it is true because it is for the benefit of Mankind that it should be so and upon that account it carries the visible Characters of Divine Wisdom and Goodness in it for it is certain that the Religion which God has established in the World must be of this nature that none but wicked men can dislike it and that all sober and good men must be well satisfied with it and mightily enclined to believe it nay even the worst men must be forced to confess that they owe their own safety and protection to the Doctrines of it And that such is the nature of the Christian Religion will be evident if we consider that I. It teacheth an universal Righteousness both towards God and Man II. It layeth down the only true Principles of Holiness III. It proposeth the most effectual Motives IV. It affords the greatest helps and assistances to an Holy Life V. It expresseth the greatest compassion and condescension to our infirmities VI. The propagation of the Gospel has had mighty effects towards the Reformation and Happiness of Mankind VII The highest mysteries of the Christian Religion are not merely speculative but have a necessary relation to Practice and were revealed for the advancement of Piety and Virtue amongst men I. The Christian Religion teacheth an Universal Righteousness both towards God and Man It teacheth us the nature of God that he is a Spirit and therefore ought to be worshipped in Spirit and in Truth and gives us an account of the Power and Wisdom and Goodness of God in the Creation of the World and in the various dispensations of his Providence in the preservation and Government of it and especially in the wonderful work of our Redemption God is represented in the Scriptures as slow to anger and great in Power and who will not at all acquit the wicked Nahum i. 3. and we are required to love and serve him with all our Abilities both of Body and Mind Deut. vi 5. Matt. xxii 37. The Duties of men towards one another are no less strictly enjoyned than our duty towards God himself For the Scriptures oblige all men to the Conscientious performance of their several Duties in their respective capacities and relations They teach Wives and Children and Subjects and Servants Obedience not only for Wrath but also for Conscience sake and they teach Princes and Husbands and Fathers and Masters a proportionable care and kindness and affection they check and restrain the rich and powerful from violence and oppression and command them to relieve those that are in want and to protect all that are in distress and to root up the very seeds and principles of Vice in us they regulate our desires and give Laws to our words and looks and thoughts they command an universal Love and Charity towards all Mankind to hurt no body so much as in a Thought but to do all the good which is in our power they oblige men to do as they would be done unto in all cases to consider others as men of the same nature with themselves and to love and respect them accordingly upon all occasions I may add what Grotius has not omitted that more favour and equity is extended to one half of humane kind by the Christian Religion than ever had been by any other for among Infidels Women are esteemed but as slaves to the Lusts of men who may have as many Wives as they please and change them as often as they think fit II. The Scriptures propound to us the only true Principles of Holiness For they teach us to perform all Duties both towards God and Man upon Principles of Love and Charity which are the only Principles that can make men happy in the performance of their respective duties and that can cause them to persevere in it What men do upon Principles of Love they do with delight and what men delight in they will be sure to do but fear hath torment and men will use all Arts to get rid of their fears and of that sense of Duty which proceeds only from an apprehension of Punishments and therefore is perpetually grievous and burthensom to them Rewards themselves may become ineffectual by proposals of contrary Rewards for smaller advantages which are present and in hand may be more prevalent than never so much greater which are future and looked upon only at a distance But a sense of Love and Gratitude and Charity can never fail of its effect because this brings its reward with it and makes our duty a delight He who loves God will certainly obey him and he that does not love him never can truly obey him as he ought but will be ever repining at his Duty and will be for seeking all pretences to excuse himself from it He who doth not love his Neighbour will be for taking all opportunities of pursuing his own advantage against him but he who loves him as himself will never do him any injury He that loveth another hath fulfilled the Law For this thou shalt not commit adultery thou shalt not kill thou shalt not steal thou shalt not bear false witness thou shalt not covet and if there be any other commandment it is briefly comprehended in this saying namely Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy self Love worketh no ill to his neighbour therefore love is the fulfilling of the Law Rom. xiii 8. The Love of God and of our Neighbour comprehends the whole duty of man which is a Doctrine no where to be met withal but in the Holy Scriptures all the Wisdom of Philosophers could never discover this Doctrine which sets before us the only infallible principles of obedience And it must be a most gracious and wise Law which makes Love the Principle and Foundation of our whole duty both towards God and Man III. The Christian