in the paths of Piety and Vertue In the Infancy of the World he taught men by the Dictates of Nature and the common Notices of Good and Evil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Philo calls them the most Ancient Law by lively Oracles and great Examples of Piety He set forth the Holy Patriarchs as Chrysostom observes as Tutors to the rest of Mankind who by their Religious lives might train up others to the practice of Vertue and as Physicians be able to cure the minds of those who were infected and overrun with Vice Afterwards says he having sufficiently testified his care of their welfare and happiness by many instances of a wise and benign Providence towards them both in the land of Canaan and in Egypt he gave them Prophets and by them wrought Signs and Wonders together with innumerable other expressions of his bounty At last finding that none of these Methods did succeed not Patriarchs not Prophets not Miracles not daily Warnings and Chastisements brought upon the World he gave the last and highest instance of his love and goodness to Mankind he sent his only begotten Son out of his own bosom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the great Physician both of Soul and Body who taking upon him the form of a Servant and being born of a Virgin conversed in the World and bore our sorrows and infirmities that by rescuing Humane Nature from under the weight and burden of Sin he might exalt it to Eternal Life A brief account of these things is the main intent of the following Discourse wherein the Reader will easily see that I considered not what might but what was fit to be said with respect to the end I designed it for It was drawn up under some more disadvantageous circumstances than a matter of this nature did require which were it worth the while to represent to the Reader might possibly plead for a softer Censure However such as it is it is submitted to the Readers Ingenuity and Candor W. C. IMPRIMATUR THO. TOMKYNS Ex Aed Lambeth Feb. 25. 1674. AN APPARATUS OR DISCOURSE INTRODUCTORY TO THE Whole WORK concerning the Three Great Dispensations OF THE CHURCH PATRIARCHAL MOSAICAL and EVANGELICAL SECT I. Of the PATRIARCHAL Dispensation The Tradition of Elias The three great Periods of the Church The Patriarchal Age. The Laws then in force natural or positive Natural Laws what evinced from the testimony of natural conscience The Seven Precepts of the Sons of Noah Their respect to the Law of Nature Positive Laws under that dispensation Eating Bloud why prohibited The mystery and signification of it Circumcision when commanded and why The Laws concerning Religion Their publick Worship what Sacrifices in what sence natural and how far instituted The manner of God's testifying his acceptance What the place of their publick Worship Altars and Groves whence Abraham's Oak its long continuance and destruction by Constantine The Original of the Druids The times of their religious Assemblies In process of time Genes 4. what meant by it The Seventh Day whether kept from the beginning The Ministers of Religion who The Priesthood of the first-born In what cases exercised by younger Sons The state of Religion successively under the several Patriarchs The condition of it in Adam 's Family The Sacrifices of Cain and Abel and their different success whence Seth his great Learning and Piety The face of the Church in the time of Enosh What meant by Then began Men to call upon the Name of the Lord. No Idolatry before the Floud The Sons of God who The great corruption of Religion in the time of Jared Enoch 's Piety and walking with God His translation what The incomparable sanctity of Noah and his strictness in an evil Age. The character of the men of that time His preservation from the Deluge God's Covenant with him Sem or Japhet whether the Elder Brother The confusion of Languages when and why Abraham 's Idolatry and conversion His eminency for Religion noted in the several instances of it God's Covenant with him concerning the Messiah The Piety of Isaac and Jacob. Jacob 's blessing the twelve Tribes and foretelling the Messiah Patriarchs extraordinary under this dispensation Melchisedeck who wherein a type of Christ. Job his Name Country Kindred Quality Religion Sufferings when he lived A reflection upon the religion of the old World and its agreement with Christianity GOD who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past to the Fathers by the Prophets hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son For having created Man for the noblest purposes to love serve and enjoy his Maker he was careful in all Ages by various Revelations of his Will to acquaint him with the notices of his duty and to shew him what was good and what the Lord did require of him till all other Methods proving weak and ineffectual for the recovery and the happiness of humane nature God was pleased to crown all the former dispensations with the Revelation of his Son There is among the Jews an ancient Tradition of the House of Elias that the World should last Six Thousand Years which they thus compute 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Two Thousand Years empty little being recorded of those first Ages of the World Two Thousand Years the Law and Two Thousand the Days of the Messiah A Tradition which if it minister to no other purposes does yet afford us a very convenient division of the several Ages and Periods of the Church which may be considered under a three-fold Oeconomy the Patriarchal Mosaical and Evangelical dispensation A short view of the two former will give us great advantage to survey the later that new and better dispensation which God has made to the World 2. THE Patriarchal Age 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Jews call it the days of emptiness commenced from the beginning of the World and lasted till the delivery of the Law upon Mount Sinai And under this state the Laws which God gave for the exercise of Religion and the Government of his Church were either Natural or Positive Natural Laws are those innate Notions and Principles whether speculative or practical with which every Man is born into the World those common sentiments of Vertue and Religion those Principia justi decori Principles of fit and right that naturally are upon the minds of Men and are obvious to their reason at first sight commanding what is just and honest and forbidding what is evil and uncomely and that not only in the general that what is good is to be embraced and what is evil to be avoided but in the particular instances of duty according to their conformity or repugnancy to natural light being conversant about those things that do not derive their value and authority from any arbitrary constitutions but from the moral and intrinsick nature of the things themselves These Laws as being the results and dictates of right reason are especially as
continuing obedient to their lawful Sovereign and firmly adhering to the worship of the Temple though even here too impiety in some places maintained its ground having taken root in the Reign of Solomon who through his over-great partiality and fondness to his Wives had been betrayed to give too much countenance to Idolatry The extirpation hereof was the design and attempt of all the pious and good Princes of Judah Jehosaphat set himself in good earnest to recover Religion and the state of the Church to its ancient purity and lustre he abolished the Groves and high places and appointed itinerant Priests and Levites to go from City to City to expound the Law and instruct the people in the knowledge of their duty nay he himself held a royal Visitation Going quite through the Land and bringing back the people to the Lord God of their Fathers But under the succeeding Kings Religion again lost its ground and had been quite extinct during the tyranny and usurpation of Athaliah but that good Jehoiada the High-Priest kept it alive by his admirable zeal and industry While he lived his Pupil Joas who owed both his Crown and his life to him promoted the design and purged the Temple though after his Tutors death he apostatized to prophaneness and idolatry Nor indeed was the reformation effectually advanced till the time of Hezekiah who no sooner ascended the Throne but he summoned the Priests and Levites exhorted them to begin at home and first to reform themselves then to cleanse and repair the Temple he resetled the Priests and Levites in their proper places and offices and caused them to offer all sorts of Sacrifices and the Passeover to be universally celebrated with great strictness and solemnity he destroyed the Monuments of Idolatry took away the Altars in Jerusalem and having given commission the people did the like in all parts of the Kingdom breaking the Images cutting down the Groves throwing down the Altars and high places until they had utterly destroyed them all But neither greatness nor piety can exempt any from the common Laws of mortality Hezekiah dies and his son Manasseh succeeds a wicked Prince under whose influence impiety like a land-floud broke in upon Religion and laid all waste before it But his Grandchild Josiah made some amends he gave signal instances of an early piety for in the eighth year of his Reign while he was yet young he began to seek after the God of David his Father and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem he defaced