very point of his dissolution as his Legacy to the Christian Church communicated to several Churches publickly and vulgarly known attested by Saint Policarp Irenaeus Clemens of Alexandria and not long since by Origen 't is not possible that all the Copies of such a Writing as this should be lost about one and the same time and that a false one should immediately rise up in their stead and that Eusebius a Man so familiarly acquainted with the choicest Libraries of that part of the World should embrace so late and so gross a Forgery and put the mistake upon all learned Men that followed after him The Man that can satisfie himself with such wild surmises and suppositions as these there is nothing so absurd but he may easily swallow its belief nor so demonstratively proved but he may withstand its evidence Now the Authority of these Epistles being vindicated and I am apt to think that they will never more be call'd in question they are a brave and generous Assertion of the truth of the Christian Faith being written with that mighty assurance of Mind that shews the Authour of them to have had an absolute certainty or a kind of an infallible knowledge of the things that he believed In every Epistle his Faith is resolved into that undoubted evidence that he had of our Saviour's Death and Resurrection and particularly in that to the Church of Smyrna he protests that he could no more doubt of its reality than of his own chains and again positively affirms that he knew it to be true And yet not withstanding that all the ancient Copies and all the quotations of the Ancients out of him agree in this sense that he knew Jesus to be in the flesh after his death because in Saint Jerom's Translation who excuses himself for the haste and carelesness of the work it is rendred that he saw Jesus in the flesh this is made use of by the learned Men of our new Church of Geneva as a sufficient Objection to overthrow the Authority of all these Epistles It is possible indeed he might have seen Jesus in the flesh but it is not probable neither is it his design to affirm it in this place seeing he proves its truth from the Testimony of the Apostles as Eye-witnesses and not from his own immediate knowledge but when he onely says that from them he knew it to be true to put this assertion upon him that he saw it with his own eyes against the reading of all the ancient Books from a careless Translation proves nothing but the invincible stubbornness of prejudice and partiality But the truth is these Men have been so zealous for their Faction as not to care how in pursuit of it they endanger'd nay destroyed their Religion For whereas one of the greatest Pillars of the Christian Faith is the Testimony of the Ancients in the Age next to the Apostles in that it is hereby particularly proved that it is no figment of an unknown time and that the Records of it were of that Antiquity that they pretend to be yet because they do as positively assert the original Constitution of the Christian Church which this faction of Men have hapned to renounce they have labour'd with indefatigable industry utterly to overthrow all their Authority but thanks be to God with that ill success that by their endeavour to shake our Faith they have onely made it to take the better root for by this occasion the most ancient Tradition of the primitive Church has been much more inquired into and better clear'd than if it had passed without any dispute or contradictition But to keep close to our Ignatius what has been the bottom of all the zeal and fury against his Epistles but his earnest pressing all good Christians to submit to the government of the Church as to the Ordinance of God or rather because he describes the Constitution of the primitive Platform so accurately as to condemn their Discipline of folly and rashness in departing from the prescription of God himself And yet all the ancient Doctours of the Church have done the same thing laying as great a stress as he has done upon the duty of Obedience to their Ecclesiastical Governours as set over them by Divine Institution For as there was nothing of which they were then more tender than the Peace and Unity of the Church so they thought it could be no other way preserved than by submission to those Guides and Governours that Christ had set over it This it were easie to make evident out of their Writings especially Saint Cyprian's who as he was a Person of very great prudence and discretion so is he full as peremptory in this point as Ignatius But I shall onely instance in the Epistle of Saint Clement because of its greater Antiquity For if that assert a certain form of Church government establisht by our Saviour and observed by the Apostles that prevents and confutes the groundless conjecture of an unknown time immediately after the Apostles in which the whole power of the Church devolved upon the Presbyters because they had appointed no one particular and perpetual form of Government And this Saint Clement asserts in these positive words The Apostles were appointed to preach the Gospel to us