obscurities And indeed what a furious love of the Alcoran is it that causes a man to observe such things in it of which its author would not have us believe he ever thought and such as his interpreters reject and his followers detest and abominate For why are they so affected to the Law of Mahomet unless because it promises them all sorts of corporeal contentments And should any expound those things to them in a mystical way who doubts but that they would think his endeavor was to cause all the hope of their beatitude to vanish into smoke Moreover though for the Words and the Rime that book was written in an Arabick style good enough yet it is composed of parts so loose and incoherent amongst themselves that 't is a wonder how they that read it with so much admiration do not advert its impertinence For it is a hotchpot of several confused matters huddled together without any other connection then they have by chance and it is sufficiently apparent that it was built at several times and by divers hands and not followed according to one uniform and continued designe For he mingles therein the Histories before the Law with those after it those of the New Testament with the Wars of his own time and sometimes divides one into two or three pieces and contrarily sometimes ineptly molds two or three into one Prayers promises exhortations admonitions commandments and laws priviledges and histories descriptions of Paradise and Hell Philosophy and Divinity after his manner fables of times past and future the number of the Celestial Orbs and the death of a Cow are to be found jumbled together in one and the same Chapter And you would say sometimes that they are verily the ravings of a man in a fever or the enthusiasmes of a drunkard Vt nec pes nec caput uni Reddatur formae And if the order thereof be so perverted the matter is little better He saies that the Mind of man is a portion of the soul of God which he breath'd into him at his first creation and that under the shadow which the trees make they adore the Deity He swears by the Alcoran in one place and in another by his pen that that book was sent to him from Heaven That the Heavens would fall were it not for the Angels that pray for us That Jesus Christ had the soul of God That many deserted Christ because he was too eloquent And disputing against the Christians he proves that Jesus is not the Son of God and that God can have no Son in as much as he hath no need of any thing whatsoever He saies Men were created of shadow and Divels of flames of fire And as for the creation of the rest of the Universe he relates it in this manner God created the Earth in two days and fastned it to the mountains as it were by anchors and cables In the two next dayes he caused all sorts of herbs to spring up for the nutriment of animals After which the earth being thus framed began to emit exhalations and steams of which he formed the Heavens in two other days in which he placed the Stars and gave them principally in charge to chase away the Devils by the splendor of their light when they go to spy what is doing in Heaven Did he reason or rage when he writ all these excellent pieces of Divinity But then he interweaves the same here and there with I know not what putid fables He repeates a hundred and a hundred times so distrustful is he it will not be believ'd that God is the author of that rare book professes that all mankind together could not have made the least syllable of it He sprinkles the doctrine of the resurrection with shamefull and unprofitable fables Sometimes he goes about to discourse of matters treated on by the Writers of the New Testament and presently discovers that he understands nothing at all of them as where he makes a comparison of Christ with Adam Then in another place he trifles incongruously about the Table of the Lord and the Sacraments of the Gospel He boasts of having cemented the Moon together again which himself had cut in sunder He speaks of Predestination and the Providence of God as a Fatal Destiny and some say 't is by this means that he rendred his followers so adventurous in war because being perswaded that the decrees of that Destiny are inevitable they cast themselves without heed into the mouth of danger presuming they shall not dye in case it be not predestinated though their hearts were pierced with a hundred Javelins Lastly he contradicts himself at every turn But the thing for which he most frequently defends himself is his not doing of miracles and he will not allow anyone to require them from him though indeed he did all thing◠which no man ought to undertake unless he can prove his vocation by authentick miracles For he abolisht the constitutions which himself acknowledged were authoris'd by God as those of the Law and the Gospel He introduc'd a new form of Religion and invaded the dignity of soveraign Magistrates levying armes against Princes though he was but a private person giving liberty to slaves in spight of their masters with an absolute authority and maikng invasions and wars the most violent and bloody that ever were seen in the world But ought not he to have authoris'd himself by miracles to shew the right he had to do all this Who ever attempted any of those things as Moses or Elias or Christ or his Apostles but at sometime or other gave testimony of their celestial calling by miracles Certainly when I consider on the one side the absurdity and grosseness of almost every thing he saies I cannot but think he had great need of miracles to perswade the same to people of understanding and I should reckon it a miracle if any honest man could believe him And on the other side when I consider the nature of his doctrine and those to whom he perswaded it I conceive it no great miracle to have allur'd and drawn carnal minds by the gaudy baits of a carnal Paradise In a word it needs not to be much versed in that work to observe that it is a medly of all impertinent and bad things amongst which there is sometimes found some little good as there is in the Drugs of Egypt 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But what good there is there is overwhelmed in an abysse of falsities impieties fables and impertinences and it is not difficult to shew from what fountains he deriv'd it all The good doctrines and sentences which are sometimes met with by the way are taken from the Old and New Testament The hatred which be perpetually testifies against the doctrine of the Trinity and the Deity of Christ he receiv'd by contagion from the Arians and other hereticks that were in high repute in his time That vile pollution of Marriage by the licentious multiplicity