whatever had been abused and prostituted to Idolatry and Superstition throughout the whole Kingdom repaired God's house and ordered its worship according to the prescript of the Mosaick Law a copy whereof they had found in the ruines of the Temple solemnly engaged himself and his people to be true to Religion and the worship of God and caused so great and solemn a Passeover to be held that there was no Passeover like to it kept in Israel from the days of Samuel And more he had done had not an immature death cut him off in the midst both of his days and his pious designs and projects Not many years after God being highly provoked by the prodigious impieties of that Nation delivered it up to the Army of the King of Babylon who demolished the City harassed the Land and carried the people captive unto Babylon And no wonder the Divine patience could hold no longer when all the chief of the Priests and the people transgressed very much after all the abominations of the Heathen and polluted the house of the Lord which he had hallowed in Jerusalem Seventy years they remained under this captivity during which time the Prophet Daniel gave lively and particular accounts of the Messiah that he should come into the World to introduce a Law of everlasting righteousness to die as a sacrifice and expiation for the sins of the people and to put a period to the Levitical sacrifices and oblations And whereas other prophecies had only in general defined the time of the Messiah's coming he particularly determines the period that all this should be at the end of LXX weeks that is at the expiration of CCCCXC years which exactly fell in with the time of our Saviour's appearing in the World The seventy years captivity being run out by the favour of the King of Babylon they were set free and by him permitted and assisted to repair Jerusalem and rebuild the Temple which was accordingly done under the government of Nehemiah and the succeeding Rulers and the Temple finished by Zorobabel and things brought into some tolerable state of order and decency and so continued till the Reign of Antiochus Epiphanes King of Syria by whom the Temple was prophaned and violated and the Jewish Church miserably afflicted and distressed he thrust out Onias the High-Priest and put in his brother Jason a man lost both to Religion and good manners and who by a vast summ of money had purchased the Priest-hood of Antiochus At this time Matthias a Priest and the head of the Asmonaean Family stood up for his Country after whom came Judas Macchabaeus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Josephus truly characters him a man of a generous temper and a valiant mind ready to do or suffer any thing to assert the Liberties and Religion of his Country followed both in his zeal and prosperous success by his two Brothers Jonathan and Simon successively High-Priests and Commanders after him Next him came John surnamed Hyrcanus then Aristobulus Alexander Hyrcanus Aristobulus junior Alexander Antigonus in whose time Herod the Great having by the favour of Antony obtained of the Roman Senate the Sovereignty over the Jewish Nation and being willing that the Priesthood should intirely depend upon his arbitrary disposure abrogated the succession of the Asmonaean Family and put in one Ananel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Josephus calls him an obscure Priest of the line of those who had been Priests in Babylon To him succeeded Aristobulus to him Jesus the son of Phabes to him Simon who being deposed next came Matthias deposed also by Herod next him Joazar who underwent the same fate from Archelaus then Jesus the son of Sie after whom Joazar was again restored to the Chair and under his Pontificate though before his first deposition Christ was born things every day growing worse among them till about seventy years after the wrath of God came upon them to the uttermost and brought the Romans who finally took away their place and Nation 18. BEFORE we go off from this part of our discourse it may not be amiss to take a more particular view of the state of the Jewish Church as it stood at the time of our Saviour's appearing in the World as what may reflect some considerable light upon the History of CHRIST and his Apostles And if we cast our eyes upon it at this time How was the Gold become dim
to their first and more immediate emanations the same in all Men in the World and in all Times and Places 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Jews call them Precepts that are evident among all Nations indeed they are interwoven into Mens nature inserted into the texture and constitution of their minds and do discover themselves as soon as ever they arrive to the free use and exercise of their reason That there are such Laws and Principles naturally planted in Mens breasts is evident from the consent of Mankind and the common experience of the World Whence else comes it to pass that all wicked Men even among the Heathens themselves after the commission of gross sins such as do more sensibly rouze and awaken conscience are filled with horrors and fears of punishment but because they are conscious to themselves of having violated some Law and Rule of Duty Now what Law can this be not the written and revealed Law for this the Heathens never had it must be therefore the inbred Law of Nature that 's born with them and fixed in their minds antecedently to any external revelation For when the Gentiles which have not the Law do by nature by the light and evidence by the force and tendency of their natural notions and dictates the things contained in the Law these having not a Law are a Law unto themselves which shew the work of the Law written in their hearts their conscience also bearing witness and their thoughts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the reasonings of their minds in the mean while 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by turns accusing or else excusing one another that is although they had not a written Law as the Jews had of old and we Christians have at this day yet by the help of their natural Principles they performed the same actions and discharged the same Duties that are contained in and commanded by the written and external Law shewing by their practices that they had a Law some common notions of good and evil written in their hearts And to this their very Consciences bear witness for according as they either observe or break these natural Laws their Consciences do either acquit or condemn them Hence we find God in the very infancy of the World appealing to Cain for the truth of this as a thing sufficiently plain and obvious Why art thou wroth and why is thy countenance fallen if thou doest well shalt thou not be accepted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be lift up able to walk with a pleased and a chearful countenance the great indication of a mind satisfied in the conscience of its duty but if thou doest not well sin lies at the door the punishments of sin will be ready to follow thee and conscience as a Minister of vengeance will perpetually pursue and haunt thee By these Laws Mankind was principally governed in the first Ages of the World there being for near Two Thousand Years no other fixed and standing Rule of Duty than the dictates of this Law of Nature those Principles of Vice and Vertue of Justice and Honesty that are written in the heart of every Man 3. THE Jews very frequently tell us of some particular commands to the number of Seven which they call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Precepts of the Sons of Noah Six whereof were given to Adam and his Children and the Seventh given to Noah which they thus reckon up The first was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 concerning strange worship that they should not give Divine honour to Idols or the Gods of the Heathens answerable to the two first commands of the Decalogue Thou shalt have no other Gods but me thou shalt not make unto thee any graven Image nor the likeness of any thing that is in Heaven above or in the Earth beneath or in the Water under the Earth thou shalt not bow down thy self to them or serve them for c. From the violation of this Law it was that Job one of the Patriarchs that lived under this dispensation solemnly purges himself when speaking concerning the worship of the Celestial Lights the great if not only Idolatry of those early Ages says he If I beheld the Sun when it shined or the Moon walking in her brightness and my heart hath been secretly inticed or my mouth hath kissed my hand this also were an iniquity to be punished by the Judge for I should have denied the God that is above The second 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 concerning blessing or worshipping that they should not blaspheme the Name of God This Law Job also had respect to when he was careful to sanctifie his Children and to propitiate the Divine Majesty for them every Morning for it may be said he that my Sons have sinned and cursed God in their hearts The third was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 concerning the shedding of bloud forbidding Man-slaughter a Law expresly renewed to Noah after the Floud and which possibly Job aimed at when he vindicates himself that he had not rejoyced at the destruction of him that hated him or lift up himself when evil found him Nor was