from our Lord Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ from God himself Christ being sent by God and the Apostles by him the sending of both was in an orderly manner after the will of God For the Apostles receiving their command and having a full confidence through the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ and faith in the word of God with an assurance of the Holy Spirit went forth publishing the Gospel of the Kingdom of God which was erecting They therefore preached the Word through divers Countries and Cities ordaining every where the first fruits of such as believed having made proof and trial of them by the Spirit to be Overfeers and Deacons to minister unto them that should afterwards believe So that it seems they were so far from neglecting to provide Governours for the future state of the Church that they were carefull beforehand to provide Governours for future Churches And this he affirms the Apostles did because they understood by our Lord Jesus Christ that strife and contention would arise about the Title of Episcopacy for this cause therefore having absolute knowledge beforehand thereof they ordained the forenamed Officers and for the future gave them moreover in command that whensoever they should dye others well approved of should succeed into their Office and Ministery So that it is evident that the Apostles themselves by virtue of our Saviour's order observed and prescribed a particular form of Government to be continued down to future Ages And though our Authour does not express the several distinct Orders by the common names of Bishop Priest and Deacon yet he describes them as expresly by allusion to the Jewish Hierarchy under the names of High-priest Priest and Levite
easie matter the Law is forced to pass Judgment on the wrong side But beside the injuries of Fraud the greatest miseries brought upon Mankind by Injustice are supported by Power and Greatness and in such cases the Tyrant and Oppressour defies all discovery and though he cares not if all the World sees his Wickedness yet if any Man shall pretend to have his Eyes open he shall forfeit his head for the boldness of his Eye-sight So that if this were the onely state of things the Governour of the World has provided neither sufficient rewards for Justice and Honesty nor restraints from Fraud and Oppression And if he has not then he has laid no effectual obligation upon Mankind to be Just and Honest for the force of every Command depends upon its Sanction and therefore if he have injoin'd this Duty and have not backt it with sufficient motives of Obedience he has onely enacted useless and ineffectual Laws In short the onely difference between the Man that is Honest and the Man that is not is meerly this that the one prefers his Duty before his present Interest and the other his present Interest before his Duty For if he observe the Rules of Justice onely so far as they conduce to his own ends then whenever they happen to thwart he is obliged to quit his Duty rather than his Interest And when he does so he is so far destitute of all Principles of Honesty that he is entirely govern'd by the fundamental Maximes of Fraud and Oppression And if this be the onely difference that distinguishes Good and Bad Men I would fain know what motive or reason a good Man has to pursue his Duty when contrary to his Interest or a bad Man has to quit his Interest out of respect to his Duty if there be no other state of things than the present And therefore without Immortality Justice is so far from deserving our regard in all cases that in many it is a contradiction to the first Instinct of Nature that is self-love in that it obliges a Man to act cross to that without any reason or recompence for his so doing And therefore seeing the Providence of God has prescribed to us those many and plain Laws of Justice that I have discover'd from the Nature of Things in the precedent Discourse it unavoidably follows that upon that Supposition those Laws that he has prescribed must be abetted with the Rewards and Punishments of a future State because those of this if taken alone and separate from those of that are not of sufficient force and validity And as Justice the most necessary so Fortitude the most noble of all Vertues will have no Foundation upon the Epicurean Principles or rather will sink together with them For if there be no such thing as Justice to what purpose should any Man run himself into hazards and hardships for the sake of it and yet that is the onely Office of Magnanimity which when separated from a good Cause is no more than folly and fool-hardiness and in a bad Cause is no better than cruelty and oppression And beside this as every Vertue must have some Principle to warrant its Wisedom and Reasonableness so above all others Magnanimity because it puts us upon the severest and hardest Service and does more than any Vertue beside endanger our own Interest for the sake of Duty But if there be no other Interest than that of this Life it is apparent madness for any Man to hazard Life and Fortune