of wives and concubines came from the Schole of the Nicolaitans The rare carnal Paradise was the invention of Cerinâ—hus and the ancient Chiliasts and that other foist That Christ did not suffer really but onely some Fantasme in his place was forged by the Cerdonians and others of that stamp The greatest part of his Fables are borrowed from the Jews and some Apocryphal Authors that were current like false money in those times and his gross follies wherewith he hath larded and strewed it throughout came from his own ignorance and for that having himself no knowledge at all neither of the Old nor New Testament nor of the writings of the Jews nor profane histories nor the Poets he trusted to the memory of a lewd Monk and some false Christians or false Jews who never understood very much of them whence all that he relates out of them is delivered rashly and at random But on the other side though there were nothing but truth in the whole Alcoran nothing but what were rational in it self and consentaneous to the Holy Scriptures both for histories and doctrines yet the author of it ought nevertheless to be held for no other then an Impostor for that he dares to vaunt himself for a great Prophet For such a Prophet as he pretends to be ought not onely to declare things agreeing with those that were before him but either to reveal doctrines unknown till then or to expound those which were delivered enigmatically and to unveil them out of their obscurities and withall to make faith of his calling either by miracles or prophesies of things to come ratified by the events the prediction of which does not import the vivacity of humane wit by penetrating by conjectures into some things undiscern'd by vulgar eyes but the wisdom of God to whom the bottom of the most impenetrable secrets is conspicuous Otherwise all Divines that ever writ concerning Religion either Jewish or Christian congruously to the books of the Old and New Testament should be either Prophets or Apostles Besides were there no errors in the Alcoran yet how many books have we that treat the best things contained therein in a manner incomparably more excellent Wherefore he ought to be accounted a Deceiver and the father of Deceivers who being so ignorant so impertinent so absurd so discordant from truth so fabulous and pollute he yet glories that he is the greatest of all the Prophets by whose ministry God revealed himself to men Now if Mahomet himself was so gross and mad a fool his principal Doctors and interpreters had yet more need of manacles and chaines then he which I shall shew onely by the sample of two books which they have in esteem In one of which is described the journey of Mahomet into Paradise by the conduct of the Angel Gabriel He entred say they into the first heaven being mounted upon Alborach an animal something bigger then an Asse and having a humane face where he observ'd that that first sphere was of fine silver and so thick as would require the space of five hundred years to be travell'd over by a foot-man There they found an Angel so high as it would be a thousand years journey from his head to his foot with seventy thousand other Angels each of which had seventy thousand heads every head seventy thousand hornes every horn seventy thousand knots and the distance of fourty years journey between one knot and another Also every head had seventy thousand faces in every of which there were seventy thousand mouths in every mouth seventy thousand tongues and every tongue spoke a thousand languages in which they praised God seventy thousand times a day you may imagine what a rare melodious noise they made In the second heaven which is made all of burnished gold they found a great multitude of Angels greater then the former amongst whom there was one whose se et touch'd the earth and his head the eighth Heaven 'T is strange no body ever saw him at least in one of the hemispheres But all these were but pygmies in comparison of another whom they met in the third Heaven who was so prodigiously great that if he should hold all the world in the palm of his hand he could nevertheless shut it Yet betwixt him and those which were in the fourth heaven it is hard to say whether there were any proportion unless some new Geometry be f und out to express it For every one of them had seventy pair of wings in each of which were seventy thousand pinions and every pinion was seventy thousand cubits long But as for him that they saw in the fifth sphere the Poets with their Briareus never understood any thing of him for what was he with his hundred armes to the Angel that opened the gate to them who had seven thousand arms at the end of each of which he moved seventy thousand hands In the other spheres they scarce found Angels of so enormous a stature but in the eighth sphere they beheld I cannot tell what huge Gyant so dreadful that he could have swollowed the Globe of the Earth Sea as easily as a little Pill Is the true History of Lucian and the Chronicles of Garagantua to be compared to this In the other Book is recited the discourse between a Musulman and a Jew who puts