all effusion of humane bloud forbidden by this Law capital punishments being in some cases necessary for the preservation of humane Society but only that no Man should shed the bloud of an innocent Person or pursue a private revenge without the warrant of publick Authority The fourth was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 concerning the disclosing of uncleanness against filthiness and adultery unlawful marriages and incestuous mixtures If mine heart says Job in his Apology hath been deceived by a Woman or if I have laid wait at my neighbour's door then let my Wife grind c. for this is an heinous crime yea it is an iniquity to be punished by the Judges The fifth was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 concerning theft and rapine the invading another Man's right and property the violation of bargains and compacts the falsifying a Man's word or promise the deceiving of another by fraud lying or any evil arts From all which Job justifies himself that he had not walked with vanity nor had his foot hasted to deceit that his step had not turned out of the way nor his heart walked after his eyes nor any blot cleaved to his hands And elsewhere he bewails it as the great iniquity of the Times that there were some that removed the Land-marks that violently took away the Flocks and fed thereof that drove away the Asse of the Fatherless and took the Widows Oxe for a pledge that turned the needy out of the way and made the poor of the Earth hide themselves together c. The sixth was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 concerning judgments or the administration of Justice that Judges and Magistrates should be appointed in every Place for the Order and Government of Civil Societies the determination of Causes and executing of Justice between Man and Man And that such there then were seems evident
the World Nay it was re-established by the Apostles in the infancy of Christianity and observed by the Primitive Christians for several Ages as we have elsewhere observed 5. THE other Precept was concerning Circumcision given to Abraham at the time of God's entring into Covenant with him God said unto Abraham Thou shalt keep my Covenant c. This is my Covenant which ye shall keep between me and you and thy Seed after thee every Man-child among you shall be circumcised and ye shall circumcise the flesh of your fore-skin and it shall be a token of the Covenant betwixt me and you God had now made a Covenant with Abraham to take his Posterity for his peculiar People and that out of them should arise the promised Messiah and as all federal compacts have some solemn and external rites of ratification so God was pleased to add Circumcision as the sign and seal of this Covenant partly as it had a peculiar fitness in it to denote the promised Seed partly that it might be a discriminating badge of Abraham's Children that part whom God had especially chosen out of the rest of Mankind from all other People On Abraham's part it was a sufficient argument of his hearty compliance with the terms of this Covenant that he would so chearfully submit to so unpleasing and difficult a sign as was imposed upon him For Circumcision could not but be both painful and dangerous in one of his Years as it was afterwards to be to all new-born Infants whence Zipporah complained of Moses commanding her to circumcise her Son that he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an husband of blouds a cruel and inhumane Husband And this the Jews tell us was the reason why circumcision was omitted during their Forty Years Journey in the Wilderness it was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by reason of the trouble and inconvenience of the way God mercifully dispensing with the want of it lest it should hinder their travelling the soreness and weakness of the circumcised Person not comporting with hard and continual Journeys It was to be administred the eight day not sooner the tenderness of the Infant not well till then complying with it besides that the Mother of a Male-child was reckoned legally impure till the seventh Day not later probably because the longer it was deferred the more unwilling would Parents be to put their Children to pain of which they would every Day become more sensible not to say the satisfaction it would be to them to see their Children solemnly entred into Covenant Circumcision was afterwards incorporated into the Body of the Jewish Law and entertained with a mighty Veneration as their great and standing Priviledge relied on as the main Basis and Foundation of their confidence and hopes of acceptance with Heaven and accounted in a manner equivalent to all the other Rites of the Mosaick Law 6. BUT besides these two we find other positive Precepts which though not so clearly expressed are yet sufficiently intimated to us Thus there seems to have been a Law that none of the Holy Line none of the Posterity of Seth should marry with Infidels or those corrupt and idolatrous Nations which God had rejected as appears in that it 's charged as a great part of the sin of the old World that the Sons of God matched with the Daughters of Men as also from the great care which Abraham took that his Son Isaac should not take a Wife of the Daughters of the Canaanites among whom he dwelt There was also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jus Leviratus whereby the next Brother to him who died without Issue was obliged to marry the Widow of the deceased and to raise up seed unto his Brother the contempt whereof cost Onan his Life together with many more particular Laws which the story of those Times might suggest to us But what is of most use and importance to us is to observe what Laws God gave for the administration of his Worship which will be best known by considering what worship generally prevailed in those early Times wherein we shall especially remark the nature of their publick Worship the Places where the Times when and the Persons by whom it was administred 7. IT cannot be doubted but that the Holy Patriarchs of those days were careful to instruct their Children and all that were under their charge their Families being then very vast and numerous in the Duties of Religion to explain and improve the natural Laws written upon their minds and acquaint them with those Divine Traditions and positive Revelations which they themselves had received from God this being part of that great character which God gave of Abraham I know him that he will command his Children and his Houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment To this they joyned Prayer and Invocation than which no duty is more natural and necessary more natural because it fitly expresses that great reverence and veneration which we have for the Divine Majesty and that propensity that is in Mankind to make known their wants none more necessary because our whole dependance being upon the continuance and constant returns of the Divine power and goodness 't is most reasonable that we should make our Daily addresses to him in whom we live move and have our being Nor were they wanting in returns of praise and solemn celebrations of the goodness of Heaven both by entertaining high and venerable thoughts of God and by actions suitable to those honourable sentiments which they had of him In these acts of worship they were careful to use gestures of the greatest reverence and submission which commonly was prostration Abraham bowed himself towards the ground and when God sent the Israelites the happy news of their deliverance out of Egypt they bowed their Heads and worshipped A posture which hath ever been the usual mode of adoration in those Eastern Countries unto this day But the greatest instance of the Publick Worship of those times was Sacrifices a very early piece of Devotion in all probability taking its rise from Adam's fall They were either Eucharistical expressions of thankfulness for blessings received or expiatory offered for the remission of sin Whether these Sacrifices were first taken up at Mens arbitrary pleasure or positively instituted and commanded by God might admit of a very large enquiry But to me the case seems plainly this That as to Eucharistical Sacrifices such as first-fruits and the like oblations Mens own reason might suggest and perswade them that it was fit to present them as the most natural significations of a thankful mind And thus far there might be Sacrifices in the state of Innocence for Man being created under such excellent circumstances as he was in Paradise could not but know that he owed to God all possible gratitude and subjection obedience he owed him as his Supreme Lord and Master gratitude as his great