and all that is dear to him here for any thing whatsoever when all other Motives that can be proposed to him are of less concernment to himself than his own Self-preservation Beside true Magnanimity bottoms all its Courage and Assurance upon no other Principle than the Conscience of its own Integrity It is that alone that gives a Man a sufficiency and satisfaction from himself that raises him to a contempt of all outward things that makes him searfull of all Assaults and Dangers and that supports him under all Losses and Misfortunes as esteeming all things whatsoever as mean and worthless Trifles in comparison to the Happiness of its own Reflections But then as Conscience is the onely support of Courage so is immortality of Conscience for that is nothing else but the Mind of Man acting with reference to the future Judgment of God And therefore from thence alone it derives all its Force and Authority and without that all seeming regard to it is nothing but Pretence and Pageantry For what comfort will a good Conscience afford a Man if he be to give no Account of his Actions Upon that Supposition the Guilty and the Innocent are upon equall Terms when the best Man is ne'er the better for all his Vertues nor the other the worse for all his Villanies If then Integrity of Conscience be the onely Principle of all Magnanimity and if the firmness of that depends meerly upon Immortality then that being taken away the one sinks into Crast the other into Cowardize In short there are but two Offices of Magnanimity either to doe or to suffer gallantly both which are manifest Contradictions to the Epicurean Principles For what Inducements can that Man have to put himself upon Hardships who knows no other Happiness but Ease and Lasiness And therefore upon their Supposition it was wise Advice of Metrodorus to his Brother not to concern himself in desence and preservation of his Country but to eat and drink with philosophick Wisedom and Discretion And then as for bearing up decently under Calamities I have already shewn that they have not one Principle wherewith to support themselves and without such Principles as can supply the absence of their present Happiness nothing else can relieve their Loss and therefore instead of bearing up with any chearfulness under Miseries and Afflictions they must for ever sink into insupportable Anguish and Despair And now from these Premises to mention no more Particulars because all the other Vertues depend upon these it is demonstratively evident that to root up the sentiments of Immortality out of the Minds of Men is to blast and put out the Sun and to overwhelm the World in eternal Night and Darkness Erasing all the Foundations of Happiness tearing up all the Roots of Vertue and laying wast all the Principles of humane Nature and humane Society And as Plutarch discourses where such Principles of Philosophy prevail as enervate the Laws of Vertue Men have nothing left to distinguish them from Brute-beasts but that they want the Claws of Lyons and the Teeth of Wolves the Stomachs of Oxen and the Backs of Camels In a word upon this single Principle of a future State depend all the differences of Good and Evil if this stand firm Vertue is secure but otherwise after all that care that the Divine Providence has taken to recommend it to us it is all no more than Craft or Folly § XXV And now having thus far and fairly
Deity has enacted those Laws for the government of the World that I have described in the former part of this Discourse it follows with undeniable demonstration that for that Reason alone though there were no other he has withall provided some other state of things beyond that of this present Life because otherwise when he has built this World with so much art and contrived the Nature of Things with so much wisedom he has done it all to no purpose and then there is neither Art nor Wisedom So that these being antecedently proved this that is so unavoidably connected with them though it had no other proof stands upon the same evidence of Reason Especially when it is so needfull not onely to moral but to natural Philosophy that without it not onely all the Laws of Vertue vanish into nothing but the whole frame of Nature sinks into utter Chaos and Confusion For that the World was built by a Principle endued with Wisedom and Understanding is I hope sufficiently demonstrated from those evident Ends Uses and Designs of Things that he propounded to himself in their order and contrivance and yet unless we suppose some other state of things than what is at present visible after those undeniable Demonstrations of all those wise Designs that appear in every part and parcel of Nature it will as demonstratively follow that the whole was made to no end at all Which because it is so plain a contradiction to what was before so evidently demonstrated that alone is as evident a Demonstration of this that is so certainly connected with it as it is of it self A Demonstration OF THE DIVINE AUTHORITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION From the undoubted Certainty