questions to him about the principal points of his doctrine and here it is that the spirit of error and lying displayes its full sails He saies God created a large Carton or Paper-volume and a pen of so rare a shape that it was five hundred days journey in length and four and twenty in breadth and that with this pen which ha's four and twenty points he writes continually in that Paper all that ever was is or shall be in the world That the light of the Sun and the Moon were equal in the beginning so that the day could not be well distinguish'd from the night but the Angel Gabriel as he flew by struck the Moon with the end of his wing and made it loose half its light Mention is made there of an Ox of so immense a greatness that between each of his horns whereof he hath fourty there is the distance of a thousand years journey And yet he says this Ox is under the Earth which the Hollanders sail round about in less then a year And least the Sea should complain of being destitute of Mahometical Monsters he assignes a fish to it whose head is in the East and tail in the West which carries on his back the whole earth seas and mountains a heavy load indeed but the air and darkness which he casts into his burden do not much increase his weight He makes Rats to have been produc'd in the Ark of the sneesing of a Hog and Cats of the sneesing of a Lyon perhaps by reason of the resemblance of their snout and muzzle And he saies that Seraphiel whosoever he be is not worth much enquiry
till he was enter'd into the Sanctuary of the Lord of Hosts and had consider'd the End that is reserved for such people And Claudian likewise declared his dissatisfaction till afterwards Abstulit hunc tandem Ruffini poena tumultum Absolvitque Deos. But seeing Death arrives equal to all and that that of the Wicked as the Prophet saith is very frequently without regrets and although it should be accompanied with some thing particularly terrible or painful yet that punishment do's not by much equal the atrocity of the crimes which they have committed if there be not some other chastisement reserved for the Wicked to come and some other recompense prepared for good men the Conduct of the Deity does not remain fully enough justified therein This consideration ought to suffice rational men to evince that our Souls subsist after our Bodies but we have other evidences besides of such firmeness that they could never be defaced by Barbarism it self For he that pleases to consider never so little attentively the capacity our Understandings have to comprehend so many and so different things their agitations so suddain as to fly from East to West and from North to South in a moment their inconceiveable swiftness in climing up in an instant even to the highest Heavens there contemplating their motions and the Earth which they environ as a point the power which they have to remember past things to connect them with the present and thence to frame conjectures of the future which are sometimes so certain that they seem to be Prophecies to embrace when they please in one gross all the mass of the Universe and also when they please to single out of it the most minute parts only the faculty which they employ to discover the beginning of the World and its annihilation to keep a register of times past not by Ages and years onely but by Moneths and Weeks and Days and Hours and Minutes to almost an infinite division the exactness they attain to in calculating so perfectly the courses of the Heavens that they divine and point out the Eclipses even for several Ages to come and their dexterous vivacity in inventing so many excellent Arts and industrious Mysteries in polishing illustrating and piercing into so many occult Sciences and difficult and intricate questions what can be said upon consideration of all these perfections but that there is something in us of greater excellence then our Bodies yea a spirit issued from the breath of God himself And herein I dare appeal to the testimony of the Epicureans themselves They do not stick to publish that their Philosopher is worthy of immortality and even to be acknowledged for a God in respect of his rare inventions in Philosophy although the rest hold him for a person absolutely ignorant of the things which he undertook to meddle with and impertinent in those which he treated of and imagined he understood Do they think then that that Divine personage as they call him who first dared to display the mighty power of his ardent spirit to break and wrest open the gates of Nature to dive into secrets formerly unknown to pass beyond the flaming Walls of the World and post over that immense space of things with his understanding to bring from thence the victorious knowledge of the Causes of the universe that he I say had no other Soul but a little Breath of Air that is dissipated in dying and I know not what kind of vital heat which is extinguished with this corporeal Mass And were it not a strange disorder in the Nature of things that Epicurus should have merited the immortality of the Gods and nevertheless could not arrive to the third part of the Age of a Raven For what advantage is it to him now while he is mingled with the dust of so many men dead before and after him that others speak of his singular devices in Philosophy And if the cause of his Life differ'd in nothing from that of a Horse whence came those faculties for which they pretend men are obliged to consecrate Temples and Statues to him Truely as an immortal faculty is requisite to serve and honor the Deity so for certain in case he had had no other principle of his Life but a pitiful mortal puffe of Air he would not have dared so audaciously to encounter the sentiments of other men and taught Irreligion with so mad an impudence as could not be repress'd by any terrors or respects whatsoever Quem nec fuma Deum nec fulmina nec minitanti