly fellow of Queen's College, Cambridge. The dif-
courses were published after his death in 1656, and are all of them
very valuable, but this is particularly so: it was translated into Latin
by Le Clerc, and prefixed to his Commentary on Ifaiah, &c. The
reader will find fomething on this fubject in Vitringa's Observa-
tiones Sacræ; in different parts of the Thesaurus Theologico-philolo-
gicus; in Du Pin's Prolegomenes sur la Bible; in Jenkin's Reafon-
ableness of Chriftianity; in Prideaux's Old and New Testament
connected; in Bishop Williams's Sermons at Boyle's Lecture; and
efpecially in the first Chapter of Carpzovius Introductio ad libros
propheticos; the XXVIIIth Section of which contains a catalogue of
fuch of the Fathers, Rabbins, Lutheran, Catholic, and Reformed
writers, as have treated de Prophetiæ et Prophetarum natura, caufis,
differentia, et affectionibus.
The late Lord Barrington rendered great fervice to Chriftianity by
his Miscellanea Sacra. In the Effay which is here printed from the
first volume of that work, he has explained the Gifts of the Holy
Spirit which prevailed in the primitive Church with more precifion,
and fet the Argument in favour of Christianity, which is derived
From the Witness of the Spirit, in a stronger light, than any other
Author has done. The Subject has been handled by Whitby in his
book intitled The Certainty of the Chriftian Faith, and in his
General Preface concerning the divine Authority of the Epiftles;
by Benson, in his Reasonableness of Chriftianity, and in other parts
of his Works; by Warburton, in his Doctrine of Grace; by Secker,
Tillotson, Chandler, and other Divines, in their Sermons: and indeed
it is a fubject which deferves all attention; for whatever contrariety
of opinion may take place concerning the Agency of the Holy
Spirit on the Minds of the faithful in the present state of the
Chriftian
Christian Church, the extraordinary Gifts which were bestowed on
the primitive Christians are matters of fact which cannot well be
controverted; and which, if admitted, prove to a demonstration the
Truth of the Christian Religion.
An Essay concerning Inspiration, taken from Doctor
BENSON's Paraphrafe and Notes on St. Paul's
Epistles.
p. 469.
What Dr. Powel has said in his discourse intitled The Nature
and Extent of Inspiration illustrated from the writings of St. Paul,
is very fimilar to what Dr. Benfon has advanced in this short Essay.
Both the Authors suppose the Inspiration of the Apostles to have
consisted in their having had the Scheme of the Gospel commu-
nicated to them from Heaven; in their having retained, to the end
of their lives, the memory of what had been thus communicated to
them; and in their having committed to writing, by the use of their
natural faculties, what they remembered. This fubject of Inspira-
tion has been discussed by Tillotson, Secker, Warburton, and other
English Divines in their Sermons; by Le Clerc, in his Letters con-
cerning Inspiration; by Lowth, in his Answer to Le Clerc; by
Wakefield, in his Effay on Inspiration; by Castalio, in a fragment
printed at the End of Wetstein's Greek Teftament; by Archbishop
Potter, in his Prælectiones Theologica; by Dr. Middleton, in the
second Volume of his Miscellaneous Works; by Jenkins, in his
Reasonableness of Chriftianity; by Du Pin, in his Prolegomenes
fur la Bible; by Calmet, in his Differtation sur l'Inspiration, printed
in the eighth Volume of his Commentary on the Bible: in this
Differtation Calmet enumerates the Sentiments of a great variety
of Authors on the Manner of Inspiration; and to those Authors I
would refer the Reader who is defirous of full information on this
Subject.
An Effay concerning the Unity of Sense: to shew that no
Text of Scripture has more than one fingle Sense. p. 481.
This is prefixed to Dr. Benson's Paraphrafe on St. Paul's Epistles.
St. Augustine, in the first Chapter of his twelfth Book contra Faustum
Manichæum, says-Faustus afferted that, after the most attentive and
curious Search, he could not find that the Hebrew Prophets had
prophefied concerning Chrift; and Celfus, as it is related by Origen,
introduced a Jew affirming, that the Prophecies which were gene-
rally applied to Christ, might more fitly be applied to other Matters:
other Enemies of the Christian name, in the first ages of the Church,
strongly objected to the pertinency of adducing the Old Testament
Prophecies, as proofs that Jesus of Nazareth was the Meffiah.
On the other hand, fome of the ancient Fathers (not content
with shewing that a great many prophecies respected the Meffiah,
and received a direct and full accomplishment in the Person of Jesus
of Nazareth) maintained that almost all the predictions and hifto-
rical Events mentioned in the Old Testament, had an indirect and
typical relation to his advent, character, or kingdom.
Grotius is faid (though the fact may be questioned) to have been
the first Interpreter of Scripture who distinctly shewed that the
greatest part of the Prophecies of the Old Testament had a double
lense, and have received a double accomplishment. He maintained
that the Predictions, even of the Evangelical Prophet Ifaiah, re-
lated, in their primary and literal sense, to the times and circum-
stances of the Jewish People, but that they respected the Messiah in
a secondary and allegorical Sense. Limborch, in his Cominentary
on the Acts of the Apostles, accedes to the Opinion of Grotius in
these words-Recte à doctiffimis interpretibus observatum eft, pau-
tiffima elle apud Prophetas vaticinia, quæ directè et sensu primo de
Domino Jesu loquuntur; fed plerifque duplicem inesse sensum,
literalem unum, olim in typo imperfectè, alterum mysticum, in
Domino Jesu plenè et perfecte impletum.
Father Baltus, a Jesuit, in the Year 1737, published his Defense
des Propheties de la Religion Chrétienne: in this work he pur-
posely examines and refutes the Opinion of Grotius at great length;
and shews that the most ancient Fathers of the Church, as Justin
Martyr, Tertullian, Origen, &c. never thought of interpreting the
Prophecies of the Old Testament in a double Sense; but applied
them in their literal meaning to the Meffiah. Whiston, in his Sermons
preached at Boyle's Lecture in 1707, had fupported the same senti-
ment before Baltus: he strongly contended that "the Prophecies
" of the Old Testament at all appertaining to the Meffiah, particu-
"larly those which are quoted as Teftimonies and Arguments in
"the New Testament, do properly and folely belong to the Meffiah,
" and did not at all concern any other person." In 1710, Arch-
deacon Clagget animadverted on this notion of Whiston, and under-
took the Vindication of those Christian Commentators who had ex-
plained some prophecies concerning the Meffiah as not folely re-
lating to him, in a Treatise intituled Truth defended and Boldness
in Error rebuked.
In 1724, Collins published a Discourse on the Grounds and Rea-
fons of the Christian Religion, in which he revived the Objections of
Fauftus, Origen, Celfus, and such other early writers against Chrifti-
anity, as had endeavoured to prove that the Prophecies of the Old
Teftament had no direct relation to Jesus Christ. I refer the Reader
to Leland's View of the Deistical Writers, and to Fabricius' Lux
Evangelica, for an Account of the several Answers which were pub-
lished.
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