desist from their vain and ambitious design as not being able to understand and converse with one another To Peleg succeeded his son Rehu to Rehu Serug to him Nachor to Nachor Terah who dwelt in Ur of the Chaldaeans where conversing with those Idolatrous Nations he laps'd himself into the most gross Idolatry So apt are men to follow a multitude to do evil so fatally mischievous is ill company and a bad example But the best way to avoid the plague is to remove out of the house of infection Away goes Terah to Haran where by repentance he is said to have recovered himself out of the snare of the Devil 17. ABRAHAM the second son of Terah succeeds in the Patriarchal Line In his minority he was educated in the Idolatries of his Father's house who they say was a maker of Statues and Images And the Jews tell us many pleasant stories of Abraham's going into the shop in the absence of his Father his breaking the Images and jeering those that came to buy or worship them of his Father's carrying him to Nimrod to be punished his witty answers and miraculous escapes But God who had designed him for higher and nobler purposes called him at length out of his Father's house fully discovered himself to him and by many solemn promises and federal compacts peculiarly engaged him to himself He was a man intirely devoted to the honour of God and had consecrated all his services to the interests of Religion scarce any duty either towards God or men for which he is not eminent upon record Towards God how great was his zeal and care to promote his worship erecting Altars almost in every place whereon he publickly offered his prayers and sacrifice His love to God wholly swallowed up the love and regard that he had to his dearest interests witness his intire resignation of himself his chearful renouncing all the concernments of his Estate and Family and especially his readiness to sacrifice his only son the son of his old age and which is above all the son of the promise when God by way of trial required it of him How vigorous and triumphant was his faith especially in the great promise of a son which he firmly embraced against all humane probabilities to the contrary Against hope he believed in hope and being strong in faith gave glory to God How hearty was his dependence upon the Divine Providence when called to leave his Father's house and to go into a strange Country how chearfully did he obey and go out though he knew not whither he went How unconquerable was his patience how even the composure of his mind in all conditions in fifteen several journeys that he undertook and ten difficult temptations which he underwent he never betrayed the least murmuring or hard thought of God Towards others he shewed the greatest tenderness and respect the most meek and unpassionate temper a mind inflamed with a desire of peace and concord Admirable his justice and equity in all his dealings his great hospitality and bounty towards strangers and for that end say the Jews he got him an house near the entring into Haran that he might entertain strangers as they went in or came out of the City at his own table as indeed he seems to have had that most excellent and Divine temper of mind an universal love and charity towards all men But his greatest charity appeared in the care that he took of the Souls of men Maimonides tells us that he kept a publick School of institution whither he gathered men together and instructed them in that truth which he himself had embraced and he gives us an account by what methods of reasoning and information he used to convince and perswade them But whatever he did towards others we are sure he did it towards those that were under his own charge He had a numerous family and a vast retinue and he was as careful to inform them in the knowledge of the true God and to instruct them in all the duties of Religion 'T is the character which God himself gave of him I know Abraham that he will command his children and his houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment And so he did his house being a School of piety wherein Religion was both taught and practised many reclaimed from the errors and idolatries of the times and all his domesticks and dependants solemnly dedicated to God by Circumcision Therefore when 't is said that he brought with him all the Souls which they had gotten in Haran the Paraphrase of Onkelos renders it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Souls which they had subjected to the Law in Haran Jonathans Targum and much at the same rate that of Jerusalem 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Souls which they had made proselytes in Haran or as Solomon Jarchi expresses it a little more after the Hebrew mode the Souls which they had gathered 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 under the wings of the Divine Majesty and he further adds that Abraham proselyted the men and Sarah the women So when elsewhere we read of his trained servants some of the Jewish Masters expound it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those that were initiated and trained up in the knowledge of the Law Such being the temper of this holy man God was pleased frequently to converse with him and to impart his mind to him acquainting him with the secret counsels and purposes of his Providence whence he is stiled the friend of God But that which shewed him to be most dear to Heaven was the Covenant which God solemnly made with him wherein binding Abraham and his seed to a sincere and universal obedience he obliged himself to become their God to be his shield and his exceeding great reward to take his posterity for his peculiar people to encrease their number and to inlarge their power to settle them in a rich and a pleasant Country a type of that Heavenly and better Country that is above and which was the crown of all that in his seed all the Nations of the Earth should be blessed that is the promised Messiah should proceed out of his loins who should be a common blessing to mankind in whom both Jew and Gentile should be justified and saved and he by that means become spiritually the Father of many Nations This Covenant was ratified and ensured on God's part by a solemn oath For when God made promise to Abraham because he could swear by no greater he sware by himself saying Surely blessing I will bless thee and multiplying I will multiply thee On Abraham's part it was sealed with the Sacrament of Circumcision which God instituted as a peculiar federal rite to distinguish Abraham's posterity from all other people Abraham died in the CLXXV year of his Age and was buried in the Sepulchre which himself had purchased of the sons of Heth. Contemporary with Abraham was his
in their story as well as we do of Melchisedeck others again refer him to the time of the Law given at Mount Sinai and the Israelites travels in the Wilderness others to the times of the Judges after the settlement of the Israelites in the Land of Promise nay some to the reign of David and Solomon and I know not whether the Reader will not smile at the fancy of the Turkish Chronologists who make Job Major-domo to Solomon as they make Alexander the Great the General of his Army Others go further and place him among those that were carried away in the Babylonish Captivity yea in the time of Ahasuerus and make his fair Daughters to be of the number of those beautiful young Virgins that were sought-for for the King Follies that need no confutation 'T is certain that he was elder than Moses his Kindred and Family his way of sacrificing the Idolatry rise in his time evidently placing him before that Age besides that there are not the least foot-steps in all his Book of any of the great things done for the Israelites deliverance which we can hardly suppose should have been omitted being examples so fresh in memory and so apposite to the design of that Book Most probable therefore it is that he lived about the time of the Israelitish Captivity in Egypt though whether as some Jews will have it born that very Year that Jacob came down into Egypt and dying that Year that they went out of Egypt I dare not peremptorily affirm And this no question is the reason why we find nothing concerning him in the Writings of Moses the History of those Times being crowded up into a very little room little being recorded even of the Israelites themselves for near Two Hundred Years more than in general that they were heavily oppressed under the Egyptian Yoke More concerning this great and good Man and the things relating to him if the Reader desire to know he may among others consult the elaborate exercitations of the younger Spanhemius in his Historia Jobi where the largest curiosity may find enough to satisfie it 22. AND now for a Conclusion to this Oeconomy if we reflect a little upon the state of things under this period of the World we shall find that the Religion of those early Ages was plain and simple unforced and natural and highly agreeable to the common dictates and notions of Mens minds They were not educated under any foreign Institutions nor conducted by a Body of numerous Laws and written Constitutions but were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Philo says of them tutor'd and instructed by the dictates of their own minds and the Principles of that Law that was written in their hearts following the order of Nature and right Reason as the safest and most ancient Rule By which means as one of the Ancients observes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they maintained a free and uninterrupted course of Religion conducting their lives according to the rules of Nature so that having purged their minds from lust and passion and attained to the true knowledge of God they had no need of external and written Laws Their Creed was short and perspicuous their notions of God great and venerable their devotion and piety real and substantial their worship grave and serious and such as became the grandeur and majesty of the Divine being their Rites and Ceremonies few and proper their obedience prompt