Murmure compressit coelum sed eo magis acrem Virtutem inritat animi confringere ut arcta Naturae primus portarum claustra cupiret For there needs almost an equal strength of wit to do so well and so ill Moreover if our Souls be corruptible they result undoubtedly from the temperature of the Elements in our Bodies and by that means are howsoever subtle they be corporeal themselves If so how can they have any conception of spiritual substances which are absolutely separated from matter For there is required some proportion berween the thing understood and that which understands for which reason Philosophers affirm that by means of the conception of things the Understanding becomes in a manner of the same nature with them How then if we be nothing but Bodies do we comprehend that there are things which are not such and how do we enter into discourse of the Deity it self Must not he be a very Brute that imagines that the Facultie whereby we comprehend that there is a Deity and dispute of a spiritual and eternal Essence and its Properties differs not but in a degree of heat and refining of our humors from the Faculties of Beasts Aristotle taught that an Understanding was either an act of the Fancy or at least was not performed without the intervention of those Images which are form'd in the Fancy upon occasion of objects that strike our Senses And like a cautious person as he was made use of that Dis-junction to the end he might not shake the doctrine of the immateriality of the Intellect of which in truth he seems sometimes to speak dubiously but in other places renders such advantageous testimonies thereunto that there appears no ground of doubting but that he had very rational sentiments concerning it Pompanatius as great a Peritatetick as he is hath liked better to determine that the act of Understanding is nothing but the formation of such Images What picture then do's the Fancy delineate in it self whereby to represent the Deity and principally in them who are so clearly perswaded of the spirituality of his Nature that if it ever happens to them to conceive any Idea of him according to the similitude of Bodies they presently condemn their conceptions and indeavor as much as possible to abstract their Mjnds and raise them above all corporeal Beings to the end they may have no other thoughts thereof but such as are purely intellectual It is
allow as much strictness in reference to the service of God as to the Duties which they render to men That is they should readily conform themselves to such ceremonies as are consentaneous to right reason or at least not manifestly dissonant and repugnant to it but where they violate the Laws of Nature so rudely it is not free for any one whatsoever to condescend to them But the matter is something further considerable For it also seems not to be more natural to men to conspire together uniformly in matter of Religion then it is natural to them to think that it is the part of God to found and give the model of such a Society All Nations have referred the invention of things to the Deity which although they concern not God at all yet seem hard and admirable so as to esteem the first authors of them not onely inspired by God but worthy to be Gods themselves The Art of waging War those of Physick and Poetry and even of Embroidery had their inventors and patrons amongst the Gods And as for things necessary to Life the tilling of the Earth for the advantage of Corn and the means of pruning the superfluities of vines to procure wine from them were not found by men without the same help It is true that if onely the meaner and ignorant sort of people had been imbued with this belief it might have been said that their ignorance occasion'd the admiration which they had of all excellent inventions because perceiving that they surpass'd the power of their own wits and measuring others by themselves they might have imagin'd that men could not have invented them of themselves And hence it also came to pass that the Epicureans have within a small degree placed their Master amongst the Gods because being for the most part but little instructed in commendable Sciences when they beheld him far above them they conceited that he had somewhat of Divinity in him although without regard to the truth or falsity of his sentiments he seems to have been but meanly qualified with gifts of the mind or acquisitions of knowledge But whereas we observe the wise and learned to have likewise held that opinion that the first Inventors were illuminated by some ray of Divinity it must be confessed that it is a natural propensity in all men and I know not what kind of constraint by the evidence of truth Socrates being condemned to dy professeth that it was God that raised him up to teach Philosophy and to reform the manners of his fellow Citizens by his precepts and pronounces resolutely that though they should open the Prison doors to him with injunction never to Philosophise more he would not go forth but would rather obey God then men And Pythagoras when he had found out an excellent demonstration in Geometry went and sacrific'd a hundred Oxen for what reason saving that he acknowledg'd that God had favour'd him with his assistance therein And truely they had reason on their side I would not so much derogate from the dignity of the humane Mind as to take from it all power of inventing excellent things and of profound disquisition But there appeared such a Providence of God in what I have alledged that he that bears not a great measure of obstinacy in his breast will suffer himself to be perswaded that God presided therein Sometimes one Nation bears away the glory of Sciences and Arts sometimes another and divers Ages give birth to divers Inventions Egypt of old for skill in Arts Greece after had the fame Rome glory'd in their height a while Now Paris bears the Name Archimedes