Religion proposeth the most effectual motives of Obedience and Holiness of Life The moral Reasons and Arguments for a vertuous Life are so great and evident that those who live otherwise are generally convinced that they ought not to do it but because the Arguments from Reason are to faint and lifeless to oppose to sense and passion therefore the Christian Religion is purposely fitted to every faculty and presents us with greater objects of fear and love and desire than any thing in the world can do And as God will be served by us upon no other Principle but that of love so the chiefest Motive to our Obedience express'd throughout the Scriptures is the Divine Love They represent to us all the methods which God has been pleased to use as necessary to reclaim the world by his mercies and his judgments by sending his Prophets at sundry times and in divers manners and at last by sending his own Son He saw the fondness that men have for this World and for the pleasures and sins of it how subject they are to Temptations and how prone to comply with them and therefore he has been pleased to pursue
they had been never so vicious and profligate before The Christians are represented as an innocent devout and charitable sort of men by Pliny Lucian and Julian the Apostate himself Plin. Epist ad Trajan lib. 10. Epist 97. Lucian de Morte Peregrini Julian Epist 44. by those who had most narrowly enquired into their Doctrines and Practices and were worst affected to them And by these means the Christians became as so many Lights in the world to guide and direct others in the ways of Vertue for by their example and doctrine they soon reformed even the Heathen world to a great degree Morality was taught by the Philosophers in much greater perfection than ever it had been before and they became so much ashamed of the grossness of their Idolatrous worship that they sought out all arts to refine and excuse it And those vices which made up so great a part of their Idolatrous Mysteries appeared too abominable to pass any longer for Religion The Oracles soon ceased and the seducing Spirits confessed that they were hindred from giving out their Answers by the Power of Christ and all that Julian the Apostate could do was ineffectual to bring the Heathen Oracles into reputation again These are things before insisted upon and so notorious in History that they cannot be denied to be solely owing to the Power and Influence of the Christian Religion I shall mention but one instance more and that is the barbarous cruelty of the Heathen Religions which the Gospel has delivered the world from For they were wont to offer up innocent Men and Children in sacrifice to their false Gods and that frequently and in some places daily and in times of great danger and upon extraordinary occasions they sacrificed so great numbers of men at once that it would be incredible if we had not the Authority of the best Historians for the truth of it And this custom of sacrificing men to their Gods prevailed not only here in Britain and in other Countrys which were accounted barbarous but all over Greece and in Rome it self It may well seem strange to us now that such a practice should so generally prevail in the world yet nothing is more certain from all History than that it did prevail and that men were with difficulty brought off from it For when Mankind was thus cruelly tyrannized over by bloody Daemons nothing but the omnipotent mercy of God could rescue them And for this purpose the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the Devil 1 John iii. 8. which he soon did Beasts and Idols were no longer worshipped and men were no longer made Sacrifices when once Christianity began to appear in its full power and efficacy in the world The plain and humble Doctrine of him that was laid in a Manger and died upon a Cross was in a short time more effectual to reform Mankind than all the Precepts of Philosophers and the Wisdom and Power of Lawgivers had ever been Those Enemies to their own Souls who are so fond of little cavils against the Gospel as if they were resolved not to be saved by it yet owe the happiness of this present Life in great measure to its influence they would not have been so safe in their Bodies and Estates nay perhaps they might have been sacrificed to some cruel Daemon long before this if that Religion which they resolve to despise but will not be at the pains to understand had not been believed by wiser and better men Of so great advantage has the Gospel been to those who will not be reclaimed and converted by it it has destroyed the works of the Devil and has dispossest him of that Tyranny which he held over mankind it has made the unconverted world less vicious and has banished all the profess'd Patrons and Deities of wickedness from amongst men it has made Idolatry less practised and reduced it to narrower bounds confining it to the remoter parts of the Earth and every where upon the first approach of the Gospel the evil Spirits are disarmed of their power and flee away before it as we learn from the History of Lapland and other Countries So general a Blessing is the Gospel of Christ that even unbelievers are the better for it in this world tho they exclude themselves from the benefit of it in the next And the Christian is the only Religion against which the common objection concerning the prejudices of Education in favour of it cannot be urged for as it first prevailed in the world by conquering all the prejudices of Education so it still maintains it self against all the opposition