and sincere and indeed the whole conduct of their conversation discovering it self in the most essential and important duties of the humane life According to this standard it was that our blessed Saviour mainly designed to reform Religion in his most excellent Institutions to retrieve the piety and purity the innocency and simplicity of those first and more uncorrupted Ages of the World to improve the Laws of Nature and to reduce Mankind from ritual observances to natural and moral duties as the most vital and essential parts of Religion and was therefore pleased to charge Christianity with no more than two positive Institutions Baptism and the Lord's Supper that Men might learn that the main of Religion lies not in such things as these Hence Eusebius undertakes at large to prove the faith and manners of the Holy Patriarchs who lived before the times of Moses and the belief and practice of Christians to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one and the same Which he does not only assert and make good in general but deduce from particular instances the examples of Enoch Noah Abraham Melchisedeck Job c. whom he expresly proves to have believed and lived 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 altogether after the manner of Christians Nay that they had the name also as well as the thing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as he shews from that place which he proves to be meant of Abraham Isaac and Jacob 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Touch not my Christians mine Anointed and do my Prophets no harm And in short that as they had the same common Religion so they had the common blessing and reward SECT II. Of the MOSAICAL Dispensation Moses the Minister of this Oeconomy His miraculous preservation His learned and noble education The Divine temper of his mind His conducting the Israelites out of Egypt Their arrival at Mount Sinai The Law given and how Moral Laws the Decalogue whether a perfect Compendium of the Moral Law The Ceremonial Laws what Reduced to their proper Heads Such as concerned the matter of their Worship Sacrifices and the several kinds of them Circumcision The Passover and its typical relation The place of Publick Worship The Tabernacle and Temple and the several parts of them and their typical aspects considered Their stated times and feasts weekly monthly annual The Sabbatical Year The Year of Jubilee Laws concerning the Persons ministring Priests Levites the High-Priest how a type of Christ. The Design of the Ceremonial Law and its abolition The Judicial Laws what The Mosaick Law how divided by the Jews into affirmative and negative Precepts and why The several ways of Divine revelation Urim and Thummim what and the manner of its giving Answers Bath-Col Whether any such way of revelation among the Jews Revelation by Dreams By Visions The Revelation of the Holy Spirit what Moses his way of Prophecy wherein exceeding the rest The pacate way of the spirit of prophecy This spirit when it ceased in the Jewish Church The state of the Church under this Dispensation briefly noted From the giving of the Law till Samuel From Samuel till Solomon It s condition under the succeeding Kings till the Captivity From thence till the coming of Christ. The state of the Jewish Church in the time of Christ more particularly considered The prophanations of the Temple The Corruption of their Worship The abuse of the Priesthood The Depravation of the Law by false glosses Their Oral and unwritten Law It s original and succession according to the mind of the Jews Their unreasonable and
a mere pretender to Divine revelation but that he really had an immediate commission from Heaven God was pleased to furnish him with extraordinary Credentials and to seal his Commission with a power of working Miracles beyond all the Arts of Magick and those tricks for which the Egyptian Sorcerers were so famous in the World But Pharaoh unwilling to part with such useful Vassals and having oppressed them beyond possibility of reconcilement would not hearken to the proposal but sometimes downright rejected it otherwhiles sought by subtil and plausible pretences to evade and shift it off till by many astonishing Miracles and severe Judgments God extorted at length a grant from him Under the conduct of Moses they set forwards after at least two hundred years servitude under the Egyptian yoke and though Pharaoh sensible of his error with a great Army pursued them either to cut them off or bring them back God made way for them through the midst of the Sea the waters becoming like a wall of Brass on each side of them till being all passed to the other shore those invisible cords which had hitherto tied up that liquid Element bursting in sunder the waters returned and overwhelmed their enemies that pursued them Thus God by the same stroke can protect his friends and punish his enemies Nor did the Divine Providence here take its leave of them but became their constant guard and defence in all their journeys waiting upon them through their several stations in the wilderness the most memorable whereof was that at Mount Sinai in Arabia The place where God delivered them the pattern in the Mount according to which the form both of their Church and State was to be framed and modelled In order hereunto Moses is called up into the Mount where by Fasting and Prayer he conversed with Heaven and received the body of their Laws Three days the people were by a pious and devout care to sanctifie and prepare themselves for the promulgation of the Law they might not come near their Wives were commanded to wash their clothes as an embleme and representation of that cleansing of the heart and that inward purity of mind wherewith they were to entertain the Divine will On the third day in the morning God descended from Heaven with great appearances of Majesty and terror with thunders and lightnings with black clouds and tempests with shouts and the loud noise of a trumpet which trumpet say the Jews was made of the horn of that Ram that was offered in the room of Isaac with fire and smoke on the top of the Mount ascending up like the smoke of a Furnace the Mountain it self greatly quaking the people trembling nay so terrible was the sight that Moses who had so frequently so familiarly conversed with God said I exceedingly fear and quake All which pompous trains of terror and magnificence God made use of at this time to excite the more solemn attention to his Laws and to beget a greater reverence and veneration for them in the minds of the people and to let them see how able he was to call them to account and by the severest penalties to vindicate the violation of his Law 4. THE Code and Digest of those Laws which God now gave to the Jews as the terms of that National Covenant that he made with them consisted of three sorts of Precepts Moral Ecclesiastical and Political which the Jews will have intimated by those three words that so frequently occur in the writings of Moses Laws Statutes and Judgments By 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Laws they understand the Moral Law the notices of good and evil naturally implanted in mens minds By 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Statutes Ceremonial Precepts instituted by God with peculiar reference to his Church By 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Judgments Political Laws concerning Justice and Equity the order of humane society and the prudent and peaceable managery of the Commonwealth The Moral Laws inserted into this Code are those contained in the Decalogue 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as they are called the ten words that were written upon two Tables of Stone These were nothing else but a summary Comprehension of the great Laws of Nature engraven at first upon the minds of all men in the World the most material part whereof was now consigned to writing and incorporated into the body of the Jewish Law I know the Decalogue is generally taken to be a complete System of all natural Laws But whoever impartially considers the matter will find that there are many instances of duty so far from being commanded in it that they are not reducible to any part of it unless hook'd in by subtilties of wit and drawn thither by forc'd and unnatural inferences What provision except in one case or two do any of those Commandments make against neglects of duty Where do they oblige us to do good to others to love assist relieve our enemies Gratitude and thankfulness to benefactors is one of the prime and essential Laws of Nature and yet no where that I know of unless we will have it implied in the Preface to the Law commanded or intimated in the Decalogue With many other cases which 'tis naturally evident are our duty whereof no footsteps are to be seen in this Compendium unless hunted out by nice and sagacious reasonings and made out by a long train of consequences never originally intended in the Commandment and which not one in a thousand are capable of deducing from it It is probable therefore that God reduc'd only so many of the Laws of Nature into writing as were proper to the present state and capacities of that people to whom they were given super-adding some and explaining others by the Preaching and Ministery of the Prophets who in their several Ages endeavoured to bring men out of the Shades and Thickets into clear light and Noon-day by clearing up mens obligations to those natural and essential duties in the practice whereof humane nature was to be advanced unto its just accomplishment and perfection Hence it was that our Lord who came not to destroy the Law but to fulfil and perfect it has explained the obligations of the natural Law more fully and clearly more plainly and intelligibly rendred our duty more fixed and certain and extended many instances of obedience to higher measures to a greater exactness and perfection than ever they were understood to have before Thus he commands a free and universal charity not only that we love our friends and relations but that we love our enemies bless them that curse us do good to them that hate us and pray for them that despitefully use and persecute us He hath forbidden malice and revenge with more plainness and smartness obliged us not only to live according to the measures of sobriety but extended it to self-denial and taking up the Cross and laying down our lives whenever the honour of God and the interest of Religion calls for