performed such wonders in the Mechanicks as none in the world ever effected since And of late days the singular Inventions of Typography and that terrifying one of Artillery declare that God did not exhaust all his treasures in the Ages of old but reserves some or other particularity to every Generation It is true when things are once found out there 's no body almost but observes a great obviousness and facility in their discovery which yet is not so much even in such things as are now 〈◊〉 days accounted the most easie but that thâ— would never have come into any man's thougâ— without the influence of Heaven or if they had yet the atchievment and execution of the design would have seem'd impossible without assistance from thence Who observes not such an orderly concatenation in the Propositions of Euclide one with another that they correspond together and propagate in a continual series with infallible truth and that consequently the power of humane wit may seem capable to have found out such a contexture of it self since the onely thing considerable is to perceive what follows indubitably from certain principles by the means of ratiocination And nevertheless I cannot perswade my self upon estimate of the great difficulty there was in the first discovery of those things and of the admirable vivacity of imagination and vigor of judgement requisite to the concinnation of their first compages that that Person could possibly have drawn so many subtle and solid consequences from the first Principles laid down by him and erect so firm a structure of a noble Science upon the same without some especial favor of the Deity who was pleas'd to provide by such means for the advantage of humane affairs and for the adorning of our Minds with the Understanding of Sciences What a marvellous thing was it to find out the Polar inclination of the Loadstone and to make that discovery the foundation of the great Art of Navigation by help of which these latter Ages have discover'd so many unknown Lands and brought so many eminent advantages to our times above those of â—ld But moreover Homer who perhaps was the most clear sighted among the Pagans notwithstanding his decryed blindness not onely ascribes to God the invention of abstruse matters but referrs even our ordinary cogitations to him in these verses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Talis nempe mens est terram-incolentium hominum Qualem in dies indit pater hominumque Deumque And his Poem is throughout beset with advertisments directed to men from the Gods as so many pourtraicts of the Divine Providence sutably as the obscurity of the times and the ignorance of the true God could permit him And hereunto likewise all intelligent men agree especially the Poets who seem to have been the Divines of the Pagans and the Priests of their Mysteries Now whereas they believ'd that humane Arts and Sciences could not be invented without God what would they have said of the Sciences of knowing and serving God himself But although there may have been some dissonance of opinion among the Ancients concerning this Production or Birth of things yet the foundation of these two kinds of Societies Civil and Religious ha's been consider'd by them as a thing altogether divine Whence it is that there never was any celebrated Legislator but
of God If there be not why then are arguments drawn from thence against the Epicureans to prove providence to them and to refute their opinions concerning the nature of God If there be why cannot a man make use of them to guide him at least in some measure to the knowledge of those secrets God forbid that we should so much forget our selves as to forget how clearly God ha's revealed himself in the World The manifestation which he hath made therein of his Perfections is one thing and the faculty which we naturally have to understand them an other Reason indeed but that which is right and in its integrity not such as we now possess might have thence collected the means of serving God in a due manner But as it is deprav'd blind and maim'd in its powers and apprehensions it is utterly incapable of discerning the truth therein or forming certain rules of piety from thence There is light enough in the Sun to make it be seen but it is by those who have eyes to these who never had any or have lost them it is as dark as the Earth on which they tread In like manner an infinite number of bright and excellent truths are held forth in the World and its Government to him that ha's the eye of his Understanding sufficiently clear and serene But the Eye of the Understanding which we call Reason in the conditition we injoy it at present is so distemper'd clouded and perturb'd that it beholds the truths which are there notwithstanding all their clearness but very obscurely and though they are most certain and stedfast in themselves yet when it contemplates them it perceives them onely as if they were inconstant and wavering Nor are men in this Age more free from these natural impediments then they were two thousand years ago and consequently can be no better assured of their knowledge For to say that 't is a Science which may aswell have been improved as others they which liv'd since having taken from the Opinions of the Ancients what was pure and rejected the unsound and bad is a thing of no moment to our discourse because it is untrue Perhaps Aristotle built his Philosophy up with the opinions of Elder Philosophers by refining them from that which he found faulty and serving himself with the truths before discover'd by them aswell to employ the same as materials to his structure as to find out others which were yet abstruse aad unknown And indeed it hath been observed that Hippocrates furnish'd him with the grounds of his Physiology so that he had no more to do but to build upon them and some have moreover believ'd that in