that corrupt nature and a vicious Education can make to it Indeed it may seem a needless thing to have been thus large in the proof the excelleney of the practical Doctrine contained in the Scriptures when God knows this is the greatest exception that most men have against them and if the precepts were not so strict and holy but they might be allowed to live in their sins half the evidence we have for the Authority of the Scriptures would satisfy them VII The highest Mysteries of the Christian Religion are not merely speculative but have a necessary relation to practice for the advancement of Piety and Vertue amongst men As there is nothing in the practical Duties taught and enjoyned by the Scriptures but what is most excellent and worthy of God and which has raised and improved the Nature of man beyond what could have been attained to without it so the speculative Doctrines have as evident Characters of the Wisdom and Goodness of God They all tend to the advancement of our Nature to make us better more wise and more happy and are not designed to gratify a vain and useless curiosity but to excite in us the Love of God and a care and concernment for our own happiness They set before us the Original and Creation of all things the innocence in which man was first created and God's love and compassion to him after his Fall how the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost are concerned in our Redemption that the Father sent his Son that the Son was born that he lived a despised and persecuted Life and at last underwent for us a most shameful and grievous death that he rose again and ascended into Heaven and there continually interceeds for us and that he sent the Holy Ghost the Comforter who supports and assists us under all temptations and dangers in our way thither and will if we be not wanting to our selves safely conduct us to Heaven there to reign with Christ in Eternal Bliss and Glory both of Body and Soul but if we will be disobedient and obstinate to our own ruine we must be eternally tormented with the Devil and his Angels The Apostles who without Learning or Philosophy taught the most sublime and useful Truths more plainly than the wisest Philosophers ever had done must derive their knowledge from
and it being foretold half a year before the Birth of Augustus that a King of the Romans would be born that year the Senate made a Decree (i) Sueton. August c. 94. Nequis illo anno genitus educareter (k) Plutarch in Lycurg Plutarch himself says that he could find nothing unjust or dishonest in the Laws of Lycurgus tho Theft community of Wives and the murthering of such Infants as they saw weak and sickly and therefore thought they would prove unfit to serve the common-wealth were a part of those Laws Revenge was esteemed not only lawful but honourable and a desire of popular Fame and Vain Glory were reckoned among the Virtues of the Heathens and were the greatest motive and encitement they had to any other Vertue (l) Plut. in Aristide Plutarch tells us of Aristides so famed for Justice that tho he were strictly just in private affairs yet in things of publick concernment he made no scruple to act according as the present condition of the Common-wealth seemed to require For it was his Maxim that in such cases Justice must give way to expediency and he gives an instance how Aristides advised the Athenians to act contrary to their most solemn contract and oath imprecating upon himself the punishment of the perjury to avert it from the Common-wealth Tully in the Third Book of his Offices where he treats of the strictest Rules of Justice and proposes so many admirable Examples of it yet resolves the notion of Justice only into a principle of Honour upon which he concludes that no man should do a dishonest Action though he could conceal it both from God and Men and determines that an Oath is but an Appeal to a man 's own Mind or Conscience Cum vero jurato dicenda sententia sit meminerit Deum se adhibere testem id est ut arbitror mentem suam qua nihil homini dedit ipse Deus divinius The Indians themselves whatever may be thought to the contrary have naturally as good Sense and Parts as other people which (m) Jos Acost Hist lib. iv c. 1. Acosta sets himself to prove in divers instances but they had less communication with those who retained revealed Religion and by their own vices and the subtilty of the Devil the Notions which they had received from it were lost or perverted The Egyptians who were so famous for their Learning are a great instance how poor a thing humane Reason is without the Assistance of Divine Revelation for all their profound Learning did but lead them to the grossest Idolatry whilst they conceived God to be only an Anima Mandi and therefore to be worshipped in the several parts and species of the Universe The Stoicks in effect held the same Error and taught (n) Tull. Acad. Qu. lib. i. that there is nothing incorporeal But when the excellency of the Christian Morals began to be so generally observed and taken notice of the last Refuge of Philosophy was in the Moral Doctrines of the Stoicks For almost all the latter Philosophers were of this Sect which they refined and improved as well as they were able that they might have something to oppose to the Morality taught and practised too by the Christians (o) Theophil ad Autolych lib. iii. But the Ancient Stoicks had been the Patrons and Advocates of the worst vices and had filled the Libraries with their obscene Books II. The Stoicks first sprang from the Cynicks that impudent and