as a little to ruffle their imagination yet never so as to discompose their reason or hinder them from a clear perception of the notices conveyed upon their minds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Epiphanius the Prophet had his Oracles dictated by the Holy Spirit which he delivered strenuously and with the most firm and unshaken consistency of his rational powers and afterwards 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the Prophets were often in a bodily ecstasie but never in an ecstasie of mind their understandings never being rendred useless and unserviceable to them Indeed it was absolutely necessary that the Prophet should have a full satisfaction of mind concerning the truth and Divinity of his message for how else should they perswade others that the thing was from God if they were not first sufficiently assured themselves and therefore even in those methods that were most liable to doubts and questions such as communications by dreams we cannot think but that the same Spirit that moved and impressed the thing upon them did also by some secret and inward operations settle their minds in the firmest belief and perswasion of what was revealed and suggested to them All these ways of immediate revelation ceased some hundreds of years before the final period of the Jewish Church A thing confessed not only by Christians but by Jews themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There was no Prophet in the second Temple indeed they universally acknowledge that there were five things wanting in the second Temple built after their return from the Babylonish Captivity which had been in that of Solomon viz. the Ark of the Covenant the fire from Heaven that lay upon the Altar the Schekinah or presence of the Divine Majesty the Urim and Thummim and the spirit of Prophecy which ceased as they tell us about the second year of Darius to be sure at the death of Malachy the last of that order after whom there arose no Prophet in Israel whom therefore the Jews call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the seal of the Prophets Indeed it is no wonder that Prophecy should cease at that time if we consider that one of the prime ends of it did then cease which was to be a seal and an assurance of the Divine inspiration of the holy Volumes now the Canon of the Old Testament being consigned and completed by Ezra with the assistance of Malachy and some of the last Prophets God did not think good any longer to continue this Divine and Miraculous gift among them But especially if we consider the great degeneracy into which that Church was falling their horrid and crying sins having made God resolve to reject them the departure of the Prophetick spirit shewed that God had written them a bill of divorce and would utterly cast them off that by this means they might be awakened to a more lively expectation of that new state of things which the Messiah was coming to establish in the World wherein the Prophetick spirit should revive and be again restored to the Church which accordingly came to pass as we shall elsewhere observe 16. THE third thing propounded was to consider the state of Religion and the Church under the successive periods of this Oeconomy And here we shall only make some general remarks a particular survey of those matters not consisting with the design of this discourse Ecclesiastical Constitutions being made in the Wilderness and the place for publick worship fram'd and erected no sooner did they come into the promised Land but the Tabernacle was set down at Gilgal where if the Jewish Chronology say true it continued fourteen years till they had subdued and divided the Land Then fixed at Shiloh and the Priests and Levites had Cities and Territories assigned to them where it is not to be doubted but there were Synagogues or places equivalent for prayer and the ordinary solemnities of Religion and Courts for the decision of Ecclesiastical causes Prosperity and a plentiful Country had greatly contributed to the depravation of mens manners and the corruption of Religion till the times of Samuel the great Reformer of that Church who erected Colledges and instituted Schools of the Prophets reduced the Societies of the Levites to their Primitive order and purity forced the Priests to do their duty diligently to minister in the affairs of God's worship and carefully to teach and instruct the people A piece of reformation no more than necessary For the word of the Lord was precious in those days there was no open vision CCCLXIX years say the Jews the Tabernacle abode at Shiloh from whence it was translated to Nob a City in the Tribe of Benjamin probably about the time that the Ark was taken thence after thirteen years to Gibeon where it remained fifty years and lastly by Solomon to Jerusalem The Ark being taken out to carry along with them for their more prosperous success in their War against the Philistines was ever after exposed to an ambulatory and unsetled course For being taken captive by the Philistines it was by them kept prisoner seven months thence removed to Bethshemesh and thence to Kiriath-jearim where it remained in the house of Abinadab twenty years thence solemnly fetched by David and after three months rest by the way in the house of Obed-Edom brought triumphantly to Jerusalem and placed under the covert of a Tent which he had purposely erected for it David being setled in the Throne like a pious Prince took especial care of the affairs of Religion he fixed the High-Priest and his second augmented the courses of the Priests from eight to four and twenty appointed the Levites and Singers and their several turns and times of waiting assigned them their proper duties and ministeries setled the Nethinim or Porters the posterity of the Gibeonites made Treasurers of the revenues belonging to holy uses and of the vast summs contributed towards the building of a Temple as a more solemn and stately place for Divine worship which he was fully resolved to have erected but that God commanded it to be reserved for the peaceable and prosperous Reign of Solomon who succeeding in his Father's Throne accomplished it building so stately and magnificent a Temple that it became one of the greatest wonders of the World Under his son Rehoboam hapned the fatal division of the Kingdom when ten parts of twelve were rent off at once and brought under the Empire of Jeroboam who knew no better way to secure his new-gotten Soveraignty than to take off the people from hankering after the Temple and the worship at Jerusalem and therefore out of a cursed policy erected two Golden Calves at Dan and Bethel perswading the people there to pay their publick adorations appointing Chaplains like himself Priests of the lowest of the people and from this time Religion began visibly to ebbe and decline in that Kingdom and Idolatry to get ground amongst them 17. THE two Tribes of Judah and Benjamin were loyal both to God and their Prince