divers places of his Writings and particularly in his Epistles he supplyed him with many singular advantages to the composing of his Ethicks And although he refutes Plato in several of his Opinions yet it is certain that he took many excellent instructions both from the discourses which he heard him make in his Academy and from the reading of his Works But I pray observe how this came to pass Aristotle was indued with an understanding capable to discern distinctly enough in matters of Philosophy the truths which his predecessors had brought to light and distinguish the same from falsities he was able to cull out and to place some apart from others and so to compose out of his own inventions and those of others a Body of Science better contriv'd then any had been before and whose parts were more correspondent amongst themselves But here the Question is concerning truths which the mind of man in its present estate is not capable to perceive clearly so that if he were put to make his choice of those different Opinions it would betide him that instead of hapning right he would rather choose the worst and thus it hath fallen out to all them which took imperfect humane reason for their guide therein If this reason be not satisfactory to my Adversaries let them pay themselves with experience Why did not Cicero garble all those different Opinions of Philosophers touching the Nature of the Gods to frame a good one if possible and leave posterity a rational doctrine in so important a matter But in stead of doing so the consciousness of his weakness makes him content himself with reciting them and after all his stories he knows as little of it as he did at first as if they had been nothing but clouds and darkness cast before his eyes Or why do not they show us the writings of some Philosopher either ancient or modern who being no otherwise assisted then by the meer light Reason ha's had more sound and sober opinions concerning it then his predecessors On the other side it will be found that some Philosophers who heretofore impugned Christian Religion and the Books of the Old and New Testament and who ought to have purifi'd that doctrine from the old absurdities it abounds with to the end their adversaries might have less advantage against it have been guilty of as many impertinences as they of preceding times and afforded as much cause to be insulted over in regard of the stupidity and ridiculousness of their conceits The unhappiness is that being naturally blind in these things we nevertheless conceive we see clearly and are so possess'd with a good opinion of our selves that we will not admit any one to teach us or if we have been taught by some bodyelse we are so ungrateful that we will not acknowledge it but reproach and execrate those persons from whom we have received all the purest of our knowledge For 't is the same case with these people and the Epicureans who having been enlightned by Christian Religion in many truths in the ignorance or incertitude of which they had otherwise eternally stagger'd or fluctuated they arrogate the glory of having of themselves drawn them out of the bottom of Democritus's Well or establish'd the belief of the same amongst men by the strength of their reason For why are they not say they as capable to invent them as they are to apprehend and receive them since they are revealed A wonderful Question truly and worthy of such subtle persons As if there were not a capacity in children of a dozen years old to apprehend the most difficult Geometrical Demonstrations when they are taught the same by some skillful Master who notwithstanding could never of themselves have invented the least Theorem in that Science Or as if we did not see them every day learn the Arabick Tongue readily by help of a knowing Instructor although they were as well able to pull the Stars out of Heaven as we say as to have disentangled the confusion of that Language and reduc'd it into Grammatical Rules It is indeed by the same faculty of Understanding that discover'd truths are comprehended and those found out which are unknown but there is required a far greater strength and vivacity of Intellect to make new discoveries then to comprehend
side Presumption because not sufficiently acknowledging how much they ought to the Deity they imagin'd that their good works their offerings and the exercise of that shadow of Virtue which they pursued might countervale the offenses they committed so that if they were balanc'd together there might be hope not onely to avoid punishment but moreover to obtain recompense Upon which ground it was that Socrates being near his end and discoursing of the immortality of the Soul speaks largely of his hope in case the Soul be not extinguisht with the body to go and live with Hercules and Palamedes and the other persons of high account But as to asking God pardon of the offenses he had committed he makes no mention at all of it because though he spoke always dissemblingly of himself he had in the bottom of his Soul a great opinion of his own Virtue and made no great reckoning of his vices from which notwithstanding he was no more exempt then others And had his life been of such purity that the eyes of men could not discern a blot in it although some have written infamous matters of him yet when the account is to be made up with God there needs an other perfection of Virtue then that of his to satisfie so exact a justice But yet further Oftentimes these two Vices of Profaness and Presumption have met together in the same subject and lull'd men with vain hopes into absolute supinity Whence the excess of Fear hath been retrenched which would otherwise have at last turn'd into despair and consequently not only dissipated all communion in Religion but likewise ruined all humane Society For Fear restraining man on the one side from absolute contemning the Deity by