of the Matter of Fact and the uninterrupted Tradition of the Church PART II. § I. HAving demonstrated the general Providence of God in the Government of the World by those Laws of Nature that he has enacted and proclaimed to all his rational Creatures and proceeded as far as the natural use of our Faculties would guide me to discover both the Duty and the Happiness of Mankind I now advance to a much greater and more glorious discovery of both by that particular Revelation that he has made both of them and himself in the Christian Institution And here the Advantages both as to the Certainty of the Reward and the Perfection of the Law are so exceedingly great as almost utterly to supersede the necessity and usefulness of the former Discourse For first we were there forced to make out the Law of Nature to our selves by various Observations of Nature and Trains of Reasoning but here we find them all distinctly and exactly drawn forth for our present use into particular Rules and Precepts and made easie to our practice by familiar Instances and Examples of Life so that now without any laborious workings of our own Minds without any knowledge of Nature and without any skill in Philosophy our whole Duty is made known to us in a System of plain and easie Propositions And then secondly when we had wrought out the Laws of Nature to our selves from the nature of Things after that we were forced to work the proof of a future Reward out of them and though the connexion when it is discovered is very evident and undeniable yet it requires some carefull intention of Mind and competent skill in the Art of Reasoning to discover it whereas now it is made evident to us beyond all doubt and exception both by certain Revelation and experimental Proof the knowledge whereof is conveyed to us by such undoubted Records that we could scarce receive greater satisfaction of the matter of Fact by the Testimony and Conviction of our own Senses And the Divine Providence has given us so great an Assurance of the Being of a future state that we have not much more of the present At least the Grounds and Motives of our Christian Faith are so convincing and demonstrative as not onely to perswade but even to enforce our Belief so that no ingenuous and unprejudiced Mind can withstand their Evidence though it is possible that malice and peevishness may defeat their Efficacy and so it may too if it please over rule the Power of Mathematical Demonstration But if Men will be honest and impartial in the Enquiry and not do manifest violence to their own Convictions it will be as easie for them to doubt of or disbelieve all the Problems about Lines or Numbers as to suspect the Foundations of the Christian Faith Not that it is capable of the same kind of Evidence but because its Proofs are so forcible in their own kind that upon the same ground that any Man shall distrust or demur upon their credibility he is obliged to an universal unsettledness and irresolution of Mind For when we have weighed and consider'd the whole account of Things we shall find the rankest Scepticism to be very little more unreasonable than Infidelity Because though the Evidence of all matters of Fact and Faith be onely historical yet some historical Evidence is so strong and convictive as in the last result of things to equal Mathematical Demonstrations I know indeed we are told by some learned Men that in matters of this nature we are not to expect demonstrative Arguments when the things themselves are not capable of any other than moral Certainty But here I would first enquire What they mean by moral Certainty And to this their Answer is ready That it is all the certainty that the Nature of the thing is capable of But if that be the definition of moral Certainty then is all certainty moral for every truth is capable of its own kind of certainty But then secondly There are very many things from which I am in reason obliged to suspend my Assent because they are not capable in their own Natures to warrant its Wisedom and though I cannot rationally expect more certain grounds concerning them yet I cannot rationally give up my Assent to them because their Evidence though the clearest that in that case I can expect is too obscure and uncertain to found any consident Assent upon Thus have I a moral Certainty that Romulus was the Founder of Rome i. e. I have all the proof of it that the matter is capable of and yet have I not sufficient grounds to venture any thing that nearly concerns me upon the truth of it because the first beginning of the Roman Story is in many things very fabulous and in all very far from being sufficiently certain And therefore thirdly If by moral Certainty they mean any less degree of evidence as they plainly do when they distinguish it from the more certain ways of proof then the scruple that remains after this their determination is this that the very thing the belief whereof is made the very Foundation of our Religion is capable of no higher degree of evidence than onely moral Certainty In that it seems not consistent with the Divine