beastly Sect of Philosophers and they refined themselves but by degrees Zeno who had as great Honour done him by the Athenians as ever any Philosopher had under the Notion of his Vertue taught that men ought to have their Wives in common and would have been put to death by the Laws of most Nations for sins against Nature (p) Diog. Laert. in Zenon Chrysipp Chrysippus taught the worst of Incest as that of Fathers with their Daughters and of Sons with their Mothers and besides his opinion for eating humane Flesh and the like his Books were filled with such obscene Discourses as no modest man could read Athenodorus a Stoick being Library-keeper at Pergamus cut all such ill Passages out of the Books of the Stoicks but he was discovered and those Passages were inserted again But these Philosophers might do as they pleased for they pretended to be exempt from sin and the stoical Philosophy in the Original fundamental Doctrines of it is nothing as Tully observed but a vain pomp and boast of words which at first raise admiration but when throughly considered are ridiculous as that men must live without love or hatred or anger or any other passion that all sins are equal and that it is the same Crime whether a man murther his Father or kill a Cock (*) Tulâ— pro Muraena as Tully says if there be no occasion for it And it is no wonder that Plutarch and others wrote purposely to expose the stoical Philosophy upon its old and genuine principles but the latter Stoicks being very sensible of the many defective and indesensible parts of their philosophy endeavoured to mollify what seemed too harsh and absurd that they might bring their own as near the Christian Doctrine as they could Quinctilian will not allow that Seneca was any great Philosopher but says that his main talent lay in declaiming against vice (q) Quint. lâ—st lib. x. c. 18. in Philosophia parum diligens egregius tamen vitiorum insectator suit It was rather the Art and Design of Seneca who knew wherein the strength and defects of his Philosophy lay to endeavour to give it all the advantage he could and to recommend it to the world by exposing the Follies and Vices of men rather than by instructing them in the Notions of his own Sect. But (r) Seu de Tranqu Animi c. 15. this notwithstanding was one of his Rules nonnunquam usque ad ebrietatem veniendum and when he had expos'd the cruelties the filthiness and the absurdities of the Religions in use amongst the Heathens in a Book written upon that subject yet says he (Å¿) Aug. Civit. Dei lib. vi c. x. quae omnia sapiens servabit tanquam legibus jussa non tanquam Diis grata And Tully likewise in divers places when he has reasoned against the absurdities of their Religion resolves the obligation to observe it into the Duty which men are bound to pay the Laws of the Government under which they live their Philosophy it seems taught them that we must obey Men rather than God But they held no more than (t) Xenophen Memorab lib. 1. Socrates had taught and practised before them Epictetus himself who has set off the Heathen Morality to the best advantage cannot be excused from as great errors and defects He teaches also that men should follow the Religion of their Country whatever it be Enchirid. cap. xxxviii He allows too great indulgence to lust cap. xlvii And
Composition of Cato it had been hard for him to avoid the being a Stoick and he might probably have founded that Sect if it had not been known in the World before The Philosophers had no Authority to promise rewards or to threaten punishments upon the observation or neglect of their Precepts and therefore every man was at his liberty to chuse or to reject what they taught and divers of them were sensible of this unavoidable defect in all humane Doctrines and therefore pretended to Revelation There is no inconvenience therefore in supposing that many of the Precepts contained in the Proverbs and other Books of Scripture might be known without a Revelation for there is notwithstanding very good Reason why they should be inserted into the Scripture Because the Scriptures have the Authority of a Divine Law and are to be looked upon not as a System of Ethicks or a Collection of Moral Precepts but as a Body of Laws given out upon Divers occasions and as Rules of Instruction which at the same time both shew us our Duty and command our Obedience It is not expected that Kings in their Laws shouid argue more profoundly than other men do but they should command more effectually than others can teach they do not dispute but pronounce and dictate what their subjects must take notice of at their peril And it is no diminution to a Princes Authority to command the most known and obvious things though it may be a fault in the subject to need such commands And God in his word did not design to furnish us with a Treatise of Philosophy to gratify our curiosity with strange and new notions and make us profound Scholars but to speak to the necessities of men and put them in mind of known Duties to appeal to their own Consciences and to enforce those notions of Good and Evil which natural reason perhaps might suggest to them by the authority of a revealed Religion and a Divine Law established upon Rewards and Punishments 3. Though the Philosophers were able to discern something more than other men yet they durst not openly declare what they knew but were over-born with the errors and vices the Times and Countries in which they lived even to the Commission of Idolatry and the worst of vices and therefore their Doctrines whatever they were