profaness on the other side profaness and presumption hinder'd it from precipitating men into that furious despaire which would have overthrown all and caus'd more horrible agitations in the mind of man then ever the most outragious Bacchides were sensible of So that by the mixture vicissitude variation of these divers humors ha's Religion been maintained in the World But it is easie to judge how sincere that devotion was which was bred of Fear a passion that is naturally terminated in hatred Self-presumption and Misapprehension of the justice of God Whereas the certain knowledge of the remission of Sins of which the especial revelation from Heaven can onely give us assured hope is a marveillous powerful attractive to piety out of gratitude towards so inestimable a goodness But if the Ancients both Poets and Philosophers were so much at a loss concerning the preceding particulars that they extremely needed some other light then that of nature to direct them to a firm knowledge of them they have been much more uncertain in the point of the Resurrection of the dead of which they have been so far from determining any thing that scarce so much as a slight shadow of it ha's been discerned by some few in so many Ages The Stoicks indeed were of opinion that there would come a day that should turn the Universe into flames which should be incontinently follow'd with a restauration of all things into their ancient estate And others thought that after a certain revolution of time the Stars being returned precisely to the point in which they were when all things began to be all should be renewed every thing returning again in its order time and nature And one Theopompus according to the relation of Diog. Laertius affirmed that by the doctrine of the Magi who were Philosophers amongst the Caldeans all men must revive again one day and become immortal That Passage of Phocylides an ancient Poet and Philosopher is singularly excellent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Non honestum est hominis compagem resolvere Et mox e terra speramus in lucem prodituras Reliquias defunctorum postea vero dii erunt And I deny not but this is sufficient to shew those that accuse the Christian Religion of teaching absurd and impossible things that those famous persons amongst the Pagans would not have accounted them such if they had understood them since having onely a dubious and obscure tradition of this transmitted from the hands of their ancestors yet they publisht and maintain'd it with some confidence For if they attribute that power to the Stars how would they have impaired the credit of Religion which refers the Resurrection to the power of him that made the Stars themselves But notwithstanding these glimpses of light have been so rare and so suddenly disappear'd that scarce any perceived them not even they from whose mind and hand they proceeded for I do not conceive Phocylides distinctly understood himself Besides that there was a great deal of extravagancy in their opinion For did Seneca think that after that great combustion he should come again into the world and write anew to his friend Lucilius and once more be under the Tyranny of that monster Nero Or Lucan that Câ—sar and Pompey should act over their wars again and himself compose the Pharsalia again in verse After which first there must also be another burning of the world and another Palingenesie or renovation of things And so to all eternity the world should after certain revolutions be consumed by fire and like the Phaenix arise again out of its own ashes But if this must be done perpetually for the future I see not why it should not have been done from all eternity hertofore so that there have been already infinite worlds and infinite more are yet to come which beside the contradictions that a knowing Philosopher finds in so many infinite things existing actually and so successively some after others is strangely extravagant and absurd to be conceiv'd Moreover what piety is that which this opinion begat in the minds of them that held it that thought it thus determined by an inevitable necessity of Destiny For according to them God shall have no hand in the matter but the same destiny that shall carry all things to their period when they are consumed by that universal conflagration shall likewise give new being to all things Now there is no obligation to return thanks to God nor to acknowledge his goodness for being restored into being by the might of destiny over which God hath no power Nevertheless men are so wedded to their own opinions howsoever extravagant that there being Stoicks at Athens at the time of Saint Paul's preaching there for as for the Epicureans it was no wonder if they called him a Babler and the Stoicks being a Sect to whom the doctrine of the resurrection and universal judgement ought to be agreeable as bringing much light to their own Tenets yet there were few or none that receiv'd it Some saith the Historian derided it and others desired more satisfactory information of the thing And yet of how great importance is it to true piety to be fully assured of this truth For otherwise