But our Lord entering in with the commanding efficacy of two words restor'd her at once both to life and perfect health 5. OUR Lord after this preached many Sermons and wrought many Miracles amongst which none more remarkable than his feeding a multitude of five thousand men besides women and children but with five Loaves and two Fishes of which nevertheless twelve Baskets of fragments were taken up Which being done and the multitude dismissed he commanded the Apostles to take Ship it being now near night and to cross over to Capernaum whilest he himself as his manner was retired to a neighbouring mountain to dispose himself to Prayer and Contemplation The Apostles were scarce got into the middle of the Sea when on a sudden a violent Storm and Tempest began to arise whereby they were brought into present danger of their lives Our Saviour who knew how the case stood with them and how much they laboured under infinite pains and fears having himself caused this Tempest for the greater trial of their Faith a little before morning for so long they remained in this imminent danger immediately conveyed himself upon the Sea where the Waves received him being proud to carry their Master He who refused to gratifie the Devil when tempting him to throw himself down from the Pinnacle of the Temple did here commit himself to a boisterous and instable Element and that in a violent Storm walking upon the water as if it had been dry ground But that infinite power that made and supports the World as it gave rules to all particular beings so can when it pleaseth countermand the Laws of their Creation and make them act contrary to their natural inclinations If God say the word the Sun will stand still in the middle of the Heavens if Go back 't will retrocede as upon the Dial of Ahaz if he command it the Heavens will become as Brass and the Earth as Iron and that for three years and an half together as in the case of Elijah's prayer if he say to the Sea Divide 't will run upon heaps and become on both sides as firm as a wall of Marble Nothing can be more natural than for the fire to burn and yet at God's command it will forget its nature and become a screen and a fence to the three Children in the Babylonian Furnace What heavier than Iron or more natural than for gravity to tend downwards and yet when God will have it Iron shall float like Cork on the top of the water The proud and raging Sea that naturally refuses to bear the bodies of men while alive became here as firm as Brass when commanded to wait upon and do homage to the God of Nature Our Lord walking towards the Ship as if he had an intention to pass by it he was espied by them who presently thought it to be the Apparition of a Spirit Hereupon they were seiz'd with great terror and consternation and their fears in all likelihood heightned by the vulgar opinion that they are evil Spirits that chuse rather to appear in the night than by day While they were in this agony our Lord taking compassion on them calls to them and bids them not be afraid for that it was no other than he himself Peter the eagerness of whose temper carried him forward to all bold and resolute undertakings entreated our Lord that if it was he he might have leave to come upon the water to him Having received his orders he went out of the Ship and walked upon the Sea to meet his Master But when he found the wind to bear hard against him and the waves to rise round about him whereby probably the sight of Christ was intercepted he began to be afraid and the higher his fears arose the lower his Faith began to sink and together with that his body to sink under water whereupon in a passionate fright he cried out to our Lord to help him who reaching out his arm took him by the hand and set him again upon the top of the water with this gentle reproof O thou of little Faith wherefore didst thou doubt It being the weakness of our Faith that makes the influences of the Divine power and goodness to have no better effect upon us Being come to the Ship they took them in where our Lord no sooner arrived but the winds and waves observing their duty to their Sovereign Lord and having done the errand which they came upon mannerly departed and vanished away and the Ship in an instant was at the shore All that were in the Ship being strangely astonished at this Miracle and fully convinced of the Divinity of his person came and did homage to him with this confession Of a truth thou art the Son of God After which they went ashore and landed in the Country of Genezareth and there more fully acknowledged him before all the people 6. THE next day great multitudes flocking after him he entred into a Synagogue at Capernaum and taking occasion from the late Miracle of the loaves which he had wrought amongst them he began to discourse concerning himself as the true Manna and the Bread that came down from Heaven largely opening to them many of the more sublime and Spiritual mysteries and the necessary and important duties of the Gospel Hereupon a great part of his Auditory who had hitherto followed him finding their understandings gravelled with these difficult and uncommon Notions and that the duties he required were likely to grate hard upon them and perceiving now that he was not the Messiah they took him for whose Kingdom should consist in an external Grandeur and plenty but was to be managed and transacted in a more inward and Spiritual way hereupon fairly left him in open field and henceforth quite turned their backs upon him Whereupon our Lord turning about to his Apostles asked them whether they also would go away from him Peter spokes-man generally for all the rest answered whither should they go to mend and better their condition should they return back to Moses Alas he laid a yoke upon them which neither they nor their Fathers were able to bear Should they go to the Scribes and Pharisees they would feed them with Stones instead of Bread obtrude humane Traditions upon them for Divine dictates and Commands Should they betake themselves to the Philosophers amongst the Gentiles they were miserably blind and short-sighted in their Notions of things and their sentiments and opinions not only different from but contrary to one another No 't was he only had the words of Eternal life whose doctrine could instruct them in the plain way to Heaven that they had fully assented to what both John and he had said concerning himself that they were fully perswaded both from the efficacy of his Sermons which they heard and the powerful conviction of his Miracles which they had seen that he was the Son of the living God the true Messiah and Saviour of the World
the body commanded her to arise and lifting her up by the hand presented her in perfect health to her friends and those that were about her by which he confirmed many and converted more to the Faith After which he staid some considerable time at Joppa lodging in the house of Simon a Tanner 3. WHILE he abode in this City retiring one morning to the house-top to pray as the Jews frequently did having thence a free and open prospect towards Jerusalem and the Temple it being now near Noon which was the conclusion of one of their stated times of Prayer he found himself hungry and called for meat but while it was preparing he himself fell into a Trance wherein was presented to him a large sheet let down from Heaven containing all sorts of Creatures clean and unclean a voice at the same time calling to him that he should rise kill freely and indifferently feed upon them Peter tenacious as yet of the Rites and Institutions of the Mosaick Law rejoyn'd That he could not do it having never eaten any thing that was common or unclean To which the voice replied That what God had cleansed he should not account or call common Which being done thrice the Vessel was again taken up into Heaven and the Vision presently disappeared By this symbolick representment though Peter at present knew not what to make of it God was teaching him a new lesson and preparing him to go upon an Errand and Embassy which the Spirit at the same time expresly commanded him to undertake While he was in this doubtful posture of mind three messengers knock'd at the door enquiring for him from whom he received this account That Cornelius a Roman Captain of a Band of Italian Souldiers at Caesarea a person of great Piety and Religion being a Proselyte of the Gate who though not observing an exact conformity to the Rites of the Mosaick Law did yet maintain some general correspondence with it and lived under the obligation of the seven Precepts of the Sons of Noah had by an immediate command from God sent for him The next day Peter accompanied with some of the Brethren went along with them and the day after they came to Caesarea Against whose arrival Cornelius had summoned his friends and kindred to his house Peter arriving Cornelius who was affected with a mighty reverence for so great a Person fell at his Feet and worshipped him a way of address frequent in those Eastern Countries towards Princes and great men but by the Greeks and Romans appropriated as a peculiar honour to the Gods Peter rejecting the honour as due only to God entred into the house where he first made his Apology to the Company that though they could not but know that it was not lawful for a Jew to converse in the duties of Religion with those of another Nation yet that now God had taught him another lesson And then proceeded particularly to enquire the reason of Cornelius his sending for him Whereupon Cornelius told him That four days since being conversant in the duties of Fasting and Prayer an Angel had appeared to him and told him that his Prayers and Alms were come up for a memorial before God that he should send to Joppa for one Simon Peter who lodged in a Tanner's house by the Sea side who should further make known his mind to him that accordingly he had sent and being now come they were there met to hear what he had to say to them Where we see that though God sent an Angel to Cornelius to acquaint him with his will yet the Angel was only to direct him to the Apostle for instruction in the Faith which no doubt was done partly that God might put the greater honour upon an institution that was likely to meet with contempt and scorn enough from the World partly to let us see that we are not to expect extraordinary and miraculous ways of teaching and information where God affords ordinary means 4. HEREUPON Peter began this discourse that by comparing things it was now plain and evident that the partition-wall was broken down that God had no longer a particular kindness for Nations or Persons that it was not the Nation but the Religion not the outward quality of the man but the inward