could do but little good towards the reformation of the World I shall not enquire into the Reports concerning Socrates and Plato Seneca and Cato himself but only observe that Socrates who was the only Martyr among the Philosophers for the truth yet when he comes to die speaks with no assurance of a Future State and ordered a Cock to be sacrificed to Aesoulapius which can hardly be reconciled to that Doctrine for for which he is supposed to die And after his Death how did his Friends and Disciples behave themselves Did they openly and courageously vindicate his innocence and teach the Doctrine for which he suffered Did they not use all means to conceal and dissemble it But Mankind stood in need of a perfect example of Virtue and of such instructors as should both teach and practise the Doctrines of it at their utmost peril and of a succession of such Men as should bear Testimony to their Doctrine both by the Miracles wrought during their Lives and by the constancy of their Deaths 4. As the Heathen Philosophy wanted the Authority of a Law and the example of those who taught it so it wanted principal Motives to recommend the practice of it to the Lives of Men. The Philosophers teach nothing of the exceeding Love of God towards us of his desire of our happiness and his readiness to assist and conduct us in the ways of Virtue They owned no such thing as Divine Grace and Assistance towards the attainment of Vertue and the perseverance in it (o) Tull. de Nat. Dâ—or lib. iii. Virtutem autem nemo unquam acceptam Deo retulit nimirum recte propter virtutem enim jure laudamur in virtute recte gloriamur quod non contingeret si id donum a Deo non a nobis haberemus nam quis quod bonus vir esset gratias Diis egit unquam Jovemque optimum maximum ob eas res appellant non quod justos temperatos sapientes efficiat sed quod salvos incolumes opulentos copiosos This occasioned those (p) Sen Epist 53. insolent Boasts of the Stoicks equaling themselves to the Gods and sometimes even preferring themselves before them because they had difficulties to encounter which made their conquests of vice and their improvements in virtue more glorious than they supposed the like excellencies to be in their Gods who were good by the necessity of their own Nature Wherefore tho the Rules of Philosophy had been never so perfect yet they must needs be ineffectual being so difficult to find out and so unactive and dead when they were discovered without that Authority and Life and Energy that may be had from Divine Revelation which there was a necessity for not only to supply the imperfections and correct the errors of Philosophy but to enforce the Doctrines of it tho they had been never so true and perfect CHAP. VI. The Novelty and Defect in the Promulgation of the Mahometan Religion THE Novelty of the Mahometan Religion in respect both of the Old and New Testament is past all dispute And this Religion notwithstanding all its sensual allurement owes its Propagation solely to the â—ower of the Sword For though the Alcoran has been translated into most of the Languages in use amongst Christians yet it has never been known to make any Proselytes but by force of Arms. At first this Religion had many circumstances for its advantage which might in humane probability gain it success in the world It was begun in Rebellion and in a final Revolt from the Emperor Heraclius and besides this popular and seducing Temptation of Licence and Violence Mahomet added the enticements of Lust and Sensuality he forbad Men indeed some things but such as he could easily see they would part with for the free and unbounded enjoyment of others then he pretended to sound his Doctrine on the Authority of Moses and of Christ saying that Christ had promised to send him all which made his Religion find the more easy entertainment amongst both Jews and Christians 'T was but like the Heresy of the Gnosticks at the first and not altogether so gross and this must needs encline all of Seditious and lewd principles to come in to him being glad of such a colour for their wickedness and it had the advantage of Power and Force to make it more lasting than other such Blasphemies have been Christ on the contrary forbad Resistance of the supreme Power upon any terms whatsoever he asserted the Authority of Moses but so as to abolish the ceremonial part of the Law which was what the Jews were most fond of so that this very thing made the Jews
Evangelists wrote his Life with the same Humility with which he lived And it is observable that when St. John says that there were so many other things which Jesus did he speaks with relation to the things done by him after his Resurrection having just before given an account of what our Saviour had said to St. Peter And so in the foregoing Chapter when St. John has declared how our Saviour certified St. Thomas of the Truth of his Resurrection he adds and many other Signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his Disciples which are not written in this Book but these are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God and that believing ye might have Life through his Name Joh. xx 30 31. So that we are acquainted with no more than was necessary of what pass'd between our Saviour and his Disciples after his Resurrection the rest concerns us not to know it was for their Instruction and encouragement in their Duty and they were empower'd to teach and instruct us We know that beginning at Moses and all the Prophets he expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself Luke xxiv 