familiarity with the language in which they writ to observe the same attentively For I am confident whatever some say there is not to be found in any Author Greek or Latin so magnificent and pompous an eloquence And if they understand them not in their natural language let them read them considerately in some version performed with care and diligence especially in those which are commonly call'd Living Tongues For though the Greek and Latine languages are in their own authors more rich and copious yet those which live if well manag'd are more plyable to these Translations and take off better the impression and graces of the language of the Prophets and this because they are capable of new words and phrases It will without question appear that all the reproaches profane men cast upon the Holy Books and disparagements of its style and eloquence are frivolous If therefore these Books teach the doctrine of the Trinity as we have shewn they do and are delivered to us by divine Inspiration as is clearer then the Noon-Sun what a folly would it be to go about to examine by reason the mysteries of the Divine Wisdom which it self ha's revealed Now concerning the correspondence these verities have with others unquestionable in the Doctrine which holds them forth it may seem sufficiently declar'd in the preceding discourse Man is fallen into a depth of misery and so is become an object of pity Now in whom can he excite it unless in him that is the Father of Mercy But it was by his sin and so he is an object of justice And from whom is he to expect punishment but from the supreme Judge of the World Will this Mercy display it self in pardon without punishing No that would be to the prejudice of justice Will this justice be executed upon man himself Nor so this would be to exclude all Mercy in which the Almighty takes delight What remains therefore but for God to substitute a pledge in the room of men Now it is requisite that this substitute suffer death and by consequence that he be man And it is requisite that his passion be of an infinite value and for this he must be God for no other is capable of making such a satisfaction And if he who is God be stricken by the hand of God by way of punishment do's it not necessarily follow that there are two distinct persons in God This redemption is unprofitable if it be not efficaciously applyed to man Who shall apply it to him Not himself A blind man might as well open his own eyes or a Carcase raise it self out of the grave And since this work of our salvation is common both to the Father and the Son what is more consentaneous then for them to consummate and apply it by a Virtue which is common to them both Now if it be common to both it is distinct from both How therefore is there not a Third This is that which men chiefly stumble at in the Christian Religion In all other things it is so consistent with reason that its greatest enemies dare not gain-say it In this indeed it is in no wise incongruous with reason provided it be attended to in a due maner we let not loose the bridle to its presumptuous curiosity These principles are likewise common to both the parties into which we have distinguisht all those which profess the Christian Name in Europe at this day If there be some things embrac'd by either which seem absurd to reason or contrary to piety yet it behoveth not forthwith to accuse Christian Religion for it It is meet to try the same by those Books which both equally own and explore them by the common Principles upon which their Religion is built For if they be conformable thereunto they will be found in no wise repugnant to right reason if not they must be held for humane inventions and Religion discharged of the blame CHAP. IX That Jesus is the Messias promised by the Old Testament Also Of the Divinity of the New WHereas we have evinc'd in the preceeding Discourse that the Christian Religion far surpasses in excellence of Doctrine that which the Jews of old profess'd how divine soever it was and consequently that it was substituted in its place it is now sufficiently clear since Jesus is the sole author of it and profess'd himself to be the Messias promised by the Prophets that he is really the person For how could an Impostor have been the interpreter and revealer of so celestial a Doctrine And this is chiefly the means by which he verily ought to be judg'd For 't is a man's Doctrine which manifests what he is Nevertheless our design would not be complete unless we also observ'd here briefly because others have most diligently and amply acquitted themselves in this matter the principal circumstances of his birth his Life and his Death For there ha's not been the least defect therein in relation to all that was heretofore either required or presignified by the Prophets Malachi had writ in these express terms chap. 4. Behold I will send you Eliah the Prophet before the comming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children and the heart of the children to their Fathers From this place the Jews still expect the comming of Elias But what appearance is there that Elias himself should be fetcht back from Heaven to converse again here below on Earth That after so long an enjoyment of the felicities above he should return once more into the miseries of life Certainly as it was necessary for him at his reception into Heaven to be devested of the terrestrial qualities of his body and clothed with sutable ones to the place of his new abode so if he should redescende amongst us it would be requisite for him to resume qualities agreeable with a terrene condition and to despoil himself of his celestial glories Now he might well pass from worse to better from an earthly to a heavenly life but to return from better to worse would be a mutation of too much disadvantage Elias therefore was to come just as David was to come for the Prophets promised him also Not that the Son of Jesse and father of Solomon ought to arise from among the dead to repossess the Kingdom of Israel but the Messias of whom David was a type ought to be the conducter and Chieftain of spiritual armies and passing through many dangers and fights obtain peace to his people by his glorious victories Thus ought one to be born who being cloath'd with the spirit of Elias and leading the same manner of life might prepare the hearts of men to receive the Messias by preaching the doctrine of repentance with an extraordinary authority gravity And such was John the Baptist as our Evangelists describe him to us Isaiah had said in the seventh Chapter of his Prophecies Behold a Virgin shall conceive and