temper of the mind that recommends men to God that the devout and the pious the righteous and the good man where-ever he be is equally dear to Heaven that God has as much respect for a just and a virtuous person in the Wilds of Scythia as upon Mount Sion that the reconciling and making peace between God and Man by Jesus Christ was the Doctrine published by the Prophets of old and of late since the times of John preached through Galilee and Judaea viz. that God had anointed and consecrated Jesus of Nazareth with Divine Powers and Graces in the exercise whereof he constantly went about to do good to men that they had seen all he had done amongst the Jews whom though they had slain and crucified yet that God had raised him again the third day and had openly show'd him to his Apostles and followers whom he had chosen to be his peculiar witnesses and whom to that end he had admitted to eat and drink with him after his Resurrection commanding them to preach the Gospel to Mankind and to testifie that he was the person whom God had ordained to be the great Judge of the World that all the Prophets with one consent bore witness of him that this Jesus is he in whose Name whosoever believes should certainly receive remission of sins While Peter was thus preaching to them the Holy Ghost fell upon a great part of his Auditory enabling them to speak several Languages and therein to magnifie the giver of them Whereat the Jews who came along with Peter did sufficiently wonder to see that the gifts of the Holy Ghost should be poured upon the Gentiles Peter seeing this told the Company that he knew no reason why these persons should not be baptized having received the Holy Ghost as well as they and accordingly commanded them to be baptized For whose further confirmation he staid some time longer with them This act of Peter's made a great noise among the Apostles and Brethren at Jerusalem who being lately converted from their Judaism were as yet zealous for the Religion of their Country and therefore severely charged Peter at his return for his too familiar conversing with the Gentiles See here the powerful prejudice of education The Jews had for several Ages conceived a radicated and inveterate prejudice against the Gentiles Indeed the Law of Moses commanded them to be peculiarly kind to their own Nation and the Rites and Institutions of their Religion and the peculiar form of their Commonwealth made them different from the fashion of other Countries a separation which in after-times they drew into a narrower compass Besides they were mightily puffed up with their external priviledges that
thereupon made them understand 't was Judas whom he designed by the Traitor This favour our Apostle endeavoured in some measure to answer by returns of particular kindness and constancy to our Saviour staying with him when the rest deserted him Indeed upon our Lord's first apprehension he fled after the other Apostles it not being without some probabilities of reason that the Ancients conceive him to have been that young man that followed after Christ having a linnen cloath cast about his naked body whom when the Officers laid hold upon he left the linnen cloath and fled naked from them This in all likelihood was that garment that he had cast about him at Supper for they had peculiar Vestments for that purpose and being extremely affected with the Treason and our Lord 's approaching Passion had forgot to put on his other garments but followed him into the Garden in the same habit wherewith he arose from the Table it being then night and so less liable to be taken notice of either by himself or others But though he fled at present to avoid that sudden violence that was offered to him yet he soon recovered himself and returned back to seek his Master confidently entred into the High-Priests Hall and followed our Lord through the several passages of his Trial and at last waited upon him and for any thing we know was the only Apostle that did so at his Execution owning him as well as being own'd by him in the midst of arms and guards and in the thickest crowds of his most inveterate enemies Here it was that our Lord by his last Will and Testament made upon the Cross appointed him Guardian of his own Mother the Blessed Virgin When he saw his Mother and the Disciple standing by whom he loved he said unto his Mother Woman behold thy Son see here is one that shall supply my place and be to thee instead of a Son to love and honour thee to provide and take care for thee and to the Disciple he said Behold thy Mother Her whom thou shalt henceforth deal with treat and observe with that duty and honourable regard which the relation of an indulgent Mother challenges from a pious and obedient Son whereupon he took her into his own House her Husband Joseph being some time since dead and made her a principal part of his charge and care And certainly the Holy Jesus could not have given a more honourable testimony of his particular respect and kindness to S. John than to commit his own Mother whom of all earthly Relations he held most dear and valuable to his trust and care and to substitute him to supply that duty which he himself paid her while he was here below 3. AT the first news of our Lord's return from the dead he accompanied with Peter presently hasted to the Sepulchre Indeed there seems to have been a mutual intimacy between these two Apostles more than the rest 'T was to Peter that S. John gave the notice of Christ's appearing when he came to them at the Sea of Tiberias in the habit of a stranger and it was for John that Peter was so solicitously inquisitive to know what should become of him After Christ's Ascension we find these two going up to the Temple at the Hour of Prayer and miraculously healing the poor impotent Cripple both Preaching to the People and both apprehended together by the Priests and Sadducees and thrown into Prison and the next Day brought forth to plead their cause before the Sanhedrim These were the two chosen by the Apostles to send down to Samaria to settle and confirm the Plantations which Philip had made in those Parts where they confounded and baffled Simon the Magician and set him in an hopeful way to repentance To these S. Paul addressed himself as those that seemed to be Pillars among the rest who accordingly gave him the right hand of fellowship and confirmed his mission to the Gentiles 4. IN the division of Provinces which the Apostles made among themselves Asia fell to his share though he did not presently enter upon his charge otherwise we must needs have heard of him in the account which S. Luke gives of Paul's several Journies into and residence in those parts Probable therefore it is that he dwelt still in his own House at Jerusalem at least till the death of the Blessed Virgin and this is plainly asserted by Nicephorus from the account of those Historians that were before him whose death says Eusebius hapned Ann. Chr. XLVIII about Fifteen Years after our Lord's Ascension Some time probably Years after her death he took his Journey into Asia and industriously applied himself to the propagating Christianity Preaching where the Gospel had not yet taken place and confirming it where it was already planted Many Churches of note and eminency were of his foundation Smyrna Pergamus Thyatira Sardis Philadelphia Laodicea and others but his chief place of residence was at Ephesus where S. Paul had many Years before settled a Church and constituted Timothy Bishop of it Nor can we suppose that he confined his Ministry meerly to Asia Minor but that he Preached in other Parts of the East probably in Parthia his first Epistle being anciently intitled to them and the Jesuits in the relation of their success in those Parts assure us that the Bassorae a People of India constantly affirm from a Tradition received from their Ancestors that S. John Planted the Christian Faith there 5. HAVING spent many Years in this employment he was at length accused to Domitian who had begun a Persecution against the Christians as an eminent assertor of Atheism and impiety and a publick subverter of the Religion of the Empire By his command the Proconsul of Asia sent him bound to Rome where his treatment was what might be expected from so bloudy and barbarous a Prince he was cast into a Cauldron of boyling Oyl or rather Oyl set on Fire But that Divine Providence that secured the three Hebrew Captives in the flames of a burning Furnace brought this holy Man safe out of this one would have thought unavoidable destruction An instance of so signal preservation as had been enough to perswade a considering Man that there must be a Divinity in that Religion that had such mighty and solemn attestations But Miracles themselves will not convince him that 's fallen under an hard heart and an injudicious mind The cruel Emperor was not satisfied with this but presently orders him to be banished and transported into an Island This was accounted a kind of capital punishment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says Pachymer speaking of this very instance where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not to be understood as extending to life but loss of priviledge Therefore this punishment in the Roman Laws is called Capitis diminutio and it was the second sort of it because the Person thus banished was disfranchised and the City thereby lost an head