27. but we are no where told what were the Particulars of his Exposition only we are sure that the Apostles in their Explications of the Old Testament followed the Interpretations which he had given We read that he was seen of them forty days and spoke of the things pertaining to the Kingdom of God from whence we may conclude that the time between the Resurrection and the Ascension of Christ was chiefly spent in comforting and instructing them and in expounding to them the Scriptures concerning his Passion and Resurrection and the coming of the Holy Ghost after his Ascension St. Paul mentions that he was seen by above five hundred Brethren at once of whom the greater part were then still alive to testifie the Truth of what he said 1 Cor. xv 6. tho' this Particular however remarkable is omitted by the Evangelists for they relate things just as they saw it needful upon every Occasion and since they said enough to convince Men they were not careful to say all that might be said they were ready to die in Testimony of what they delivered and daily wrought Miracles to confirm it and therefore were not sollicitous to lay together all the Particulars or to put them into any exact Order and Method they declared what they knew and their Miracles proved it and they depended not upon such Niceties as Humane Proofs have need of We may reasonably conclude then notwithstanding the silence of the Sacred Writers that when Christ had once fully manifested himself to his Disciples and satisfied them in his Resurrection the rest of the time till his Ascension was most of it spent with them in Divine Discourses for their Instruction and Comfort such as those are which we read in the Evangelists one of whom declares that a full account of all that pass'd between him and his Disciples was more than could well be express'd That happy time was employ'd in pure and Spiritual Joys and Contemplations in forming and preparing them for the Reception of the Holy Ghost As soon as Mary Magdalen knew our Lord after his Resurrection she fell at his feet to Worship him and would touch his Sacred Body Matt. xxviii 9. Joh. xx 17. For this Reason perhaps too as well as out of Devotion to him that she might be able to give the Apostles the better account of his being risen again But he forbad her saying touch me not for I am not yet ascended to my Father and then sends her to his Disciples to his Brethren as he with infinite Love and Condescension styles them He was not yet ascended or was not then about to ascend but to stay many days upon Earth and there would be time enough for her nearer approaches to him either for the encrease and confirmation of her Faith or for her Acknowledgment and Adoration After his Resurrection Christ made himself known to his Disciples by degrees and by several Appearances to them at distant times in divers Places and in different manners he suffered them to doubt of that great Article of our Faith for a while that he might overcome their Unbelief and extort a Conviction from them by such means as that no Man unless he would be very unreasonable and obstinate should pretend any Cause to doubt of it afterwards But when he had thoroughly convinc'd them of his Resurrection we may conclude from what we read of his Conversing with them that from that time he admitted them to a freer and more intimate Communication with himself and Discoursed with them in the most mild and gracious and instructive manner of all which it concerned them to know pertaining to his Kingdom or which they were capable then of knowing before the descent of the Holy Ghost sometimes perhaps vouchsafing his Presence to one and sometimes to others of them and most commonly to them altogether when they were assembled as we find they generally were And when he withdrew himself it was because their Mortal State would not bear a constant and uninterrupted Attendance for so long a time upon their Blessed Master and because it was requisite that they by degrees should be accustomed to endure his Absence and to walk by Faith not by Sight and after his Ascension the Holy Ghost the Comforter did not immediately come upon his Departure from them but their Faith was to be exercised in the expectation of him for the space of Ten Days and then his Promise was to be fulfilled in the fittest and most proper Season on the Feast of Pentecost In few words Christ was seen of them says the Scripture forty Days which implies that these for the most part were spent in his Presence and we are in the same place told how this time was employ'd in speaking of the things pertaining to the Kingdom of God II. We may observe the manner how our Saviour left his Disciples when he ascended up from them into Heaven He had before prepared them to expect his Ascension for besides what he had said to them before his death immediately upon his Resurrection he sent this Message to his Disciples by Mary Magdalen Go to my Brethren and say unto them I ascend unto my Father and your Father and to my God and your God Joh. xx 17. They were in hopes it seems that he would at this time have restored again the Kingdom to Israel and did not think he would have left them before that which they so much desired had been accomplished However taking his Leave of them he commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem but wait for the Promise of the Father which says he ye have heard of me And whilst he was giving them repeated Assurances that this Promise should be most effectually fulfilled while they beheld he was taken up and a Cloud received